Saturday, December 25, 2010

Empath or.....not?

A couple life encounters lately have increased my curiosity about empathy. Particularly, how it applies to me and if do or don't consider myself an empath. It should probably be noted that I've gone into this with the assumption that I don't consider myself an empath. I've heard my boyfriend talk about, and seen, how he gets "caught up" in other's emotions. When someone feels something, he very literally feels it too. When I'm down, he feels down. When I'm happy, his emotional tone adjusts to reflect that.

It's not something I relate to. The experience of feeling "inside someone else's head" or feeling that deep and intense resonance to how their feeling is a very, very exceptional (in both senses; rare and amazing) experience for me. If anything, I frequently feel emotionally discordant with what's going on around me. When a crowd is going wild, I don't find myself getting inadvertently swept up in it. When someone is sitting in front of me crying, I (usually) don't start crying too.

That said, I feel it's also important to note that I consider myself a very relatable, very sympathetic person. In many ways, I've made my life a study of people. I've recently come to realize more fully how intentionally I position myself socially to be on the edges, or even outside, of groups so that I can observe better (that also partially stems from being highly uncomfortable with attention). I'm very observant and highly analytical. In (almost, let's not be too general) any conversation I'm paying constant and detailed attention to the flow and energy, how people are interacting, watching their reactions (and I seem to derive more amusement out of picking up on quirks or funny reactions than most people), and getting a sense for the dynamic and balance of the conversation. But that doesn't mean I am literally feeling the emotions around me.

Further, I seem to find myself frequently playing the role of confidant. I am good conveying to people that I understand, that I relate, and giving sensible and trustworthy advice (not the best, but better than many). I consider it to be a nod to my ability to make people feel safe and comfortable around me; personable is a word I've frequently heard people describe me as. It probably also has something to do with, despite having an admittedly "sheltered" background, I've kind of been a few places in life. I've been through a pretty broad range of things and been around a lot of different types of people in several places and situations.

So given my ability to relate, but not feel; sympathize, but not empathize, does that entirely mean I'm not an empath? I think it comes down to how you define a few things. Unfortunately, it also depends a lot of how I see myself in the context of others, which is difficult to peg down because it's a vision jaded with the bias of my self-perception and the fact that I am many different sides of myself around many different people.

I little poking around online and it does seem that there is an accepted distinction between emotional intelligence and empathy. Given the points I made earlier, I do consider myself to be a person who is fairly (my ego would say highly) emotionally intelligent. But my ability to relate to and pin point and act intelligently in accordance with others emotions often comes only very deliberately. During the course of an intense discussion, I find myself stepping back and thinking myself through what I'm hearing. "Ok, they say this makes them feel like this.....that must FEEL like ______ (pause to let the applied emotion set it), hm, ok that might because of this other thing they told me, and probably also means they're sensitive/averse to/effected by this other thing......" and so on. Very conscious, very deliberate. But also, usually, not too far off.

So this seems to become a question of the role intent plays in empathy. Many seem to describe it as natural, organic (even genetic), something that people inherently possess, and seems to be often also bring up allusions to psychic powers of "sensing" a person's true and hidden emotions. It seems to be considered an innate force.

Doesn't sound like me.

Yet when it comes to nature and feeling my surroundings, I seem to fit the empathy label better. I'm highly environmentally sensitive. I can "feel" a room, and be effected by its atmosphere and vibe very strongly. Consequently, when I find a space I like, I tend to LOVE it (and vice versa). I personally think this also coincides with loving being outside and a part of nature. But I've never really connected this to my ability to communicate with and understand people.

So am I an empath? Probably not. Is that a bad thing? Not really; it doesn't mean that I don't care about people, or that I'm not a good leader, or not creative, or not a good listener. Yet, my understanding is that empathy carries with it socially positive connotations. Those that are sensitive and able to feel with others are perceived as caring and lots of other good stuff.

Regardless, I'm happy with myself, however I am. I do realize that I tend to get blocked by my own emotions, but my ability to step back and logic out how other people are feeling has its benefits. I don't lose control of how I'm feeling in the presence of other emotions. And I'm able to remain sensible in otherwise highly emotional situations (unless the situation directly revolves around me, in which case all hope of sensibility is almost lost). And I'm able to provide perspective to those that are stuck in a particular emotional place that they don't want to be. I can adjust my focus to where they're act while still maintaining my internal emotional spectrum and thus help guide them and show them other ways to see and feel things.

Pros and cons, pros and cons....

Friday, December 24, 2010

Missing India - A recipe!

I was fortunate enough to get a few recipes of my favorite dishes from my host mom in Rajasthan, India this summer.

Even during the monsoon season, rain is rare in central Rajasthan; it rained for a few hours a couple days the entire time I was there, and the relief of seeing it brought child like elation from adults. Going up on the rooftop while it was raining, and you'd see the heads of all the neighbors on their rooftops also taking rain baths.

Seemingly everything has a meaning and a tradition there, and rain is no exception to this. It didn't take me long to immediately start looking forward to eating dal dhokali as soon as I saw rain. It was easily one of my top 5 favorites and I miss it!! So I thought I'd share the recipe :)


Ingredients
(for dal)
-1/2 cup mung dal (kidney beans)
-1/2 tsp red chili, tumeric, coriander
-salt to taste
-pinch asafoetida
-1/4 tsp cumin seeds
4 cups water
(for dhokali)
-1 cup wheat flour (unbleached)
-1/2 tsp red chili
-¼ tsp tumeric powder
-¼ tsp cumin seeds
-salt to taste
-2 tsp oil/ghee

Method
Wash and soak dal for 15-20 minutes and drain excess water. Put 3 cups of water, salt, tumeric powder into dal and leave on gas (simmer) for 5-6 minutes. Now puta ll spices and duokali in and leave for ½ an on gas.
Take wheat flower and add all spices and make into dough (knead with water and pinch of salt until it stops sticking to your fingers. Roll to about ¼ inch thick and cut into 1 inch squares) and put into dal and simmer for 10 minutes. Add more water if needed.

Thursday, December 23, 2010

Drop it like its hot

I'm actually on the ball for once in my life and looking up textbooks for my classes BEFORE they start.

I looked up the texts for my "fun" class, political psychology, and...well, a few things. First, there's 10 books for the course. The most I've read for any one course in a semester thus far is 8. I'm unsure the level of depth that will be required, but still its a lot to keep track of.

AND costs a ton; its the nontextbook books that always sell back for the least. Kids always complain about science classes being expensive, but honestly, it's the english/language/novel heavy books that cost the most because you get the least back, if you get anything at all because they tend to have rotating topics so the reading list will change every semester meaning the bookstore no longer wants last semester's books back.

AND all the books appear to be about war and leadership. Perhaps I should have seen this coming? There's books about establishing authority, legitimacy during war, books by war time heros, etc. I want to take this class to learn more about citizens in the context of the state. It looks like we'll be studying the opposite end of the spectrum. Which could be intersting but not something I entirely can justify making time for given the other constraints in my life.

Droppin' it like its hot.

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Easy Way Out

I can already tell I've got a potentially too full academic plate next semester. I've had more than one semester with 6 solid academic classes, and by the end I'm always swearing never to do it again. I have 5 solid classes and a fitness class, but the combination of classes and knowing how busy I'm going to be with the grad school apps and the job hunting and everything that comes with being an RA (namely having to be spur of the moment flexible and frequently being kept up at all hours of the night to deal with stuff).......I'm fearing I've set myself up for too much to be able to get the academic results I want.

So I'm faced with a decision.

Right now I have a "fun" class, my first intentionally-doesn't count for my major-just because I want to take it-elective credit class since I started college (and since sophomore year of high school for that matter, although my 7th IB subject was intended to be an elective that just happened to get me IB credit). It's political psychology and it appears to appeal precisely to my research interests. I'm fascinated by the relationship between citizen and state; how does the citizen contribute to government outcomes, how is the citizen shaped, how is their behavior as a citizen influenced, and in turn, what are the policy implications of all that. Fascinating. People think that because I'm a student of International Studies/Relations that I want to save the world, which dichotomously can only be achieved by either being a diplomat or being a certain breed of NGO running, non-profit loving, corporation hating, Peace Corps volunteering, UN working......person. I've come to find that I am centering on an unusual middle path between the two that is far less traversed and I think it has much to do with my research interests and the simple fact that I chose IR because I am, quite simply, interested in how the world works. My particular chosen angle on this happens to involve governments because they are an inevitable and often powerful presence in nearly everyone's lives and thus can be important to how we chose to live our lives and can be a mechanism to reach thousands, if not millions, of people at one time.

Now that I've basically written my personal statement all over again; political psych. Cool, want to take it, probably won't be massively difficult, but won't exactly be underwater basket-weaving either.


So do I drop it? Do I accept the simple fact that it is a luxury that I cannot afford and need to drop to free of time to attend to my other classes?

Another route is change my selection for my quantitative reasoning requirement. I've currently selected deductive logic. I almost chose philosophy instead of economics (and in retrospect, thank goodness I did) so I obviously have some penchant for it and thus would consider it a worthwhile and fulfilling course that would enable me to be better tutored in the practice of logic, an excellent life skill. But, despite the fact that my brain is fairly well attuned to the type of thinking required for the course, it still will be difficult, and the class doesn't give many A's.

So I'm considering instead taking the easy way out and taking something like.......college algebra just to get the requirement done.

This seems a bit backwards to me though since I've already taken calc and on principle have something against the idea of it.

So what's most important here?

Its my last semester. This semester was a disaster that I'm still beating myself up about, but it doesn't even compare to the nuclear destruction I did to my GPA last year. I have a particular goal GPA in mind that I'm not super excited about but can live with. Anything less than that is a prospect I'm currently not sure how to handle. In order to meet this goal my GPA has to be solid next semester. Not impossible, definitely not my highest ever, but nothing can go wrong. I can not afford any disasters or surprises and I don't want to set myself up for failure. At the same time, my academics are important to me and I'd hate to forfeit the pursuit of education in favor of my GPA.

But I keep coming back to the fact that this is my last semester, my last chance. There is no redemption after this point. Either it happens or it doesn't. And right now, walking out of UNC with my diploma in my hand knowing I reached my goal GPA is much more important to me than taking a certain class.

So I think I know I have to back down and change my schedule. I just haven't quite gotten to a point of action yet.....

Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Pardon my opinion

Some ideas are just stupid. So it upsets me when people with stupid ideas are praised.

Cases in point:

1. A project at a certain top-tier school to raise funds for something in Kenya (probably a school or an orphanage, they seem to be the only things college kids care about) (And yes, I am sick and tired of hearing heart warming, touching, oh-so emotionally compelling stories about African orphans so I'm slightly more sensitive to the topic). The project involved sending old newspapers and magazines (in the US, a-hem, Indiana) TO Kenya where they make them into necklaces (if you've been to East Africa, you know what I'm talking about). Then they shipped them BACK to the US, sold them on campus, and donated the funds.

Two trips, across the ocean, just to make a necklace. And why not use local magazines and newspapers (bc there certainly is plenty in trash piles in Uganda, I can only assume the same for Kenya) is absolutely, positively beyond me.

2. Another project at another top-tier school (a-hem public university in, cough cough, North Carolina) that ships defective painted glass beads (from a local craft organization) from Kenya, to the States. Students then make the beads in the jewelry and sell them on campus and send the proceeds to an orphanage that students have built a relationship with by sending numerous interns to volunteer over summers.

Clever, but the project is product of at least two grants and entreprenurial fellowships to stay afloat and I highly highly doubt they are coming out ahead.

Oh, you say, but Cortney, darling, you're missing the point! Its social entreprenurship! The point is to enact social change! Not make a greedy captialistic profit! That's entirely beside the point!

Look. Positive social change, ok, great, love it, whatever, BUT YOU CANNOT IGNORE BASIC ECONOMIC PRINCIPLES BECAUSE DOING SO ONLY GENERATES MORE LONG RUN HARM THAN GOOD.

If you have to survive off of government funds to do you're little feel good (but completely and illogically inefficient) project, lets just think about that for one second. Let's extrapolate a little bit. Someone has to pay to ship the beads and the necklaces and the purses and the aprons from Africa to the US. Even if you're organization doesn't, the government has to foot the bill. Hurray, you've successfully increased national debt, weakened the US's economic position further, and therefore made the country less capable of allocating funds to development related issues.

Is the money lost to the US small in comparison to the gains in Africa? Perhaps. I'll agree a little goes a long way. But it adds up in the US, too. Argues of profit v. nonprofit organizations aside, if everyone takes on ventures that aren't self-sufficient and sustainable, where on earth is the money going to come from to fund them? And no, you can't just print more, bc horray you've just devalued the national currency and further weakened our position globally, horray, we now can do less to help other people with our money that is worth less.

It seems amusingly ironic to me that a lot of "these people" talk on and on and on about social responsibility and taking social issues into account, in fear of the big bad capitalism monster, well guess what folks..........isn't all this just a TAD socially irresponsible? It's inefficient and it comes at exorbitant unnecessary cost. Thanks for keeping OUR nation's ability to provide for OUR citizens in mind. Not.

I could go on longer to make this more air tight but I have studying that needs get done so I wont. But overall, I'm ticked at how idiotic some ideas can be and how much praise they are given and the pedestal we put these people on.

Why not send ONE intern over to TRAIN more personnel at the orphanage so you don't need to spend the money on sending so many interns over, and consequently have more money to donate to the orphanage?

Why not train women to make their own beaded necklaces to sell locally and pump money into the local economy, which lots of research has show has greater net results than merely donating money directly (and trains more women and "empowers" them, which some researchers say has consequent benefits on better family spending decisions such as educating children and saving. I see pros and cons to this argument, however)

Why not get wealthy families in Kenya that can afford newspapers to donate them for jewelry making, instead of shipping US newspapers all the way to Kenya. (and consequently increase rich/poor interaction and increase inequality awareness that could potentially lead to narrowing socialeconomic gaps via cultural attitudes)


Yes this is personal for me because I'm in the same field as these kids and had entertained the exact same ideas, but turned away from them for sake of attempting to avoid doing more harm than good. I will rarely do something unless I see some net benefit to be found in it and I DO NOT believe that "something is better than nothing" which is what motivates a lot of people to rationalize their under-scaled and inefficient efforts.

Yet who wins at the end of the day? Who is getting national attention and praise and a great resume full of lots of fellowships and grants and acceptance in to great grads schools. The idiots. Yes I'm jealous and yes it doesn't seem fair. Call me a brat but I do think I have some validity in my point.

Oops

I really am horrible at remembering I have a blog. All I need is one sufficiently distracting thing, and BAM it's existence ceases to be something I'm aware of.

Luckily something usually jogs my memory.

I've been weirdly on top of my work lately. Like, it's legitimately unprecedented for me.

I'm the procrastination queen. I do everything at the last minute; its a way of life for me.

And yet, sometime, three weeks ago, I accidentally wrote down the due date for a huge paper a week earlier than it was actually due, which resulted in me getting ahead on my work.

Suddenly I had time to do all my other work in a timely matter.

And since then, I've been precisely on top of my work, with enough time to get everything done without cramming, and enough bumper room to make sure I have time to rest and relax and stay healthy.

I think part of it also has to do with the fact that my boyfriend is visiting this weekend, the weekend before finals, and I'm worried about a) getting distracted and not doing the studying I need to do and b) having to study all weekend and thus not getting to spend much quality time with him. Consequently, I've been working diligently to make sure I'm on top of my work, rather than behind, so I don't have to cram this weekend.

I'm not saying this to gloat. It's a life lesson that I think should be shared.

I don't have any more time than usual, nor do I have less work than usual, simply put, I just do stuff when I need to do it rather than putting it off as long as possible.

I'm amazed how....rewarding trying this new approach has been. Procrastination might be addictive, but so its staying on top of your work. I'm so much less stressed, can really enjoy the time I spend not working, and I work better because I'm not so hyper pressured to finish my work.

I'm rather acutely aware of the fact that at any point in time I could get knocked off my balance, get behind, and end up cramming as usual. Which, interestingly, motivates me further to do my work now rather than later so that doesn't happen. It still feels weird to run out of things to study and go to sleep rather than staying up all night to study as much as possible. I've also noticed I seem to be more sensitive to changes in stress levels. Which I suppose makes sense, I'm not so hyper stressed that I lose all sense to magnitude.

We'll see how the week plays out.I have two problem sets due tomorrow, which I finished yesterday, and an exam friday, which I'm almost done with my study outline for, meaning I can spend a little time today and tomorrow starting to prepare for my two exams Tuesday rather than waiting until after my Friday exam.

Monday, November 29, 2010

Bull Between the Horns

I was told to write "a 8-10 page paper on a relevant topic" for my Global Issues class.

Given that I hate this class and would be hard-pressed to do any serious damage to my grade, I'm not entirely gung-hoe about putting a lot of work and effort into this.

So, ticked at all the time we spent in recitation moaning about end of end of the nation state and how horrible this is for culture and communities, I wanted to write about transnationalism and ways that the concept of boarders are being redefined by globalization.

I figured this deserved some categories of ways and settled on economic, technological, ideological (politically), and cultural.

Yeah, super broad.

But I'm too lazy to narrow it down and do the amount of thinking and research that would be required of a narrower topic (say, MNCs specifically, or just focusing on Asia).

So I'm currently banking on arguing myself out of this little situation I've created. My topic isn't too broad. Every other topic is simply too narrow. And until a broader approach is taken, we cannot begin to "realistically" conceptualize the issue of transnationalism and therefore cannot even begin to competently discuss its legal, security, etc. implications.

Basically, I'm taking the bull between the horns. You'll note that two of my categories are the ones most often focused by those arguing for economic globalization and the later two are more often the focus of sociologists/anthropologists in their social theories of transnationalism.

In reality, these are two sides of the same coin but no one seems to be acknowledging it. Rather, the economic school is overlooking social consequences as mere afterthoughts/products of economic change, and the social school is looking highly myopically at cultural implications of grande and mystical economic forces that they often only vaguely refer to.

I shall close the gap! I shall build a bridge! I shall spur discussion and dialogue between the two schools for the sake of a brighter global future!! And I shall spend less time working because of it.

Sound convincing?

Monday, November 22, 2010

Testing, testing, 1,2,3.....

Just seeing if the blog a photo straght from Picasa thing actually works pleasingly.


 
Posted by Picasa

Friday, November 19, 2010

Hmm....

I'm a little worried about the new Parker and Stone "The Book of Mormon" musical. We all know the cynical axe the South Park creators have to grind when it comes to Mormonism, I wouldn't be surprised if this was their most glorious satirical exhibition yet. I'm also fairly sure there's a lot of members of the Mormon world that are fairly concerned about the potential this production has to further taint their already highly misunderstood religion.

I'm further concerned about it being set in Uganda. The missionary rules are a little different there, as they should be, it's not the United States, but a couple of things can be easily taken out of context and misconstrued. I've been told that missionaries have been "advised" to focus their efforts of financially stable families, I can see this easily being interpreted as selective salvation, but it's truly a method to ensure that Africa doesn't become one big Church welfare project. Additionally, there are certain rules pertaining to polygamist families in Uganda, that unless they don't get their facts exactly straight....idk. Again, concerned.

I struggle to understand how people can find so much entertainment in taking such a blasphemous, taunting, stance on something that people live their lives by and hold as sacred. In general. Go spend your time building people up, not tearing them down, there's already enough of that in this world, no need to contribute further for mere sake of amusement.

I'm gonna look into it more so be watching for a follow up post.

Pretty Sure

Pretty sure I officially have everything now.

Like seriously.

I barely know how to handle having so many luxuries in my life.

Just got my new Macbook Air and I'm loving it, I can't tell you how nice it is to have a fully functional laptop again!!

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Punctuality

I am not a punctual person.

By any stretch of the imagination.

I don't know when or why I got to be this way, but ever since I remember being responsible for getting myself places at a certain time, I've been late.

I just....don't pressure myself to be there at a certain time. My arrival time margin of error seems to be wider than most (although that would presume that I'm sometimes early so I guess the....positive side of my margin of error?). I'm not bad at estimating traveling time, quite good at it actually, I'm just bad at leaving when I need to leave.

I suppose I've found compounding evidence in the fact that the polychronic cultures I've visited haven't stressed me out in the least. If anything, it was freeing. I'll leave for the bus when I leave for the bus, and it comes when it comes. I'll show up for a meeting somewhere between 4-5 and the meeting will start somewhere between 4-5. This whole snap to it arrive on the dot precisely attitude just doesn't click with me.

And it's not a matter of disrespect. It's not a disregard for the person/place/thing I'm going to. It's not some subconcious avoidance of some place I don't want to be. It's not that I don't take things seriously. I just don't take TIME seriously. It's not you, it's time.

I've been having issues getting to my 9am class that's 20 min away on south campus (if you know me, you're probably cracking up right now because you know I'm physically incapable of waking before 10). The bus is usually late which means I'm usually late, but I've resisted walking because...idk just don't want to walk.

I recently check up on my grade and noticed the toll this has been taking on my grade. I knew I was losing attendance and participation points, but I'm a GREAT participator in class, if not one of the best, so I figured the damage for my showing up 3-8 minutes late for a 120 minute class was minimal.

Nope, my A&P grade is hovering around 60% right now, which means I just landed myself AT MOST a B+ in the class.

Is this fair? I understand that being present in class, for it's entirety, is important. But I mean, it's not like anything happens the first 10 minutes of class. I'm being grades sheerly on the principle of punctuality. Is that important enough to be held back from getting an A(-)? Why on earth is it THAT important?

Apparently my professor for the course, when asked what was up with my grade, remarked along the lines of, "I just don't get it....the kids that are late are usually the ones that sit in the back and don't talk, Cortney is GREAT in class but she's always late....I just don't get it."

Um. WHAT IS THERE NOT TO GET? I'M NOT A PUNCTUAL PERSON AND IT'S NOT AT ALL RELATED TO MY ATTITUDE TOWARDS YOU OR THE COURSE OR THE MATERIAL.

Why on earth is there an assumed correlation there?

Monday, November 15, 2010

Question

If you were a party hardy, sterotypical Greek, above average wealthy, (authority challenging, vandalism inciting, rule breaking, hormonally charged) college freshman, either male or female, what would be sufficient incentive for you to submit daily answers to Community Standards quiz questions posted on my door? Gift cards aren't allowed. An ipod shuffle? Something from student stores of your choosing, like a hoodie? VIP tickets to a basketball game?

Friday, November 12, 2010

Sound Interesting?

This is the (current) introduction for my WMST paper:

To the vast majority of American society today, Mormonism is known as a highly conservative religion, regarded by some as a cult, of polygamists that worship Joseph Smith, get married at 18, have at least 12 children, oppose gay rights and abortion, and most important to this paper, relegate their women to spending their lives within the sphere of the home, ignorant of the outside world and dutifully obeying their husbands.

Within Mormonism, women are championed as those divinely endowed with the capacity for motherhood and are consequently a vital source of nurture and spirituality within the all-important unit of the family. It is their duty to raise and teach their children and thus the future of generations lies in their hands. This responsibility and power is said to be equal to, if not greater than, that of their priesthood holding husbands, with whom they are equal partners before the Lord and equally potentially worthy of eternal Godship in the afterlife.

It can be seen that there is some difference of perspective here. Instructed to be “in the world, but not of it” Latter-Day Saints have long embraced their identity as a “peculiar people” that might not always be understood in context of the current social trends. In a world where “women’s lib” is crusading for equality among the sexes through things like reproductive rights and greater employment opportunities, the traditions of Mormonism are ever requiring a unique paradigm to understand a culture that promotes gender equality through chastity and housewives.

The relationship between Mormonism and society at large is not static. Rather, as society changes, so to must Mormonism make clear, and frequently adjust, its stances on certain issues. A gospel of living doctrine and modern day Prophets, Mormonism is constantly in flux and thus as society changes, it perpetually is reestablishing it’s attitudes towards women. Yet, the common source of this re-establishment is always, and always will be, through the lens of the family, said to the key unit of society and the building block of nations. Thus, it cannot be said that as society has “progressed,” Mormonism has simply stayed stagnant. No, this would be altogether too simple. Yet, it can be said that as society moves farther away from the traditional nuclear family, the gap between Mormonism and society will be ever widening and thus increasingly difficult to bridge.

As this gap widens, a valid question emerges: can a Mormon be a feminist? Given that there are a number of Mormon women that are self-declared feminists, several of them housed at the church sponsored Brigham Young University, the answer seems to be yes. Yet, this raises three key questions. Firstly, what characterizes the self-declaration of a Mormon as a feminist? Second, what diversity of opinion exists among Mormon feminists? And third, in what ways is, or isn’t, Mormon feminism compatible with current “mainstream” feminism? In order to full explore these questions, a groundwork for understanding women in context of Mormonism must first be established and a series key topics relating to women in Mormonism will be discussed and critiqued according to multiple responses of Mormon feminists. Following this, will be a discussion of the experiences of Mormonism with feminism, both historical and personal, in an attempt to better understand the ways in which Mormon feminists identify themselves and how the church has responded to this. Lastly, will be a discussion of how Mormon feminism compares to current trends in feminism.

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Rant

School sucks right now. I feel like I'm getting overly slammed for little things left and right and it's costing me dearly and my grades are a mess.

In WHAT universe does being 6 minutes late for a 120 minute class (whereafter I very actively participated) warrant losing HALF my participation points for the day?

In what universe does skipping 6 out of 33 problems on a problem set (they weren't any harder or longer than the others) warrant a BELOW failing grade for the assignement?!

Ugh. Gr. Argggggg. afkjadsfalkjsdf F U school.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Tattoo

Random thought: but I really don't get why people say, "I want a tattoo that says this jslfkjslfksfjs and then I want it in french/italian/sanskrit/hebrew/whatever language they don't speak"

1. Words on your body should be a language you understand

2. If you so choose a language other than your native tongue, it should be one that has personal meaning to you

3. The combination of the phrase and the language should have some sensical connection. I would probably go so far as to argue that it should only necessitate the use of another language if it is a colloquial phrase IN THAT LANGUAGE. Picking a phrase in english and then translating at whim often seems to take away so much of the meaning, both literal and sentimental.

For example: a lot of people like "joie de vivre" it sounds close to english and thus is easy to understand, the joy of life (fyi, joie is NOT pronounced joy, but closer to "jeu-wah"). Um, yeah, you probably won't hear that coming out of a french person's mouth any time soon. I feel like a lot of people use this in the sense of saying something IS their joie de vivre (which would more accurately be their raison d'etre), or a way to remember that life is joyful. Connotations translating, and its closer to "taking joy in life," relishing it. That's not how most people use it. Fail.

That's all.

Last Semester as an Undergrad

After an incredibly close brush with having to extend graduation through summer, everything finally fell into place. I even have time for a "just for fun" class for the first time since I've been in college (although, I'm liable to drop it for sake of cutting back on work).

As things stand right now I'm in:

-Advanced International Economics (which is going to suck bc I don't like intl econ, but it was the only 500+ course offered next semester). And it's at 8am MWF. Fml.

-Politics of African Culture: this double counts for my major and my visual arts, and should be really interesting. Or really soft sci BS and dissapointing. We'll see.

-Deductive Logic

-Yoga!

-Political Psychology (my "fun" class)

-And I WILL be in some sort of BS "get the requirement done" art class, but registration is closed to non-majors until after regular registration, so I have to wait and see what scraps are left over. Fingers crossed for photography, but it's highly unlikely.


So, overall, not too shabby. Not entirely super easy classes, it's only marginally lighter than my average semester. Underloading wouldn't have been an option anyway since it screws up my grant money so....just another semester.

Monday, November 1, 2010

Fortunate

I thought about titling this "Unexpected fortune" but then I realized that "unexpected" is sort of implied in the meaning of "fortune" given its association with luck.

And then I thought about titling it "fortuitous" but then realized that implied something happening entirely by chance, which isn't the case; a series of predictable events, had I thought about it enough, led to what I'm about to talk about, but because I didn't think about it enough, it was unexpected. It's a pleasant surprise and thus rather fortunate, but not at all entirely due to random chance, and hence not at all fortuitous.

Words are interesting.

Anyway.

I'm trying to sort out the mess that is my potential schedule for next semester. It's a...well.....clusterfuck. To say the least. I've got about 7 things up in the air that are all partially contingent on each other (the messy side of double counting) and thus well...its just a mess.

I'm nervous every time I hear my phone get an email because I'm afraid it will be another professor turning down another request for course approval for a particular requirement I'm trying to frantically fulfill. (ranting moment: you'd think two summers researching, one summer interning, and two semesters volunteering for a non-profit would get my experiential education requirement fulfilled, but it seems all to indicative of my life that....no, of course not.)

But the good part of the story is that I am now in need of a humanities course. I'll be taking probably 3 philosophy classes next semester (leaving me curious if I'm close to an accidental minor) so I was looking to mix it up a little and see what the english department had to offer.

Come to find out, they have a literary arts (very humanities) course in "life writing"

COOL!

So, hopefully, fortunately (but not fortuitously!) I will be able to take a course in the art of writing a life story next semester. Which will be very interesting to think further about how and why people share their stories the way they do, the implications of the way the story is told, and be able to develop a greater understanding of how to tell my story.

Nice, very nice.

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Overheard: Relationships

"I feel like I just keep making mistakes and I don't know what to do to fix things"

But are you making mistakes? Or are you just not jiving with your partner and it is causing tensions? And if you are making mistakes, what's done is done, you can't just do one thing to negate another. I do however, believe in sufficiently proving false a behavior that was considered a "mistake" if it truly was a one off. This takes time though. And willing patience on the part of the partner, which is rare. Either learn and grow, or find a relationship that works better for you, where you aren't making "mistakes."

"He's 3,000 miles away, is it too much to ask to just call and say hi every day?"

No. And not because calling every day is what should be done, rather, it's what YOU think should be done. If it's what you want and need, there's nothing wrong with that (in this instance) and if he's not ok with that, that doesn't make it, or you, wrong. It just means you see things differently; accept it, talk about it with him, and find a way that works for both of you.

"I need to be single so I can learn to stand on my own two feet"

So.....a relationship is sitting down? You learn about different parts of yourself in different contexts, being single is one context, being in a relationship is another. But to equate being not single with being not independent seems ridiculous to me. I'm not arguing that time on your own can't be a good thing. What I'm saying is that being with someone else doesn't necessitate a denial of yourself to the point that you feel like your independence is compromised. Two people in a relationship can be mutually dependent, but what I think is healthier is inter-dependence where both support and build up each other. Having someone to support you doesn't make you weak, and it doesn't mean you can't do things on your own.

"I should have reacted differently"

Well guess what, you didn't. And you know why? Because you're you. And you're not going to be anything other any time soon so learn to love yourself. Sure, maybe you screwed up, we've all been there. But where is hating yourself and wishing to change the past going to get you? Further, you chose to make the decision you did for some reason, sure in the scheme of possible reactions that you could have exhibited within the range of who you are, there were probably other possibilities, but this is the one you chose, and you probably had a reason for choosing it. Don't regret that. Don't regret who you are. If it didn't work out well, it might not have been because you made the wrong choice, it might be because you're just not with someone that works with the reaction you chose.

"He seems so much more into the relationship than me...do I not love him enough?"

No. Love is love. People are at different points in the relationship for different reasons at different times. You might be distracted, you might be stressed, you might...a zillion things that might mean you have to divert your attention elsehere, but that doesn't mean you love less. UNLESS you are looking for an excuse to not love enough because you actually don't.

"I'm trying to get over him (guy she cheated with) so I can put my relationship back together! I need to move past it!"

Fact is, you cheated. It happens. But the notion of getting over one guy to move to another seems a bit strange to me. I'd sooner say it would be better to seek a better understanding of what prompted you to step outside your relationship because it won't be until that is understood that you'll understand how to step back in it. If that's even still possible. It's also possible that you were LOOKING to step outside the relationship, in which case, dealing with this specific guy isn't necessarily going to prevent this from happening again. Either way, it's probably not him, and more likely you. Which is fine, but...a little more introspection please.

What do all these have in common: the problem isn't the problem, the problem is that you have a problem. I feel like I've watched several people get caught up in trying to change a specific instance or fix a specific error and turning it back on themselves without instead looking at the event in context of the whole (the relationship) and seeing WHY a problem occurred. Further, it often seems that a lot of that why simply has to do with incompatibility. People have different wants and needs, when those don't align, there's friction, accusations, mistakes, regret, etc. Again, the problem isn't the problem, the problem is that you have a problem. I'm definitely not arguing that the "right" relationship has no problems, but I do think there's something to be said along the lines of that a relationship that works is one that can constructively work through the problems, which is more of a speed bump (and learning experience!) than an actual issue. Working through can happen a lot of different ways, but modifying work with "constructively" I think is important, it should work out better for both of you, and you shouldn't have feel like you have to act a certain way to keep them happy or change a part of yourself to be more compatible with them. If you are going to change, it'll happen fairly naturally, and it does happen, but it shouldn't be a tool to make things better.

Monday, October 25, 2010

Irresponsible

My life would be a lot easier if I were more responsible. It would be even easier if I didn't beat myself up so much when I act irresponsibly.

I seem to think that when I screw something up that was totally preventable, I am somehow worthy of punishment. More accurately, I'm am not worthy of being happy with myself. How can I possibly deserve to be happy when I have behaved unacceptably? Further, I seem to think that putting myself in the mental dog house will be sufficient to alter my future behavior in a more responsible direction. If I remember feeling horrible, it will be sufficient incentive to avoid actions that would cause me to feel horrible again.

After years and years of self-spiraling after I've screwed something up for the zillionth time, guess what? I'm not a whole lot more responsible.

If anything, the greatest steps I've made towards more responsible behavior have come from positive external reinforcement when I behave responsibly.



I missed the overnight bus back to school yesterday. On the way up to NY, it arrived in Durham 45 minutes late and arrived in NY an hour and a half behind schedule. Given this prior data, in calculating when to leave to catch my return bus, I made the false assumption that the bus would again be late and thus planned to arrive right on time, rather than early.

To my horror, I saw the bus pull away from the curb only 2 minutes after the scheduled departure time, while I was still a block and a half away.

I don't think I've ever run so fast with a 15 lb backpack and full arms.

I caught up to the bus just as the light changed and it began to turn left to merge with moving traffic. I ran out into the street along the side of the bus, banging on the side as I ran (apparently I've learned well from begging children in developing countries).

The bus got bottle necked after it turned and I began banging on the door, gesturing to please, please, PLEASEEEEE let me on. Don't not ask me what compelled me to namaste the Chinese driver, I need some sign, some gesture, to show him that I was respectfully asking for his help and...that's what my frenzied mind thought of. The bus driver just waived me away over and over and over again. I tried to reach for my ticket in my duffle bag but the more attention I gave the search, the less chance I had to secure the bus driver's attention. As traffic picked up again, the bus drove away and I was left on the side of the road.

At this point I looked around me and was shocked to see a crowed of about 50 people standing directly behind me. They were waiting for a bus to Indiana. I looked across the street and....more people. Going north. My bus was gone, my ticket money, and any chance of turning in my problem set in class the next day.

I'm pretty good at accepting sunk costs. It's difficult to nuance, but it's when things are still in the process of being determined that I flip out. What's done is done, but if it isn't done, I'll fight with every ounce of everything I have. The money on the ticket was lost, I had no choice but to deal and get home another way ASAP. That, I was fine with.

What I got upset about was how worried I was about getting my homework turned in, the consequent effect it might have on my grade if not accepted, and how on earth I would find the time to sufficiently prepare for my exam on Wednesday given that I was likely going to lose a lot of study time while being in NY for an extra day. THAT is what I got mad myself about.

At this point, I really need to work on ACTUALLY learning, REALLY internalizing, that even though things aren't fully determined, for example how my exam is going to turn out, flipping out about it will not help me in any way. It's a waste of energy and time. I get that for things that I know I absolutely cannot change because they are already determined (such as missing the bus. It happened. Done.) But what I need to get better at understanding is that similarly, while there is still technically time to study for this exam, that time is fixed and determined. It will happen. Done. Can't change it. So rather than get upset about trying to make my best use of that time, I need to use the time to freakin' USE IT!

I guess what I'm trying to say is that my perspective is starting to change a little on what I can and can't control. I'm good at understanding my lack of control over things that are overtly out of my control. But my studying for this exam, while seemingly in my control, really, in a way isn't. All I can do is all I can do. There's no way I really manipulate that or change that. I can't make myself study more than I am capable of, and I can't make more time. Further, getting mad at myself isn't going to help me currently, nor do much to alter my future behavior.

Maybe someday I'll learn....

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Doubt

If you know me, you know I'm a REALLY determined and persistent person, to the point where sometimes when I set my mind to something its really hard for me to know when to stop pushing for it. Along with this drive comes a general assurance that I'm making the decisions that I feel are right for me. Sure I think about what it would be like had I chosen another major. Sure I wonder what staying at BYU would have been like, but never question overall I would have been better off not transferring.

The point is, I'm frequently "unsure" about things but I very, very rarely ACTUALLY doubt myself with an "oops, that may have been the wrong choice."

So, I'm saying it: oops, not applying for a Fulbright grant might have been the wrong choice.

It's been hard the last couple weeks watching friends and people I know submit their applications and watch their excitement as they get their interviews, begin to more fully explore the possibility that lies ahead, and most of all, the laudes of support, encouragement, and admiration from their peers.

I like respect. I like accomplishment. I like being taken seriously and having a little academic clout to rest my laurels on.

When it comes to doing stuff with your life, Fulbright is pretty, as they say, "legit." Hello, STATE DEPT GRANT?! It's the experience of a lifetime, a free gig for a whole year in a country of your choosing to study whatever the heck you want. For a year. Free.

Not only that, it's prestigious. I may have done some stuff with my time in college, but nothing that carries a name like Fulbright. It's basically a foot in the door at a lot of grad schools; a nice little sticker on your application that says, "the state dept approves of me, you should too." And its often the key to a lot of merit fellowships in grad school, which can considerably reduce the cost and make life a lot easier.


In all honesty though, what's really driving me up a wall is watching the rounds of applause, the pats on the back, and the smiles and high fives being directed towards the kids that applied and knowing that that COULD be me. And consequently, I feel somehow less, inferior, not as good, because I chose not to apply. And it bugs me that no one knows why I didn't apply, for very rational reasons, all they know is that I didn't, and it's like, "ooo she didn't apply."

Well, here's why not: it just wasn't right for me relative to where I am in my life now. I know, what a snob, too good for Fulbright. Except not really. Only that I've spent the last three summers in developing countries doing field research. I'm just a LITTLE field researched out. I want work experience. I want development experience in the states. I don't want to be in an internationally long distance relationship for a year when I don't absolutely have to be.

I know I'm going to find a job and get the work experience I want, but a part of me can't help but think.....maybe I should have done the Fulbright application.....

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Related thoughts on National Coming Out Day

A friend recently posted about National Coming Out Day and in so doing brought up the question of how Pride Parades do/don't fit into the current social trends relating to LGBTQIAers.

Her post is here: http://fragmented-shilpagogna.blogspot.com/2010/10/national-coming-out-day.html


And....this was my response:

(I've been told that I sound angry, offensive, and that my response is an ad hominem attack. I have mixed feelings about this, but surprise is definitely one of them)

I think the instance of Pride Parades are a slightly spurious topic that serve as an outlier in context of the "homosexual community" which is why, as you said, sociologists are "stumped" by it. Because it is a rather particularistic phenomenon, that is very much not representative of the "homosexual community" (I keep using air quotes because the existence of such a community could very well be debatable) and thus to say "if there's this movement of acceptance and respect then why are there displays like this?" is a statement that suggests a correlation that really doesn't exist and thus is a question that really can't be asked.

I'd argue that putting these two things side by side is an invalid approach and that there are three possible reasons for this.

First, that Pride Parades are an absolute outlier and thus not related to the image that the "homosexual community " is attempting to project. Homosexuals are a highly public topic in (especially) American society, particularly in the media. This gives the opportunity for a lot of representation while at the same time grossly condensing the range of that representation to the most shocking and attention getting. We don't cover nudist conventions in the news as much as we do pride parades. This rather myopic image, manipulated by the media, then seems to be a bigger issue in the context of the larger image of the "homosexual community" than it might actually be. There are millions of homosexuals, there are mere thousands that participate in pride parades.

On the other hand, rather than take the outlier approach, it could be argued that the incidence of pride parades is at the very center of the homosexual community. Out of the millions of homosexuals, this is the spark that has risen to the surface. If that's the case, a couple of questions need to be asked, primarily why? and how? You mentioned a movement for "acceptance, respect, and normality" and then further presented Pride Parades as if they were a contradiction to this. But are they? You seemed to determine that they were given that these displays would be deemed highly unrespectable for say, the work place. What if, to the homosexual community, things like respect and acceptance involve seeing Pride Parades as perfectly respectable and acceptable. So much of the dialogue among LGBTQIA voices that I have heard stress values of freedom to determine and identify oneself. Given the primacy of desiring to achieve this, do you really think they're all that worried about what they're employer is going to think? What our society deems as acceptable is largely rooted in heterosexual patriarchy. To me, much of the homosexual community's vision involves the removal of the imposistion of these values, which are seen as limiting and constraining to one's identity. Isn't judging what is and isn't respectable similarly constraining? You referred to the upswing in promiscuity and sexuality as a result of National Coming Out Day......who is defining what IS promiscuous? who is adding value judgements to what IS sexual? You questioned how they could possibly gain respect in the face of displays like this.....but maybe the goal is PRECISELY to gain respect on these terms. To see displays such as this AS normal, rather than conform to what society currently does and doesn't consider "ok."

In line with that, another point to consider might be that you mentioned the great strides towards acceptance and support of homosexuals in society. Who measures this progress? Maybe the homosexual community feels like heterosexuals haven't accepted homosexuality as as normal. Consequently, the need for greater, more radical, exposure is needed through things like Pride Parades.

A third response might be to go between the bull horns. Maybe there is a rift; the more conservative side that projects that image of respect and acceptance that you started your post with, and perhaps a different perspective, as observed in your presentation of Pride Parades. Thus to hold them next to each other and go, "this doesn't make sense, this seems discontinuous....why?" well, maybe the answer is that it seems discontinuous because....it is. Maybe there's competing ideologies pertaining to "the image" that "the homosexual community" is trying to project and what their goals are regarding societal acceptance, and the media is only picking up on bits and pieces of the dialogue surrounding these ideologies and consequently, there's room for confusion about what is really going on here.

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Change is in the air?

So it's a long and boring story but I'm starting to consider getting a Masters in International Education Development instead of a Masters in International Affairs. Not only are the programs generally less competitive but there's considerable room to argue that an while an MIA is greatly applicable to a great number of fields and thus great for a future career, it is really broad. On the one hand, it could be a way to explore my interests more and figure out precisely where in the development field I want to end up, but on the other hand, it could be so general that I really don't learn a lot. Additionally, I don't plan on going into the NGO world or the foreign service and most MIAs are geared towards those two pretty binary paths. I want grad school to a time for me to narrow my focus and get a really deep and specialized education in my field. Focusing myself by studying Development Education would be a response to that desire.

It's a little scary though. I consider myself a teacher, but am I an educator? I'm not jumping up and down with excitement and going, "omg I found what I've been looking for my entire life!" (that's what I did when I found International Affairs), but being realistic, it might be the best option for me.

I don't want to study peace, or conflict, or disaster relief, or agriculture, or environment, or health, or elections. While I DO want to study governance, basically every program lumps it into "democracy and governance" and that's when I start rolling my eyes. Further, I'm interested in governance insofar as I want to better understand the relationship between the institution of the state and its citizens and how to manage and influence that. A friend once joked that I basically wish I was born in a developing country so that I could run it. Unfortunately, this isn't too far from the truth. While my interests do play well into research, academia, even policy analysis and consulting, it begs the question of what PART of policy to analyze and research. "Government policy" in general doesn't cut it, so then I run into the same issue as the first sentence of this paragraph of not really liking any of the sub fields.

Except education. The role of the school as a source of political information, as a place where knowledge and information are disseminated, of education as a information spreading strategy....all of that is REALLY interesting to me. There's also a lot of interesting theories about the relationship between education and development (social, economic) that I would really like to explore more and get experience with. So it makes sense. It might be a field I end up in even if I study International Affairs.

It's a big committment though. It makes it easier to get jobs in the field of international education (like parts of USAID, Oxfam, etc) but makes it considerably harder to say....work for the UNDP. I can still be a researcher, be a policy analyst, be a professor, but it does sort of force me to do all those from the angle of education.

It makes sense, I'm just not 100% comfortable with it yet.

Monday, October 4, 2010

Ahhhhh

-I had absolutely no school work last week (outside of reading a book for my WMST class and a 2 page response of my Global Issues class). No problem sets, no midterms, no upcoming midterms, no papers, nothing.

-I worked four RA duty shifts last week, which involved a grand total of 14 hours sitting bored stiff at a desk with nothing to study.

-I've read the one econ chapter we're working on now, twice. And taken notes on it.

-My next problem sets for either of my econ classes aren't even posted on blackboard yet and the syllabuses don't say when they'll be due, but it definitely isn't going to be this week.

-I skipped my one class Friday because midterms were coming back meaning nothing would actually get taught. I was SOOOO excited for class today because I've had nothing to do for forever, and.....class was cancelled.

-Which means I just had a 4 day weekend but had nothing to study and couldn't go hang out with people because I was on duty.

-I've read two books in three days.

-I actually emailed the global center director declaring I wasn't busy enough, begging to be put to work (we're meeting on Wednesday).

-I'm getting tired of coming up with BS things to do. "Oh maybe I should learn more about the Truman Doctrine" "oh maybe I'll write a chapter of the book that's never actually going to get finished and is thus actually a waste of time" "oh maybe I should do more job research even though my field doesn't start hiring until March." My life has been relegated to waiting for the next meal as an excuse to do something and shopping online in the interim.

-I'm going crazy here!

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Passing Thought

So I don't know what's wrong with my life, but I've had literally zero school work this week. I think my classes are just in weird sync this semester since last week had me running around like a chicken with my head cut off, pulling 7am-2am long days trying to get everything done. Now, I'm hating the lull.

I could talk more about it, but the point of this post is to talk about House.

I was watching an old episode online the other day and the opening scene was a bride walking down the aisle with her Dad.

Given my religious background, I haven't exactly spent a lot of time in my life thinking about walking down a traditional church aisle, so it was a moment to pause for fresh reflection.

Maybe my women's studies class (which I love, love, love) is pushing me to the edge of radical but, watching the bride, something didn't sit right.

She was with her Dad in the final moments before walking through the door, with her Dad the whole time down the aisle, and met her husband at the pulpit. She wasn't without a male presence the entire time. And further, symbolic of being passed from her fathers care to her husbands care, she wasn't without someone to "look out for her" or "be responsible for her" the whole time. Her fiance/husband is just poof, magically there at the puplit. He doesn't need to go through any metaphorical passage of changing hands of caretakers, he can take care of himself just fine, heck, he can even walk himself to the puplit just fine. But the woman....can't.

And what about what everyone always says about the day of marriage being, "the bride's day" I think its probably mostly in reference of getting micromanaging Mom's to back off, but in actuality isn't it.....THEIR day? The bride's AND the groom's? This again seems to stress a pattern of the attention being focused on the bride because she is going through some major life transition of going from her father's home to her husband's home. The man doesn't need attention because again, it's implied that he can take care of himself. Doesn't that seem just a little belittling towards the bride?

Then again, this is all coming from a girl that's always insisted that her and her prince charming are going to pick out the wedding dress and the wedding tux together so they both find things they, collectively, both like. The colors, the songs, the food, everything done together so that the day is fully representative of THEIR relationship (although, I'm aware that it will probably actually be more like dragging around my tired and bored finance who will ultimately defer to me to make the decisions, but still! Speaking ideally!). I've always staunchly refused to even THINK (ok, think very much lol) about things like what I want the wedding colors to be because I want to decide when I know who I'm marrying, when I'm at that point in life, when I can choose what seems to match US best.

I'm sure, sure, sure there are a lot of culturally comparative statements that could be made about how much more patriarichal other cultures around the world are compared to America, but....just thinking about our own culture a little bit.....

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Free Marketing

So Gilt should probably swing some money my way for the sales pitch, but I'm so excited about it, I can't help but rave.

My boyfriend was recruiting at a career fair last week and saw a girl with shoes he knew I would love (stop and take a second to go: awwwww) so he asked her about them and that is how Gilt.com came into my life.

Gilt is an online start-up with a "flash sale" scheme, meaning certain designers are highlighted for a period of 36 hours, starting at noon every day. In other words, designer stuff on the serious side of cheap.

And I'm not talking about the ugly leftovers in impossible sizes that they can't sell and that are only marked 20% off and you can probably find for 40% off somewhere else.

Legit designers, with the latest stuff, and a huge range of selection for 50-70-pushing 80% percent off. There's women's, men's, kid's, and homegoods, and a link to Jetsetter with deals at luxury hotels around the globe.

For a girl bored with suburban malls, yearning for the shops and sample sales of SoHo, Gilt is a light in the darkness.

Another thing I like about them is that they showcase some designers I haven't heard of. Sure I know DVF, D&G, Missoni, Inhabit, Tart, etc. But I hadn't heard of, for example, Daryl K, Marais USA, or Magaschoni. It's been a great way to increase my designer knowledge beyond companies I baisedly self-select to learn about and hence I've gotten a better range of understanding and helped hone my fashion sense.


However, BE INFORMED:

As I got closer to actually purchasing from Gilt, I obviously figured I should do a little investigating about a company that seems a little too good to be true.

I'll let them first speak for themselves: http://www.gilt.com/company/about

Hopelessly economically oriented, I've wondered about Gilt in context of the recession and its implications on designers. Is it expanding the reach of designers, helping them to long term increase their business pool and exposure? Or is it cheapening the image they've worked to build by practically throwing their clothes at us? What are the ethics behind this, given they are obviously thriving off of companies struggling through the recession (my capitalistic answer: totally ethical and don't you dare think otherwise). How is the "cheapening" of these goods effecting the way that high fashion is perceived and consumer demands? (for example, are people feeling more entitled to these goods, decreasing their luxury status, and consequently decreasing their elasticity, which has effects on their pricing and purchasing patterns). What would Meryl Streep in the Devil Wears Prada do?

All these questions are rather obvious and thus it's not surprising that New York Magazine has a 6 page article asking precisely the same things I've been asking myself: http://nymag.com/fashion/10/spring/63807/

Overall, I'll let you make your own decision about Gilt, but it should be pretty clear how I feel about them.

[And if you want to be the nicest person ever, shoot me your email so I can refer you before you sign up so I can get store credits :)]

P.S. They're main competitor is Rue La La, but my evaluation of it is that they're don't have as good of brands or as much stock. And the styles are a little different, probably due to different buyer's tastes. The discounts might be a little deeper, but it Gilt makes it look like an outlet mall.

Monday, September 20, 2010

A lack of math

First off, let me just say, blogging on a iPad (checked out from the media center) from the column laden steps of the campus library overlooking the quad on an early fall morning is.......awesome.

I was just browsing through my international Econ book to read up a bit on offer curves. In my mind, offer curves, and the number of things they tell you, are pretty cool. The most simple way to describe them is that they represent the relationship between exports and imports of two goods in a basic two country model. This is derived from each countries relative factor prices of the two goods, which leads to the terms of trade, and consequently, they also tell you about the supply and demand for each good. I'm throwing around a lot of terms here so it's pretty clear that offer curves are pretty useful for a lot of things. Because they tie together supply and demand of exports and imports of the goods for each country, effects of things like changes in income, substitution, etc all also can be observed with the curves and the magnitude of these effects measured through the elasticity of demand for the good and the elasticity of the curve itself.

The math for all this is pretty intuitive (and pretty cool). The relationship between relative prices and their consequent effect on terms of trade is simple calculus, and understanding the effect of elasticity requires only the most basic of basic understandings of multivariate calc, really, it's just a couple simple partial derivatives. Rudimentary though it may be, the math going on here says a lot and gives you an intuitive sense of how and why everything comes together in offer curves. You can literally see the relationships when you have the equations linking all the variables together; you can feel each thing shifting and responding in graceful, seamless unison. It all ties together like a pretty bow on a present.

Given this, I was obviously surprised when I noticed that the chapter merely skimmed through their explanation, simply gave the bottom line of what needed to memorized, and relegated all the math behind it to to the appendix at the end of the chapter.

Um. What?

The math should be the building blocks, not an afterthought of "oh btw, in case your interested."

With a sigh, I filed this away as compounding evidence that there is a lack of math in the Econ dept at both my school and a couple others that I've encountered. Only one semester of calc is required to graduate, the "hardest class" of the major is the only one that is quantitatively based, and I've heard more heard one kid bemoan having to "do math" in more than one class.

For me, economics is a way of seeing the world. A lot of my fellow majors won't disagree with me there. But my reasoning behind this statement seems to be a little different than most. For me, seeing the world is observing relationships. Why people make the choices and decisions they do, what influences their behavior, and how that behavior in turn has effects on the world around them. The first thing you're taught on the first day of your first Econ class is that people are rational. Thinking that through: people are rational, their behavior can be patterned and predictable, patterns can be linked to it other patterns, relationships can be defined, MATH can be used to describe those relationships. Econ is logic. Math is logic. Econ is math.

So it's seems sad to me that math is so often cast to the way side in so many econ classes in universities today. It seems a bit like taking a french literature class and only reading English translations. You get the gist of it, the meaning and richness are gone.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

INTS 210

"Global Issues" is the required foundational course for my international studies major. Given that I transferred my Junior year, I wasn't exactly around to take it my freshman year and have found myself unable to waive the course, test out, swap credits, or any other means of avoidance.

Fully indulging my annoyance with this course is something I simply don't have the time or energy for, but I would like to share a few delightful tidbits of "knowledge" that have been imparted through the course so far:

-Globalization is a world wide evil that is a unstoppable, uncontrollable mystic external force that is controlling all of us against our will and destroying everyone's cultures.

-Liberalization (and I honestly don't think half the kids in the class actually know what this term means, let alone ANY significant facts, or theories, or studies, or anything scholarly about it) is BAD and we should all buy local and shop at farmer's markets and whole foods to encourage local cultural and cease to be mindless economic consumers void of social values.

-And today we learned that the Marshall Plan was basically a US conspiracy to control Europe and us imperialist Americans with superiority complexes cruelly forced American values and standards on European culture and therefore it was actually a horrible idea.

I think you should now have some idea of how I feel about the course. My patience is wearing thin on the number of uninformed ideas being fed to these freshman who don't know any better than to nod and say yes, who aren't being given the facts or even remotely informed about the current scholarly discussion on the topics. Don't get me wrong, critique is fine, great, healthy, and all that good stuff, but this is so subjectively one-sided it's absolutely ridiculous.

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Book

I just wrote the introduction to my book.

And yes, I know you're supposed to write that last, but the words for it came, so I wrote them down. And that was that. Quite suddenly, I've commenced.

I'm not entirely ready to give the verbal trailer for it yet (maybe I never will be). Suffice it to say that it is about my life.

I know, INCREDIBLY self-indulgent. I know, I know, I know. It seems arrogant, egotistical, self-absorbed, overly dramatic, to even THINK that my life is a story worth writing about.

I finally had enough people tell me that IT IS WORTH WRITING ABOUT to stop trying to suppress the urge and force humility. Better to get it all out and down now before I forget the details that give it color and it all runs together.

It's rather unlikely that I'll ever finish, and even less likely that I'll publish it. But it is noteworthy that I've put energy into it given that I seem to have a rather high threshold for interest and purpose before I invest in a project.

So.......here I go!

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Don't try this at home. Or school. Or anywhere.

Under no circumstances should one EVER, EVER put a coffee mug in one's bag.

Even if it only has (sigh, RED) juice in it and is "basically empty."

And especially NOT if one also happens to have $$$$ textbooks in said bag that they were going to return.

Furthermore, one should probably not enlist the help of every swear word they know in front of a group of housing administrators whilst reacting to the unforeseen, yet imminent, disaster produced by this situation.



:(

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Order v. chaos

I was flipping through some style blogs I keep tabs on and found a blogger talking about a room they just love because of its symmetry, "how relaxing" they said.

I peered longer at the room. To me it seemed cold, stiff, overly formal. The idea of being in that room make me feel uptight.

Don't get me wrong, I'm an organization freak who loves me some clean, bold, sleek contemporary lines, but I feel most at home amidst the clutter and unordered mess of the boheme, "how comfy" I say.

And so this interests me.

To one person, an ordered environment can be calming, relaxing: no stress about chaotic, unpredictable lines and not knowing where to fit in them.

Yet to another, the chaotic environment can be more comfortable: no stress about rigidity and conforming to a defined space.

What makes the difference?

Saturday, September 4, 2010

Let's throw the Christians under the bus

First off, what is it with that expression? Is everyone else using it as much as the people I'm around are? What's funny is that every single time I hear it I get an image of the scene at the end of Mean Girls where that one girl gets run over by a bus.

Anyway.

So we were in RA bootcamp a couple weeks ago and there's one particular event that I keep thinking about so I thought I'd blog about it.

We had a couple days of simulations where the old RAs acted out situations and the new RAs had to handle it. It was actually a lot more open-ended and realistic than I thought it would be (although I struggled with the fact that the actors were actors so I couldn't tap into their emotions as much, especially when I knew the actor and that they would never get themselves into that situation. But logistically getting a feel of the flow of situation dynamics and how to handle it was really good).

Anyway.

One of the simulations was a roomate coming out of the closet. Before we walked into the room to start the simulation, we would always prep as a group a little before going in, they would give us about as much information as we would have as RAs, so that the person heading it up would be prepared, and the rest of us observing (we rotated) wouldn't be clueless while watching.

We had some questions about what angle to take on approaching this, with respect to our role as an RA, and our leader made it very clear that, as in ANY case, we are primarily faciliators invested in enabling our residents to have a healthy living environment. With facilitating and enabling comes a sort of neutrality, we're open, we listen, we are flexible on how much we share and step in, but ultimately our goal is to help the residents live the life they chose to live, and to live it healthily and happily.

Neutrality....live their life......"so we can't have any opinion on if they should be gay or not?" asked one of the girls. Uh. No. The leader made if clear that anything along those lines would get you out of a job faster than you can say fire me. "But what if we don't support gays? We can't facilitate them being not gay?" was the girls response. Again: uh. no. definitely not.

I think she took it kind of personally. She rolled her eyes and sighed and said, "well let's just throw the Christians under the bus."

Hm.

In a way, I got where she was coming from, I didn't relate to her personal opinion, but given places in life I've been in the past I could relate to her feeling like she had to support the opinions of an organization that didn't align with her own and she felt jipped.

The thing is. It's not a zero sum game. DHRE wasn't saying "we are pro gay and you are not allowed to not be pro gay, so Christians, keep your opinions to yourselves." DRHE is saying that we are a neutral third party that allows our residents to decide and chose for themselves. If a student is struggling with homosexuality and they themselves do not support homosexulaity, we are there to help them access the resources and support they need to deal with it in the way that they want to. If a student is homosexual and embraces that, we're there to faciliate that aspects of life, theirs and otherwise, that are effected by that choice.

It's not that you can't have your own opinions, its just beyond your role as an RA to impose those opinions on others. Granted, maybe not speaking up about what you believe is against your principles, which is where it could get sticky.

Anyway. I thought her reaction was interesting.

Friday, September 3, 2010

Dreams

Literally every day so far this week, I've had some degree of a nightmare. As in, I wake up suddenly in a cold sweat, or out of breath, or scared, or just plain unsettled.

And every dream has involved a (ficticious) close friend or family member (or both) DYING.

A weak and sickly younger brother that falls ill and dies, an invisible serial killer who targets my closest friends, a grandfather passing away in some strange way I can't recall, etc etc.

I'm not a big dreamer, I've never been the kid who every day goes, "I had this dream last night" no, like seriously it's once in a blue moon that I wake up remebering my dreams. And as far as I can remember, death is not a common topic.

Interpretations please?

(tbh, I think it's bc I'm stressed about my relationship with some people, particularly the possibility of losing them in my life)

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

How full is full?!

I know this sounds ridiculous, but the most difficult adjustment to being back in the states was resuming my old/normal eating habits.

You'd think after 21 years of having relatively similar eating habits, it wouldn't be hard to bounce back after eating differently for a mere 9 weeks.

My best guess (I have no idea how this stuff works) is that because it was something that was difficult for me in India, and took a tremendous amount of self-discipline and effort to adjust to in India, the habits ingrained themselves just that much deeper because of how deeply it impacted me while I was there.

My (amazingly awesome) host family was Jain and thus were not only what Americans might most conceptually equate with "vegan" but also did not waste anything. As in, however much food got made for dinner, it had to be completely consumed (baring death bed status).

My parents never demanded I clean my plate as a kid so this was completely new for me. I struggled the first few weeks and derived little methods to ease trying to squeeze in the final bites I just didn't have room for.

1. Eat as fast a possible, especially at the start of the meal
2. Chug as you have never chugged before. Smoothie? Gone in a gulp.
3. Liquids last. This includes drinks and any food that doesn't require chewing. Chewing makes the inevitably approaching need to swallow that much more arduous.
(4. When all else fails, pitch the leftovers out the window in an unattended moment or feed it to a cow on the street)

This led to a bit of a paradigm shift on what eating was and my mindset while eating. I thought about my food less, enjoyed and savored it less. My focus changed. You'd think I would have been very determined and goal oriented towards finishing my food. Interestingly, that wasn't the case. I can't exactly explain it, but I....I sort of just got into automatic pilot of finishing my food. I didn't focus on the end, I just ate until I reached the end without thinking about it.

I got ice cream once that had these horrible chewy gummy things (ew gummy) in it that would have been grounds to discard the food. I noticed that I didn't continue eating out of guilt, I continued eating out of habit.

My first couple meals at home, with significantly larger portions, I exhibited the same behavior. At one meal, I realized that portions were just so incredible that I literally would have made myself sick had I kept eating and had to force myself to regain awareness of how much I was eating such that I was able to stop myself from finishing.

Yet this posed a new dilemma. If I wasn't going to finish, when did I stop? There was a large buffer range of when I could possibly be considered full.

I remembered in the past, always just sort of knowing when to stop eating. Just as I had made a habit of not thinking about working on finishing, I'd previously lived a life of habit of not thinking about when to stop eating.

My paradigm hadn't shifted all the way back, and it took about a week of effort to get back in touch with my stomach capacity and forcing myself to try to be consistent on when to choose to stop eating.

I still feel like I'm eating more than "usual" and probably more than I should. It all tastes so good though! OH MY GOODNESS it feels so good to be nourished and healthy again! To feel my body strong and feel it soaking up the nutrients in the food!! Asparagus! Broccoli! Zucchini! Pasta! Salad! Chicken! Who cares if I've gained back those 12 pounds I lost, it feels GOOD! Yet, now that I'm healthy again, I recognize that it's time to exhibit some restraint; I don't need TWO plates of butter laden carrots at each meal....

Which lane is the right lane?

Getting used to driving on the left in India took me a while. I was around more organized roads and more traffic than I was in Uganda (in other words, another drive on the left country that I've spent comparable time in) and consequently had to adjust to it more for sake of minimizing stress.

Even then, when I personally was behind the wheel more towards the end of my time there I found myself automatically reverting to driving on the right as instinct kicked in while I tried to handle everything else on the road.

So I thought I actually wasn't that well adjusted to the road system.

Funny thing is, three weeks back, and I STILL frequently, when I'm making a left or a right hand turn, have a moment in the middle of the turn where I become very, very confused about which lane I should be turning into.

Weird, right?

But seriously, I keep having to pause and stop and intentionally tell myself to turn into the right lane. I'm sure the people behind me appreciate it.....lots.

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Dog Tricks, $1

The main street by my campus is known for two things. Cool spots to shop, eat, and drink. And homeless people begging.

I think a lot of us share a common story with how we respond to walking by a homeless person (in the States) waving their coffee mug of coins or their cardboard box with a few sparse dollars. We approach, divert eye contact, and keep walking; often times feeling slightly guilty, but more comfortable with the guilt than the idea of giving money to a strange person that might use it in strange ways. We all know the stories of the beggars that use the money to go buy alcohol, the scams for bus money to visit sick relatives that probably aren't actually sick. Certainly there are a VAST NUMBER of tough life stories that are actually true, of which we may reserve our own opinions about whether situations could have been avoided or handled differently, maybe even with some extrapolation to our political stances and general philosophy on why the world is as it is.


Yadha, yadha, yadha.


So I was walking down the street today and saw a man on a bench with a sweet looking golden retriever lying next to him. Next to the dog was a sign that read "Dog tricks, $1"

How very interesting.

I immediately went through a flood of thoughts and emotions trying to determine what my reaction to this was. My first thought, as I glanced back over my shoulder at the dog, was oh that poor, poor dog taken into possession of his master entirely to serve his master. Like a circus animal (I always threw a FIT about going to the circus as a kid because it made me too sad to see the animals make ridiculous displays of themselves. Not that I was an over-sensitive child or anything...). I also recognized that the dog was probably safer with this guy than roaming the streets and probably quite well fed by passers by.

And then I smirked a little. At this little piece of human behavior that this homeless person (and many others) had picked up on. I doubt many people that pay their $1 to watch the dog trick are actually looking for amusement from watching a dog roll over or sit on command. More likely, that dog, and the owner responsible for the dog whom it's life depends upon, is probably the source of much sympathy.

OF COURSE we feel sorry for the dog, it's in a helpless and desperate situation. And it's a dog, it's sweet and cute, and we cannot judge it for its life choices.

And yet our sympathies for the homeless owner are often mixed, conflicted, if not confused in the complicated mess of how we feel about ourselves, others, our society, etc. And so, this man had figured out that his best shot at inciting money from his peers is to turn attention to the dog. People might not help him. But people will help the dog.

What does that say? What does that mean?

If life is a journey, why not have a full-time travel blog?

I've kept up this site while traveling the last two summers, and when I tell people about it, I always seem to get the same question of if I'll continue blogging when I'm done traveling.

I've always slightly had a thing against blogging about one's life, sure it's interesting, often insightful, and resourceful even, but just didn't seem like something I was interested in.

Then I got a life.

What with the whirlwind of returning from India, the craziness that was RA training, having some free time for the first time in I can't remember how long, exploring my role as an RA, settling into some really interesting class, the woes and joys of starting the job hunt, and a massive expansion of my social group both in size and diversity.........I've got a lot to talk about.

I still haven't decided precisely what the purpose of blogging is for me. As best I can gander, I like having a platform to sort out my thoughts and the accountability that comes with knowing people might be reading it. Forces me to think things through more. As for how I'll decide what to share and why....I'm leaving that up to what I feel the urge to share.

So check up occasionally, and please! Comment! I always like feedback and discussion :)

Best,
Sole Searching

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Made My Day

I was in the kitchen watching Deep cook dinner and playing with Piyu, who was swinging her legs over the counter, contentedly munching on masala chips.

As usual, Piyu was yabbering away in Hindi and also as usual, I was understanding basically none of it. (although, she and I have made incredible progress on the communication front)

I looked at her and, in english, lamented that I wished I could understand what she was saying and that I was sorry.

She brightly cocked her head up at me and said (in english), "it's ok!"

Saturday, July 17, 2010

For Sister Spencer (and everyone else)

1. What was the best thing you ate on your trip?

Oh my gosh, I don't think I can narrow it down. I think the yummiest dish is my host mom's chana something or other with fried roti (verus like.....sauteed-ish). I'm hoping she'll teach me how to make it before I leave, the particular combination of spices is awesome!

Oothapam (uttapam? it seems to vary) is my go to food though. A fried circle of rice flour mixture topped off with a spicy mix of tomatoes and onions (or other stuff) and a side of coconut chutney for dipping. Nom nom nom.

Also, there's a street food here that's basically a fried spicy dough that they salt and serve with whole roasted green chilis. You take a bite of dough and then a bite of chili and honestly, the combination is unbelieveable. The spice of the dough hits you and then sort of a sweet from roasted chili and then a minute later the heat sinks in and you need more dough....and it cycles and builds to hot intensity. Perhaps not the yummiest dish I've had, but it was a great sentimental moment to share with my coworkers.


2. What was the most wonderful experience you had?

Wow, who knows. I mean, what type of experience? Sometimes when I travel, there's a moment that sort of stands out profoundly and comes to sort of define the trip. In Uganda, going out to do house visits for the HIV/AIDS patients in the area was one of those. In Morocco, talking in french about the language of music with a lute player in Casablanca was that.

It could be said that the value of a trip for me is counted in the currency of these moments.

Here, I'm not sure yet. Upon thinking about it more, I realized most of the moments that I cherish deeply are ones where I had a great discussion or felt I was able to really connect with someone. The language barrier has left me more of an observer than a participator, which makes connect difficult.

Sharing chai and discussing life with my coworkers has been great. Getting dressed up for weddings with my host mom has been great. I think also, there's room to say that the extended experience of interacting with the other interns has been momumental for me: they don't just tolerate and accept me but actually embrace and value me and give me space to be quirky and awkward. That's sort of new for me and I've consequently gotten a lot more comfortable with myself.

I think though, one of the most distinct experiences actually may have happened yesterday. I was out in Dewatha to do some final interviews and ended up waiting for a couple hours, whereupon basically the entire village gathered to talk to me. What was amazing was I'd been to a nearby village for a workshop and I recognized some of the kids! And they recognized me! It was great. Over the course of about two hours, I was lead from house to house meeting everyone, being offered chai, and directed to the next place they wanted to show me. It was awkward because I was being waited on hand and foot, but the sheer VOLUME of the people was amazing, really there must have been about 50 all gathered around me and herding me around. So many beautiful people and personalities in one place! I'll probably post about it in more detail later :)


3. What was the most wonderful new insight or revelation you experienced?

No clue. I've learned a lot about community interaction and interdependence and that has been fodder for thought for me and shown me new ways of thinking that I like. It's funny that they refer to African villages as the prime example of working together, the whole, "it takes a village" mantra, but honestly, I think any Indian village is a stronger example of that.

4. Did you buy anything wonderful to bring home and keep the memories alive?

I haven't found THE THING yet, I actually haven't bought a lot here which sort of surprises me because I love the culture so much you'd think I'd be buying things like crazy, but then again, most of it is touristy and that sort of turns me off.

I was actually thinking this morning about what to buy. Usually I like to get one big thing to have in my house when I'm older. I'm not sure what that thing from here will be yet. I'm considering a bed spread. But, and I know this sounds crazy, I think I'm actually leaning towards a small water pot. They decorate them beautifully here and I think it represents a lot about the way of life I've experienced and come to love here and that would be nice to take back with me.

5. Would you go back if you had the chance?

ABSOLUTELY. I HOPE i can come back at some point. I'm basically dying to see Southern India; Pondicherry, Kerela sounds so different and fascinating, and everyone goes to Tamil Nadu, I'm so curious to see it!

6. What did you learn about the faith of the people? Did it strengthen your own faith?

Hm. Not completely sure what you mean by this. Are you referring to any exposure I've had to Hinduism? There's a huge overlap here between the culture and the religion, I've actually wondered what it's like to be a Christian Indian here because Hinduism is so intertwined in everything. I think my exposure to Islam in Morocco was more of a "faith building" experience, to hear some of the people talk about their faith there and the earnestness and absolute reverence they feel struck me profoundly.

They don't overtly proclaim their faith here but they aren't entirely casual about it either. What I think I've enjoyed experiencing the most is that in one way or another, religion is constantly on your mind here but not in such a way that it's separated from everything else. It's not uncommon to see a group of strangers gather on the side of the road at dusk to take a break from traveling and pray together. There are public shrines everywhere. Every family has their gods and/or guru. Every event, every decision, every major life moment is carried forward with hope and help from the gods.

Some could say it's riddled with excess of tradition and a dirth of spiritual comprehension. I don't now enough to make a call like that. What I do know that I've found interesting is what an example it is of having an integrated life and having your faith be at the center of it, but not in such a way that it overshadows other things or blinds you.

Any Requests?

I keep a personal journal to record my thoughts, feelings, ideas, things I personally feel the need to record for myself for any variety of reasons, so I’m a little less hung up on using this blog as a means of record keeping, and am more focused on sharing my experiences.

The problem with this is, on any given day, I have a huge range of experiences. And it all just sort of fills up in my head in a giant mass. Which I think plenty about, but not usually with any succinct goal in mind so I tend to spend most of my time quite literally “lost in thought”. And I really don’t have much of an idea what you want to hear about, so I really don’t know what angle to take in sorting through those thoughts and deciding which to share and how.

So if you have any requests, that’d be great. For both of us. It gives me the chance to think about things I might normally pass by without conscious notice, and gives you the chance to hear more about the things you’re particularly curious about.

In asking for your requests though, I have only one request. In order to ease my hesitancy to speak and not be overwhelmed by my lack of comprehension, I ask your patience and understanding towards anything I might have to say. Any angle I take on anything is obviously going to be ridden with the biases of my American background, my fundamental nature, my opinions, my previous experiences, my still developing understanding of the world, any given number of things. (And anything I do say, I can also probably say about six different ways all leading to different points depending on which things I chose to emphasize at the time of telling.) So take it with a grain of salt, I can only say how I see things. If you disagree or if I’m missing some key point or you see things another way, I’d LOVE to hear.

So please! Ask questions! Just leave a comment below or on facebook or an email or…..some mode of contact, if you have anything in particular you’re curious about!