Sixth week

In this week we participated in two exercises that where fun and interesting. For the former we watch a video dealing with the poor water conditions in Ayole and the efforts that were made to fix successfully this problem. For the latter we played a fun game that had to do with life. In this section I will focus more on the thoughts that I had on the game rather than those of the movie.

In the game we made teams of four people, we randomly (or at least that’s what I think) received a character (photograph of a kid that had a red or blue frame). The game was full of traps, simulating difficulties in life that a person may or may not have throughout his life. The characters that had blue frames always succeeded to avoid any penalty when they landed on these spots, while the red ones where not so lucky (no one except the teacher was aware of this partiality). At the beginning of the game the professor told us that we were going to play this fun game and that the winner will receive one additional point in the grading scale while the looser will loose one.

Since part of our grade was at jeopardy, teams started to behave aggressively and for a moment it seemed as if each other miseries were other people happiness (for some people at least). At the end of the game the majority stated that the game was not fair but I get the feeling that they formulated that decision from empathy without truly judging the system.

In my case, I was in a handicapped team that lost against the other five teams. When asked whether the game was fair or not, I said that the game was fair because:
1. Everyone played under the same rules, meaning that they had the same possibility of receiving a good character or a handicapped one. Furthermore, we tossed a dice throughout the game thus we had a probability of 1/6 of winning and one of 1/6 of loosing the game.
2. We never disagree at the beginning or throughout the game that the system was unfair or that gambling part of our grades was not correct.

After thinking for a while I think the professor was trying to create a cognitive dissonance in the class, in addition, by jeopardizing a small portion of our grades some people may have internalized an attitude. But how good did it work? For people that stated that the game was not fair the empathy and some other feelings were greater at the end, but they didn’t really do anything to stop it meanwhile (thus accepting the reality). If they were playing the real game, this situation might generate even more cognitive dissonance, furthermore with little or not remuneration people might internalize the attitude deeper thus more people will be convinced that this game was fair.

Was my decision correct? Not really, while thinking of this, I missed part of the delusion.
1. We were not given an option at the beginning of the game whether we wanted to play it or not.
2. We were not given an option to quit the game
3. Our grades should be something we earn, not something left to luck.
After some thought, I got to the conclusion that this game was not as fair as I thought in that moment because I was missing these fundamental ideas. I also don’t think that it was completely unfair since, although not given the choice, I had the right to refuse to continue playing the game.

Then, what should I have done, without affecting the dynamics of the exercise? First of all I should have paid more attention to the pattern and the fact that our grades should not be left to luck, instead of thinking of winning or loosing, the probabilities behind them and the fate of our character. After doing this, I should have stood up when it was our turn (especially when we were not winning nor loosing), and claim that the game was not fair thus stepping away from it. (At this point I don’t think the professor would question my decision because it could jeopardize the dynamics of the exercise thus letting me out after unsuccessful tries to get me back in). Although this may not be the best way to deal with the game, I think its elegant and it wouldn’t break with the dynamics of the game ^^;;

After all the meditation, I think that this game was fun and it really made us “see” that the world is unfair and sometimes we must question the system and the society we live in.

Fifth week

This week was very interesting. On Tuesday our class played a fun game where half of the class had to walk blindfolded and the other half had to guide them (teams of two), then we interchanged roles. I don’t really know the name for it, but let’s call it “blind trust”. For the first part we were instructed to guide our partners to walk to a nearby lake (100m + 50m of stairs, 150m) pretending that they where the most precious thing in life. When we changed roles the other teammates where instructed to do whatever they wanted to (the blindfolded people did not know).

For the first part I felt that I was giving protection and that the responsibility of my partner was on my shoulder. While I was walking I felt somehow happy and powerful. That feeling was great and perhaps that is the most powerful charm for helping other people out, Satisfaction!

For the second part my partner started walking me around, but for no apparent reason my partner left me without saying a word. I was thinking that perhaps my partner had to do something but was to shy to say anything. Then all of a sudden someone grabbed my arm and made me run for no reason. Before this event, I was expecting some kind of unexpected situation because it wouldn’t make sense for the teacher to tell them to be kind to us. Although I don’t know for sure, I’m positive that the person that made me run was not my original partner. Since I felt the texture of the ground, my hearing increased and I remembered the scenery I could tell where we where with a precision of 5 to 15 meters of error even though we were running. Since this person did not bring me to far places, he/she had to be from our class thus I started trusting him and started running around at the same pace. After this, this person left me too.

Then a third person made me walk around this area. I think that he just wanted to have some fun bringing me to difficult places and at the end leaving me nearby another blindfolded person. Although the teacher told them that they could do anything (without me knowing), this person cared when I was about to crash. -_-;;

After we finish this exercise we returned to the class and discussed. I think that what we can get out of this experiment/game is that helping other people feels well. We must also remember that it is always a good idea to let people (who are receiving help) know how much time are we going to expend with them so when we leave (if we do), they don’t feel abandoned.

Another thing that I learned is that the majority, if we are given the freedom to do something, we won’t question if that action is right or wrong and instead, we tend to do what everyone else is doing. In my case I think that it is always better to question our actions and think about the situation, we must not rely on our rights/privileges or on our limitations.

Summary 1

After thinking for a while I have decided that I must do the following
1. Be more efficient in what I do.
2. Give myself some free time.
3. Watch more news in order to notice important events
4. Prepare for the future
5. Help my family and the community.

I have learned that I must do things that I really like so I can be passionate about it and follow it till the end. I must think about the future and what kind of person do I really want to be.

I have found out that I have a mature consciousness but I still want to work forward, in order to be a better person. I will also try to work harder in order to get out of a laziness state and start being more productive.

In these four weeks I have found out that there are more people than what I thought trying to make a positive change to the world. For a long time I have thought that by working hard and helping the economy grow, the average living will also raise, although this is not necessarily false, doing something for the community also, might bring better results since we must work and live as a society.
I think that the main problem is generated in the education system.

I think that the ideal education system for Mexico would be.
1. Make more schools so more people get education.
2. Have more vacations and free time.
3. Let students progress in the education systems depending on their abilities (faster, normal or slower)
4. Pursue the ability of problem solving instead of memorization.
5. Inspire the kids in their studies and for the care of the common good.

I think that my social work this semester will be focused in giving classes to people so they can become prepare and start changing Mexico. I will keep in mind some of the points that I mentioned above, hopefully the education system in the future will move toward this approach.

Fourth week

This week we thought about what might be some reasons for the poverty in Mexico.
Some of the factors that were listed were.
1. Poor education and lack of knowledge in poor communities
2. Government since it just gives away money to poor people
3. Lack of job opportunities
4. Natural Resources.
5. Desire to succeed.

From these factors some people think that many poor people have desired to succeed and I agree with them, but I think that in average there are less poor people that really do something to succeed thus they keep doing what they have been doing for long time.
Why do many poor people have lots of children, even though they are poor? Why do some poor people become middle class or even rich if they try? I think that key is “will” and that we should instead inspire this will and open opportunities in poor towns than giving away money.

A nice question was brought up by the teacher,
What still is the reason for not doing community service?
In my case I have done some community service once in a while and the main reason for not doing it now is that I don’t really have time since I’m at school taking the ridiculous amount of 56 credits. Why do we need so much work? If anyone wants to do this then they will have to jeopardize not the fun stuff, but their base of their studies. In the past I haven’t done a lot of things for myself because I had to study, therefore I think that the education system in Mexico is much harder than the US thus it really needs to be modified.

Third week

We watched a video about the regular life of a human being. This video was full of facts about the average distance we will walk in our lives, how many litters of water we will drink, how much dead skin it would fall out of our bodies etc. In general this video told us the fact of how complex a human life could be from an outsider’s perspective. Having this is mind we should appreciate life more.

I also did a self conscious exam that tried to evaluate me in different aspects related to my own personal growth. Although I do not fully agree with some of the questions that were asked I ended up being in a mature level of consciousness as some of the students in my class. My rational rating was surprisingly lower that what I had expected but this might be due to some ambiguities in some questions.

Furthermore we watched a section of the movie “Lion King”. Luckily enough I found that part of the movie shared on internet, so I decided to reference it here at the bottom of this post. I found this clip to be inspiring because Simba finds out that he could be a lot more that what he actually is right now, and that he must do what he has to do.

Second week

We started watching a video that made us “see” the reality of some communities in Mexico. In here, a group of people were trying to search for a way to bring water to the community of Santa Maria. This clip was interesting because a lot of the people of the community wanted to have a bright future so they joined the project to help build a dam. In the first try, what they thought it would work, failed, but without blaming anyone they tried again but this time in a more organized manner. I think that the most amazing fact out of this is that if people really want to change their living conditions they can and in some of the cases they just need a little help to make a positive change.

The other set of videos that we watch had to do with Ryan’s well. When Ryan was six years old, his teacher told him that they could make a difference in the world and that in that moment lots of people in Africa where dying. This conversation inspired Ryan to build a well in order to bring water to these people. I really think that Ryan actions were correct and he can inspire us so we can also make a positive change in the world.

Here is a documentary video of Ryan.

First Week

My class has approximately 25 members from different majors. In the first week our teacher made us introduce ourselves and we played some fun games in order to remember everyone name. The interesting thing is that even though they were interesting and we could learn from them if we really wanted to, we instead raced each other.

Why did we do this? I don’t really know the reason for other people but for me since I’m bad at remembering names, I didn’t want to go in front and call some random person’s name since I barely remembered some of them. Another important factor is that I tend to over-think stuff in these kinds of scenarios thus missing the purpose of the exercise...

Even though I think that I failed this exercise of remembering names, the most important thing is that I got to know myself a little bit better. Later on we shared what we like to do and what we expect from the class in a virtual platform called BlackBoard (BB) thus we got to know each other better.

Furthermore we made teams of three and four people and talked about ourselves. In my case the team is made up of three members.