College makes it so that you live in a bubble sometimes. It’s not a bad thing to focus on yourself, to use your time in effort not only to better yourself but to heal and move forward as an adult and functional human being. Being in Hawai‘i is sometimes even more isolating.

Sometimes that’s great, all the drama, all the negativity of my past and my High School Years is unreachable here. I can create a whole new self and heal, fix my wounds and focus on myself and new relationships. Being close with my family, sometimes it’s especially hard to be so far away, but it happens and time goes by as it does every day.

Sometimes, this bubble of isolation moves into the realm of ignorance, and with it brings a lot of guilt. Aleppo is my example, the very definition of a war-torn city where the civilians are used as pawns in a power war—and no one seems to want to help. Sure, articles are shared, opinions are formed, and because of the political delicacy of the Middle East, it seems that only three articles a day are published on BBC, even though this is one of the largest humanitarian crises of my generation. Despite the horrific circumstances of Aleppo, no one really seems to know. I was lucky to take a class on Peace and Conflict Education and was able to analyze in-depth the Syria situation, but many others are not so lucky. Many others don’t even know where Aleppo is. This is my frustration, this disconnect, this true isolation occasionally. And it’s not because I’m the only one that cares, that is very and grossly untrue, everyone does. This frustration is not an open letter to the people, but it is an open letter to the bubble, the little isolated island I have both figuratively and physically moved to, so separated from the world. There is so much I do not know, and when I know it because I am so far, so hidden in my own world, it does not strike as much as it should. That is what frustrates me.

Aleppo is only one of many examples, the most striking maybe. I am not the only one that notices it, either; I have had conversations with other students from other universities that all have noticed the same thing. It’s not that we’re bad people, it’s just that University is a lot more complicated than is possible to anticipate.