ecology ecology ecology ecol....

what a weird experience. today is my third full day at the fundamentals in ecosystem ecology course at the cary institute for ecosystem studies in upstate ny. its incredibly interesting, incredibly intense, and incredibly over my head at times. im trying and working hard in lectures to grasp onto the material and have it click. unfortunately, my lack of biology and chemistry make it difficult. im able to get the basic ideas though, im pretty sure, and in the end, thats what matters. im not receiving credit for the course, so i can just do my best to learn. biogeochemisty, primary production, secondary production, nutrient cycling, energy budgets, carbon cycle, aquatic ecology...hopefully by the end of this course these things will mean more than just fancy words to me, and ill maybe even be able to explain in non-science jargon what they mean to you.

im in a workshop about policy and communications, where we spent 3 hours talking about and practicing how to make scientific research more accessible to the general public, how to convey these concepts easily and how to convey why something like a food web is, well, actually of importance. its very useful, and my public speaking skills always need more work, but its nice to have an outlet to talk about how to actually maybe make some use out of all this. whether its social science or natural science, so much of it is dominated by experts doing research on things for the reason of understanding, knowing. but never quite doing. the fact that there is a distinction of applied science is extremely frustrating. in social science it is a little different, since by working with groups of people via interviews and data collection, there intrinsically is some kind of relationship where your work should, ethically speaking, relate back to help the community you extracted information from. they gave you the material your new theory or book or etc is based upon, and so you are obliged to give back. basic marcel mauss sort of concept. in natural science its a little different at least, since as far as we currently know plants, animals, ecosystems, and other organisms aren't voluntarily giving information and data away, and since we can't sit down and interview them we just have to assume all the data collection is ok. maybe some day somebody will find out they have some sort of consciousness, and maybe that will warp everything. but my point is, with natural science there isnt as much of that obligation to give back to the community you are working with when your field is ecology, and so it skews the whole idea of responsibility in some regards. like if you work with co2 in a forest. but theres also fields and fields of ecology, like disease ecology or urban ecology, which we will study next week, that do include humans in the web of ecological interactions, and thus, perhaps their work, by nature, is more applied.

end rant.

its a little disconcerting being the only undergraduate. it makes you realize how much of a culture there is to science. im pretty out of the loop id say. i dont have any kind of ecology research since im not doing a graduate or doctoral thesis, so...i dont have much to relate to the gang here about. today in our policy and communication workshop we had to do a simulation of a telephone and television interview to talk about our research and why it is relevant, explain it to the public, reduce jargon, etc. so i wasn't able to really do what everybody else was doing, little frustrating things like that. i could go into more socially oriented things, but thats not what the course is about, so i wont.

other than that...feeling a little stressed out in general about life. i felt so fresh and rejuvenated upon my return from brazil, such a sense of being able to do anything, everything, capable. recently ive felt somewhat on the other end of that. maybe its been just being home. maybe its been culture shock depression. probably other things. being here feeling a sense of cluelessness, or not being able to connect well with the people here, doesn't help much. id like to think im generally an easy person to get along with, and would like to think i make myself pretty accessible and open. i am an open minded person, i know that much. maybe its also about wanting to make amends and fix things, but not being sure quite how. i want to feel that sense of happiness, capability, and rejuvenation that i felt in brazil. i dont know where it went off too, but im hoping i find it again back at bard, back in something of a comfort zone, or at least the nearest thing for me.

im realizing here that ecosystem ecology is not my thing; im ok with that. i dont think research scientist really has my name on it. im hoping i can find soon what it is that really makes me happy. i struggle. i know what i think is important, and i will apply for internships this summer based on that, hoping i can make some sort of difference. but what makes me happy? a brainstorm is in order.

• finding people i dont feel strange being quiet around. i hate when i feel uncomfortable about being quiet.
• i really loved the boat trip on the amazon, the whole experience of just living on one
• looking at stars
• engaging and slightly dark novels, being a writer isnt obscure in my mind, but i would probably be haunted by the question of all the things i wasnt doing to help the world
• i like anthropology, and im good at it, but same problem. theres too much about it that i find irrelevant to solving actual problems for me to go too seriously into it. it focuses on community development, listening and taking people/cultures other than ones own/ones self seriously...so much good. but past the undergraduate level, it seems its mostly designed to go get a pHD and teach at a college. and i dont particularly love giving presentations so i dont know if that much public speaking is up my alley anytime soon
• good cups of coffee
• again, i love the idea of reciprocity and giving back. and you know it makes you happy to give a gift somebody really enjoys. or in a not so materialistic sense...it just feels good to know you are doing something that makes you a good person, to be a giving member of society, to contribute. although its dry and cynical, this one joke website i go to sometimes for a laugh had this one line...something like..."self-esteem and the ability to like yourself only come after you've done something that make you likable." which is a little different, but still related, in a way. helping, being in a community, feels good. plain and simple. i miss being a part of a real community, which is something that i need to start as soon as i get back to bard
  
• being in cities makes me surprisingly happy, on a social level. but being near water also leaves me content. answer: maybe end up living in a port city eventually.
• and i actually do like writing. or really, learning that what i write might actually have an impact. even if that just means changing somebody's image of something, or shifting their opinion a little bit.

so what do we have? writing reading cities boats water giving back etc etc etc. a nice framework, but still...what just makes me happy? not feeling guilty, for one thing. i want to find this something so badly. my parents always told me to make sure i end up doing something that 1) i love and 2) i know helps people. in brazil the experience made me think thoroughly about the latter, but since i was already pretty happy i guess i didnt stop to think about how to tie that in with the former. i think back to high school and remember how happy wrestling and photography made me. more or less because they gave me an outlet for expression, a chance to be myself, and i know i harp on it a lot, but ive really missed that at my time at bard. one of my promises to myself was to give myself that again upon coming back. to exercise, get involved with a martial art, start writing more, to find, in short, something i love and care about and want to devote energy to. then again maybe i had that, and lost sight of it.

trying to figure yourself out, out of context (like in this random ecology course) is tough work. i told myself and this blog while in the amazon, in the south of para i think, that i knew the person i think is inside of me, that i have the potential to be, and now just need to find ways to...be him. find outlets. honestly i havent felt much at all like that person here at this course, and it bothers me a lot. maybe over parts of break in general, to certain people, ive seemed unlike myself and i want to correct that. i feel like here ive shelled up to some degree, partly out of not understanding the material, partly out of not feeling at all understood/accepted by the people here. point is, i want that to change as soon as possible. not to say i wont take everything i can out of this experience...but i want to feel more like myself. which maybe i should take more accountability for while im here. but its hard to be yourself when you just feel so...different. maybe im just crazy, with this post being blatant proof. but maybe, just maybe, i have a point?

sss

happy new years and off i am, again

another new year.

tomorrow i leave for my ecosystem ecology course at cary. im excited, although a little bummed that the process to apply for credit was so burdensome. at least i can put it on my transcript. besides, im more excited about just learning about this stuff anyway.

break's been an interesting time. ive been feeling for sure whatever kind of culture shock depression there is. its more of missing the kind of life i had in brazil, that kind of go with the flow independence that one just doesnt quite have living in the suburbs . i also miss constant change, and back at home its all too easy to drift back into the daily grind and routine. which ive tried to mix up here and there, but i think ive been feeling some of what i gained slipping, so, its time to be on the move again and throw myself in to something random. a graduate level ecology course sounds just about right, and comes at a good time. although, the trade off is that i really havent seen much of some people from home, and thats not great. theres still so much to catch up on. and i want to tell people all about brazil and my experience but...one can't just do it all at once. ive tried...and i think it just loses a lot in translation. or at least, when i give the typical overview of my semester, to me at least it doesnt sound all that exciting. i think its like my friend maisha said, "dont tell me about it all at once. ill find out in little stories throughout next semester". and i think thats a good way to approach it. im pretty nostalgic for it though. as much as it was frustrating at times, it was good to get through to the other side. and i do feel different for it, it most atmospheres. when im surrounded by friends i can feel a different me. or just this feeling of warmth and strength inside that ive felt missing for a while.

right now i am starting to apply for internships and put together my resume. im giving myself a month to get applications and cover letters in. i do believe i have a general idea of what i want to work on. and i think i might know what lights me up. but im not sure. im sure being back at bard will rekindle that spark. my friend told me about this quote thats been haunting me:

"don't ask yourself what the world needs; ask yourself what makes you come alive. and then go and do that. because what the world needs is people who have come alive."

i dont know who it is by. brazil made me think so much about one's obligation to one's community, and made me see what some communities really do need, what sorts of help really is important. but at the same time, who decides who to help whom? if i am in america, living in the suburbs of pennsylvania or the little town of red hook in new york, who is to say that i should or should not work with those communities or with some group that works with amazonian communities in the tapajos? where is my obligation to help, to give back? what if what really makes one come alive isnt in their home, but far away? or what if it isnt even what those communities need? but if it makes me come alive...im not making much sense, just trying to sort something out in my mind. i know what is important is grassroots bottom-up organizing, capacity building, environmental education. but i know the arts, culture, self expression, is also important. all things contribute to a holistic vision of health. making a healthy ecosystem is conducive to good health. but so is giving people the tools and power to address these problems in a political sense. but so is helping people express their thoughts, worries, fears, hopes, dreams, on a piece of paper, with words, with paint, with mediums. whether i work as a writer (vonnegut had a great quote about writing, "why bother? i feel and think as much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people do not. you are not alone"), somebody who works within capacity building, or somebody who works in the amazing new field of eco-epidemiology-ish, it all works towards the same end. which makes looking for internships so difficult.

Collegiate Leaders in Environmental Health
WE ACT
Center for Environment, Health, and Justice
Environmental Law Research Institute
Pesticide Action Network North America
Food and Water Watch

environmental health, resource management, corporate responsibility, pesticides, clean water, education and outreach. theres so many possibilities. i could also look into environmental education, environmental journalism, etc etc etc etc etc. i know i want to do something with advocacy research, for sure. but what brazil showed me, is that like i said, its all towards the same thing. so if im interested in health...im interested in everything?

i mean...
ecosystem services
community building
capacity building
grassroots organizing
toxic exposure
microbiology
looking at the city as ecosystem
community based participatory research
democratic decision making
...how to i try and throw that all into one summer internship experience? HA

oh and i have an intestinal parasite living inside of me. today i get to try and find out what kind of lovely parasite it is. fun fun fun fun. i also get to get a few pairs of new clothes for school. and then pack. and pack some more. dreamcast is coming with.

a great christmas
family, too much time playing pokemon while eating muffins, watching stepbrothers, driving, laughing as a family together, holiday hellos from friends, and a new pile of books to read.

The Elephant Vanishes by Murakami
The Hungry Tide by Ghosh
Biography of a Germ by Karlen
Symbiotic Planet by Margulis
Cosmicomics by Calvino
Art Forms from Nature by Haekel

i also spent xmas eve looking up internships, like a freak
The Center for Health, Environment, and Justice
Environmental Law Institute
WE ACT
Ceres
Beyond Pesticides
Cary Institute REU

who knows? ill be doing apps for these in the meantime.

a merry holidays to all. this is quite nice.

how different am i?
i dont know. tell me.
there's this overwhelming inner sense of capability and hope.
i actually listen to and trust myself in what i say and think.
challenges excite me.
overall, i feel a lack of the kind of fear to act that would have gripped me before brazil.
even my host mother thought i was quite different from the period she finally met me to my final days there.
brazil taught me that faith that the world works out is crucial.
nobody is the center of it, and everything works out, somehow.
which ive been trying to apply. to live in the moment. to stop trying to plan and control anything.
which leads to happiness and defeats, for sure.
i want motion. speed. change. nothing fixed. up in the air. friction.
fears are just barriers set up for us to push them down.
somebody can show us the way, but its our job to plow through them.
in a way im grateful to SIT for being so disorganized.
it made us do everything ourselves.
initiative.
and its helped me to find the independence i wanted. the strength i knew was in there.
for the first time in so long i feel i can do anything.
not everything. just, anything.
there's this wonderful little quote at the end of Italo Calvinho's Baron in the Trees:
"only by being so frankly himself as he was till his death could he give something to all"
its something i quarrel with on my return home.
ive always found myself, on return from such things as this, coming back refreshed, renewed.
and then slowly, it slips away as i find myself slipping to be the way people imagined i was.
i vowed after the last time to not let that happen.
and stubbornly, am sticking to myself, now actually having a sense of who/what that means and is.
how do you stay to yourself while still reaching out to the people you care about?
and what if that is too late?
i made wonderful friends in brazil. really wonderful. who i know i will keep in touch with,
and we will always share the connection of the giant rite of passage that was the semester.
but whats the worth if you end up losing the same connections with others?
or really, how do you reconcile the two worlds?

merry christmas and happy holidays.

back in america. ate a cheesesteak the other night with hibby and keej. learned that everybody is also obsessed with mgmt and kids here. awesome. theres no acai, acerola, goiaba, etc here. depressed. its also very cold. it was 95 every day in belem. needless to say i now have a cold. been reading the invisible pyramid. if i could find my old copy of the phantom tollbooth i would read that too. next is the bookseller of kabul. i have a pile next to the massage chair. theres also a spot for my tea cup. been working out too. no ju jitsu, not enough time. leave jan 4th for ecosystem ecology. will bum around vassar and nyc until bard starts. need to buy a jump rope. going to get my hair trimmed today. i can drive. go grocery shopping. i hope this post is a good example of the state of my mind right now. talk about liminality.

thursday im heading up to bard with larkin's parents and will hang there for the night. it will be really good to see people.

its very weird to be home. both happy to be back, but also miserable not to still be there. but then again, it was mostly the people there who made it what it was. to be back in amazonia right now on my own would be a completely different experience.

last day in Belem. but first, listen to this, and tell me it isnt the most beautiful thing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qPvJ8FAEg4

im going to miss it here. despite times where ive hated it and been frustrated. deep down, i love it all. i want to come back here with you, whoever is reading. show you why buying a cup of acerola juice can make my day. to buy fresh coconut water. pass by salgado stands. do the gringo run across the street. get frustrated with the brazil whistle. today i got some avacate juice. great. last night was wonderful. getting fresh juice makes it even better. today maura was asking me if i feel like a different person than the one who arrived in Amazonia. she thinks so. i agree. com certeza. im about to go out with her and diego to buy last minute presents. dont talk to me about packing my suitcase tonight. i dont want to think about it. i dont know how successful it will be. ive bought too much. comprei de mais...

when will my next time to speak portuguese actually be? today is so bittersweet on so many levels. so many good things coming to an end. unless i can find a way to make them live on back home. i have a thing of guarana powder im excited about. dammit. im not ready to be home. i am, but im just not ready to leave. or, i just wish we had another free day here. theres too much to do. i might never see my host family ever again, more likely than not. i only have a few more hours with them, you know? damn you simon and garfunkel, and the random guy on youtube who sings it in the way i imagine it being sung. i will lay me down.

im going to go home, set up my hammock, pretend i am back on the boat trip aka the greatest week ever and read the phantom tollbooth. its moments like that from the trip i will miss so much. so much has happened in the past 4 months its insane to think about it. there is so much. and all of it has been helpful. wonderful. beautiful. empowering. and the harder its been, the more rewarding its been in the long run. because i overcame all of my obstacles and bumps in the road on my own. i have found my independence and inner strength to accomplish what i need to. and although its mildly dormant within me, i can feel the presence of somebody who knows they can handle whatever life throws at them. because thats what i did. and stepped up to the task.

im going to learn how to play the portuguese cover of bridge over troubled water on guitar, ive decided. i like my voice in portuguese better. i dont think nancy scheper-hughes was right. i dont think its about a desperate search to find meaning somewhere outside of your normal life. the contrast is part of the process and the beauty. i thought i would find everything i wanted, that comfort of a different culture that perhaps would get me better, here in brazil. i found something in brazil. but very diffierent. because what i found wasnt a feeling on finally belonging at all. but realizing the steps within myself. realizing what culture even really is. realizing that everything ive been looking for is right back home, but its also here, and its also everywhere else in the world i havent been. its no one place thats right for me or anyone. its about putting all those little pieces together and seeing what you can make out of it.

man. crazy stuff. i wish i didnt bring all these books to brazil. no point

Does this have to be the price of modernity: water pollution, community needs, and organizational support in Sao Luis

“…even if our hopes are misplaced, however, and the specific disease control and health outcomes we seek are not achieved, fundamental requirements of the ecosystem approach for open and democratic communication, tolerance, negotiation, and ecological awareness will surely have made the effort worthwhile” –David Walter-Toews (2001, 21)

besides the shoddy powerpoint i just whipped together for tomorrow afternoon, i am officially done with ISP.

which is nice. im mildly content with that i ended up writing, which is more than most of the group is expressing. or at least, those who actually turned it in today...

this means my friday night, saturday, sunday, and monday are my last free days here. when the hell did that happen? sunday theres some last minute shopping to be done. but...gah.

will be in the philly airport in a week. how weird. wrestling tournament? philadelphia? west chester? fennarios? cheessteak? hot wings? some element of patience? people who say excuse me instead of "pstttt"?

no but i really will miss brazil. i miss it already, with the knowledge that i really dont have much free time left and most of what is left is ISP or group sitio time. but also, thinking back, there is so much i have seen and done in the past 3 months. its almost mind boggling. ive lived in5 major amazonian cities. traveled all over. the boat trip seems like months ago, but it wasnt at all. even the time in sao luis seems so far away. i ate a turtle! that was so long ago. and what i have are the greatest little fragments of memories.

on another note, i am officially in 2 of my classes. below are the course descriptions for them

Anth 322 Cultural Technologies of Memory
This course is organized around several practices and technologies that produce collective and personal memory. The class will explore a distinction commonly made between 'memory' and 'history', asking on what basis this distinction is made and how it maps on to our ideas about foreign places and people. The techniques and technologies of public memory we will examine may include ancient "memory palaces," historical writing, oral narrative, ritual, myth, monuments, museums and archives. We will also explore how radio and photography are used to produce national and familial representations of the past. The focus in each section will be on how the particular medium of remembering shapes the content of what is remembered. We will address who has access to memory practices, stressing the link between the production of particular memories and their political uses. The class will give students a theoretical base to write a final research paper that situates a contemporary memory practice in its specific cultural and historical context: the recent proliferation of family genealogies, Holocaust testimonies and/or museums, the truth commissions, local histories are among a few possible examples.

Hist 164 Hooke's Micrographia
A monument of natural philosophy and scientific illustration, Robert Hooke's Micrographia (1665) was the first laboratory manual in microscopy. A great experimentalist, Hooke developed his research as a Fellow of the newly founded Royal Society of London. Hooke and his colleagues intended the work to be a manifesto of experimental method and faith in progress. They also hoped Hooke's observations would lend credence to atomism, a notorious ancient philosophy that was being rehabilitated in the seventeenth century. The work's descriptive and experimental language suggests objectivity, as does the author's recourse to geometric principles. Yet Hooke's treatise is also permeated with a theological agenda. We will read the Micrographia, examining its philosophical antecedents and experimental foundations. We will also investigate Hooke's life and work, his association with the Royal Society and contemporary savants, as well as the links between science and society during the Scientific Revolution.

right now im just waiting on GIS, Ecology&Evolution, and Nonfiction writing. Considering auditing a class on...something.
today i ate country fried steak in brazil with my host family. ..