Author Archives: Shannon Reddy

Love and Tennis

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Okay, can we take a second to acknowledge how genuinely nice tennis coach Silviu Tanasoiu was?  Throughout his talk I found myself thinking, “wow this guy seems so nice”, “I wish he was my coach”, and “he is really passionate about tennis”.  His talk covered several key aspects of his coaching that truthfully relate to more than just tennis.  He talked about what a privilege it was for the players on the team to be playing, how “low” their chances were of playing here, how important time management was for them, and how he of them to be grateful and intentional with their time.  He talked of the importance of adversity and how his players were competing on a daily basis, how they can’t pick and choose responsibility, and how he asks to not focus on the outcomes but instead to focus on the tiny details that are in front of you and that you can change.  Finally, he talked about the importance of relationships and being grateful for all the people who made sacrifices to help us get where we are.

I think these lessons relate to more than just tennis and sports in general.  They are lessons we can all relate to as students at Cornell working toward our future.  We are so fortunate to be here getting a good education and getting set up for our future and we are here because of the many people who helped us get here.  Be it our parents, coaches, teachers, and many others, there are so many people who have affected and aided our paths that we should be thankful for.  We are constantly competing with others for better grades, internships, and jobs.  There is a lot we can learn from the lessons taught by our University tennis coach.

Undocumented Dreamers

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While it was hard to hear the speaker, what I gathered from Esmeralda Arrizón-Palomera’s talk on undocumented youth was a rather powerful and important conversation that needs to be had.  Her talk was about the conflict many undocumented youth have, a topic that is important considering how large an issue immigration has been lately.  While many people think of the negatives of immigration this talk phrased this conversation differently.  It is hard to imagine deporting young people who are working hard to gain an education and improve themselves in the only country they have ever known.  The talk discussed the many different programs to help undocumented student youth.  It was interesting to hear how the language changed over time and the many challenges undocumented youth faced within the system built to help them.  For example, the language seemed to criminalize the parents and blame them for the illegal immigration.

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The system also seemed to deem who was deserving of belonging to that group.  By doing this they decriminalized only those deserving while still criminalizing all other immigrants.  There is a definite divide in how undocumented immigrants are visualized and identified.  I think it is impressive that the undocumented youth, despite all the other problems they face, were able to collectively work toward changing people’s perspectives and the many laws that affect them, their families, and how they are perceived.

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Cars and Cooking Stoves

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Today our House Dean, Professor Garrick Blalock, gave a talk at the rose cafe.  He started off the talk by pointing out the hypocrisy between our thoughts and actions when it comes to cars and the environment.  He then led us through a discussion explaining why we wouldn’t purchase a environmentally friendly car if we care about the environment.  The arguments against purchasing a environmentally friendly car made sense, but one thing seemed odd to me.  What did a Prius have to do with the claimed topic of the talk, “Barriers to Adoption: Why Technology Isn’t Helping the Poor and What Can We Do About It?”  It wasn’t until he began talking about the village that I realized that the discussion about the cars was to get our minds going and thinking the way it is necessary to think when discussing technology and why choosing the more technologically advanced and healthier/environmentally beneficial option is not always best.  It was sad to hear how the women in these small villages were using a method that was slowly killing them.  When he began to talk about the new, mechanical engineers design, cooking stove, I was surprised at how quickly we were able to determine its impractical nature.  While it would be healthier, it was in no way practical, like the environmentally friendly cars are for some people.

A new program for more than just techies

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As a pre-vet I was wondering why the Jacob Graduate Degree At Cornell Tech should matter to me.  After all, I’m not an engineer so I won’t be interested at all, right?  Well Adam Shwartz gave a talk that led me to be interested in learning more about the program.  He started by giving insight into the technological industry and how it worked as well as how the school was designed versus other schools.  The appearance and location of the school is amazing and to hear that the school ran similarly to how things ran in the real world was interesting.  I was surprised to learn that teams working together on a project are often from different majors with different backgrounds.  While that makes sense, I always though groups of a certain engineering major worked together on a certain project.  I was also interested to learn the role that other majors play in the program.  The program is not only for techies but also for those interested in health care and other fields.  In the program they teach you how to start up a company and also group people to finish a project.  This allows for people with specialties and knowledge to combine that knowledge to solve a problem.  This means that potentially, someone who is pre-vet, could end up there using technology to solve a major problem in their field.

Humor in the environment

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Similar to last week’s Rose Cafe, we discussed the similarities and differences of two words.  For this talk, it was comedy and tragedy.  Interestingly he chose to define comedy as walking the fine line between acceptable and upsetting.  He also told stories of his grandfather, which opened the talk in a light way and also made the talk feel more like a conversation than a lecture.

I was most interested in the fact that the topic of the talk was “environmental humor” and he talked about his upbringing, religion, and the definition of comedy.  It all seemed to come together when he started showing the clips.  He incorporated a clip that contained jokes about the apocalypse with jokes about religion that showed the pragmatic humor the Jewish people held in relation to Christians.  He was able to incorporate his book idea with the idea that while tragedy brings people together their tends to be more judgement.  He was able to incorporate so many ideas into an engaging and entertaining talk.  I was surprised to hear him talk about laughing at oneself and say that environmentalists did not laugh at themselves as it was interesting to think that perhaps certain ideas lead to more laughing at yourself than others.  This was then transitioned into a humorous clip about environmentalists’ self interest.  Environmentalists get made fun of most because they are not working for a group of people and do not make fun of themselves.  As a animal science major, and huge animal lover, I totally get where this is coming from.  I will make fun of other human issues but never an animal or animal issues.  I prefer animals to people so I, to a certain extent, feel the same way that the people in the clip about wolves felt.

The Past and Present of Numbness

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I never actually took the time to think of the difference between sad, melancholy, and depression.  I also never too the time to think about the history behind these words and what people once thought they were caused by.  As someone who is interested in history, especially greek history, this history of the word and where it came from was very interesting to me.  The image of melancholy is a natural one but is also a calm one, one that is not the same as the wailing image of sadness.  Melancholy is pain and solidarity.  It was also interesting to hear how the overall thought process about melancholy and life in general has changed over the years.  In olden times it was thought that melancholy was thought to bring intelligence and creativity.  Melancholy soon was thought to cause an increase in writing.  Later on, Hamlet rose as a spokesperson of melancholy.  We looked at one of his speeches, the one after his mother marries his uncle soon after his fathers passing, and it made me re-think the character of Hamlet.  In high school we never discussed the character of Hamlet as someone filled with melancholy, he was always described as the grieving son who was sad.  His melancholy led him to be an individual with emotions that those around him never understood.  Instead, those around him act as many do today and questioned weather he was faking it.

Today people will dismiss those who are melancholy or depressed and some go so far as to claim that people are just doing it for attention and they can snap out of it as soon as they want.  This however, is not the case as can be seen by melancholy’s consistent appearance in art and literature throughout the ages.

We came to the modern version and though process behind melancholy when the speaker talked about how melancholy is necessary for love and while we watched the film “Vertigo”.  This reminded me of the idea that there is no darkness without the light and how the moon shines brightest in a dark sky.  It is the idea that everything shines brightest when surrounded by their “opposite”.

Why Ithaca looks the way it does

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Today at the weekly Rose cafe I have to admit I was more distracted than ever.  This was simply because the Guiding Eyes dog that I am a sitter for was there and was very energetic today.  My attention was split between paying attention to the speaker and making sure she didn’t get up and walk around or bark in the middle of the talk.  Her presence was known by everyone there as when our house dog Pepper walked in and walked around, my dog got up to go play with her.  Unfortunately for Pepper she started barking and had to leave.

While I was more distracted the talk was incredibly interesting.  The speaker was talking about the planning of Ithaca and why spaces were the way they were.  It was interesting to hear about the expansion of the city outside of Cornell and the many opportunities and different spaces we have here.  It also made me think of how Cornell was expanding and what our school would do to expand, how it would look, and how it would affect Ithaca.  It was also interesting to hear about the events that happen in Ithaca Commons and how special the layout of the commons is.  I really enjoy spending time in the Commons because of its unique design and was also impressed with the video of the concerts held there.

It was also interesting that the area where Wegmans is, is something that the people of Ithaca were against.  When I am up here at Cornell I go to that area to get a lot of the things I need or want.  I go shopping at Wegmans, pick up pet supplies at Pet Smart, and grab lunch at one of the many food places available.  I will run over to Barnes and Nobles to grab a book or go to Walmart for things I need.  It surprised me that Ithaca doesn’t want a commercial place like this in their city.

But what if we left them alone?

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Tonight at the Rose cafe Nicolas van de Walle, a Professor in the department of government.  I had not read what the talk was about so I found it very interesting that the focus was on the political economy of development in Africa and on democratization and the politics of economic reform in the region.  Africa is not a focus in many history classes, the only mention in my class was when talking about slavery and colonization.  It was interesting to hear more of an economic/governmental talk about Africa as I had not heard much about it previously.  What I found interesting was that one of the only countries in Africa that was economically successful and had a dictatorship without corruption was one that had not previously been colonized.  All other countries who were colonized and receive help from the UN are unstable and have corrupt governments.  This stands as some proof that perhaps if we stop trying to decide everything and provide funds and instead gave them knowledge they may be able to pull themselves together.  One assumption, however, that is being made by both Professor de Walle and the UN is that being a developed country is better.  Perhaps having advanced agricultural methods and farming methods would be beneficial to provide the country with food but other than that it seems that other countries are deciding what is best for another country.

I also think that developing a place like Africa which has such a important diversity of animals and space.  Developing it could turn the once beautiful safari’s filled with animals into a smog filed suburbia with no wildlife.

Getting on the Ice

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First of all, I think it needs to be said that I am a huge hockey fan.  I have been to every home game since freshman year and have gone to the Frozen Apple at Madison Square Garden every year.  I know a lot of the players names (not to be creepy) and own hockey jerseys and a hockey sweatshirt.  I have even pushed my family to come to the games when they are here and buy hockey apparel.  So for a hockey fan, to get to skate on the ice at Lynah Rink was beyond cool. That being said, I have only ever skated twice before in my life because I played basketball all throughout middle school and high school.  I was not allowed to skate for fear of injuring myself while in season so the times I did go, I either clung to the wall for dear life or I was pulled around my other, better skaters (like my sister).  The open skate started off with a mini history lesson about the rink and then a basic skating lesson, however for someone who has never skated before, I was not able to keep up and so I clung to the wall during it.  Eventually my friends taught me the basics and I was able to move around the rink more freely.  I was only able to move one leg though (I’m not the most coordinated) so I felt like a bull or a flamingo instead of a graceful ice skater like many other people looked like.  It was really cool to be on the ice instead of in the stands like I usually am.  My friends and I had a blast skating around and taking pictures.  When the zamboni came out however and we stepped off the ice we realized just how much pain our feet were in and decided to call it a day.  I was really happy though, because this was the first time I was able to go around the rink by myself without the fear of injury.