yygs-ase 2017

I'm taking a brief hiatus from the Netflix theme as I use this platform as a journal

YYGS was the greatest experience of my life.  It was laughs and games of Spyfall over the tables in Trumbell dining hall; it was stolen moments waiting in line and in lecture; it was sitting in the grass with Jorge and our family group; it was nervous conversation with Gustavo as we awaited our admissions interviews—and the rest of our lives; it was inside jokes with Grace and Ashley; it was learning of Douglas's sugar addiction; it was struggling to carry a 24 pack of water on the long trek from Walgreens to Branford college entryway C; it was laughing over gifs we found that were relevant to our presentation on the feasibility of CNS prosthetics; it was a whole new world jammed into two short weeks.

I'll admit that on the first day, I hated it.  I felt like such a social misfit.  As the days went on, I found my social niche(s).  Everyone I talked to, I wanted to—yearned to, even—hear more about.  The genuine interest I saw everyone have in learning, in doing great things, in changing the world....it's unlike anything I've ever understood at home.

Not to mention the incredible cultural diversification.  YYGS is truly a GLOBAL program.  All around the world, people go through disparate and glaring hardships just to earn an education, yet, the commonplace issues I face on a daily basis—not enough sleep, college apps, friend issues—persisted as common threads between us (threads that reach from Germany, to China, to Brazil, to Canada, to the US, to Egypt, etc).

The program as a whole, not to be cliche, was truly life-changing, and overall, inspirational.  I arrived with my goal being to find direction in my life, and along the way, I found myself some lifelong friends. I realized that the latter is probably the best (and the most important) thing that's ever happened to me.

How to Take a Walk down Memory Lane (HIMYM)

This week, I scoured my camera roll in hopes of finding campaign gold for my NHS video.  Between thousands of pictures and hundreds of videos, I realized that the most photogenic moments aren't always caught on camera.  The moments that represent the little things—a high five, a hand up, cheering on a teammate, the creation of that legendary inside joke—find refuge in memories.  In taking pictures and documenting every little thing we do, not to mention our own faces as they change over time (forever chasing that coveted "glo up"), we make a spectacle of things that society views as important, but in reality, the moments that we truly cherish are kept private.  They are the memories we value the most—because we have no insurance policy backing them.

The moments we tell ourselves are important: a wedding, a graduation, a baby shower, that we painstakingly stage to seem "picture perfect" offer only "a semblance of knowledge" into emotion.  What happens behind the lens of the camera tell a real story; what happens in front of it stages a production. The freeze-frames taken today on DSLRs or iPhone 7s may rack up thousands of "likes," but are about as intangible as our ever-dwindling appreciation for life. 

 We're too focused on getting the lighting right on our picture of an aesthetic lunch to truly taste that panini we ordered; we follow our peers on Instagram before we learn their deepest fears and greatest ambitions; we filter out (literally) the imperfections of our life before we realize that we're unhappy.

Our incessant snapping of our lives has given us nothing but a disjointed image of existence.  Now, the sentiment of "life flashing before your eyes," is no longer considered a rare occurrence, present just on the windowsill between life and the grip of death, but rather a mainstreamed form of quasi-sentimentalism brought to us by the makers of Flipagram and Snapchat stories.  Only now, instead of signaling the end of life, these fleeting images signal the end of living.  

Public microagression& rejection (Parks& Rec)

Aggression lives under many identities: passive, blatant, physical, verbal, cyber, political, economic, hidden.  It also thrives in many homes; it festers in workplaces, businesses, schools, public, homes, on the global stage, and even in Hollywood.

Professor Sue clarified that microaggression, the "unconscious" usage of "racial epithets" to reinforce feelings of "superiority and inferiority," is just as prevalent as macroaggression, the only difference being that microaggression is harder to find since it is affixed behind a facade of cultural conformity.  In its more obvious form, aggression stems from nations butting heads like quarreling siblings.  When North Korea gets new, shiny, nuclear toys, so should America.  When Mexicans keep going into the US's room without permission, the only solution is to lock the door (or wall).

Aggression moves towards discreetness in the case of the Chinese one-child policy, which forces the growing population in while kicking girls out.  This misogynistic state of mind persists elsewhere: in the workforce.  When women take maternity leave, they are labeled as "weak" and are passed up for promotions.  When they cut their leaves short, they run the risk of insufficient childcare, as in most states, men are not granted leaves for newborn children (and women are subsequently expected to be the sole caregiver).

Or how about the fact that girls are expected—no, required—to wear a dress to our own school's graduation?  Of course, this dress shouldn't be too suggestive, as to avoid being a "distraction."  Remember ladies, we wear dresses to refine the keep-your-legs-closed mindset "proper" women have; if we are raped it must be because we failed ourselves.

How about the fact that there is nearly no representation of diversified culture in mainstream media? Or, when there is, it's done by white actors, white writers, and white producers?  Even worse, what about our alienization of Native Americans on our stadiums and baseball jerseys?  In doing this, we are literally putting them on the same level as animals: bluejays, seahawks, broncos, bears. Native American "Redskin" culture has been stomped out by modern culture for so long, it's no wonder that our divisible nation, with liberty and justice for some, is barely fazed by objections to derogatory mascots and oil pipelines. Americans may have gotten the whole "no taxation without representation" thing down, but I think we still have a while to go before we can get to "no representation without consultation."  

this reminded me of Sue's comments of the "no, where
are you really from" experiences all too familiar to
all people of color

Raising Smartphones (Raising Hope)

In 1969, the first message was sent between the Interface Message Processors at UCLA and Stanford University.  The internet was born.  The world—and how its people interacted with each other—became forever altered.  In a whirlwind of innovation, computers, microchips, cell phones, smartphones, laptops, WiFi, social media, sprung up like incessant Twitter notifications.  We became obsessed with complete strangers, checking in on them (for even trivial matters) more than we check in on our own families....

nice to see where journalism has gone in
recent years (how can you blame them, though,
when reputable print sources are being phased out
for digitized attention getters)

With the internet, great things happened: knowledge became streamlined and more efficient,  awareness for worthy causes have been able to come into the public eye, and companies have gotten their starts.  People have been given a voice, proliferating the melting pot (or proverbial group chat) of America. But that's not to say that the internet is perfect; in fact, it's far from it.  

Our world has spiraled down into a "cultural anomaly" state of dependence.  Kids are handed "smart"  devices before they learn to tie their shoes.  Our phones go everywhere with us—which is probably why they carry more bacteria than a public restroom's toilet seat.  When the internet goes blank, so do we.  To put it simply: the internet has killed communication.  

The internet has taught us how to live under 140 word limits and 10 second time constraints.  We like to rush through things, scrolling quickly while getting the most information possible—so much so that we tend to scroll past the people and world events in our lives, too.  In the darkness of 1 a.m. browsing, we're trained to be careless and impatient.  Reaching hundreds, thousands, or even millions of fellow internet dwellers at once, we've never been so alone.  

Or, even when we think we are alone, we might not be.  Webcams, public WiFi, online transactions, and dating websites are feeding grounds for cyber security threats and deception.  We allow ourselves to be lulled into a false sense of security from behind a 13" screen and a backlit keyboard, thinking the "best action...is not to be worried" as strangers hack away at our safety.  

The digitization of our world has made us believers in a society without consequences.  Just hit "delete" and all mistakes will be erased. Or let them run viral.  After all, our culture seems to idolize poor behavior.  Take the "How Bow That" girl whose claim to fame came from an exiguous middle-school-dropout education and a violent streak.  

We've been confined to the radius of available network connection for nearly all of our lives, trapped under a net of virtual social obligations.  It's hard to realize how much we rely on the internet until we are faced with, say, a power outage or data overage charges; it's also hard to admit how many excuses we are willing to make for why we rely on it so much: "I'm bored," "I can't sleep,"  "I was curious about something," "I need it for ____".  In the end, the internet won't be going away anytime soon, but what might go in its place is even scarier: our humanity.  

Safe (shopping) spaces {Crazy Ex-Girlfriend}

I once read an article about how relationships are often defined by gift-giving, and the more expensive the gift, the more valuable the gift is considered (more so by the gift-giver rather than the gift-receiver).  With consumerism being such an integral part of our social development, it's no surprise that our national obsession lies not in the Redwood Forests, or Democratic freedom, or even our star spangled banner, but instead in the aisles of our nearest superstore and the swiping of our AmEx gold cards.  I mean, if you haven't struggled under the weight of twenty shopping bags, or left your family on Thanksgiving night to pounce on Black Friday markdowns, are you even American?

Even worse, our consumerist tendencies send a dangerous message simultaneously reminiscent of the pre-Rosa-Parks era and a 1950s household (fitting, since this seems to be when the modern "throw-away" culture began to emerge).  It's no secret that TV ads are geared towards "shopping crazed" and "spendthrifty" women—although most of the women I've met don't love shopping at all (especially shoe shopping... I have never met a woman who genuinely likes it), and in fact, think of it as stressful and tedious.  

If a woman asks to go shopping, it's usually for one of two reasons: she wants to transform a lonely task into a social endeavor, or she believes that she has to stay up to date with the latest trends or be left in the dust.  I, for one, am never one to object an opportunity to shop, but half an hour, sore feet, dozens of chaotic clothing racks, and countless styles sold out of my size later, I realize what a grave mistake I've made (and will most likely make again).  Somehow, the elation and full wallet I usually enter the mall with always manages to be exchanged with fatigue and subtle regret by the time I leave. 

And when advertisements do happen to be geared towards men, this happens: 

you have to give these marketing directors kudos for creativity, though; they
are somehow able to include women in ads for even the most unrelated products!!

 

Here's the real kicker: not only are the advertisements gender-segregated, but the stores themselves are.  In men's clothing sections, the flooring is darker than in the feminine section (I watched a video on this once, and ever since I haven't been able to un-notice it).  This is to promote a sense of "gruff" manliness,  the kind that gives a "man's man" his "display of power."  More than that, the wall color and light brightness in the dressing rooms both tend to fall on the darker end of the spectrum for the ultimate male shopping experience.  And, is that musk I smell? Or perhaps it's just the ambiance from the brown leather seating in the corner...

While male shopping experience may reinforce macho male stereotypes, the same is done for the female shopping experience.  Lighter and brighter colors work to impose the stigma that women are dainty—dare I say, "easy, breezy, beautiful"—and are meant to exploit the feminine instinct to buy. 

The retail giants of our world further amplify gender stereotypes by slapping "feminine colors," a heftier price tag, and a "for her" label on its products, expecting for women to buy into it:

 Simple as that, the frontiers of American consumerism create clear boundaries between men and women.  We as Americans love our separation; we like our societal groups like the food in our microwaveable TV dinners—to never touch, thanks to modern convenience and capitalism.  It seems as if we're telling the same old story, but in a new context: first we separated our rich and our poor, then our colored and white, and now our pink and blue. 

that loving solution (that 70s show)

It is a pitiful truth that great projections of love, being especially conspicuous so near the holiday of St. Valentine, are plagued by fake lovers.  These fake lovers are adulterers, exploiters of our most trusting members of society, and overall, master manipulators.  

Dare I speculate that the growing number of these adulterers have put our nation in shambles; they are the cause for ninety percent of vengeful actions and result in millions of dollars worth of destroyed property (not to mention the physical engagements jealousy can bring people to act upon).  Even worse, philandering calls for the humiliation and defamation of the innocent party.  I think it is an agreeable assertion that "whoever could find out a fair, cheap and easy method" to solve this unbearable epidemic should experience little resistance in its integration.  

Well, after much reflection, I have come upon a most humble solution: a system to permanently mark our mates.  Now, I am not proposing something as barbaric as a cow or even slave branding, as this would be inconsiderate, especially to those who have skin sensitivities.  No, I am proposing for serious couples to have tattoos corresponding to their significant other.  This is a much more modest, yet modern and effective solution.  Aye, the greatest human enemy is shame, and if adultering acts were to be made with visible evidence that the man or woman committing the heinous crime belongs to someone other, shame would surely dissuade even the most unscrupulous lovers.  

I have recently consulted "a very worthy person, a true lover of his country, and whose virtues I highly esteem," a renowned psychologist, on this pressing issue and have received nothing but support for my modest proposal.   "Some persons of a desponding spirit are in great concern" of couples that have bitterly separated, yet each party still suspected of infidelity due to his or her tattoo.   To that I respond: do not fret.  The threat of this will only cause for more caution in entering new relationships that may yield these markings and will offer as a motive to couples to work harder at protecting their relationships.  

It is not enough to ask for a society that values trust, we must force this trust upon it.  We cannot change the American consumerist mindset that views everything as disposable, temporary... but we can create permanence in our relationships ourselves.

Finding X (finding Nemo)

Find "x".  This phrase doesn't just serve as race's stigmatized mantra, but also as my heritage.  That elusive "x" is attached to my identity—both literally and figuratively.

It represents thousands of years and countless generations that have overcome economic and political turmoil.  It represents my yéyé, who once headed a company, yet now struggles to remember his own address.  It represents my wàigōng, whose legacy lives far beyond the grave in all the lives he's saved.  It represents my father, whose calloused hands tell a story of his pre-American lifestyle; from the hard, physical work he did on a countryside farm to the quick-thinking he used while driving a military ambulance—unlike the busy streets of Beijing where he studied, or to the United Nations where he worked—he's truly done it all.  It represents my mother, who has a scar on her right hand from the time she had to build her own school, who raised her younger sister while their parents were working all day and night at a hospital, who tells hilarious tales of the time she gorged herself on crates upon crates of the most delicious grapes imaginable.  The "x" that appears on the top corner of all my papers, my birth certificate, my driver's license...represents more than just me.  It references all these people and more; it pays tribute to every sacrifice and accomplishment others have done to get me where I am today.

But it's more than even that.  In a paradoxical way, nothing represents my American heritage more than my Chinese name.  Like I said, "x" tells a story—one that wouldn't be complete without addressing my parents' immigration to a land "where it is possible to start anew; where it is possible to escape the rivalries of the Capulets and the McCoys."  It tells a story of the clash between stingy communism and careless capitalism...

It tells a story of how my mom cuts her own hair, a post-communist frugality present decades later.  It tells a story of the stoicism and the "I love you"s that are as wrapped up and hidden like the meat of homemade dumplings.  It tells a story of my frigid house temperatures in the winter ("just wear more clothing!") and sticky uncomfort in the summer (apparently air conditioning is for wimps).  It tells the story of Sunday Chinese school, piano lessons, and my father's obsession with succeeding in the American school system.  It tells a story of the (truly inedible) "brownies" my parents used to make without sugar because "American food is always too sweet." It tells a story of the plastic utensils my parents use and reuse.  It tells a story of eating bacon with chopsticks.  It tells a story of the empty pickle, yogurt, and cashew containers under their new identities:  sugar, sponge, and soap containers.  It tells a story of adversity.  It tells, or rather, shows, me that if my parents can start from nothing—little money, minuscule social awareness, and limited communication skills—there's no reason why I can't succeed, too.

My name gives me both the confidence of historical backing and the optimism for future endeavors.  It builds the framework of my identity and is the linking bond that reaches across thousands of miles (specifically, 7,100) and back thousands of years (specifically, 4,087).  I haven't found "x;" it's found me.

I really, really, really like this gif for some reason

A Man's Best Friend (Friends)

***I decided to attempt to mimic Wallace's writing style here... unfortunately, blogger does not have a footnote feature :(

Consider the Pets.  Consider the dog, or cat, or goldfish, or lizard, or hamster.....

They may not grow up in the depths of the ocean, only to be snatched out of their homes and held captive, awaiting death at the hands of a kettle— in fact, the pets we have in our homes most likely have never known living in the wild at all (and no, an afternoon in a gated, suburban backyard does not count as the "wild").  Surely, our domesticated bundles of joy would never be found on our dinner plates, only on our windowsills looking longingly out, or in our cages, clawing at the bars.  Perhaps our friendly companions have more to do with our food than we originally thought...

Let's take a look at the hamster (they're totally overshadowed by dogs and cats and deserve some of the spotlight too).  My family has had 4 before (two at first, but they died within a couple years and were promptly replaced); they were the first and only pets at my house.  From the moment my brother brought them through my front door and I looked into their endlessly black, beady eyes, all I could think was "What was he thinking?" My family... we aren't pet people.  Between the grooming, and strange smells, and the pure maintenance a pet requires, my sibling's (and my) pleads for a pet were always met with a scoff or an eye roll.  Eventually, though, our hamsters grew on us.  Even though, all night long, the sounds urgent sounds of spinning hamster wheels would fill the house; even though we had to buy another cage to separate our two hamsters because "the stresses of captivity" caused for them to "[tear] one another up" to the point that one of them (we called her blackjack) became blind in one eye (Wallace 670).  

living together in close quarters was no party for our hamsters

I watched the hamsters scale their "three-story" cages to the very top, only to make the drop all the way down to their bedding.  Were they trying to find escape, or simply on a suicide mission?    I watched them, notorious for their performances on the hamster wheel, run until they couldn't keep up (often, they would literally flip head over heels), only to pick themselves up and start all over again.  Then follows the trite hamster-on-its-wheel metaphor, the one that pokes fun of those who keep running, only to stay in the same place.  Perhaps, though, the goal has never been to run towards something, but rather, away from something—captivity. Or, even if it is something they are running towards, maybe it's their native homes in Syria, or Siberia, or Greece, or Rome... after all, we all get a little homesick occasionally, and a living room in Troy, MI doesn't exactly mimic the sandy, dry atmosphere they are used to.  I'm not trying to be dramatic... but the more I remember them, I can't help but wonder if they endured pure misery, just for my family to get a few moments of entertainment from them. 

I can't be the first one to have stumbled across this train of thought, but is often not talked about for one simple reason: thinking about the experience pets must endure is unpleasant and interferes with our happiness (and as the hierarchy of the Animal Kindom dictates, our happiness should be valued above all else).  So, we turn a blind eye as we sign up for an invisible fence, or pick up some catnip, or flush yet another goldfish down the toilet.  

Worse than all of this, we make a spectacle of all this misery we put our pets through.  We may not live in glass homes, but apparently, it's fine for our pets to.  Not just glass, though, we will settle for anything, really: plastic, glass, metal bars.... as long as it lets our pets "watch...while [we] point"  (670).  Even when our actions are made with good intentions, to give them a home and loving family, we're displacing our pets from their own homes.  Sure, many pets are born into domestication (especially hamsters), but home is where the heart is... and I doubt that the fluorescent lights and plexiglass cases of PetCo screams "home."

Mindless in the Media (Malcolm in the Middle)

Tick. I'm in third grade.  The girl who sat a few rows down from me uses a walker; she has osteogenesis imprefecta "brittle bone disease."  We became friends, but every time I talked to her, she struck me as beyond her years— maybe this was because she was more serious than anyone else in my class, or because I'd never seen anyone under 70 use a walker before.  Most of all, she looked...tired.  Amidst all the kids swinging, running, and jumping, we would sit together on the playground's only bench and look on.  After I moved away, we promised to keep in touch.  I never did get around to that.

Tick. I'm in 11 years old.  My best friend had broken her foot.  Every day, a swarm of girls would beg her to choose one of them to be her "helper" for the day.  Between getting out of class early and being allowed to try out how "fun" running on crutches is, it was the dream job.  We all knew that the injury was temporary and that in no time, the crutches will be gone and forgotten.  We never thought about what would happen had the injury been permanent.

Tick. It's 7:17 on an unremarkable Tuesday morning.  Swarms of students flooded through the front doors, pressing the handicap assist button to avoid opening the doors themselves.  I walked through easily, my stride unbroken without the inconvenience of a door. I passed by special education classrooms and the school elevator as I rushed to get to first hour on time, unaware of how a slight annoyance to me can be an impossible burden on others.

Tick.  It's a half-day after exams and I'm in the Smashburger parking lot.  I started to wave as I saw two girls from Troy High try to find a parking spot, but I drop my hand as I spotted them, unwilling to wait for a spot or drive to the back, pull into a handicapped-reserved space. That was the first time I ever thought about what those saved 10 feet meant to a disabled person.

there are so few tv scenes dealing with disabilities
that I had to make my own gif

I had let the ubiquitous nature of disability fade into the background like white noise for so long that the realization that "without warning, at any time," the reality of disability could become my reality shocked me (Mairs 15).  In each of these experiences, my time as a "Temporarily Abled Person" was ticking away; I was growing closer and closer to becoming disabled myself (15).  The biggest problem surrounding disabilities' portrayal in the media is that there is almost none (and when there is, the disabled are seen as weak and unimportant, so they never end up sticking in our minds anyways).

We see the accommodations made for the disabled every time we walk into a public restroom, park our cars, or use automatic doors... but we ignore them.  In a world where efficiency is valued in communication (if it's not under 140 words, is it even worth reading?) and clickbait is the ultimate media tool, we know more about what Kylie Jenner wore last weekend than the 6.5 million people who require a wheelchair/cane/walker on a daily basis.  Maybe it's because we see humankind as invincible and the vulnerability of the disabled makes us uncomfortable.  Maybe we are too busy with our own lives to worry about others.  Whatever the cause, we've become disabled in our efforts to avoid disability; we've blinded ourselves from the harsh truth that runs our world.