An academic conundrum

The rain continues but there’s light at the end of the tunnel.  I went to visit Manuel Antonio, which is THE national park in Costa Rica, over the long weekend and it was gorgeous.  I went with some friends from Heredia and we had a wonderful time.

The biodiversity in Costa Rica is incredible.  There were capuchins (a.k.a. Marcel the monkey from “Friends”), sloths, raccoons, birds of many different species, crabs, etc.  I took many pictures which you can see on my Facebook (www.facebook.com/tina.rathburn), as I have not figured out how to upload pictures to my blog yet.

It was nice to get away from the rain as it has not stopped in 12 consecutive days in Ciudad Colon, I believe we have been under attack by a hurricane.  Yesterday, the sun came out here and everyone’s mood was visibly lifted.  I think we’ve all literally been feeling under a dark cloud.

At the moment, life is stressful because we are deciding and writing our thesis proposals.  I still have not decided if I want to continue my undergraduate research or pursue a fresh new topic. 

I am very passionate about poverty and inequality in the U.S. and especially how the myth of the American Dream contributes to growing animosity between the rich and the poor.  I did my undergraduate work on mental illness and homelessness briefly touching on the subject of the American Dream but I did not pursue this idea.

Thoughts, anyone?

Rain, rain...go away

Rainy season is in full swing in Costa Rica and I must say I find the massive amounts of precipitation to be less than inspirational.  I understand the need for rain to sustain life in the tropics and I think this is a wonderful, life-giving process; however, I can’t help but find myself and many others at school being susceptible to S.A.D. (seasonal affective disorder).

At the beginning of the year, one of the counselors said we might be feeling the symptoms of depression and homesickness around October.  I think for me this is true.  I am trying very hard to keep feelings of sadness and homesickness at bay- exercise, eating foods from home, talking to friends and family, etc.  

I am finding this difficult though.  In my previous travels, I have not really experienced the effects of this before and I am wondering how much of my mood is influenced by the weather.

Luckily, my studies remain interesting and there are a wide variety of activities to keep me busy.

I have been admitted to the Board of Directors as a logistics coordinator for UPMUNC, which is the University for Peace Model United Nations Conference that will be held in March.  I am very excited about this opportunity and I anticipate that planning this event will be an exciting and challenging process.

I am also in Research Methods currently and we are discussing possible research topics for our thesis, which is both scary and exciting.  I will post my research proposal at the end of the course.

I am continuing Spanish classes and I have recently begun attending career development seminars, which I find interesting as I attempt to figure out life beyond Upeace.  Many people here have similar interests as me and I am happy about this amazing opportunity to network with people who can possibly help me figure out where to go from here.

Oh, the people you will meet

Maggie, Jean Paul, and I as Rotary Scholars had the pleasure of meeting with the Hon. Ruth Dreifuss this week. 

Ruth is the current Chancellor for the University for Peace and if you Google her, you will find out she worked on the Swiss Federal Council for 10 years, and she was the first woman to hold the position of President of the Confederation for one year.  She is an amazing woman with an amazing history.

She began as a social worker in Switzerland but she grew disheartened by the daily cases she worked with and began to see that a greater change needed to occur at the level of policy.  As a Trade Unionist and a representative of the Socialist party, she became active in politics in Switzerland and her political career began to grow. 

She worked tirelessly for over 20 years to get maternal leave for mothers in Switzerland.  During her time in the council, she motioned for the laws to be passed granting mothers paid maternal leave and these motions were denied 5 years in a row.  The laws were finally passed the year she was finished with the council.

She told this amazing story in my class.  When I met with her afterwards, what struck me was how easy and down to earth she happened to be. 

She was sweet and sincerely interested in learning about JP, Maggie, and I and about the scholarship which brought us here.  I am so inspired to have met such an incredible woman who made such a difference in her country through her determination and perseverance in a field dominated by men.

I feel like this is a testament to the character of Upeace and with each day I grow more certain that I picked the institution most fitting for me.  I am excited to see where these experiences will take me.

"Live passionately so you may die peacefully."

This past week has been very difficult at Upeace.  One of our professors, Dr. Mahmoud Hamid passed away unexpectedly last week. 

Dr. Mahmoud Hamid was head of the Environmental Department at Upeace and believed passionately that peace was a possibility for his home country, Sudan.  Everyone has spoken highly of his intellectual contributions to the field of peace and conflict and even more so they have talked about his infectious smile.

Although I did not know Dr. Hamid personally, his death has touched each of us profoundly.  For me, I have been reflecting on the fleetingness and beauty of life.  We have this one chance to live our lives and to make a difference in the world- the impact of Dr. Hamid upon the Upeace community and the wider world is evident. 

I sincerely hope that when my time comes I will have “lived passionately so that I may die peacefully,” as my colleague, Greg so eloquently stated.

In the past few days, I have been trying to embody this philosophy.  Over the weekend, Maggie, Jean Paul (a fellow Rotary Scholar), and I went to help with a beach cleanup sponsored by the Downtown San Jose Rotary Club.

Two miles on la playa de Guacalillo is littered with trash which washes down from the capital, San Jose, and into the ocean which then washes the trash back on the beach.  We spent 6 hours picking up trash and sorting trash from recyclables, there was an amazing effort from the community and over 200 volunteers showed up to help clean up. 

The beach cleanups, however, are not enough and the Rotary and Rotaract clubs are taking initiatives to educate people in the city about how to properly dispose of their trash.  The Rotarians and especially the Rotaract club members appear to be very active in the community here and I’m very excited to be a part of the projects and the passion shared in Costa Rica.

Finding a Balance

I have just finished the Foundations Course, my first class in graduate school.  I am very thankful to Dr. Baldwin for preparing us for what lay ahead in post-grad course work.  We had a long weekend this week, which I spent much of working on my final paper; I felt it turned out well.

I am learning more and more, however, that time management as always is a challenge.  There are so many extracurricular activities going on at school that I am finding it difficult to balance my social and academic lives.  I know I will get better at this as time goes on and I become more used to the class structure. 

This week is the Costa Rican Independence day on September 15, and I am looking forward to the celebrations in Ciudad Colόn as well as the holiday weekend. Three week courses are exhausting and I think we all need a break before we start fresh in our new courses.

So, taking pictures has turned out to be harder than I thought because unfortunately, my camera is broken but hopefully I can get a new one soon.

Time keeps on slipping

I’ve discovered that finding time to write my blog will be more difficult than I imagined.  Everyone at Upeace is very active and there are a variety of student-led activities that we can get involved with.  Thus far, I have been filling my time outside of class and studying with Yoga, Spanish classes, and Ultimate Frisbee (although I must admit I am terrible at this last activity).

I took this past weekend to recuperate and attempt to get myself grounded; I suppose we will see how much this helped later in the week.  I have quite a lot to do in the next few days; 2 papers and a group project all before Friday, which happens to be the last day of our first class. 

We have a 3 day weekend and a final paper for this course due on Monday and then we begin our next class on Tuesday.  I find this fast pace to be exhilarating and I think I am up to the challenge.

Here is an excerpt from my first paper reflecting on the lectures, seminars, and readings during our first week of class:

The definition of peace as “the wholeness created by right relationships with oneself, other persons, other cultures, other life, Earth, and the larger whole of which all are apart” is not an inclusive definition; I chose this particular description of peace because it resonates most closely with my Western and cultural influences from which I have been taught the importance of individuality.  The discussion in our seminars, however, helped me to look outside this perspective and realize that this definition of peace makes several assumptions that are not always true such as individual peace may be obtainable in a given circumstance during war, for example.  Therefore, the definition of peace lies on a spectrum and may differ for everyone depending upon his or her cultural and educational background. 

The definition of conflict similarly exists on a spectrum although the accepted description appears to be coined by Rubin, Pruitt and Kim (1994): “conflict means perceived divergence of interests, or a belief that the parties’ current aspirations cannot be achieved simultaneously.”  This definition encompasses the heart of conflict and I think will serve as a good reference as we continue into the study of conflict management, resolution and transformation.  Theories of conflict according to Pruitt and Kim (2004) include contending, yielding, problem solving, and avoiding, each of these theories leading to an opposing strategy to deal with conflict, however, the author’s note, “conflicts differ in their complexity and importance, in the strategies to which they give rise, and in the solutions to which they lead” (7). Dr. Abdalla’s lecture on the characteristics of peace and conflict studies highlighted the importance of understanding the inevitability of conflict but emphasized that conflict does not always need to be harmful and conflict transformation can work to benefit both parties in a given situation.  Perspective plays a huge role in conflict and I deeply connected to Dr. Abdalla’s observation, “No one wakes up thinking he or she is the bad guy.”   

Because this was a reflection, we were encouraged to use first person pronouns though I honestly did not feel comfortable writing in this particular style and as you can see I shied away from it.  However, I would like to note that I received good marks for my first paperJ

Again, I promise pictures and I will deliver soon, hopefully, this coming weekend will provide more time for me to do so.  Please leave comments, dear readers at home; I would love to know what you would like to hear or what you think about my adventures.

"There is no road to peace; peace is the road."

I find it difficult to believe I have been in Costa Rica for a week.  Time all ready seems to fly and we are only just beginning classes.

I spent the weekend attempting to get my life in order, but to no one’s surprise, I still find myself quite scattered.  A group of us also went to la playa de Jaco on Sunday to relax and enjoy our free time before classes become intense.

The class schedule for Upeace is quite different from the schedule I am used to back to home.  My master’s program is 42 credit hours and we take classes in 2-3 week blocks. 

For example, I only have one course right now, Foundations in Peace and Conflict Studies, which meets 5 days a week one hour for lecture and 1.5 hours for a seminar.  In the lecture, all 210 students meet in the lecture hall and listen to the professor and then we are split into groups of approximately 15-20 students to discuss the lecture and complete exercises further exploring the topics of peace and conflict resolution.

I find the lecture and the seminar to be very instructive and I feel I will learn the most from the different perspective provided by my colleagues in class. 

During the first day, we were introduced to several definitions of peace ranging from “absence of war” to a more reflective description of “individual peace creating the right relationships with others, the environment, etc.”  

Most “western” influenced students subscribed to the individualistic and relationship-based definition assumptions about the absence of war withstanding, however, I was enlightened when my classmate from Rwanda gave the differing perspective about how it is difficult to find individual peace when your country is in turmoil and people are being raped or murdered every day.

I think eye-opening experiences such as this will be what I take away most from my education here.

I am also finding much of our readings here to be quite fascinating as well and I am very excited to learn about “Ghandian conflict theory.”

This Tuesday, I attended my first Rotary Club meeting in Belen, a small town near the capital San José.  I found to the club to be very friendly and quaint with only 13 members.  Maggie and I will be helping the club with a fundraiser on September 4^th and we plan to recruit some fellow Upeace students to help us.

Pictures will be posted soon.