SCE: My Opinion

How are you doing?

This class has succeeded in helping us understand modern world problems. Educating us has only been the first part though; the second part was telling us what we could do about the problem. I really appreciated how you guys did that for us. The fact that I learned about problems that I didn't even know were problems, like the world's water crisis, is one of the best things about this class. I also got a feel for what a college class is like in SCE better than my AP classes have. I can honestly say that this was one of my favorite classes in my four years since I learned things, but not in boring ways. We were engaged in lectures with multimedia and, thanks to our intimate class setting, we had great discussions about real world issues. I am thankful that SCE requires us to have sixty hours of volunteering. Although, I don’t feel like its a requirement, but a chance to get out there and help my community.

How am I doing?

I believe I have made some progress with my social skills by being in this class. I have always been a little shy but this class has helped me refine my social skills. I have had a chance to improve how I work with others around me to get the job done and done well. I have also had a chance to get out there and volunteer. I probably wouldn’t have known how good it feels to help out if I didn’t take SCE. A lot of people are ignorant of all the world’s problems, but I feel like my eyes have been opened to all the problems out there. I have also grown less nervous of going into my first college class next year since I feel like I already know how it would be from taking SCE.

What can be done better?

I wouldn’t change any of the subjects that are learned. I like having the tablet and it has definitely benefited me in SCE and in other classes. The multimedia in lectures has helped me grasp information better. You guys are the best teachers at this school, seriously though you guys rock. I feel like the discussions in class help me understand anything that confused me about the subjects we discussed and the readings. If I could change something, I would ask to get rid of tweeting for an assignment, twitter is useless. Also, I would try to compile all of our blogger urls since a lot of us were confused in the beginning of the year on how to send/share our blogs to you guys. (We didn’t know whether to email it or Facebook it or use that Google+ thing…) I would suggest asking students to paste our urls on a note or the wall on Facebook or something like that. As long as you guys have all the urls together, it will be easier for you guys and us. I would have liked to have a chance to help out with the Haiti trip fundraising. A lot of others in the class and I wanted to help out, but we didn’t really know what the Haiti-goers were planning and how we could help. Students in class can be useful when you Haiti-goers are swamped with fundraising work. Utilize your resources! Plus, you could always add more fun… and food. You can never overload on food.

Food blog

Breakfast:

Rice crispies cereal: rice, sugar, salt, malt flavoring, high fructose corn syrup, vitamins and iron: iron, ascorbic acid (vitamin c), niacinamide, pyridoxine hydrochloride (vitamin B6), riboflavin (vitamin B2), thiamin hydrochloride (vitamine B1), vitamin a palmitate, folic acid, vitamin D and vitamin B12

Lunch:

Rice: canola oil, rice, salt

Bean Stew: black-eyed peas, tomato paste, water, salt,

Lamb meat: meat, canola oil, salt

Barbecue sauce: High fructose corn syrup, vinegar, tomato paste, modified food starch, honey, salt, less than 2%molasses, natural hickory smoke flavor, spice, mustard flour, dried garlic, dried onions, and paprika

Lentil soup: smashed lentils, mint, red chili’s, water, lemon

Lemon

grape juice: Filtered Water, Grape Juice Concentrate, Grape Juice, calcium gluconate, calcium lactate, ascorbic acid (vitamin c)

Later Snacks:

Steamed beets: beets, water, salt

Cinnamon pecans: pecans, butter, sugar, vanilla, cinnamon

I look at all the names of chemicals that I can’t even pronounce and I think that I eat so many bad things. But, then I think of all the people out there that eat worse stuff, like fast food, everyday. I mean, to me, having cereals, lamb and Barbecue sauce (!) in the same day if so unlike me. I eat pretty healthy for a lot of reasons. First, my mom has hypertension and high cholesterol so she kind of makes us eat healthy with her. It’s kind of like saying: well, if I can’t have it, you can’t either! I can’t remember the last time I had Wendy’s or McDonald's  same goes for junk food, when we have ice cream or pop in the house there must be a really big and special occasion because otherwise it wouldn't be allowed. It’s not really that I'm trying to be healthy but that I was raised that way by my mom and any other way would feel right. Second, we eat a lot of Middle Eastern food in the house, mostly Kurdish food, and our foods are pretty healthy. They mostly consist of beans, rice and a lot of veggies. I wasn't surprised to learn that I'm not that much of a bad eater.

Water Wars

Great Lakes v. Nestle

One thing that Nestle has up its sleeve is that it is a large corporation, but that can also be a drawback. Because it is a large corporation, Nestle bares a lot of weight and burden on its shoulders. And if there’s one thing I understand about big business and corporations, it’s that they need to make a lot of money to keep up with competitors (among other reasons) and they are willing to do anything to make that money. I feel that when you become the head of such a large company as Nestle the dehumanization of the world begins in your mind. You become so detached from the rest of the world, the people and the environment, that it’s hard to think of a project like Nestlé’s withdrawal of the water from the Great Lakes as being a bad thing.

In the documentary Flow, two men were flown up high from the ground in a Ferris wheel and one of the men said how easy it would be to kill any “dot” on the ground for money, this is the same disconnect the Nestle has with people. In simple terms, people are just dots to these CEOs and they don’t care how many dots they have to kill (legally, of course, because it would be a bigger problem otherwise) to get to their prize. And if that means killing off ecosystems and sucking the Great Lakes dry, then they will do that because those things are just dots to them. So, when such pressures like competition threaten Nestle, they have to resort to vile acts like disturbing ecosystems and depleting the Great Lakes water supply. Unfortunately for them, Michigan is not a developing country so they still found a way to beat Nestle at their own game.



 

Privatization of Water Rights

To be fair, we need to look at both sides of the argument. On one side, the big businesses are, supposedly, going to provide economic stimulation (jobs for everyone!). They are supposed to provide cleaner drinking water to the people. They are supposed to do more good than bad, well that’s not happening. Now, I will give some of the private companies the benefit of the doubt and say that they care providing cleaner water, but most of them seem to be hurting the people rather than helping in all other ways. Yes, they are providing cleaner water, but at a cost that is virtually unaffordable by the poor people where most of these private companies are located (one example is Bolivia). The only liquid that seems to be reaching these people for free is the company’s sewage. They were provided jobs but most are fired and yet the cost of water goes up in the region. The water corporations say that “If water costs more, we will conserve it better” (The New Oil – Newsweek). I think this is by far the worst reason I have ever heard a corporation give for what it’s doing.

I think the privatization of water rights may have started out as a way for developing countries to get the economic boast they needed. And even better, get clean drinking water. But it seems that the big corporations controlling this water has lost its way and doesn’t want to help anyone but themselves. Developing countries are vulnerable, they can’t defend themselves like, for example, the people of Michigan can against Nestle. So they just sit around and are forced to deal with these private companies giving them good water at high prices without compensating with a secure job. I think privatization of water, although it may have its strengths, does more bad to people than good and should be subjugated to these private water companies.





Manning the Book Cart

     Can she handle it?

 

          I will be volunteering at St. Joseph's Mercy Hospital-Ann Arbor starting this Friday. I am going to receive training on that day to become a volunteer who mans the book cart, strolling down the corridors of St. Joes with books to give to any and all patients who are bored. This temporary profession may not seem as heroic as, perhaps, going to India or Haiti, like some of my fellow Capstoners, but we can’t all be out there saving babies. Some of us have to do the boring jobs; I do confess to being a little prejudice since I haven’t actually started volunteering yet.
          I joke about my choice in volunteering, but I do take it very seriously. I believe that even small things like this can be that one piece that makes a kid (or adult) happy. Laughter and happiness is the best medicine and I will strive to draw that emotion out of patients whenever I can. I will be volunteering on either Fridays or Saturdays (depends on what day my volunteer coordinator gives me), every week, for four hours a week. I do have to commit to at least six months of service which I look forward to fulfilling with utmost pleasure as I cruise down St. Joes with books.

Currently, the only evidence of my service is this very entertaining volunteer orientation. You can tell how excited I am to be volunteering at St. Joes.

 

This is the wonderful place where I will be volunteering for the next six months. I am truely excited to be able to see the many bright smiles at this place; but really, they dont stop smiling at you the moment you walk in the door.

 

 

"Harlem Streets"

 

The song I picked, “Harlem Streets” by Immortal Technique, discusses the difficulties of living in the ghetto that is Harlem, New York. He talks about how the government doesn’t help the people there so the people have no choice but to live bad lives. He wants people to listen and realize the truth about how bad it really is in the ghetto.  This is shown when he says, “And if you can't acknowledge the reality of my words/You just another stupid mother f***** out on the curb.” The singer, Immortal Technique, is from Harlem himself so this song is really personal. He is almost begging people to listen and work together to do something about the conditions in the ghetto. At one part in the song the Immortal says, “making them deceitful, cannibalistic and lethal.” He is talking about what the conditions in the ghetto are doing to the people. He is exaggerating when he says that the people turn “cannibalistic”, but it really catches peoples’ attention when you hear that. So, it was a very effective use of the word. The lyrics are rhetorical. Immortal Technique is not telling people to rise up and turn against one person or group. He is just trying to educate people on what is going on in the ghetto of Harlem. I really liked that he used “we” a lot instead of “them”.

He made the song personal by including himself. I believe what these kinds of issues should come first over wars in foreign countries. We need to help ourselves before we help others. How can we possibly tell other countries how to run their people and country when we neglect our people like the ones that the singer mentions in his song. The song mostly talks about how and why people turn bad in the ghetto. He explains that there is no other way than to go bad because there is no help from the government. Examples he mentions in the song are the poor education system and minimum wage not being good enough to hold a family with. These problems are always being discussed and protested about, especially minimum wage which most of the time isn’t enough for one family.

Song: "Harlem Streets" by Immortal Technique

(Back-up link to video): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWAyux_yvng

Lyrics:

[Verse 1]
Yeah.... Harlem streets stay flooded in white powder
Like those mother f**** runnin' away from the twin towers
Gun shots rock the earth like a meteor shower
Bowling For Columbine, fair, giving the media power
Innocence devoured like a chicken spot snack box
Government cocain cooked into ghetto crack rock
Corrupt cops false testimony at your arraignment
Check to check, constant struggle to make the payments
Working your whole life wondering where the day went
The subway stays packed like a multi-cultural slave ship
It's rush hour, 2:30 to 8, non stoppin'
And people coming home after corporate share croppin
And f*** flossin, mothers are trying to feed children
But gentrification is kicking them out of their building
A generation of babies born without health care
Families homeless, thrown the f*** off of the welfare

[Hook]
Homicide Harldem, BLAOW!, what's the problem?
Homicide Harldem, BLAOW!, what's the problem?
Homicide Harldem, BLAOW!, what's the problem?
Homicide Harldem, BLAOW!, what's the problem?

[Verse 2]
It's like Cambodia the killing fields uptown
We live in distress and hang the flag upside down
The sound of conservative politicians on television
People in the hood are blind so they tell us to listen
They vote for us to go to war instantly
But none of their kids serving the infantry
The odds are stacked against us like a casino
Think about it, most of the army is black and latino
And if you can't acknowledge the reality of my words
You just another stupid mother f***** out on the curb
Trying to escape from the ghetto with your ignorant ways
But you can't read history at an illiterate stage
And you can't raise a family on minimum wage
Why the f*** you think most of us are locked in a cage
I give n****s the truth, cause they pride is indigent
You better off rich and guilty than poor and innocent
But I'm sick of feeling impotent watching the world burn
In the era of apocalypse waiting my turn
I'm a Harlem n**** that's concerned with the future
And if you’re in my way it'd be an honor to shoot ya
Up root ya with the evil that grows in my people
Making them deceitful, cannibalistic and lethal
But I see through the mentality implanted in us
And I educate my fam about who we should trust

[Hook]
Homicide Harldem, BLAOW!, what's the problem?
Homicide Harldem, BLAOW!, what's the problem?
Homicide Harldem, BLAOW!, what's the problem?
Homicide Harldem, BLAOW!, what's the problem?

(lyrics link): http://www.lyrics007.com/Immortal%20Technique%20Lyrics/Harlem%20Streets%20Lyrics.html