Session 1: Pilot

Sometimes, getting up in the morning and brushing your teeth is the hardest part of the day - it all just hurts! The morning of our TWC class, I was pulled out of bed by my shrieking, panicking mother. I wasn't done packing. I had my flight back to Singapore that night. I was to miss my first TWC class. After the most boring 4 hours, especially since I can't sleep on flights and my flight happened to have no entertainment (yes all bad things happen at once!), I reached my home away from home. I was bored further when immediately after landing I was forced to listen to my friend ranting about what we have to do for TWC. Really, I could have done without it. Anyway, so it took me like 3 days to actually register everything I was being told about the coursework and the first session. The flight had made me slow I guess. 

Since I didn't get to be part of the ice breaking session, I think I should start by a short introduction of myself. I'm from India, a sophomore in SIS (it's a tough life!!). I love music (who doesn't?!), playing the synthesizer, art work (sometimes I feel I should have gone to Lasalle!) and absolutely love to dance (although I get conscious when people stare!!). I believe in being nice to one and all (trust me it gets difficult at times!). To conclude, I have been getting this feeling that 2013 has made me smarter, like I have been enlightened or something. So I'm hoping to have a good semester, an even better year, making lots of new friends and obviously learning a lot more. 

So I got down to catching up on what I missed. I started by seeing the video: Shift Happens. I read "Size does matter" and got a little disinterested. I'm short. "Size matters" isn't something a short person would like to hear/read. I chose to ignore that and continued. On watching further, I realized what it really meant. The United States is considered to be the most powerful nation of the globe. But we measure power by where the country is today. Not by how much it's growing. Thus it proves to be very misleading. If we were to see the growth of nations, China would be at the top of every counting. The gallops that China has made is almost unbelievable. In terms of population, in terms of dominance, you name it and they have conquered it. In essence, US is just a brand name. The facts in the video reinstate the same. The power of a country is determined by its people. As mentioned in the video, China and India have the numbers in their favor. The video also mentions how the times are changing. There was day when a person worked for just one company all his life. And then there is today when a person works for almost all companies in just one life. This is the degree of change. Everyone is preparing for the future. Everyone is gearing up for a race that hasn't even started. It's mind boggling to even imagine the kind of competition that the future beholds. It's scary to think about how the human is preparing for his own doom. The shift in power has happened even before we could think about it. There was a time when England was the world leader. It was outdone by America and now China and India are looking to take the lead. It's scary to think of this uncertainty. In my opinion, it's not about how much you know, but about how fast you can learn. Everything is uncertain. Everything is changing, shifting. The facts at our disposal are growing exponentially. In this age of information and technology, it's all about how fast you adapt to the never ending change. Therefore, people are forced to prepare for the future. Students are prepared for jobs that don't exist. They are taught to solve problems that don't even exist. Essentially, I feel that they are made to live in a make believe world. Even so, the future is unpredictable. In terms of statistics, it's not about the y, it's about the delta y!

The first video made me think so much, I couldn't watch the second till the next day. Guns, Germs and Steel: it made no sense to me. What was this video about?! On watching the video, what I liked the most was the fact that it spoke of how "a society's potential for advanced development was not determined by race or creed, or by time and experience, but by access to domesticated animals and cultivated plants." It's not the fault of the people of the third world countries that they are underdeveloped. It's not that they chose it to be so. As mentioned in the video, the people are one of the most culturally diverse and adaptable. So how is it their fault that they are not as advanced as the modern Americans? Why are they so much poorer? Yali's question is so simple, yet the toughest to answer. There is nothing genetically inferior about them! How did the world get split? How did it become so different? I guess some questions will remain unanswered. I was really shaken up by this video.

To sum up, even though I didn't attend the first class, the matter was so interesting and brain wracking, that I can't wait to see what the next class holds in store for us. A criteria for the blog is to specify what I wish had been given more discussion time. Well right now I just wish I was in the class to be part of the discussion. 

I can't rate the class, however, I can rate the content: 9/10 :)