This week, I got to watch a demonstration on how to make sushi. Sushi is my favorite food, but I have never tried making it on my own. However, I always assumed that it would be easy to do. Not quite. I never thought about what an art it is to make food, especially sushi. I assumed the most important ingredient was the raw fish, but it’s actually the rice. Not only is sticky rice cooked with a special cooker that steams the rice to make it fluffy, but it is also very difficult to handle when making sushi. You need the correct amount per roll and you need to flatten it out without crushing it. Once that is laid out, you need to place the ingredients carefully onto the rice. Apparently soggy foods like cucumbers and avocado has to be in the back of the roll to preserve the roll’s structure. And rolling it perfectly is an art of itself. This is definitely not an easy food to make. The chef demonstrating the sushi creation told us that it took 600 hours to be a certified sushi chef. It’s incredible how we assume things to be easy, but actually are very complicated.
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Sunset from Beyond the Grave
I love old films. I’ve seen many black and white movies, and I even watched a few silent movies. I came into this not knowing anything about the movie’s plot, but I was excited to watch a new old movie. This movie had a very unique narrative: one of a dead guy. Joe, the main character, establishes that he is dead from the beginning and the movie presents the events that lead to his downfall. We inevitably know what’s going to happen, but the tension and intrigue comes from the lead up to his death. The movie presents a full circle where the character ends up dead in a pool, which is where he started. This narrative is so important to the movie because it emphasizes how badly the human voice wants to be heard. Even after his death, he continues to tell his tale. Ironically, this also parallel’s Norma’s desire to be heard (despite her hatred of voices). Even though her voice wasn’t coming from the grave, she no longer wanted to remain irrelevant and so she wrote a script so that people would hear her. The human need to be listened to is demonstrated perfectly in this movie. No grave will silence a voice that wants to break through as badly as Joe’s.
Dinner and Chat
This event was a great way to talk to Cheryl Einhorn in a relaxed environment. It was nice to casually discuss my experience at Cornell so far and to hear about Cheryl’s experience when she attended the university. She has had an incredible professional life and it was interesting to hear about it. I like how Cheryl has stayed connected to Cornell and has two children currently enrolled. Her AREA method has been utilized by high schools and companies. It was very cool to meet a Cornell alum who established such a successful career.
Does education have a place in community service?
In high school, community service was a nuisance where we just checked off the hours we put in. However, during the seminar, we discussed the importance of community service. Originally, community service was broken down into two categories: giving back and giving forward. What’s the difference? Giving back was defined as being helped by the community and returning the favor by helping the community, whereas giving forward was about helping others without being helped beforehand or expecting anything in return. Ultimately, the lines between giving back and giving forward were blurred and it essentially results in helping other people. We attend a university that encourages us to pursue our passions. After this seminar, I see community service as more than just a punch clock; instead, it is the opportunity to channel our academic interests into projects that better our community. Cornell produces people who are not only great at their respective field, but also utilize their knowledge to make the world a better place.
Appreciating Cornell’s History
Sometimes Ithaca gets so cold, I couldn’t understand why Ezra thought this would be an ideal location for a university. But Mr. Blalock’s talk on Cornell’s history opened my eyes as to why Ithaca is the perfect place for a university. Ithaca started out as frozen land, but was carved into what it is today by glaciers passing through for hundreds of years. The discussion mostly focused on West Campus and how Ezra planned to set up the buildings for dormitories. The eldest buildings were built on the donations of alum. One of the more memorable facts was that Mennen Hall was named after the founder of the Mennen company who produced speed sticks (deodorant). We talked about the different buildings that were erected over time and compared the way West campus looks now to the way it looked in the 70s. And then the question was raised: what will West campus look like in 2119? In 100 years from now, I predict that the gothic buildings will remain but the newer buildings (Bethe, Keaton, Rose Maine, Becker) won’t. They’ll probably be torn down and updated dorms would replace them.
Are We Working During Our Leisure Time?
This Table Talk was particularly interesting. We talked about social media platforms and if by using them we were laboring. The definition of labor is what’s in question. Are we working when we are “relaxing” by using social media? By using social media, our likes are marked down by the platforms, who then sell them to advertisers. Thus, when we access our social media, our feed is filled with advertisements. Ultimately, we have no privacy. Another question comes to mind: are we being exploited. The discussion got very heated when someone strongly argued that we are fine with our lack of privacy so as to use the platforms without charge. However, it can be argued that a lot of people are ignorant of how little privacy they actually have. Now, after this discussion and after realizing that our usage of social media is monetizing our virtual behavior, are we going to stop using social media? The answer is probably not. Society has structured an emphasis on the importance of keeping others updated on your life and staying close to your friends. Almost everyone has some kind of digital fingerprint, and society questions those who refuse to conform to the “norms” of being a digital user. Thus, we technically are working by helping someone profit off our likes but the issue is we don’t see it as labor. As long as it doesn’t feel like dreadful work, we are going to keep using social media and will continue to live in a world without privacy.
Fitting into the Fitness World
My greatest takeaway from this seminar is that you don’t know where life if going to take you. Chantelle, a Cornell alumni, shared her story and unexpected trajectory into the fitness world. She was an OR major in the engineering school, but after working in Ithaca college and various start ups, she realized there was a need for more gyms in Ithaca. And then she decided to take it upon herself to open up a gym. She said that her engineering courses have prepared her in some ways for running her business; it provided her with a skillset to learn. I am currently in the ILR school and have met ILR alum who end up in fields that they never even considered in undergraduate school, such as SEO. Cornell has a structured curriculum, but it certainly doesn’t prepare you for life outside of college.
Is it better to be on furlough or an unpaid employee?
In this table talk, we discussed the government shut down. One of the subtopics mentioned was if it would be better to be an employee who was on furlough, as in someone who did not have to come in to work when payments ceased but whose job was secured when the shutdown was restored, or an essential employee who was required to continue going to work, even though you would not be paid for that time period. Technically, once the government is no longer on shutdown, the employees are paid back for the time period they were working, but it is really inefficient. Some government workers are still waiting on the money they were owed back in the 2013 shutdown. On one hand, employees who are on furlough do not have to work, so the money they aren’t paid is justified. Whereas, essential employees are essentially working for free. They have to spend money on gas to get to a job that is not covering their commute expenses. Government jobs are meant to be secure, and yet there are shutdowns and unpaid employees. It is probably better to be on furlough because the time that this employee is not working could be spent pursuing another job.
Is Grad school a fad?
I have been considering grad school, given its new importance in our society. About fifty years ago, a high school diploma was enough and now a bachelor’s degree isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on. A lot of people are turning to grad school whether in pursuit of a PhD or a Master’s. I can’t help but question if grad school is a fad people are turning to or is grad school going to be a necessity within the next twenty years ?Would an even higher form of education would be required of the incoming labor force? This seminar has been very informative about the grad school process. Regardless if it is a fad or here to stay, grad school is a very relevant topic now. As I enter my junior year, I want to be prepared to market myself to companies and grad school would be the best way to do that. There are many available resources on grad school, such as reddit and grad café. You should do your research about the program you are most interested in and make sure that it is best suited to what you seek out of the experience. Unlike applying for undergrad, your essay should avoid failure; instead, it should focus on personal growth and experiences. This seminar was extremely helpful in realizing how invested many people are in continuing their education after undergraduate school.