Waiting on the World to Change

Officially Closing Shop - New Blog

2011-06-21T22:23:00.000-07:00

So with the conclusion of the blog assignment for this course I am officially shutting down this blog. I know it's going to be tough for you avid readers, but worry not...I have created a new and better blog for you to follow while I'm away in Africa next year. I promise it's more relevant, easier to read and has better gadgets :)

Here is the link

http://sarahvoegeli.blogspot.com/

Lessons from the Kalahari: Roy Sesana at UW

2011-06-07T21:39:00.000-07:00

On Friday, we as a group of 26 International Development students, or INDEVOURS as we have been affectionately termed, hosted a most esteemed guest speaker – Roy Sesana. Roy originates from New Xade in the central Kalahari of Botswana and works as a traditional medicine man within his San community. In 1991 he co-founded the First People of the Kalahari (FPK) as a means of promoting and protecting the traditional lifestyle of the San.

Under Roy’s guidance the Bushmen and sympathetic supporters have been involved in protecting the rights of these indigenous populations for more than a decade. After the resettlement of a group of Bushmen living in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR) in 1997 to government allocated resettlement camps a legal case unfolded within the courts of Botswana. This landmark case in 2002 saw the First People of the Kalahari taking the Government of Botswana to court to seek the right to return to their ancestral lands on the reserve. Roy was arrested in September 2005 for rioting and attempting to forcibly enter the CKGR but was released within a few days. After years of efforts to persuade the courts to review the case the High Court of Botswana ruled in the Bushmen’s favour on December 13, 2006, stating that the evictions were unlawful and unconstitutional.

Yet the San of the Kalahari have been unable to return to their homes. The government of Botswana claims that they are unable to provide the groups of Bushmen with basic infrastructure and services while they are within the reserve because it will conflict with the preservation of the game reserve itself. Complicating the issue is the way of life the San have been forced to adapt to within the resettlement camps. Unemployment, alcoholism, diseases (especially HIV/AIDS) and other social ills have for the first time in the Bushmen’s history become widespread issues for the San living in these camps.

Roy Sesana, recipient of the Right Livelihood Award for “resolute resistance against eviction from their ancestral lands, and for upholding the right to their traditional way of life” spoke with the type of passion one could only expect from a man who has travelled a great distance to champion the plight of his people. He congratulated us on our commitment to international development and for being so open and willing to listen and extend our hearts to stories such as those of his people. He further called us to take action in our own communities to make these stories known; to support FPK and to write to our members of parliament expressing outrage over the mistreatment of the San people.

While this story does appear to come from a world away, it draws many parallels to our own experiences here in Canada. It has not been too many years for us to forget about our own treatment of indigenous populations within these borders and the many social and political issues which persist to this day. While it is important to recognize what is going on within the international community, and inviting people like Roy Sesana to engage us in a dialogue, is an important way to go about doing this I do think it is just as important for us to continue that dialogue once his plan touches down in Maun once again. If there is one thing we can take away from Roy’s talk it is the importance in not becoming apathetic to issues which may not directly impact our daily lives. The Bushmen are a proud, however small, minority within Botswana. Yet Roy Sesana has made it his life’s work to make sure the world knows their story. What would our world look like if more people like Roy made such sacrifices for the betterment of their neighbours? How would our own cultural landscape here in Canada be altered if we made similar efforts to champion those peoples who make up our past, present, and hopefully our future? Roy has opened our eyes, now it’s our turn to decide how we will respond – in typical apathetic Canadian fashion, or with a renewed sense of ownership?

INDEVOURS 2012 with Roy Sesana

Ever Wanted to Buy Your Own Island???

2011-05-24T18:16:00.000-07:00

I know I sure have. I mean who wouldn't want their very own island right? But for most of us buying an island is up there with winning a million dollars and getting to meet Brad Pitt...nice fantasy, but never going to happen.

Luckily it seems that IGLUCRUISE, an award winning UK based cruise travel agency, would like to make owning an island a reality for the everyday person. An official statement put out by Iglucruise states "With many of major cruise lines now owning their own white sandy beaches in the Caribbean here is a look into how we can own our own paradise too." They have even provided a comprehensive graphic detailing how to bet go about owning an island, with helpful pictures and a comparative price guide. (see below)

Also available: http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/2S8nVX/www.iglucruise.com/private-islands

This has really got me thinking about the way our globalized market operates these days. I mean if we are advertising easy ways to buy an island what does that say about our economies? It's one thing to pay for an extravagant cruise, but to actually own the island you wish to cruise to...wow that really is something else. I have the feeling we all need to re-evaluate our priorities if this is going to become a reality for people.

Building Global Solidarity One Community at a Time

2011-05-18T13:12:00.000-07:00

"You have the power to change the world for the better"

How many times have we heard this line before? Personally I think it is what most of us INDEV students at least have at the core of our reasoning for even being in this program. But it has never really made much of an impact on me before. I've always thought it was a great idea to want to make change in the world and be part of something that can actually bring about change, but I never thought this was a different or unique want. Not until very recently that is.

Last Thursday Canada's former Governor General, Michaelle Jean, was invited to the University of Waterloo to deliver the 2011 Stanley Knowles Humanitarian Service Lecture. I was privileged to have the opportunity to meet Mme Jean, and she really embodies all of the passion and charisma of what development work is supposed to be like.

Michaelle Jean photographed with (from left) INDEV Director Larry Swatuk, Dana Vanthof, Eric Christensen, Sarah Voegeli, Sheila Ball, INDEV Field Placement Coordinator Grainne Ryder, & Professor Bruce Frayne

Throughout her lecture Michaelle spoke directly to youth in my position, actually she spoke directly to myself and three other fourth year INDEV students, as she "saluted our desire to make a difference". After encouraging us to hold on to our passion and remember how important we are to the world Michaelle made a very important distinction. "Like me you say 'yes' to humanity and 'no' to every man for himself".

The focus of the talk was about building global solidarity through meaningful actions at the local level. While I find that those of us who study development issues talk about this very idea over and over again, I did like that Michaelle encouraged a "move toward a new logic of investments and partnerships". This is becoming increasingly important in an expanding and at times convoluted field. It is a crucial aspect of what not only myself, but everyone in the field of international development will have to move towards now and into the future.

2011 White House Correspondents' Dinner

2011-05-06T08:50:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine recently shared this video with me, and I have to agree that it is quite amusing. However was this really the intent behind the White House Correspondents’ Dinner? This glitzy event sponsored by the White House Correspondents' Association aims to raise funds to be put towards scholarships and awards to honour the media for their commitment to news coverage in America. However at a pivotal time in news journalism this ‘over the top’ affair may have done more harm than good in terms of legitimizing news media.

The fact that the tables reserved for such well known media outlets as the Huffington Post and NBC were filled with celebrities only goes to show that the arenas of politics and journalism are becoming ever more intertwined with the entertainment industry. This is only further confirmed when considering the discourse of the evening – a constant conversation over Donald Trump’s legitimacy as anything more than host of Celebrity Apprentice and Obama’s birth certificate. Funny? Yes. Good for ratings? Of course. But at the end of the day what does it say about how seriously we take news journalism in North America?

Budgets are increasingly being cut in newsrooms across the continent. In Canada there has been much talk about phasing out the CBC as our central broadcasting agency. Yet in the US it is not only appropriate but encouraged for the president to make jabs at some of the major news networks in the country. Fewer and fewer North Americans trust the press or place much confidence in the news they are being fed and having everyone in on the joke, as was the case on Saturday, doesn’t help to ease these fears.

Don’t get me wrong, I found Obama’s speech to be full of wit and charm befitting the best of presidents. However it becomes all too easy to get drawn into this and look past the criticisms against Obama for holding fewer and fewer press conferences, restricting photographers in the White House and making himself widely unavailable for journalists. Rubbing elbows and clinking glasses with news reporters is no way to bypass what could become a serious trend in contemporary journalism.

A businessman once remarked that he could buy any reporter in New York with a steak dinner. On Saturday, DC's press corporations got surf-and-turf and bottomless glasses of wine. Seems like a fairly strong correlation to me.

An Insecure Technological World

2011-03-23T14:29:00.000-07:00

So I learned a valuable lesson this week. I mean I've always had my tech savvy father yelling at me for not saving my files and having to rescue me when it's 2:00am and my computer crashed and the essay I was working on for 12 hours, which is of course due in 6, was never saved and now my world is ending and it's all technology's fault. Yep that happens to me a lot, yet I never seem to learn from these experiences.

But this week, I think I've gotten the message. My blog, this blog, was reported to google through an automatic scanning software that flagged blogs the computer believed to be violating the blogger terms of agreement. I was unable to access it from Saturday until today, and as my blog assignment is due to be handed in tomorrow needless to say I panicked a little bit. Now it has been restored, worry not, but this has prompted a discussion on the volatility of such social media sites as blogger which are available free of charge to the world and how this might actually impact the not for profit sector.

For most not for profit organizations, especially those who are newly emerging, having such social media services like a blog can really be a cost effective way to generate a following and get people interested in their work (I mean it's free of course). But this also poses a new problem, as I have recently experieneced, where by the very nature of being widely available to the public these sites have to have security measures but in place to ensure the integrity of the service. However, when your organization depends on a free service, and for no fault of your own the service is taken away because of something like an automatic scanning software, where does that leave you? If you don't have enough money to pay for a more secure and stable domain and instead are relying on such blog sites as blogger, how do you continue to operate if your blog is randomly inaccessible for a period of time as mine was.

Here are a few examples:
http://blog.firstbook.org/
http://impact.webershandwick.com/

I mean my issue was with a school assignment and a professor who was understanding, not exactly what I would call real life. But as an organization you were placed in a similar situation I feel like it would be much more detrimental to the well being of operations. These are things we don't often think about, however sometimes when it's 2:00am and you didn't back up your annual report posting to your donors maybe the consequences are a little more serious than losing a few percentages.

Just a little perspective for you. Hopefully if nothing else you've learned to back up your files :D

Doing More Harm than Good?

2011-03-15T08:00:00.000-07:00

Have you or someone you know even been on one of those one week trips down to the Dominican Republic or El Salvador for the sole purpose of 'doing more with their vacation'? Shelling out thousands of dollars to help build a school or a house or help teachers take care of orphans for a few days? This is what we call voluntourism.

But what exactly is voluntourism? For most people it just looks like a made up word someone threw together to try and sound clever. Well in fact volunteer vacation of 'voluntourism' is an idea which originated from the sustainable tourism movement aimed at seeing a lessening of the impacts of tourism on the environment and culture. It is a way, as Sustainable Travel International's motto state, to leave the world a better place while at the same time enjoying a vacation. Voluntourism combines the traditional vacation travel with opportunities to volunteer within the destination countries. This up and coming 'package vacation' is now widely available through dozens of travel agencies and not for profit organizations across the world.

My discussion today is on whether this is a good idea or not?

The debate surrounding voluntourism is extensive, with strong arguments for both sides. Sure these trips can provide a memorable experience for participants and have the potential to help projects get off the ground and a cultural exchange to occur. But I find myself allied with the critics this time. I think that voluntourism trips, if executed well and planned to allow for sustained benefit, can indeed lead to many positive impacts. But I also know that the reality of such trips is not always one which benefits all parties involved.

One of my first experiences talking about voluntourism comes from a CBC podcast on the topic which my mother made me listen to. It was actually extremely insightful and provided a great anecdote which I will now share.

Apparently a woman who worked for an organization in a developing country that ran thrift stores and other services for local residents received a call from a high school teacher about her students' becoming involved. She spoke of how her students' had collected all this clothing that they wished to give back to these poor people in the south. The employee explained that they would of course be willing to accept the clothing and would sell it in their stores at a fair and reduced cost within the communities. The teacher however was adamant that her students' be given the opportunity to go to the country with the clothing, set up tables to display the clothes, and give it out to the poor people themselves. The employee then replied : "so what you're telling me is that you want them to pet the animals".

I think this is a great lesson for all of us to learn. There is nothing wrong with wanting to help, and inspiring youth to get up and do something proactive that could benefit someone else. But often we here in North America are ignorant to the realities of the development system. Does it make sense for students' to spend thousands of dollars to stay in four star hotels with a personal security guard and imported water all so they can have the experience of witnessing their own good work?

You may agree with me or not, but at the very least I hope this has caused you to think about the issue and where you stand. What is the motivation behind taking part in these trips to begin with? In what ways can they be improved to allow for greater benefits to not only the participants but also the community in the destination country? Is this a great first step into development issues for many ignorant North Americans who have no concept of what it is like to live the way millions of people do?

All of these questions and hopefully many more will be pondered, debated, and discussed at the year's Student Conference on International Development hosted by the Student Association of International Development. I am excited to see what we as a academic community can learn about this highly contested issue. Please join me!

You can register at http://scid2011.eventbrite.com/ for this Free day-long conference. For more information please visit our association website at http://envblogs.uwaterloo.ca/blogs/said/student-conference-on-international-development/

The Power of Slam

2011-03-13T17:53:00.000-07:00

What is Slam Poetry?

"A circus act of hyperbole, a war of words, a magic act of metaphor, a wild ride of wit, wisdom and wonder. Competitive poetry. Raucous, raunchy or raw.

Three minutes to say your poem – no music, costumes or props to prop you up. Extra points for style, passion, and performance. Instead of reading off the page, memorize it, improvise it, channel it, sing it out, let it surge and roar through you. Tease, taunt or tempt the audience. Try to touch their hearts, minds, guts or even more private parts with words, rhymes or the sheer delicious music of sounds bearing meaning.

Then wait for five random audience members elected judge-for-a-day to flash a score out of ten, like perverse Olympic referees of verse. Highest scores win a second chance to perform and be judged again. Actual rules change from venue to venue, so go prepared for surprises, like "Bad Poetry Slam", where low scores win." Jim Thompson, President Shoreline Writer's Society

I'd never really heard about slam poetry until this week, but it is actually really interesting. I went to a poetry slam at the campus pub on Thursday because it was a fundraiser for the WUSC Shine a Light Campaign to raise funds for girls' education in refugee camps, and I'm not gonna lie I was a little nervous. If you don't know that much about slam poetry, I've posted a few I found on youtube below that I'd suggest you check out.

While the poetic style changes based on the poet for the most part each work is closely associated with the vocal delivery style found in hip-hop music and draw heavily on the tradition of 'dub poetry', a rhythmic and politicized genre belonging black culture. Others employ an unrhyming narrative formula. Some use traditional theatric devices including shifting voices and tones, while others may recite an entire poem in ironic monotone. Some poets use nothing but their words to deliver a poem, while others stretch the boundaries of the format, tap-dancing or beatboxing or using highly-choreographed movements. At the poetry slam I attended, most of these styles were used.

I wanted to comment on the effectiveness of slam poetry as a medium for spreading a message. For the most part slam poems are meant to engage and inspire and I find them to be extremely effective. You can have a slam about almost any topic (the one on Thursday was about women's issues) but really anything from racial segregation, to environmental issues to the concept of getting up and doing something meaningful have been slammed about.

And sure not everyone is into poetry, and some people may be confused by the delivery...but I think that at the very least this style of poetry catches the attention of it's audience. And in this world, being able to make someone listen, even if only for a few minutes, really cane make all the difference.

No Logo? No Reason...

2011-02-27T16:58:00.000-08:00

No Logo. It really is a very simple concept these two small words, together barely making 3 syllables. A theory indicating our modern fascination with logos and brands that has spread like wildfire into a backlash of an ‘anti brand’ movement. Yet it takes Canadian journalist and author Naomi Klein more than 446 pages to make what some feel is a revolutionary ‘statement’ against the multinational corporation and the brand empire that has emerged and taken over public space, jobs and more than anything: human choice. However while I was reading through the countless pages of No Logo, I found that Klein doesn’t really meet this revolutionary objective, rather she provides a very interesting commentary on the evolution of the brand in modern society. Klein’s writing is that of a true journalist, descriptive with enough cynicism and emotion to keep the reader engaged for small periods of time, yet I felt that she didn’t inspire much inside of me to continue reading. Through this analysis I will critique many of the main, for lack of a better word, arguments that Klein puts forward in No Logo and comment on how I feel this ‘movement bible’ can be properly implemented in the Not For Profit (NFP) sector.

As a typical young consumer I have grown up surrounded by countless images and brands from a very early age. I also had the added pleasure of living very close to the United States and therefore was not only subject to the best of Canadian advertising, but also American television networks, news stations and radio shows as well. I feel that this influence, especially within my high school, allowed for a defined split within our perceived ‘microcosm’ of the real world. It was clear who belonged where on the social ladder and this was further perpetuated through brands. And I went to a Catholic uniformed secondary school! But teenagers will set themselves apart from everyone else in any way they can; some screaming to be heard through unconventional hair and bright converse shoes, and others tactfully purchasing t-shirts with Hollister written across the chest as a means of ‘fitting in’. This is the type of environment I have lived through the majority of my formative years and I really do believe it has made me not only aware of the type of power branding can really wield over the young and impressionable, but also made me bitter towards branding in general.

This is what Klein speaks most heavily about throughout her many pages in No Logo: branding. It is a central theme that is built upon as you move from section to section, however her alleged ‘unpacking’ of the real meaning behind branding primarily occurs in the first section of the book entitled “No Space”. What struck me the most in this section was the notion of lifestyle branding. This is something that I have noticed for years and always found puzzling, however never really had the chance to study in depth. That the brand has shifted away from the selling of a product and moved into the selling of an idea or a feeling is a major accomplishment for the branding movement in my opinion. Whether we like it or not, it has happened and I think it is fairly impressive for a company to have the ability to sell ideas as abstract as ‘hope’ or ‘sustainability’. It seems that every time I go to the store I can find some ironic t-shirt with an owl or tree on it making claims about something to do with the environment. And once consumers tired of the ‘save the trees’ argument you could see a shift into feelings of peace, love and hope along with the planet. It’s almost as if legitimate movements such as the ‘green revolution’ have been exploited to be utilized in corporate marketing, yet from a profit making standpoint this is extremely effective. Why wouldn’t you capitalize on the latest cause or collective public identity? It makes perfect sense to me and while at first I was annoyed that a

dozen students in my INDEV classes were wearing shirts with peace signs and endangered animals on them (who would have thought I wasn’t the only one?) I’ve come to accept that this is just part of our reality. As Klein asserts, it is the culture that Starbucks sells, not just their coffee. As an important and impressionable demographic we students have been a very integral part of shaping the types of cultures that companies have chosen to mass market in all areas of the world, and we just need to accept it.

While I think that the first section of Klein’s book is the most applicable to the reader in terms of the relevance and breadth of information, I also find some value in the remainder of her material. It is important to acknowledge that branding really is an inescapable component of our life and that we as functioning human beings, especially in North America, cannot escape to a commune somewhere on the outskirts of some southern state and hide from the brand giant forever. However I feel that Klein almost doubts the consciousness of individuals to effectively exist within a branded society. Yes brands surround us and yes there is no way of getting out of that, but it doesn’t mean that people are unable to make their own decisions. Her explanation of ‘no choice’ reminds me of the film Josie and the Pussycats where subliminal messaging in essence took over the minds of everyone who listened to the band’s music until listeners were unable to escape the need to buy whatever brand was being subliminally ‘shoved down their throats’. Yet in our modern society this is not necessarily true. We are all very aware of the presence of branding, even if most people are able to let it fade into the background and conform to societal norms and pressures. This does not mean that the individual doesn’t have a choice in what brands to support however and I feel this is something Klein fails to address. Further while the No Jobs section I felt was most relevant to the area of international development as it brought to light the issue of sweatshops and Export Processing Zones (EPZ), I do feel as if these concepts were introduced without nearly enough explanation. Sweatshops and EPZs are extremely complicated development issues which encompass a large variety of contributing factors, yet Klein lays a lot of blame with multinational corporations and the creation of the brand. This type of analysis is misleading for an issue that deserves more consideration and careful analysis of all the underlying factors.

The final section of the book, No Logo, is in theory a section devoted to ‘anti-corporate activism’. Unfortunately this is not the feeling I got at all while reading through what was a lot of repetition from prior pages. While I do concede that there has been some backlash to branding, and as Klein points out adbusting, culture jamming, and billboard liberation have been useful activities in this ‘revolution’ against multinational corporations, I do not feel that this portion of the book brings forth any real call to action. Klein states that it is not simply enough to merely shop responsibly, that we are to band together to challenge such bodies as the World Trade Organization (WTO) and World Bank (WB) who govern trade and can make changes in trade legislation and policy. Yet she doesn’t offer much in the way of advice as to how we are to accomplish such a feat. I’m sorry Naomi; there can never be enough adbusting or culture jamming to get the attention of the WTO to change policy. This is what I feel is one of her major shortcomings, a lack of foundation for the ‘revolution’ this book is supposed to have started, or at the very least contributed to.

Don’t get me wrong, I think that No Logo has the potential to be a useful tool, however not necessarily in the way Klein intended. If NFP organizations were able to learn from the examples of branding extensively discussed in No Logo and apply those principles to their own marketing they would have a leg up on the competition. Further, Klein’s commentary on the evolution of the brand provides a useful lesson in understanding the competition that NFP organizations face on a daily basis. One of my main concerns with No Logo in reference to the NFP sector however is the fact that Klein doesn’t suggest much in the way of how NFPs can work towards establishing a niche within this corporate system or how they can even work to change the widespread impact of the branding phenomenon. Klein’s presentation of the brand almost makes it seem that NFPs must either ‘join or die’. That is, become part of the problem through branding of their own or be tossed to the side as this sophisticated machine continues to operate around them.

While No Logo as a written work was both educational and at times even amusing, it lacked the type of inspiration required to start a real ‘revolution against the corporation’. In this regard it was rather lack luster and quite frankly disappointing. I also found it very difficult to take Klein’s words seriously as I find her to be extremely hypocritical. Naomi Klein herself and the book No Logo are a BRAND. For a woman with such strong convictions against branding I find it very puzzling that she felt the need to republish the book on its 10^th anniversary with the addition of a new introduction. Does this not go against what Klein claims to stand for? I would say so! Republish a book using the same logo as the last book but charge another $25.00 to readers who may wish to read a new, seemingly insignificant introduction, and then continue to advocate against corporations who do the same thing through the branding of products. Naomi, I respect the message you’re attempting to spread to the ‘unenlightened’ population, but I can’t respect you as an author or an advocate. And who do you have to blame for that? Not the logo, the brand, or the corporation. Nope, you only have yourself to blame this time.

Teen Activism

2011-02-26T19:43:00.000-08:00

Today I'm thinking about teen activism, to be honest I don't really get it. I mean I am 100% a 'cause' person and am always interested in learning about what the latest campaign is about...but young, especially radical, activists they I do not understand.

This conversation comes from a high school trip I helped chaperone this week. Every year the Teachers for Global Awareness (a joint association between the public, separate and french school boards in Windsor Essex County) hosts a Social Justice Forum for High School Youth. This event is held at the University of Windsor and involves high school students from all of the schools in the county getting together to talk about a world issue. This year the topic was on conflict, a neutral topic i expected seeing as last year's forum on gender issues resulted in a fight over homophobia that no board was prepared for. But unfortunately even 'Resolving a State of Perpetual Conflict' appears to have been a controversial topic.

The day progressed well enough, with some informative sessions on the state of the conflict in the Sudan, reflections on Rwanda, Haiti, Palestine and the Congo. Over sandwiches and cookies at lunch the students I was with seemed engaged and excited about everything they had learned; eager to try and bring the information back to my old high school and 'make a difference' as was constantly quoted throughout the day along with typical 'be the change' Ghandi sentiments. Yet for 16 and 17 year olds this is a pretty effective strategy and the energy in the room was hopeful and positive (something I think many of us 3rd year INDEV students have forgotten about)

Overall I was impressed with the day, that is until the final panel discussion entitled Stand Up for Your Rights: Youth, Politics, and the G20. I will give them one thing, every student left that day with a pretty drastic impression of how they should be 'standing up for their rights' and if this was the objective of the panel, well then I would call it successful. However, I found that the panel appealed way too much to emotion and 'shock and awe' tactics then to providing information in any real context for these impressionable young students. The panel itself was a group of university students who were supposed to exemplify youth activism and inspire the high school students to get involved and stand up for their beliefs (as if this is a new concept for university students). But the students that were chosen to run the panel could not have been more ineffective in my opinion, which was one of an educator unfortunately not from a student's perspective. As we sat for more than an hour and were yelled at, called to action, and made to feel naive I became more and more annoyed.

The discussion was supposed to be around the events of the G20 summit in Toronto last summer, and it was, however a very biased discussion. We heard about police brutality, conspiracy theories, government plots...really everything you'd expect to hear under a Stalinist regime or something actually oppressive, not from modern day Canada of all places. I mean it was highly amusing and the speakers presented the information in a charismatic, and convincing manner...which is why it was so dangerous. I was talking to some of the students afterwards and they were shocked at the nature of the presentation. How is it possible that we could allow this type of activity in Canada??? I don't dismiss the many wrongdoings that occurred on behalf of the Canadian government and police forces during the summit, however I know that the picture these activists painted for us was less than entirely truthful and most definitely lacking context.

Which brings me to the whole concept of teen activism. I mean I get that young people generally need something to rally around and have their voices heard, but I feel that there are effective ways to do so. One of the panelists went on and on about tuition increases and the university not caring about the cost of education (as if that is a new concept - students getting upset about tuition?!? Unheard of I know...someone should inform these kids that they aren't exactly original). And yes tuition fees are ridiculously high, and continue to increase on a yearly basis, and yes that may be unfair to those of us already in debt, but making buttons and screaming in protests hasn't been effective for decades...maybe it's time we started looking to new options for dealing with these issues. Or another speaker, feminist this time, enlightening us about the lack of equality between men and women and the patriarchal relationships which are fostered through university campuses (another brand new concept?). And again, I agree with her, however shaving half of your head to break away from the socially accepted norms of behaviour, and staging a feminist writing campaign may or not be the best way to be taken seriously. Don't get me wrong I do think it's great that these people are at least trying to do something and I agree that young people should be encouraged to act, I just feel a little uneasy with some of the ways this is carried out, and think that impressionable high school students should be encouraged to enter into the conversation as opposed to attending these events where they are swayed into action without really understanding the issues, all for the sake of 'standing up for their rights'.

The Last Lecture

2011-02-10T18:06:00.000-08:00

What would you say if you were given one final chance to say it? What lessons from your own life do you think would benefit others? What would you say in your 'last lecture'?

For Randy Pausch, a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon University this became a reality on September 18, 2007. Randy's lecture entitled "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams" was delivered with more charisma and inspiration than could have ever been expected from a man quickly loosing a battle with pancreatic cancer. On that day on that stage randy seemed invincible, even if as he acknowledged, it was only for a brief moment.

Randy's lecture was simple, what does it take to achieve your childhood dreams. He spoke of his own dreams as a child (reaching 0 gravity, winning big stuffed animals, and becoming a Disney Imagineer) and outlined the steps he took in life to reach these. But the lecture was about much more than that. It was about the experiences he had in life, the people he met along the way and the invaluable lessons he learned.

While Randy's story is in so many ways different than many of our own, it is also first and foremost a love story about life. It's no wonder this 'last lecture' has become a phenomenon...widely available on the web (you can watch the video I posted above), and published as a New York Times best Seller. It is something that almost anyone can identify with, even if only for a few seconds.

For me one of Randy's greatest lesson is learning that the critics in your life are the ones who truly care about you. It's when people know you're doing something wrong but don't tell you that you know they've given up on you. I think this is something we all too often fail to acknowledge. And if you really think about it, most often it is the people who hassle us or push us too hard that we learn to resent, when all along they just want to see us reach our potential. I've learned this lesson recently and am pretty thankful for the experience. After all, as Randy explains early on in his lecture...experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted.

"You Want to do What?!?"

2011-02-06T12:34:00.000-08:00

Yep that’s pretty much the reaction I got 3 years ago when I stumbled across the International Development post on the University of Waterloo website and told my parents this is what I wanted them to spend tens of thousands of dollars on. Not exactly the dreams of medicine or law that most parents hold for their children, but hey we’re in a new age where kids get degrees in medieval studies and philosophy right? I mean I hadn’t even heard of international development until then, imagine what they thought. Especially considering I had already applied to 3 universities and INDEV was not the program of choice at any of them. But I am rather persistent and my parents are of the mind that I will succeed at whatever I decide to do. So a PowerPoint presentation later (yes my dad had me make one explaining the merits of such a program) and I had them convinced that INDEV seemed like a good idea, and when I received the confirmation e-mail while on vacation at a converted monastery outside of Naples Italy (that's a completely separate story in of itself :p) I couldn’t have been happier.

But why international development to begin with? I’m not entirely sure actually. For most of my life I wanted to be a teacher, and then a marine biologist, a lawyer, an astronomer, even a nuclear physicist…so how does international development fit in? It’s not like I went on a mission trip to a developing country and was changed forever, or that I really had any concept of development issues at the age of 17. But I did know that there was a lot of controversy over the state of the environment, and let’s face it…at 17 ‘saving the planet’ seemed like a good career choice. It took my poor mother months to convince me that I didn’t really care all that much about the trees or air quality, and that maybe I should try to find something that focused more on the human aspects of many of the problems in our world. And thus the concept of international development entered my life, and to be completely honest I’m still not entirely certain I know what international development is. And let me tell you, when absolutely everyone you meet asks you what you go to school for and you tell them INDEV, you’re supposed to be able to come up with a description…oh well it’s a learning process right? I just keep telling myself that all of this conviction and idealism will get me somewhere, I just need to be patient and see what happens. And that my friends is the nature of international development :)