Life is a Helper

I have never been a good narrator, and I doubt I will ever be. When the professor announced that this week’s writing style focus would be narratives, I thought to myself, “great, Rick the lousy storyteller is back in town again, everyone.” Just as I was struggling with filtering for anything interesting in my life, a series of unbelievable events happened to me during this short week that would prove to be good narrative material. Yes, no doubt life is a helper.

On Monday as I was biking home from school, feeling excited for the creativity dripping off my writing class, I discovered my car parked in front of the house was wrecked. The left front fender was severely damaged and the front bumper came half off. My mind immediately went blank, then a second later, a voice in the back of my head said, “oh boy, what a great way to start summer school.” Lucky me, a note was left on the windshield by a police officer, saying “Your car was hit by a Yolo County bus. You need to call xxxxxxxx.”

On Tuesday morning, I called the number provided by the police officer. Apparently it was the number of the county sheriff’s office. The person on the phone informed me that I should instead contact the Yolo County Human Resources Department to start the insurance claim process. Ok, I guessed HR was the insurance expert in the government, so I went on and gave them a call without thinking too much. The person answering the phone from the county HR was in shock and asked who directed me to call their number. And once again, I was referred to contact the county department of transportation.

On Wednesday, as the endless phone call transfers continued, I discovered my bike was not working properly. I took it to the Bike Barn and borrowed some tools to fix the supposedly minor problem. The problem wasn’t minor after all. Some mysterious sealing ring to protect the bearing was broken on the wheel and it would lead to a fifty dollar replacement of the entire wheel. I couldn’t afford it, and so I dragged my bike all the way from school to home.

On Thursday, I decided that I was sick of the phone calls and I wanted information of the car accident to file a claim with my own insurance company. I went to the city police station and spoke with the person at the front desk. After she made some phone calls and worked on the computer, she told me nothing regarding the accident was on file. She suggested that I email the police officer that handled the accident for more information.

On Friday, I am still waiting for the police officer to write me back and tell me what exactly happened to my car. And as I am writing this post, my laptop is making some very funny noise that makes me believe I should be expecting a computer system breakdown very soon.

Yup, life is a helper. Just as I thought I had nothing to narrate, who would have thought my week would be filled with stories?

Note: None of events is dramatization. Ok, maybe I was paranoid about the computer.

Ideology vs. Ideal

I guess I am growing addicted to video demonstration. After all, they say, “a picture is worth a thousand words,” let alone a video clip. My thanks go to multimedia presentation technology.

This clip selected is an excerpt from my favorite video game of all times: Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. The universe of the game is set in the Cold War era after the Second World War. In this scene, the protagonist, a CIA operative code named Snake is about to have a final faceoff with his former mentor the Boss, who appears to have defected from the US to the Soviet Union. Before their tragic battle, Boss explains to Snake the reason of her defection and describes her ideology to her beloved apprentice, which also serves as a convenient visual introduction to my entry.

Earlier as I was reading Calvin’s post regarding ideology and identity, I couldn’t help admiring his vision for ideology on an individual basis. Calvin believes that people are unique individuals for they hold different ideologies that cannot be forced upon them by authorities or any outside influence. In other words, we are who we are because of our different beliefs and the freedom to form and hold on to them. That would be a world I would love to dwell in. Perhaps I am a pessimist. Reality presents itself a bit differently to me than to Calvin.

In my opinion, a fine line can be drawn between ideology and ideal. According to Lawrence Grossberg, ideology represents a collective system of absolute beliefs, ideas and attitude (Bennet, Grossberg and Morris, 177). Ideal, in a sense, would be a more personal approach to realize an ideology in my interpretation. Calvin gives a good example about the United States and the political parties in his entry, which I would like to borrow and elaborate on.

It is true that the Republican and the Democrat have very different practices of politics. However if we closely examine their core values, how different truly are they? Do they agree to practice capitalist or communist philosophy? Do they believe in democracy or totalitarianism? Do they support a free market or a centralized economy? All the aspects mentioned above are the essential philosophies in the foundation of a nation, which can be translated as ideology. On the other hand, whether the government should issue a tax cut (Republican) or whether the country should support gay marriage (Democrat) would be different methods to realize the similar core values. In other words, these are different ideals to approach the same goals.

As individuals we can certainly claim that we hold different ideologies and ideals. However, it seems nearly impossible for everybody to freely implement their own ideologies in a collective community setting: society. To survive as an accepted social member, people mold and adjust their ideologies to fit in with the larger, collective ideology by establishing and practicing different ideals. Should times of absolute defiance happen, immigration or even exile occurs.

Granted, it is a fairly dark picture I depict in the entry. However it is only based on my personal observation of the reality. Perhaps I am a pessimist. And that is my idealistic way to examine the world.

Rick's Identity

“I remember, I remember everything.”

That was a line from the Bourne Ultimatum, the concluding sequel to the action/thriller hit the Bourne Identity that was released in 2002. Jason Bourne, the protagonist in the series, is a well-trained, highly skilled spy who suffers from amnesia. With “only” his fighting skills and the ability to speak seven languages left in him, Bourne loses memories of who he is. Therefore throughout the timeline of the series Bourne is determined to uncover his identity by triggering occasional gunfights, hand-to-hand combats and explosive car chases. Shockingly the movie ends with Bourne recovering his identity and deciding to abandon it for a normal life.

Unlike Jason Bourne, my identity, or rather my different identities are not well documented and preserved on some super computer in the government archive. Instead, I am in constant search for my own identity, despite the fact that I don’t have amnesia, at least not that I can remember. Then what is identity? Sometimes identity can be explained as a role that one plays in a certain social setting. For example, in school, I am your light-hearted average college student; at work as a community intern at the Cross-Cultural Center on campus, I perform as a dedicated employee; and at home, I act as caring son to my parents. However more often, identity also intertwines with ethnicity, cultural perception and religions. Because of this complexity, my search for identity constantly involves questioning, critiquing and reaffirming.

One may ask, how can we critique and affirm who we are? Kevin Robins provides us with a very creative answer in the textbook. Instead of an innate quality, Robins considers identity a fiction with which people work and live (Bennet, Grossberg and Morris,175). I find Robins' explanation very close to my own definition. To me, identity is a statement, a declaration we make to ourselves in order to become who we desire to be. Following this statement, we behave and perform to create identification traits to convince people that we are that personality we create in our heads. Does this definition explain every aspect of identity? No. But this is the one definition I have a firm grasp on based on my current life experience and knowledge. And so my search for identity continues.

First Thoughts on UWP 101 and the Textbook

I haven’t had a writing class in quite some time. This morning I arrived early and was anxious waiting in the classroom, wondering what sort of workload would be laid before me in this upcoming six weeks. To my surprise, this class does not seem like a typical writing class where a student needs to read seven books and do three term projects. Instead, we are asked to create our own blogs and write four entries weekly, which provides great incentives for a technology addict like me to write and work my creativity.

In addition to the weekly writing assignments, a textbook named New Keywords was required for the class. Therefore I went straight to bookstore to purchase this mysterious work of words (literally) after our first meeting. The travel between Storer and the bookstore was nothing more than linear. I located the pile of the book, picked a less-tortured copy, went to the register and paid for it. The process was as smooth as it could be.

While having lunch, I had a chance to read the introduction of the book. I was totally amazed by the originality of the idea of making connections between vocabulary and cultures. A quote I came across working as an intern at the Cross-Cultural Center on campus coincides with the book’s intent: Say what you mean and mean what you say. The world and history evolve, so does people’s choice of words. In today’s multicultural society, we, as the educated bunch, do have a responsibility to understand the power of language and be aware of the cultural sensitivity of words. I am pleased and grateful that we select a textbook that speaks to my passion. I am eager for future class discussion to come.