Author Archives: Sabrina

Some Important Lessons in College

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I was really glad that Charlotte and Liz were able to get this event for the couple of Rose House Scholars. Unfortunately, I think that this event would have actually benefitted several people if it was a larger and almost course like thing that we had to take at Cornell. There should be a better way to implement this program on a large scale. I enjoyed the fact that we covered several different types of situations and what we should do in each whether they be in college parties, in academic settings, or somewhere in between. This little hour long workshop revealed that although we do have certain resources at Cornell, they aren’t advertised around campus very well. I feel like the different resources that Cornell offers are just well hidden facilities. Yes, you’re able to look around as a student. However, there are several newsletters and different places that carry different opportunities which you can lose on. Anyway, it seems that the Skorton Health Initiatives are well made to fit the different situations that may arise while you’re on campus. But having several programs is useless if we’re not using them.

Alcohol poisoning is a common event that happens at many colleges in the US but, other than the alcohol wise mini course we had in freshman year, there has been no actually course or direction as to what to do when a friend isn’t responding.  Yes, alcohol wise is a good (the word is being used lightly) starter course but we were immature and naive when we walked into college. Another thing we, as Cornell students, should be coached on is when should we intervene. We are a huge community but we still have that family-like vibe in the many mini communities we are in. However, even then, how do we know we should step in when an acquaintance looks like they’re in a precarious situation? These were all just little thoughts I’ve had when thinking about how can we make our community a healthier place.

Knowledge and Choices

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The movie “Arrival” was an interesting find. I’ve never gotten around to watching it on my own even tough I’ve heard great things about it. The entire story line was a tiny bit confusing because it wasn’t exactly in chronological order. Although the term evades me, it added to the mystery and slightly dark nature of the film. In the beginning of the film, with the bleak opening (I’m trying not to reveal too many details and this event really dictates a lot in this film), the audience is left questioning what is the true storyline. The protagonist is a linguist who seems very disheveled and unsure about her own position in life on her own story line. She’s confused about her husband although she isn’t married and there’s this aura of sadness that surrounds her in the opening scene. The audience believes that this sadness is attributed to the event that occurs in the beginning of the film. However, at the end you realize she just has knowledge of this event but, she hasn’t gone through the pain as of yet. This brings to a light a very important question on whether or not would anyone like to know what will happen in their lives in the future or in a certain timeline. If you would like to know, would you try to change it?

Even though this movie brought up several points to discuss, I think it takes a particularly brave soul to continue on with a certain life knowing the consequences. When I initially saw the movie, I thought her decision was dumb because her particular choice in life would cause her a lot of misery and that haunted and hollowed look we see in the opening. Personally, if I acquired the power to somehow break the normal way of perceiving time, I would probably try to scan through the several different possible storylines and find the one that I would end up being the happiest. There’s no point in walking into heartbreak. Because your perception of time would change, you’d be able to scan through these different time lines. Her choice baffled me and was kind of expected. I guess from the opening they determined the timeline she would choice and I wish they added a separate timeline. Maybe they could’ve changed some other event that would preserve who her life partner is but, would save her from her fate. I guess that’s  a question we should all ask ourselves and not just in retrospect, would we do certain things all over again?

Let’s Bike Away

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When I first saw Seema’s little poster for the bike sharing systems, I was intrigued. I’ve seen them as I was growing up in New York City and then I saw a couple of the bike sharing stations at Cornell. I thought that having a discussion on the history and thought process behind these bike sharing systems is very cool. The Table-Talk revealed that the initial bike sharing program was actually almost a non-profit attempt to decrease motor accidents. Seema brought up how people use to have these white bikes that were dispersed around several areas over Amsterdam. However, these bikes were repetitively stolen and it’s understandable in how easily a bike can be painted over. The interesting thing is that over time they found systems to where people can place the bikes back. By somehow balancing the cost of maintaining the bikes and finding a crowd to promote the bike sharing programs to, companies were able to justify the cost. We started to discuss the bike sharing system at Cornell and we found one major flaw. Although there are several different stations on the central campus, we don’t see many stations elsewhere such as on West. Thus, there’s an inconvenience when one borrows a bike from central as they have to return back to central to return. The bike sharing system may be an interesting feature of Cornell but I wish they studied how many people actually use it.

Cultural Appropriation and Understanding

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The initial read that Sam assigned was very interesting. It almost felt as if I had to read up an English assignment for high school because we had to read two sides of the argument. However, after reading both pieces, the lines that define cultural appropriation blurred. Both articles defined the term as using a part of another’s culture without benefitting them. There were several examples used in the articles such as a painting of the poor Emmett Till, Elvis Presley’s success at the cost of African Americans, and a sculptured attributed to the hangings of several Native Americans. It’s true. All of those examples depicted horrendous events/times in history where a minority has been taken advantage of. I think these were more serious forms of cultural appropriation than the chandelier hair clip that ASOS decided to sell a while back. I think the problem that comes along with cultural appropriation is that the cultures that are borrowing from others fail to credit them. If it was just the idea of borrowing and recognizing, then we wouldn’t have had such a problem. However, people “steal” ideas or forms from other cultures and try to relabel them as something new. Just the acknowledgement is enough to make people happy. Sometimes if it is about a heritage, things get more complicated. Cultures are mixable and the lines aren’t very defined because it depends where you grow up and are raised. Heritage, however, is solely yours. People may sympathize or try to to understand but, they may not completely do so. In these cases, although a person’s intentions may be pure, the reception is critical. Permission is needed and the best actions should be taken to comfort the people you have offended. If culture is understood and one has a passion to ask the questions to explore that culture, then I think cultural appropriation may not be in the form that it is in today. I’m just questioning how we’ll define the term once we become a truly global society.

Mental Health and Labels

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I honestly enjoyed the Table Talk today because it really related to what I want to do in the future. I’ve been very interested in mental health and forms of therapy since I want to be a psychiatrist in the future. Something that stood out to me during this conversation with Magdala (who is always amazing) was how different people have different defenses. How do we block others from seeing how we are feeling? Even some of the greetings have meanings that vary with tone and we, as a society, like to keep up a flawless image to present to others. One person mentioned that dressing up was their shield against society and it’s just very sad. Based on personal experiences and what I’ve seen from my friends’ experiences, it is very, very hard to keep up appearances when you just don’t want to get out of bed.

Something that has always annoyed me was how lightly we treat mental health when it really effects how we function. While we acknowledge how mental health can effect functioning, we don’t treat it as an actual issue. We either consider mental illness as an excuse for being lazy and inconsiderate of others. There are different perspectives on mental illness in different parts of the world. It’s amazing how regardless of culture, we isolate those who we deem different and that’s why so many people have shields and guards. We put on face to make sure others don’t perceive us as things to be put away or isolated. We share a fear of being outcasted because we’ve seen people who don’t fit labels being ousted. Historically, we’ve been institutionalizing people for deviating from the norm and the ghosts of these institutions are still spotted across the east coast. There are still skeletons of buildings where people were kept because they were unfit for society. Maybe, just maybe, the fear of stigma perpetuates stigmatizing others and putting on the mask of normalcy, hiding behind the accepted label.

 

Sleep and Peace: The Story of Cornell

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I think I have been constantly complaining of how exhausted I am and how little sleep I get at Cornell regularly. I’ve had conversations with Liz about how hard it is to get relaxed enough to sleep at the end of the day and then having to wake up within a couple of short hours. I have tried chamomile tea, warm sleeping masks, sleepy time tea, and changing exercise routines to regulate my sleep cycle. I ended up using a sleep cycle app and the warm masks to help and, in the end, I got myself off of caffeine. It has been an interesting journey and this table talk showed me that, of the sample of maybe 10 students, none of us were well rested.

Interestingly, each of us had different strategies to deal with the lack of sleep and all of us expressed guilt because of sleeping. In the article that Liz made us read, this professor at Cornell at Doha proposed that college students should get about 9 hours and 15 minutes of sleep. Personally, between classes, schoolwork, work, research and just functioning as an adult, there’s no chance I can sleep for 9 hours without missing some type of work. It is just very difficult to be well rested and get work done. It’s not healthy but I think that’s how I’m functioning.

An Olympian Conspiracy

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Although I had been following the olympics, I  didn’t watch anything beyond the figure skating and some of the blunders associated. This was a great table talk where we not only were able to discuss the very interesting articles but, see what other events others were interested in. Interestingly, we have a bunch of figure skating fans. I actually had no clue that Russia had been found cheating in the Olympics and to read the article was a shocking revelation. The plot line was almost as if straight from a spy movie. You could almost imagine a team of three people in a dimly lit room, retrieving little bottles of urine and trying to break through the tight packaging. The entire situation was almost as if someone intended to make the situation as dramatic as possible.

Nevertheless, we approached the matter of whether or not the Russian athletes should have been allowed to participate. Most of us agreed how despite the Russian athletes being barred of carrying their flag and representing themselves as a country, they still represented Russia via the gray ensemble. Although we agreed that this may be the one logical solution to keep athletes who have trained their entire lives to fulfill their dreams, we still know that they represent Russia. To a degree, I think that the question comes to making cheating regulations much harder and blurring the lines between state and individual aspirations. Do we punish a nation of athletes or do we punish just individual athletes? In the case of Russia, there’s an entire corrupted system hungry for success. The idea of having a system designed for cheating and going to different lengths for the recognition as an athlete of a nation is terrifying. In addition, this news actually makes the idea of Russia even scarier as they’re manipulating their own people who just “disappear”.