Been a while

Every now and then you seem to hit your stride, and then something derails you. In the case of this blog, success may have been my worst enemy - I was doing well, I felt like I had something to say - and then Carnival was done and I had said what I had to say. And I was left with a "so now what..." Last week I had things to say, but I was just out of the habit.

Last week we joined a gym. It was great to finally do so. We visited three of them, and picked the first one, as usual. Linz calls me an impulse buyer, but quite frankly, since so much of what I come across isn't "right", once I find something that feels right, I know it. Which reminds me of the day before we joined the gym when I had to buy shoes. That wasn't fun - and it was a lot less fun for Linz than it was for me. I hated most of the shoes I saw. Granted, that's my normal feeling. Once I have to buy shoes I realise how ugly I find most shoes. But that isn't anything new. I like very few shoes, but generally once I find a pair I like, I like them. The problem, in this case, was that I never saw a pair I liked - I only saw shoes I either disliked or disliked intensely. In the end we went to a running shoe specialist, where the guy knew what he was talking about and was able to recommend a pair of shoes which weren't too ugly and, far more importantly, suited my feet - probably better than any pair I have owned.

The gym was a different matter. I really didn't know what to do, didn't know where to start. I find gyms intimidating for a number of reasons. One is that I am in such bad shape that I fear people will laugh at me, or worse yet, feel sorry for me. The treadmill was ok, and we played around with the machines a little. It was ok. Then on Saturday we got someone to show us around, suggest a routine, and help figure out weights and reps. It was great - and empowering. And we haven't gone back since. Yesterday the weather was too intimidating - we got into the car and the wind was buffetting it around, and then we heard a tornado warning for Logan County. Not knowing where that was relative to us, I thought it best that we go home and find out. And once we got home, of course, we never left again. Today we had a valid excuse for not going - Linz is feeling unwell - but it still means that we are not going. I am afraid of breaking my stride again. But not that worried - I feel confident that we will be back as soon as Linz feels well enough. I am looking forward to it, I want to go back. And, for a change, I was able to pace myself in such a way that I felt like I was getting something done without overdoing it.

Ash Wednesday

And then it was done...

As far as Carnivals "in exile" go, this was by far the best. The weekend was far better than the actually days themselves - it's difficult to stay in the mood while you have work to deal with, while you are embedded in a matrix of people who really have no interest or awareness in what's going on. Still, it was nice listening to the radio from home, listening to people who were worked up, were in the mood for it all. In that regard 101 was more effective because they have several djs who are less professional - not the slick radio presenters, but people much like people you know in real life.

Anyway, it's over. 101 is back to Filmi, it would appear. Haven't had a chance to check the others yet. Does Lent still bring more sombre music?

Carnival Sunday

Starting to feel the fever pitch, the sense of being alive. It's Carnival. I may be a world away, but it's still Carnival. I can't go to work tomorrow! That's just so wrong. Doesn't anyone realise what day it is? I'm ready to go out at 4 am (which it 2 am here), ready to stay up all night to listen to Dimanche Gras. But I won't. I'm sleepy enough as it is, I have to get a good bit of work done for tomorrow, and I have to get an abstract in by Wednesday for ESA. Who came up with the bright idea of putting the abstract submission deadline on Ash Wednesday? What were they thinking? :)

Carnival Friday

As far away as I am, it's still Carnival Friday. I could blame it on having access to Trinidad radio, but the truth is that it's there no matter what. Carnival is Carnival. You can be happy about it, or you can let it break your heart - but you can't ignore it. It's in your blood. The fact that I have access to Trinidad radio means that I can enjoy the feeling instead of having this immense sense of being excluded, of the biggest thing in the world happening, but you can't be there.

It's so difficult to not be home for Carnival. Sure, not being home for Christmas sucks too, but there is so much more to Carnival. It's the high point of the year, and no matter how long you spend in exile, no matter how many Carnivals you miss, I can't imagine it not being the high point of the year. Listening to a flood of chutney soca only makes it more intense. Kaiso is something I feel strongly about, but I don't feel the sense of "ownership" of kaiso that I do of chutney. Still, no matter how much of a sense of immediacy the radio can give you, it will never be the same, and it will never fill the sense of longing, the knowledge of what you are missing.

Wot a ting

The day after I spend my money for Homeviewtnt, 101 decides to stream for free, at least for the Carnival season. I'd say their free stream is better quality than the paid stream. No complaints - complements what Homeview has. Real chutney. Now I happy.

HomeView and Filmi

Finally (rather too late) subscribed to Homeviewtnt. So far so good - except that the only real kaiso available is 105, which seems to be covering pan-round-the-neck competition. Not exactly meeting my desire to figure out what's in play for Carnival 2006 (can't believe that in just a week I will be missing yet another Carnival).

So what do I find myself listening to? Filmi on 103.

I remember when I used to hate this kind of music. It was just too inaccessible to me. It didn't seem musical, it seemed terribly discordant. Now, hearing it for the first time in so long - I can't imagine anything better. Ok, I would probably prefer chutney, I would probably prefer dub. But other than that...and yeah, this one is about as inane a film song as I have heard (because the chorus is in English - I wonder how some of this stuff would suck the rest of the time if I could understand it).

In a general sense, listening to music in a language you can't understand seems strange to me. It's one thing is Spanish, where I can still figure out a good few words, here and there if not everywhere. Hindi is another issue. I know the odd word here and there, I know a number of other words that I don't understand...but for the most time I have no clue what they are saying. And yet the music still says something to me - there's the music, the sound of the words, and the intonation of the singing.

Review Sessions

It would appear, based on the comments I have come across in the past, that the best feature of my teaching is my review sessions. This is unfortunate, since I would rather be better at engaging students than at helping them cram for exams - but the truth is, I have been taught to cram, to spot, and all these other good things, so it makes sense that I am able to model the behaviour I have learned.

The issue now is how to make that into a useful pedagogical tool. Rather than working against your strengths, can you work with them? Anyway, first exams are today. Let's hope they do well.

On This Day I Complete My Thirty-Sixth Year

Awake! (not Greece - she is awake)
Awake, my spirit! Think through whom
Thy life-blood tracks its parent lake
And then strike home!

It seems a lifetime ago that I lived for Byron's words, when poetry was the thing that brought me to life. I wasn't even sure, as I sat down to write, whether this was the correct year; and it wasn't until I sat down to write something while anticipating my 36th birthday that I even remembered the poem.

Reading Byron was like waking up from a dream. To read the start of the poem is the feel a rush of life into you - to feel something that you haven't felt in maybe a decade - since the depression grew so deep that it drowned out the poetry. I left my books behind when I went to Michigan - no more Byron, no more Yeats. Somehow, without realising it, my workd grew smaller. All that remained was Christy Brown - and eventually even his words faded and were forgotten.

And after the depression had been pushed back, I no longer cared. I stopped writing - I didn't have the passion, I didn't have the hurt. But it was so much better than what had gone before that I did not mourn what I had lost. I still do not mourn it - it was a more than fair trade. But until this moment, until I clicked on the Google link and read the words: 'Tis time my heart should be unmoved, Since others it hath ceased to move:

To read those words was to feel something come alive - and yet it was a chance to appreciate the beauty and the sorrow without letting it overwhelm me. Before, when I read those words they were true, I read the poem and I became it. I read Yet, though I cannot be beloved, Still let me love! and I knew that it was true, that no one could love me, that I would never be loved. Now I know that it isn't me speaking, it's Byron. Then I did not know the difference.

I remember when 36 was ancient. I thought that Byron's death was perfection - he was old enough to have lived, but still young enough to care. While it really sets into stark relief my own lack of achievements, to compare my life to Byron's, it also serves as a kick in the ass - it serves to motivate me. But it does so in a good way, not in a hopeless way.

Turning 36 is still a big deal. I wish I didn't have to teach. Not because I feel I shouldn't work on my birthday - actually it's a fine day to work - it's ok to go to work on a day over which you feel ownership - you, Andrew Ridgely and India. What I would have liked is a little quiet time for reflection right around 11 am. Well, maybe I should take into account the time difference, and celebrate 9 am instead of 11 am. If I get ready early enough I'll have a few minutes to reflect.

I always get an itch almost, over the first 25 days of the year. My age is the year. So to be 35 in 2006 feel wrong, and it only feel right when my birthday finally arrives and I, too, and 36. Like a racehorse, my "true" birthday is January 1. But at the same time, it's always a little weird to get a year older.

Teacher as performer

It comes back to the same idea of teacher as performer. Overheard someone in the coffee shop talking about a really good prof - one who had him on the edge of his seat, wanting to be the one picked to answer a question. You've gotta think - "wow, how does he do that?"

The first excuse that comes to mind is both simple, easy and lazy. "Oh, it must be because he gets to teach classes on exciting, controvertial topics", or "oh, he has an upper level class with a more engaged student body". And then you think about last semester, and you realise that no, it's your own fault. You had the chance, and although it was your first semester (for one of the classes), you just didn't get into the things that would have really engaged them. Sure, if it were my class I could make it more exciting...

Well, I pretty much "own" my sections of General Botany. How do you make cells and cell division exciting? How do you manage to engage them? Well, let's see - what is tomorrow all about? Cells and microscopy. Not very exciting, you say. And you are somewhat correct in the position. But that's really just lazy thinking. You need to ask the question "what can I do to make the material more exciting?" But there I am stumped. How do I excite people about plant cells? Simply being excited about the material isn't really good enough.

What is the consistency of a cell? Solid, liquid, gas, solution or colloid? Not very exciting - but you can make it engaging. Cytoplasmic streaming is always cool, if I can get them to see it clearly enough. And how does vinegar affect the cell? Well, it denatures the protein. So I need to introduce them to the idea of proteins, and how pH affects the structure of a protein. I suppose that might be the right place to start - after I get them looking at the Elodea leaves, hopefully.

Teaching

I realised something very interesting today - I'm having fun teaching. I suppose, since it's the fourth semester that I am teaching this class I should say "it's about time". Summer wasn't bad, but it was difficult to teach two classes back to back - now, after doing two-hour sessions for a third semester it really isn't a big deal. Of course, when I mentioned it to Gordon, about "having fun" teaching, his first question was "are you getting them to talk?" My first thought was focussed on today - and the answer would be no, not much talking. But then I thought back over the four days I have taught, and I realised that I am getting them to talk - far more than I would have thought possible when I started all this. There's a distinct difference between the two classes though - my first class is more talkative than is my second class. Tomorrow's class has more opportunties for them to talk, more chances for interactions. I hope it goes well.

So I suppose I have learned a thing or two about interactive teaching. I can't be someone other than I am, but I can do a decent job of acting. An effective, engaging teacher needs to be something of a performer. It isn't just a part of their personality. While the great ones are quirky, you can be good without needing to be great. Right now, being "better" is a good starting point. If I can be better, then eventually I can be good. My personality and my way of speaking are a challenge, a hindrance, but they are not insurmountable obstacles.

Typically Trini?

What does this mean? "Eats at the same restaurant every day"? I have never heard that as a Trinidadian thing to do. But, yeah, I do. So what? Is there something Trini about that?

Not that I would read NRO's corner, google took me there, but still...

HURRICANE ROGER [Rick Brookhiser]
Neither the Transit Workers' Union nor its leader Roger Toussaint has won many friends. The tabloids are on the warpath against them, but they are following the popular mood as much as shaping it. I'm hearing disgust in unexpected places: Ed Lover, the hip-hop radio host, was mocking Toussaint's accent. Out of the blue, my trainer called him a typical Trinnie (Trinidadian). "What do you mean by that?" I asked. "He's been here for years, but he still talks like a Trinnie; he probably eats in the same restaurant every day." (My trainer is from another island.)
Seems like New York is suffering from Hurricane Roger.

Classes

First day of classes for the semester. Nervous and excited. Already have one problem on my plate - a student who insists on sitting in on a full section. May work out fine, someone may drop (is there a waiting list?) Shall see

Happy New Year

Well, it's been about a month since I posted, and my traffic has slipped down to two visits a week, so I figure I might as well post something just for the sake of posting.

My job hunt seems to be going nowhere. That after spending all that time with Bob revising my cover letter and c.v. I'm still hopeful - while the pickings are a lot slimmer than they were, there's still a flood of ads on the Chronicle every Monday, and there are still ads with deadline dates scattered across February and up to March 1.

And now onto classes. The semester starts on Tuesday (Monday is Martin Luther King Jr. Day), and I have two sections of Intro Bot and the Appalachian field trip class. So far I have already gotten a scheduling-related email from a student (a little bit last minute, to see if you can switch classes at this stage...good thing I check my email on weekends). On one hand, I am excited for classes to start back; on the other, I am not so thrilled. I do have to put more effort into fixing what's wrong with my teaching - that's both a challenge (and thus motivating, since it gives me a chance to play at a role of being someone other than I actually am, maybe someone more interesting than I am in reality) and a bother, since I will never be good enough, and if past experience is anything to go on, I won't succeed. I suppose that while success is a good thing, the real motivation is the challenge of trying to figure out how to do it.

Job hunting

They called to check references on Friday. Good news, even if they didn't reach Gordon. At least it suggests that I am still in the running for at least that one job.

Reading a post about job hunting on the Chronicle, I started to feel better about this. Making it to the stage where they are checking references is probably a pretty good sign. I suspect that it may mean that their first choices didn't work out, and they have moved onto a second tranche, but that's fine with me once I get considered. That said, I find the whole idea of interviewing to be terrifying. I doubt I will interview well, especially considering that I have never really been interviewed. Ok, I have had a grand total of three job interviews in my life - one with NIHERST, one with the Ministry of the Environment, and one phone interview with Gordon.

Anyway, there's no point in talking about interviews at this stage.

Mushtaq 1977-2005

I don't know what to do with a death of a friend. I don't think I have ever had to sort something like this out. I don't have anything useful to think. It's even hard to say you'll miss someone when you haven't seen them in years, when you have probably had as few actual conversations as we had. But it doesn't change the fact that he was like family. It's all the more difficult to sort out something like this because you don't actually feel entitled to mourn - you feel like you'd have to appreciate a person's company more to be entitled to mourn them.

He always seemed so bright, upbeat and lively. He always seemed a positive person.

I don't even know how to pay my respects. I can't imagine how Ishaq, Nisa, Bedah and their mother feel. His cousins as well - they seemed more like brothers than anything. I really have no ideas what he was up to, what he was doing with his life.

I'm glad Carol told me, but I wish I had heard something sooner.

Jobs

A week past the nibble and no follow-up calls to my references. Did I fail the phone-interview disguised as a phone conversation? Maybe. That's rather a shame - Georgia wouldn't be a bad place.

I have no concept of time in the academic job search. I wonder if the applications I sent out for December 1 have passed their 'sell by" date already. It's so hard to tell. Oh well, I'll stay optimistic, and at the same time hope that I'll be welcome to stay here another year, if need be...and focus on churning out some seroius pubs.

John Lennon. 1940-1980

Twenty-fifth anniversary of a tragic day.

Job hunting

I got my first nibble in my job hunt this week. Just a follow-up call, but at least I made the first cut - they considered me worth calling my references, and they gave me a call. I failed on what may have been the most important question - "why are you interested in us"? (Ok, the most important questions were really "are you still interested in us" and "do we have your permission to call your references", because without saying yes to them I was automatically out.

As to the "why" question, I mumbled something about being interested in a small school. Gordon said that I should prepare a "stock" answer, but I have no idea what it should be. Why am I interested in . I don't think "because I am hoping for a pay-cheque" is the right answer. I don't see how I would come up with a stock answer. I am interested in a place where I have the chance to know my colleagues and my students? I don't want to teach classes with 2-400 students? Something like that. I like teaching smaller groups.

As for Georgia? I suppose proximity to Florida and South Carolina would be something to bear in mind. It seems like an environment that's closer to tropical - kinda almost subtropical. That kinda thing. And, of course, proximity to Savannah River and UGA are good things too. If you have to be at a small school you should at least be near to a bigger school with a proper library and more potential colleagues. That kinda thing.

For the moment it's just a day-dream, but it's a good sign nonetheless. It's reassuring - at least someone is interested in me, based on my (rather slim) cv. Gives you reason to hope.

Evaluations

Doing evaluations today. Gives me a few extra minutes to avoid teaching and try to find my sanity. Or something like that.

But seriously, evaluations are scary. I'm just not that entertaining a teacher, and this semester was not a good one, given the teaching load. And yeah, I realise I'm kinda boring - as a speaker in general, certainly as a lecturer. My tendancy toward really long pauses, too many "um's", that kinda thing...I don't really know how I got this way, and I don't really know how to change. It sucks. So I have evaluations.

"That elusive national unity" (to use Carol's phrase)

Qualifying for the World Cup did more than heal the trauma of 1989 - it gave a glimpse of what could be. National unity seemed only to exist outside of Trinidad - until we won in Bahrain.

As various studies have shown, the things that unite us are greater than the things that divide us, but race and politics seems to be unsurmountable obstacles. In 1986/87 after the NAR won there was a brief window of unity, but even then there were those who were on the outside. PNM supporters felt unwelcome at the party, and as things went bad they grew more bitter. But this was different. Even people who lost money betting against them are still winners. For once it isn't a zero-sum game. Victory can come without being at someone else's expense. And that, I suppose, makes all the difference