Thankful

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They say a journey of a thousand miles begins with a step. I have to say my first couple of steps have been nothing short of exhilarating. When I got admitted here and had to move, I was befuddled. I had so many expectations. You read and hear a lot about these ends and how people of color are treated, the high rate of racial profiling and all these things that can generally cause a person to re-evaluate choices. Being here has been challenging with having to re-acclimatize, make new acquaintances and friends, juggle school work, attempt to build a social life and luckily for me, racial profiling has been the least of my worries. The people I’ve met are some of the most amazing people I’ve ever come across. Needless to say, it’s been a thrilling and enlightening ride.

One of the things I’m most thankful for is how much of an influence my lecturers have been. They are nothing short of amazing. My English lecturer have helped me rejuvenate my love for writing and for that I’m eternally grateful. If all lecturers were like her, I’m sure everyone would love school. You know majority of the time whenever the topic of student/lecturer is raised, the general concept that comes into mind is that of sworn enemies, or that of a superior and a subordinate but in the lecturers, I have had the semester, I have found mentors in them. I’m grateful for how much they have helped buffer what would have been a harrowing experience. I look forward to where this journey takes me and hope that I’ll continually supersede expectations.

I’m also thankful for my classmates and friends. I couldn’t have made it through this semester without them. Like the old saying goes, “no man is an island”. The wonderful people I met this semester have been a huge part of my success and I’m thankful that I got to meet them. A big shout out to you all!

Essay Writing

 

My hat goes off to all creatives out there, especially writers. The task of deciding on a topic to write is one milestone, another is doing adequate research and investigation concerning the topic at hand so one doesn’t provide redundant information or write off point. I’m in the process of putting down my exploratory essay and ironically, the difficulty I’m experiencing in putting together the essay gave me an epiphany of just how much creatives work to put out the work that they do. They always have to proof-read and review their write ups to make sure it’s not similar to a previous piece and to make sure they’re not ripping off of the work of other creatives like themselves.

(Source: thewritelife)

            I have to say for me personally the most challenging aspect in the writing process is the central idea to be passed. It’s sometimes simple and direct. Other times, the message to be passed has to be paraphrased and/or embedded in a series of metaphors for the sake of political correctness. As a writer, you can’t afford to be insentient or your work will only get negative feedback and destructive criticism due to the insensitivity or wrong choice of vocabulary. See what I’m doing here? I’m paraphrasing. The central idea of this write up is a revelation I had while I was struggling to write my exploratory essay, which simply is that writing is not as easy as it seems.

Bullies or victims?

In my opinion, I think it’s very biased and quite unfair the rate at which bullies are demonized without trying to understand their back stories; hear me out, I’m not advocating for bullies neither do I support any kind of bullying. Now considering how rampant this is in schools all over the world, one might almost say it’s a part of the school experience. It’s constantly portrayed in movies and tv shows. They’re often depicted as big brawny boys (often not very bright) or as spoilt bimbos. Let’s face it this stereotype has abound long enough for one to sometimes be able to accurately guess who the bully is without difficulty. I had a classmate once who made a career out of routinely bullying this other girl who was also a classmate. It got out of hand as they once got physical and the bully put this other girl in the hospital. She was to be expelled but a couple of teachers decided to run a background check and discovered she was a victim of abuse who came out from a broken home.

Now, I’m not saying bullies who are victims of abuse or who come from broken homes get a free pass neither am I suggesting that it makes their behaviors acceptable… I just feel like most of these “bullies” have one thing or another that causes them to act the way that they do. I read an article that suggests many of them have severe self-esteem issues and use picking on those they feel superior to as a compensatory mechanism for their inadequacies.

The bully in my narrative was suspended rather than expelled, went through therapy and was successfully reintegrated into the school system. It may not always be easy or possible, but I think that a major way to combat bullying would be to psychologically evaluate said bullies and try to put them through some form of counseling or therapy in an attempt to reintegrate them into the school system. That being said, schools in general should continually sensitize their students as early and as frequently as possible to at least reduce bullying. The bulk of the work lies at home and with the individual but I guess we’ve got to start from somewhere. Don't we?