pieces of me: photo voice on my culture.

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i am a hodgepodge of all sorts of things. one of the most important parts of my culture, is my beliefs. and a big part of my beliefs. i am one of Jehovah's Witnesses. a lot of people get the wrong idea about Jehovah's Witnesses saying that we're super holy and pushy. when in reality all we want to do is teach about the bible. i mean if you had something that you were so excited about, wouldn't you want to tell everyone you met about it? its sort of the same thing. and a lot people just don't understand our beliefs. and no one ever asks.

my religion has given me values. always putting first the kingdom. treating people the way i want to be treated. being humble. having a self sacrificing spirit. and learning to love one another. its taught me that it doesn't matter what your background is, what you look like, what your past was...we're all friends. and this sort of family is very important to have for me.

something else that has shaped my culture is my cultural background. my parents both came from the Philippines. I, however, was born here in New York. So i'm very much so Americanized. But i still have some parts that are considered the norm for Filipinos. For example, the standard of beauty for Filipinos (for all Asians really)  I grew up believing that to be beautiful i needed to have flawless pale skin, silky long black hair, i needed to be petite and a size 6 or under. which is funny now that i think about it because the only thing i have out of there is black hair and short height. and its even funnier to think that, only 1 in 20 Filipinas i know have all of that. The Philippines is an island country, and almost everyone there gets very very tan. so i grew up thinking that i had to be all of that. now? i'm just sort of whatever about that norm. so in that sense, my norm has morphed into a more americanized thinking, where differences and unique qualities are to be celebrated. 

i've been to the Philippines once, in 2005/2006. i was 14 years old, a born and raised american landing on this small island. and let me tell you, the culture shock was about as drastic as the heat. air conditioning was a luxury most couldn't afford, the shower didn't work so you had to boil water and use a "tabo" to take a bath.  girls there were very girly, and very skinny. boys tried being cool. picture taking was done in front of every single iconic landmark. i knew some tagalog, but my first language has always been english. i was in the Philippines for almost a month. i spent that first week trying to understand what everyone was saying. my tagalog did eventually get good enough to get by. the material culture was so ridiculously important, my cousins were always asking me to buy them the latest game or clothing. to them, it was important to have brand names, where as for me, i never really cared before. the non material culture was so different as well. the biggest behavior that weirded me out was how Filipinos are usually very quiet when it comes to things that bother them, but they gossip like there is no tomorrow! thats a big part of Filipino culture, and any Filipino who says otherwise, is lying. 

Filipinos are also a very traditional country. Our objects and artifacts are very important to witholding our ethnic culture. During fancy/formal events guys would wear "barongs" and women would wear "maria claras" . Both clothing are very European based, due to the fact that the Philippines have been occupied by so many different countries (i.e. Spain and America) The more intricate the details on your dress, or barong, the better. Clothes really do make the man in the Philippines. 

With all of these different aspects and all of this knowledge about my culture shapes me into the person that i am, and the person i am growing to be. And as i keep learning, i'll keep growing. 

pushed over the edge: "teenage wasteland"

i read an article called "teenage wasteland". the article itself talks about teenage suicide and what pushes one to take their own lives. 

this article really hit close to home for me. when i was in middle school, one of my closest friends (lets call her Jane) had revealed to me and our group of frinds that she was cutting herself. oddly enough none of our group of friends (including myself) thought much about it. in fact, it was almost glorified. we would all talk about how and where we cut ourselves, or tried to commit suicide. i myself never cut myself, but i felt the urge to lie about it so that i wouldn't be so left out of the group. in a way, it made us closer. we used to have xanga accounts and we'd write about heartbreak and other reasons why life sucked. one day, me and another friend were in class. the guidance counselor opened the door and had called me and her out of the class. she told us that my friend Jane had just been taken to the hospital. Jane had come to school that day with a fresh cut which she was hiding in her sleeve. but my teacher noticed something was wrong and they found the cut. "she was bleeding so much that we had to call the ambulance." I was told that she had just missed her vein and that she would be held in the hospital under surveillance. she was missing from school for over a month. she wrote to me once, telling me how much she wanted me to visit but that they wouldn't let her put my name down for the list because i was too young. we all worried about her so much, and suddenly cutting and suicide became more of a reality to me. i had regular appointments with the guidance counselor so that they could keep an eye on me too, since i was the closest to Jane. Jane came back to school when me and my friends were on our lunch break one day, me and my friends heard about the news and ran back to school and up 4 flights of stairs to welcome her back. Jane had a few relapses over the years, she was in and out of the hospital a lot during middle school. me and Jane went to high school together afterwards, and one day i had the guts to talk to her about it. to ask why. because even though i was also depressed, i was never pushed that close to the edge. she told me that it was because she wanted some attention, she was jealous of her brother who was in the army and loved by her whole family. basically, she couldn't be perfect. 

reading this article reminded me of that part of my life. and it reminded me that we as humans are "our own worst enemy". we constantly try to be perfect in one way or another. when in reality, "perfection" is relative and there isn't really a set standard for perfection. its only the standard that we put for ourselves. and when we are putting that much pressure on ourselves we are going to hurt ourselves. we might say that we like being "average" or even try to glorify being "weirdos". but in reality, very few of the "weirdos" actually like being "weird". 

it also reminded me that suicide is a hard thing to understand. in the end of the article Donna Gaines mentions about how some would always ask "why?" "why did they do it?"  "why didn't they just leave?" some people blame depression, and a "chemical imbalance" for the root of suicides. but me? i blame people for it. there are so many "standards" that are being set, and unless you meet such standards you're deemed "below average". what is average when it comes to types of people that we ought to be really? i can't understand how people can be called average in that sense. and for some people (including myself) when you hear "below average" in this sense, i hear "worthless" instead. and i've been told to correct my thinking because i think that way. but its not something i can really change. 

the problem with fieldwork.

"the mere observation of an experiment changes its outcome" - The Observer Effect.

When one goes into ethnography, they have to adapt to their new surroundings. They must embrace another culture and "gain the trust" of the people that they are going to be observing. It also requires intimacy with the people. I mean think about it, if you were an ethnographer, your purpose is to find out and study a group that's not of your own, and then you have to take what you learn and use that information in order to teach and educate others, those who are also not part of that group. But there are problems with this sort of research.There's bias, researchers's work is affected by their own personal opinions and "preconceived attitudes". The article says that "Good Ethnography is systematic, rigorous, scientific." But no matter how scientific and systematic a person is, we (as imperfect human beings) are always holding people to our standards of being.

Another problem...the quote above "the mere observation of an experiment changes its outcome." That is the observer effect, and while that mainly pertains to physics, can it not also be true regarding observing people? Think about it. When you know that you're being watched, you may act differently from how you normally act. Not to say you're going to act completely different. But even slight changes in the way you speak or the way you move, those are all being observed and recorded, when in fact that's not how you would be under normal circumstances. In the textbook it is called the Hawthorne Effect - the fact that human beings will react differently because they know they are in a study.
From personal experience, I know that when i know I'm being watched and in a way "judged" I certainly act differently. depending on who I am with, I will even go so far as to talk in a different manner. around teachers and older people i'll be more formal.when i'm around younger ones and friends i am very casual in my speech. so an adult's perception of me, can be completely different from how someone of my age group perceives me.

In reality though, even though there are ways of dealing with the Hawthorne effect, it's completely in human nature to act differently around different people and different scenarios. Observation is one of the main tools we have at our use in order to gain information about things. But its also flawed, and prone to so many variables. "It Depends"

who am i?

(and not the les miserable song...=P)

i'll be honest...this is slightly awkward...

so, who am i?
i'm an idealist. (i took the "jung and briggs myer typology test. i am INFP - the healer.) i'm an idealist living in a realist world. you can imagine how tough that gets. for me, the glass is half full because i drank out of it, and its also half empty in constant need of a refill. 

i'm an artist. and no i can't draw, i can't paint, i can't really play the guitar (although i'm hoping that will change). i'm an amateur photographer, and by amateur i mean that its a hobby. but i've always liked the idea of preserving something as precious as a single moment in a roll of film. music has always been a big thing in my life, i grew up singing everything and anything. i am a writer, because through writing i'm able to express my ideas without worrying about saying something i don't mean. i don't express myself very well speaking, writing makes up for it. 

i grew up in a very typical asian household surrounded by immediate family and also extended family. i was taught how to survive on my own from an early age. i was born in new york city and raised half here and half in jersey, which is where most of my closest friends live. these people have been the some of the greatest influences on my life ever. 

i'm a student at a cuny college hoping to become a high school english teacher.

i've always wanted to be the person who inspired other people. to give guidance and be the one that people could depend on and always look to for help. so i was inspired to become a teacher because of the teachers i've had who have taught me life lessons in addition to curriculum lessons, the teachers who were more than just teachers, they were friends.  i've always felt that my purpose in life was to help others, and i find that the ones i want to help most are the young ones. i can't thank those who were there for me in my (not so distant) youth, and how they've guided me through the hardest parts of my life.

now, what are some historical or social events that have shaped me and in turn shaped the way i see the world?

i am one of jehovah's witnesses. i was raised around the truth by my parents and i chose to be baptized, november 2 2002. this is my history, and it has molded me into the person that i am today. i guess faith (or a lack there of) always plays a large role when it comes to how you grow up. not only does it give you an understanding of whats right and whats wrong, but it also effects the way that people treat you. for a long time, i didn't understand why people made fun of us or even hated us. but as i grew up i gained the ability to see how others may view my faith., my religion. it's funny though because not a lot of people understand what we do and why we do it. i imagine sometimes what would've happened if i had not chose to become one of jehovah's witnesses, and i have to say, i look pretty miserable in that alternative dimension.