“Blog vs. Journal: My reflection on my blog" 

Home Written Stream of Consciousness

This semester in Journey in Literature I’ve had one of the best experiences with my writing assignments compared to my most recent literature classes. The journal and the blog are a great way to express one’s self in the form of creative writing. If you enjoy writing, and like to travel or to reflect on your previous adventures, than this is definitely the class for you! Besides the essay that we had to write (which was a good assignment, in my opinion) the journal and the blog have been the remainder of the work that we've done this semester.

The journal is where most of the work has been done. It has helped me to expand my creative writing technique in a great manner. In the beginning, I could only write around a page, maybe a page and a half of pure narration. What I mean with that is that I told everything as if it were a travel itinerary, in a synchronized order. However, towards the end of the semester, I learned to actually analyze what I have done in my past travel experiences, and comment on how that can make me a better traveler than I’ve ever been. On the other hand, the blog project has been less work, but it has inspired me a lot more than the journal. In fact, I even started my own personal blog where I can share my thoughts about life and the random occurrences that I have during the day. Writing is a very good exercise for the brain, and there are scientific tests that have proven that writing helps a great load with your brain plasticity. If I had to make a decision in which one of the projects I preferred, it would be the blog project, because it inspired me to keep writing creatively and to expand my creative capabilities, and I thank this class for that. 

Before I started this project I was never into creative writing, but the stress that it takes off your back is enormous. It really is a form of meditation, when you grab your laptop, and start typing away, its liberating! It's also a good way to express your feelings if you have no one to talk to, or write down good memories that you want to remember in the future. That's actually really important; this blog sort of works as your legacy, and it's the narration of your life through your own eyes, somewhat of an autobiography. I found this to be a great project, and I'm hoping to get this assigned for some of my other literature classes.   

“The application of Daisy Miller in Modern society”

Home Written Stream of Consciousness

The identity issue plays a very important role in Daisy Miller. She is somewhat excluded or criticized for the way in which she acts, when it’s really just her being herself. It’s not fair that people take the liberty to judge other people just because their attitudes or their social practices are different. This type of behavior occurs nowadays, and it’s a major cause of bullying which can lead to many problems in the people that are being bullied. The thing is that finding yourself and your identity is not an easy thing to do when society is organized into different cliques, and when the concept of sameness is applied. Once it’s applied, the exclusion begins, because people start to compare themselves to others, which always leads to trouble.   

In the novella, Daisy is going through this exact same process that I’m trying to explain right now. She is a young girl, and she’s in the process of discovering herself and what she wants to do with her life. Because she acts the way she does, she gets excluded and prejudiced by society, which is another problem that is reflected in modern society. You can also see that she’s discovering herself because she tries different experiences, and tries to meet new people. She meets Winterbourne, which becomes a good friend of hers, and she also meets Giovanelli which she also gets along with, and has a connection with.

People should not be so quick to judge, because they don’t understand what people may be going through in a particular time frame. I guess that society is just built that way, and humans are met to get into groups with the people that have things in common with them. It’s like people don’t even notice how cruel and sad it can be when a person is excluded.    

“I love riddles!”

Home Written Stream of Consciousness

HI! Today I read one of my friend Eduardo’s blog posts (for this class, in fact). In his post, he talked about a movie called Fermat’s Room and about riddles in general. I need to say that I ended up taking a good three hours of my day based on that small three hundred word post that he did on his blog. It’s funny how things can influence you to do things by just receiving minimal stimuli, I think that’s especially highlighted in me, because of my ADD problem. So I watched the movie, and I totally loved it, and the concept behind it. The directors did a great job keeping tension and keeping a great cohesion in the story. (Although, I don’t know if we saw the same version because I watched the original one from Spain.)

After I was done watching the movie, I went back to his blog to finish reading that particular post, and as I started to finish it, he started talking about a riddle developed by Albert Einstein. I looked it up and I started to try and solve it, and it is truly challenging. The page that I found it in said that supposedly only two percent of the population is able to solve it. I DID IT! It took me one hour and twelve minutes, but I was able to do it. I was very proud of myself when I finished, and I shared the riddle with everyone in my family. The truth is, the riddle is not that hard, it’s just complex. It has about twenty components, and you have to build up on them slowly. I think that if only two percent of the earth’s population can solve that riddle, it’s all in the patience factor, because I thought about checking the answer, or giving up a couple of times, but since I didn’t have anything better to do, I soldiered on. It’s one tough cookie!! 

“The Island”

Home Written Stream of Consciousness

The movie that I chose for the final class assignment is The Island. It is loosely based on one of my favorite books of all time, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. The novel is amazing, and the way that Huxley writes it really makes your imagination run wild. At least, when I read it, I created a really good mental image of what was going on during the story. My choice was originally going to be The Kite Runner, but I found out someone wanted to take that as their choice, so I decided to go with The Island. It’s about the way that society learns to accept things that people say are normal, when in reality they should be found morally and ethically questionable.

It was adapted into a movie that I watched (after I took the test on this book) and I found that the movie was very unfaithful to the book. However, the movie is a journey all by itself and it makes you reflect about society and how people are easily manipulated into assuming that things that are found socially acceptable are right. This is clearly not always the case, and the moral behind this book is that you should learn to question the system, and to make your own decisions in situations that normally would be considered wrong.    

Even though I really liked this novel, I’m going to have to watch the movie again because I forgot most of the details from the movie. Also, if have enough time I might be able to re-read the novel as well, so that I can compare both story lines with a fresh notion of what happens in the story. This also has to do a lot with science, which is what I’ve lived for, for the major part of my life.  

“About a picture”

Home Written Stream of Consciousness

We've all heard of the phrase “A picture is worth a thousand words”. This is sometimes very true, but it all depends on the point of view that a person has when observing the actual picture. A good example of this is the Rorschach inkblot test, where patients are shown a distorted image that is painted using ink, and they are asked what they think the image is of. This a perception test and it’s used to see how people perceive different images. The same concept may be applied to a picture, because different people apply different life experiences that can serve as a bias or as an inspiration for what they are seeing in the image.

Take this image for example, if different people are asked to describe the image people will probably have a very different opinion on what they see beyond the obvious detail of the flower. This occurs because everyone has a different type of perception, especially when what you see in the image is not a usual object or has unusual colors or shapes. Instead of thinking about the ordinary, and what you’re used to, you try to make up different traits that you can attribute to the image.

One cool activity that I did once in my 11^th grade AP psych class was an awareness test. During this test you were asked to perform a task (to count the amount of passes that a few players make while playing basketball) but then you’re asked if you saw a background activity, and the results are surprising. In fact, I will leave the video for you to watch, it’s really interesting and I can almost guarantee that laughter will come out at the end of the video. So maybe a picture is worth a thousand words, you just have to choose the words according to your previous experiences.            

“I wish I had a time machine”

Home Written Stream of Consciousness

I’m nearly half way through my college work in order to achieve a degree in biology. It really feels like I’ve hardly spent any time studying here in the UPR. Time goes by in a flash, and before you know it you already have a job and a ton of responsibilities. So, before I finish my first official college degree and I head off to medicine school, I want to do some things that I won’t have time for in the near future.

I want to do a semester abroad, so that I can get in touch with some other culture besides my own. I’m thinking of going to Australia for a semester, or maybe to the U.K. I want to visit a country that I can explore, but that I can easily move from in order to explore other countries. Australia is enormous, so just exploring it will be an adventure. On the other hand, the U.K. is much smaller, but there are many places to explore nonetheless. In addition, I can move from the U.K. to Europe in a matter of hours, which is excellent. In terms of travel, I would also LOVE to go to Brazil during the summer of 2014 in order to experience the FIFA world cup. This is something that I feel I have to do in my life, because I love soccer, and going to a world cup is the pinnacle of the sport.

After I finish my B.S., I plan to attend medical school in order to obtain my MD. I know it’s going to be very challenging and rigorous, but it’s what I want to do and feel that I’ll be good at it. I’m looking at several medical schools, but among my top choices are Brown, Columbia and the medical sciences campus of the UPR. I really hope my med school career goes successfully and as planned. After med school, I plan to specialize in Invasive Cardiology.       

“Student conference”

Home Written Stream of Consciousness

I’ve had very few opportunities to speak in public since I graduated from high school, because in High school there are many more extracurricular activities that involve speaking in front of an audience. I really like to speak in front of people, so I was glad when the professor told me I could read my essay in the amphitheater. The only problem with the whole thing for me (my presentation I mean) was that I was very sick, and after the first page my throat got really dry. After I paused for a drink of water, I got really nervous and I started to sweat, a lot! It was horrible, my face was covered I sweat, and because I was conscious that I had a crowd in front of me. Nonetheless, I tried to maintain my composure and I kept reading my essay as calmly and clearly as I could.

The idea of making a conference where students can share their thoughts is really cool. It’s good to be able to express yourself, because you can share your thoughts on assignments or life experiences with other people that have experienced similar situations. It’s also a great opportunity to foment student’s creativity and the fact that people pay attention to what you write. I think that for the next activity, the strategy for promotion has to change. This time around there was very few spectators in the crowd, but with the right promotion, a big crowd could be built up. By going to this conference, you can also observe that diversity that there is in the English department, in terms of the courses that you can take. In fact, since I have to take another English literature course for med school, I might just take one of the courses that I learned about that day during the conference.         

"The ever "Holy Cow!"" 
Home Written Stream of Consciousness 3/17/2013 

It is very difficult to truly understand a foreign culture without actually immersing yourself in that culture and actually having life experiences that resemble those of the people you are visiting. Once you are able to have these experiences you’re able to feel a lot more comfortable in a different culture, and you become fit to express your opinion in terms of that culture. It’s noticeable in Holy Cow that Sarah MacDonald makes an attempt to truly understand the Indian culture, because she tries to get in touch with the true, quintessential Indian soul. Once she’s able to get in touch with her “Indian” soul, she becomes a traveler, because not only does she visit India in order to go to the ordinary tourist attractions, but she has more of a personal, in the “nitty gritty”, point of view. This demonstrates how a person can change from being a simple tourist that has the common purposes for going on a trip, to a traveler that can get in touch with other people and have an understanding of what it is to be a part of a particular culture. This life experience taught her to “Never say Never” because she had previously said that she didn’t want to return to India, but when she did, she was able to realize that there was more to India than what she had seen.

In my opinion, this was both an internal and an external journey for her because not only did she go around India travelling, but she also had a change in her state of mind. On a personal note, this didn’t happen to me directly, but when I went to China with my family for the first time, my mom didn’t have such a good time, and she was afraid to taste the food, and she was afraid to go into dark alley ways to buy fake “stuff” (which I did with my brother and my reluctant sister) but when we went back, she actually tried to get more in touch, and she spoke with the people that spoke English, and she tried to do as many things as she could do, despite her physical limitation. (She has a bad knee, from an accident.)

I will close with a quote, which I find has a little bit to do with the theme at hand, because the USA is a melting pot of several cultures, and you can find something different within miles:

“And I will do everything that I can as long as I am President of the United States to remind the American people that we are one nation under God, and we may call that God by different names but we remain one nation.” –B. Obama

                             

“But, where is the view?” 

Home written stream of consciousness 2/18/2013 

A Room with a View was a great film. It was definitely a journey even though the main characters traveled only half of the movie. This is because it was more of an internal journey, a journey of the emotions and the actions that eventually led to George and Lucy’s marriage. This movie makes it very clear that one does not need to travel in order to go on a journey; a person can always depend on their imagination. Nonetheless, a journey in mind is as much a journey as a trip that anyone takes.

 It is clear from the beginning of the film that Lucy seems interested in George, but it appears that she is somewhat constrained or limited because of the mindset in the epoch that she was living. This makes it evident that social ideology can be very powerful, and it can even influence how people think and what people feel, because Lucy sort of doesn't like the idea of marrying George at the beginning. So basically, the movie is a journey of how Lucy changes her mindset from not wanting to be with George, to marrying George at the end.

It was funny to see how the movie started in the same way that it ended. At the beginning, Lucy was with Charlotte in the hotel room in Florence, discussing over why the room they had gotten did not have a view. At the end, Lucy and George are pictured sitting on the window frame looking out to a view of Florence, in the same place that the first scene of the movie took place. In my opinion, Italy was like the game changer in Lucy’s mind, because maybe she felt more freedom in Italy than what she felt in her small town in England.

Another noticeable scene in the movie was towards the beginning, when Lucy goes to the church and she meets George’s father, there is a tour group taking a tour. This was a funny scene, because all of them were following what the tour guide was saying very closely, and they sort of moved as a one unit, composed of a lot of tourists. If one were to juxtapose travelling vs. tourism in the movie, the traveler side of the story would be Lucy and her odyssey, and the tourist side would be all the people that were in Rome. A movie worth watching!        

"How to lose control of one fourth of the world population.”  

2/17/2013 Home Written stream of consciousness

This second chapter in Kinkaid’s novel applies to many people. Almost every part of the world has been either a colonizer or colonized. Mrs. Kincaid’s reaction is only natural. One would expect a person that lived through that era to feel mad or discontent with the colonizing country. I guess many people that live in Puerto Rico could identify with this situation, as the island has been a colony for hundreds of years. It would be curious to have a Puerto Rican person that is in favor of the islands independence read this and react to it, although many people share Kincaid’s thoughts. The only difference between Antigua and Puerto Rico, besides the obvious ones like size, population and native language, is that the country that once colonized it, gave it its independence.

This has its pros and cons: In the pros, well the country got its independence. In the cons, the country lost its source of sustenance. For example, Kincaid mentions the library that had been damaged in an earthquake. One has to ask the question: “would this library still be closed if they were still under the reign of the United Kingdom?” I think that a lot of the people in Puerto Rican society have gotten accustomed to being economically sustained by the United States, which is why many people don’t want to change the status quo. 

Personally, I favor statehood for the island, but this island is so full of deficit and of lazy people that, that might not even be a possibility. I do know though that if the island manages to get its independence, we are not going to be self- sustainable economically right away. The island would certainly go through some very hard years until it can finally reach the minimum amount of financial stability, partly because we are lacking in infrastructure, and we are lacking in industry and agriculture. It would take years before we could properly handle ourselves. I just get mad thinking about the status crisis that we have, Are we ever going to fix it?       

"Ignorance is bliss, tis folly to be wise” 

2/17/2013 Home Written stream of consciousness

WOW! This first chapter from Kincaid’s novel gives a whole other meaning to the world travel. Mostly, the point that she is trying to establish is so shocking because it’s so undeniably true in most cases. I mean, when I travel I try to be as inconspicuous as possible, I try to blend in with the locals just because the type of person that has been coined with the term “tourist” is not what I like to associate myself with. Anyway, this chapter of the novel is like viewing travel from the opposite side, we look at a trip through the eyes of the native. When one travels, and in my opinion this applies even more to developing countries, a person never thinks about the tiny details as Kincaid mentions: “You must not wonder what exactly happened to the contents of your lavatory when you flushed it.”

It’s very inconsiderate to just go to a place and enjoy all the island has to give and just leave, when the other half of the island, the one that you didn’t see, is crashing and burning. I mean, you’re paying for it, of course, but sometimes people just ignore the panorama of the situation; barely anyone sees the big picture. I’m not intending to be highfalutin, I’m not implying that when I travel I don’t do these things, but I just want to agree with Jamaica Kincaid, because it’s so true. People go through hardships and some don’t have the frivolities or the luxuries that we consider normal technology, acquirable by nearly everyone. 

I think that if you truly want to be a traveler, and be a part and immerse yourself in multiple cultures, you authentically have to experience what the people of that culture go through, not be ignorant about things, just because it’s convenient. More on this later… Those words in my title from Gray are so true sometimes, although wrong in some cases, but for the most part, true. 

"Expect the Unexpected": 
2/03/2013 Home Written stream of consciousness

There are some things that are overrated in this life. I truly believed that the first weeding I ever attended was going to be amazing and at least a bit fun for a few hours. But contrary to everything that weddings were sold out to be it was pretty boring. I mean, I’m not trying to say that I’ve spent countless hours contemplating over what my first time in a wedding was going to be like, but movies and TV shows and a fair amount of books that I have read, depict them as something out-of-this World. Of course, this is like believing that everything on the internet is true, it’s extremely naïve on my part, but I would have expected it to be a bit fun.

In reality this is what took place that day. First thing that happened was the actual wedding ceremony, which as I expected, was pretty boring. But that is always the worst part, as I expected it to be, it’s just a ceremony afterall. After this, the reception (previously known as “the promise land”) was the next event that was in plans for the day.

When we arrived, there was a ton of people mingling in a room, and since this was a second cousin's wedding, I barely knew anyone. I knew I had seen at least ten people before this event, but I didn’t remember them, and seeing as they didn’t talk to me, they probably didn’t remember me either. It felt sort of pointless standing in a room with no one to talk to, but luckily my sister had the same sentiment, so we spent the rest of the day together. 

Later on, when we started to sit at our assigned table with our parents and some cousins, I started to talk to some of them. We had some things in common which served as good conversation topic. It was the usual teenage chit-chat, video games, TV, movies which are apt for an ample conversation. They were at least enough to last us through the dinner.

After dinner (which was very well cooked), the dancing started. The band was really good, but I really didn’t have enough courage to ask anyone to dance. I didn’t know any of the girls; I hadn’t seen my cousins in years, so I took the obvious choice, my mother. We danced for a while, but she said she got tired of my two left feet. So my brother and I ended the night in the hotel room, where we hooked up a PS3 to the TV and we played for the rest of the night. Unfortunate, this was the highlight of my day. Point being, expectations are not to be taken too seriously, sometimes they don't play out.            

"Helping" is not necessarily a bad thing: 
2/11/2013 home written stream of consciousness

Late last night, I read the chapter on “Helping” in Jim Cooper’s book on his personal experiences at the UPR at Mayaguez. I really did find some of this text funny, even though in my opinion it was not written with a humorous connotation, some of the things Cooper mentioned drew a giggle or two. What Cooper establishes in the text is that some of the students that took class in the English program helped each other with assignments and even tests, because they simply had the urge to help their friends. The students kindly didn’t want their friends or relatives to fail, so they provided a little bit of help. The way in which Cooper writes this chapter is not offensive, it just emphasizes how innocent or maybe how naïve some of the students were at the moment. They genuinely didn’t understand the classroom rules, and no matter how many times the professor tried to explain, the students still didn’t understand. The thing is, the students didn’t really see what they were doing as cheating; they were simply helping their classmates to do better in the assessments.      

In my opinion this isn’t such a bad thing to do. Of course, nowadays things have changed a bit, technology and mass media make it a bit easier to learn things, at least language wise. Also, plagiarism rules and academic dishonesty are a BIG deal. I personally can’t cheat on an exam, never have and most likely never will, due to the simple fact that I don’t want to risk all the effort and expenses that my parents have put into my education for one simple test. I would rather fail with dignity than copy on an exam, get caught, get expelled, and never get a chance to reach my goals. Even if my parents hadn’t put in the effort and the money, honesty is still a crucial value for me. However, at the specific time that the story was taking place there was a much greater deficiency in the English language on the island. This was a good way for students that actually knew English to practice, while at the same time spreading their knowledge to their peers.  

When one reflects on the current situation there really isn’t much of a difference in the education system. The government seems to be indifferent in terms of education, because some public high schools have a horrible ESL program. There are a few exceptions though, I personally took the College Board in a public school, and a lot of the students that went there not only knew English, but a lot of them were really nice and welcoming, very different than past experiences that I’ve had when going to public schools. The system definitely needs a radical change, education wise, but that’s not going to happen until there is a collective radical change in Puerto Rican society.  

"A journey in a day":
1/21/2013 in class stream of consciousness (finished at home with an extra 20 mins)

Yesterday I did something that I usually don't do, I actually thought about what I did during the day. As per usual, I woke up at 4:45 a.m. hit the snooze button and went back to sleep for the next five minutes. Unfortunately, five minutes later I was on my way to the shower to take my bath and leave for my 7:00 a.m. class. I constantly keep thinking of how I seriously have to think about my schedule choices a lot more, these morning classes are really exhausting. 

Once I finished taking my shower I got my clothes from my closet, got dressed, brushed my teeth, put on cologne and finally said goodbye to my parents. When I said goodbye to my mom she said the same thing she says every morning: "call me when you get there, be safe, I love you." Seriously, if I wake up one day, and I don't here those words before I leave, something's wrong. Funny how a few words can be so meaningful and turn into a part of your daily routine. Once I said my goodbyes, I got in my car and left. At this point it was still 6:00 a.m. but I live far away from the UPR and this is the time I have to leave to make it to my class on-time. Of course, when I was leaving the driveway, I couldn't help but noticing that I put on the music in my car almost automatically, I barely though about it, I just DID it. That's muscle memory, I (as almost all humans do) have made it a natural action to put on my music  as soon as I get in my car.

The trip to the UPR was long and full of traffic, and nothing noticeable or worth mentioning happened on the way. So once I got there, I spent a good five minutes finding a parking space (7:00 a.m.) and I headed off to my first class, Psychology. During the class I sat in the same spot and did the same thing, listen and try not fall asleep. After this class I had a two hour break. This is where the eventful stuff happens, during my breaks. I walked to the Natural sciences library and sat in front with the usual "click". We usually just play cards or do homework. Although, this specific day, we decided to just study for the upcoming chem test, this carried on for maybe an hour and fifteen minutes, until I left to my next class, chemistry (10:30 a.m.). This was a good class, mostly because I love chemistry, and I like learning new things. But again, notes, attention and problem solving. Once I left chem it was 12:00 P.M. at this time, I headed to the student center with a few of my pals to eat lunch. It isn't good to eat at the student center at mid day, the lines are extremely long. We spent 45 minutes just getting lunch. By the time we were done eating, it was time for my last class of the day, biology. Which was basically the properties of a water molecule and the discussion of functional groups. After this class ended, It was 4:00 P.M., so I left and got home at about 5:30. I spent a few hours studying and doing H.W. maybe an hour having dinner and I ended up going to bed at 10:30 P.M. Just to start the cycle again in 7 hours or so. I guess my weekly routine, with the exception of weekends, is pretty much based on the same activities on a daily basis, I find it sort of monotonous when I think of it, but really, I rarely analyze my daily activities, so it must be pretty normal by now.        

"I Think I’ll stick with the Dolphins": 

20/1/2013 home written stream of consciousness 

There was this one trip to Mexico which was rather adventurous. I got to swim with dolphins, climb ancient pyramids (funny story, I'll leave that for later), and even got the chance to go cave diving. Now, I have been a certified open water scuba diver since I was ten years old, so by then I had already been on a few dives; I was twelve. However, I had never been so scared, vulnerable or prone to death while scuba diving. 

Honestly, when my dad told us that we were going cave diving that morning, I was really excited, because this isn't an opportunity that comes up often. So later that day we went to take a course on cave  diving where we learned all the guidelines, rules and safety procedures on what to do while underwater. This whole lesson just made me even more excited, but it wasn't until we were about to go underwater when the nerves kicked in. My whole idea of what this would be suddenly took a drastic change and I no longer wanted to do it, nonetheless, I ended up doing it. But here's what made me nervous, it wasn't the 1,000 pound sharks or an eel the size of my arm, the worries lied in the holes that you had to squeeze through in order to proceed with the dive. Those holes were really tight! So really the fear factor roots from being in a foreign environment, where you can’t breathe, and you can lose your breathing apparatus in a heartbeat. There are practically hundreds of things that could go wrong. 

But the fact of the matter is, we pushed through and made it to the end of the dive. This adventure ended on a humorous note: while we were putting our gear away, my dad asked me "What did you think of cave diving?" and I answered "I think I’ll stick with the dolphins."