Why I Care (about developing countries)

I gave four, almost consecutive presentations at Oakland High about developing countries on Tuesday. I came to realize that I'm getting old and my daily life is pretty far removed from high schoolers. It's hard for me to think about what they know and what they don't know. There were moments when I didn't even realize they don't understand something that was seemingly obvious to me. Anyway, class periods are so short. I don't know how any teaching and learning get done. I really wish I had time to talk about "why we should care," especially with this group of students. I'll write about it here so that I can flush out my thoughts. Maybe I should have done this before going to talk at the school.

Honestly, I did not care about developing countries when I was in high school. I didn't care until probably senior year of college, when I did D-Lab. I felt that there were so many problems "at home" and that we should really focus our energies helping people in our own backyards rather than spending resources on people far away. It's so much harder to care about people far away.

That's one of the reasons why I joined ESP, actually. I volunteered with a bunch of different organizations freshmen year, all of them focusing on outreach to nearby communities. I stuck with ESP even though there wasn't a whole lot of underprivileged outreach because the people who ran the program were cool. I consciously and unconsciously avoided all the talk, hype, and clubs that involved global poverty issues. And then I did D-Lab.

I actually signed up for D-Lab because people who I went to Cambridge with were really enthusiastic about it. They talked about the program's uniqueness and that it's something you can only do while at MIT. So I went to the first class and wrote a pretty convincing application for the class and got in. I went to class and worked on the projects but still treated everything as a class. I mean, I cared about my project (rammed earth) a lot but I didn't feel its connection to society until I actually went to Sierra Leone.

At some point either during or after the trip to Sierra Leone, I had a realization that the problems we were trying to tackle were strikingly similar to problems "at home," namely income security, food security, education, shelter, and nutrition. The problems are the same, all having to do with basic human needs. The details are different but those always are. The question is, what about the solutions? How do the solutions differ?

I really believe that by traveling to different countries and experiencing other cultures, you learn much more about yourself and your own culture. I had many eye-opening moments while in Germany (my "first" abroad experience) about myself and the culture that I subscribe to. By putting myself in a places where I didn't know the language, don't understand the culture, and have no clue about the religion, I really appreciated the kindness and understanding of other people. I became much more aware of what "culture" is and the assumptions that people make about how life should be, how things should work, etc. I (would like to think) am much more sensitive to other people's needs because I have been in situations where I couldn't articulate my own needs.

Through these experiences, I realized that I can't necessarily relate to the situation "back home." I had thought that I understood the issues that immigrants to the US face. I thought that since I had experienced it first-hand, I would be best suited to help solve these issues. But after my travels, I realize that this is a false assumption. I really don't know what other people are going through and shouldn't try to pretend that I am an expert on their experiences. There is no one formula to alleviating the problems that are entrenched in underprivileged neighborhoods in the US. And the best people to work on solving those problems may not be people who had experienced them first-hand. While these people bring with them, some sort of assurance that they understand and care about the people that they are serving, they are also the most likely to "think outside the box."

I am much more likely to think "outside the box" (since I am coming from "outside the box") on issues pertaining to people in a different community than the one I grew up in. I don't deny that I would have different emotional attachments to projects involving Chinese Americans in the Bay Area vs. Africans in Sub-Saharan Africa. But I really believe that working on projects in the developing world has made me much more capable of working on problems in the developed world. They are, in essence, the same problems.

I wish that people working on problems at home can come in with the humble open-mindedness that is so important to international work. By going into a community and admitting right off the bat that I don't understand the culture, the people, and their problems, I have a lot more motivation to try to understand the situation before proposing solutions. I am much more sensitive to the real needs of the people rather than what I think they need. Again, this last point is relevant for projects everywhere.

I hope this made sense. It's something that I have been thinking about for the past few days. I certainly don't think I have it all correct. I would love to hear what other people think about this.

Sisters and Happiness

Very cute article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/26/health/26essay.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=general

Tsunami in West Sumatra!

Recent tsunami in West Sumatra, Indonesia. Luckily, it was too far offshore to affect Padang. There are causalities though. About 4 villages were swept away and the death toll has climbed to almost 300 people now, with many still missing. The villages are on a chain of islands offshore of Padang. Some are only reachable by a 12 hour boat ride. The weather has also hindered the search and rescue operations.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/27/world/asia/27indo.html
http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/SEAsia/Story/STIStory_595764.html

I subscribe to USGS earthquake notifications and saw the email for this particular earthquake. I clicked on the links to find out about possible tsunamis and found that a warning was issued and then canceled. This was on Monday, around noon. Some of us on the Padang project emailed and texted each other about this and we were all relief. But then I came home on Tuesday night after a full day of talking about Splash at Oakland High to find my inbox full of stuff about a tsunami.

I was shocked for about half an hour while I go through my inbox while searching for articles about the tsunami. It's still hard to find much information about it because of a volcano eruption in Central Java. Found lots of articles about Australian surfers though. I'm hoping to read more scientific information about the tsunami in the next few days, specifically, if this earthquake released any stress on the fault. Hopefully, this will mean more funding for tsunami preparedness in the region.

I talked to a couple of friends in Padang (via facebook) and neither of them felt the earthquake. But here's a quote from one of them,

"The people in padang is okay but a little bit panic. But in mentawai is so terrible, There was 13 meter high tsunami hit islands. there is 272 people died, 412 people missing and 40 people injured, 4000 people evacuated. Pray us! We stay alert."

I'm also really glad that some of my friends who are unrelated to the Padang project have emailed or otherwise contacted me about this tsunami. These are all people who I have talked to about this project. I'm so touched that they thought to contact me about this after reading about it on the news.

Week 6, more than halfway done

It did not rain as much as I expected this past weekend. I was looking forward to the sound of pouring rain outside the window all weekend. I basically sat in my room and did work the entire weekend. I mean, I took some breaks to watch anime but it was still quite minimal.

I can't do this "no sleeping" thing anymore. I went to bed at 2am and got about 5 hours of sleep before having to wake up for an 8am class this morning. I also realized that I've been drinking too much caffeine. It's all in the form of tea but I think drinking dark tea with every single meal and maybe in between meals was too much. My stomach has been feeling a bit queasy in the mornings lately. Anyway, refraining from drinking tea excessively should help. I swear I used to only drink one cup of tea a day with dinner. I'm sure I was also getting like 6 hrs of sleep a night fall semester of senior year...

Going to Oakland High really early tomorrow to talk about Splash and give a Splash demo class. Still need to work on shortening the real Splash class into a 30 min session. It'll be interesting. I hope we can really reach out to some kids and they will make the effort of coming to Stanford. I'm doing a trial run of the class I'm teaching with Yalu in Nov. We've never taught this class before. It's about developing countries. Sort of a comparative study between countries and what are the main issues involved. I hope it will give the kids a start on thinking about the rest of the world. Can't be that frog that sits on the bottom of the well all his life.

And we'll also see how skilled I am with this teaching thing. I think teaching, tutoring, and related things are some of the best ways to do community outreach. I realized a while ago that it's not really my thing. I don't think I'm patient enough. I've seen people who are really good at teaching and tutoring and I definitely can't compare with them. But I'm okay with this. Don't need to be good at everything.

Big earthquake near Padang a few hours ago. It was far away though and there was no tsunami generated. There was a warning issued initially but it was lifted a few minutes after. There were several pretty big aftershocks as well. I wish we can tell the earthquake/tsunami gods that they can't come yet because we're not ready. Hopefully, they'll just never come...

Work, work, and more work

Working a Friday night. I'm actually glad that I can work on a Friday night. I spent the last couple of Friday nights not at Stanford. This is the first weekend I've had in my room in a while. I literally didn't know what to do with myself this morning. Only had one class and one meeting. I came back, watched some Conan, napped, went to the store...

It's going to be a rainy weekend. It was misting this morning. It's also alumni/homecoming weekend. There are a ton of alumni here, many with their families. I feel bad for these people coming on such a weekend. It will be sunny again during the week. But there's a flood warning this weekend, that's how much it's going to rain. Anyway, hope this doesn't ruin their memories of Stanford.

I'm almost caught up with homework and such. Need to do more studying though. I usually write my notes twice. But my classes this quarter are all powerpoint. So I'm re-writing the PowerPoint notes. That seems to take longer because they cover more stuff with all this technology. Oh wells, I need to put in this extra effort because just attending lectures and reading the notes doesn't cut it for me.

Lots to do this weekend. But fear not, I got chocolate today! Been missing this treat. I think it really gives me a boost, especially after meals and before launching into a note writing or psetting session. Oh and the persimmon trees in Rains have a ton of fruit on them. I picked a basket full and just waiting for them to ripen now. I hope the rain doesn't destroy the trees this weekend. The tree branches are pretty fragile; I broke a few with no effort. 

After Graduation Asia Trip

I've added a SmartyPig widget on the left side of the blog. For all you RSS feed readers, you have to actually come to the website to see this. I recently opened a SmartyPig account because it seemed like a good way for me to save for my after-graduation-Asia-trip. Mint.com recently added a Goals section to their services but SmartyPig lets you make widgets like this so that other people can contribute to your goals!

I want to go to Asia after I graduate in March. I haven't been back to China since after graduating high school. So I think I should go back to see family. And then I want to do some traveling around in East and Southeast Asia. I feel like I know so little about Asia. Really looking forward to going to more places and learning more about other cultures, see historical sites, eat good food. Not sure how all the logistics will work out yet. Really hope I can travel with someone. Or even meeting up to travel with different people along the way would be fine too.

Anyway, feel free to contribute to this fund! I'll repay the favor when I get the chance, I promise. It all comes back in the end. I've deposited an initial $100 to this fund. This will be used for the buying the backpack because believe it or not, I don't have one of these backpacking backpacks. I've realized I'm pretty efficient at packing and I think I can pull this trip off with one big and one regular sized backpack.

Cats Rule

The kitty owns you! hahah. Actually, I think all "cat owners" know this already. Thanks, Lena.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/pets/detail?entry_id=75065&tsp=1