money buys happiness

but not love. 

i've kind of been on a rampage.

things that i bought that i love (that will also probably turn me into more of a pretentious music-snob):

-brand new 160 gig iPod classic 

-replacement (FREE because of warranty) BOSE headphones

-blank CDs (this is more like a present to everyone else)

-the 15-item iPod Bundle for SUPER CHEAP on Amazon

-the indie rock poster book: it's probably a little too indie for me, but it's SO cool. it has rip-out BEATIFUL (and you know, hip) posters, each depicting an artist's rendering of a good song. and apparently all the proceeds go to charity. 

DISCLAIMER: money doesn't buy happiness. music is happiness. and yeah, music has to do with money, but it doesn't count as something greedy-making. i think. also, it's not a bad thing to get happiness from money! none of these expenditures, to me, are frivolous luxuries. they were all things i've kind of needed for a while anyway. so don't playa-hate. 

my dream last night

for some reason, the strokes needed a new singer because julian couldn't sing, and for whatever reason they chose me. they let me record the song "under cover of darkness," but i kept messing up because they started the recording from where i come in instead of at the intro where the guitars do that cool thing, and julian kept on being really condescending and saying, "are you sure you can do this, aarushi? are you sure we shouldn't just get peter griffin to do it?" and i was like, "YEAH I CAN." but then i sang it again, and then i forgot the lyrics, because i don't even know them right now. and then julian printed me the lyrics off the computer, and then it was fine, and then i was the lead singer of the strokes.

cool things i've been gaining more of an appreciation for

-solid foods. since getting wisdom teeth out, i suddenly realize the joy of foods that are solid like bagels and chips and cookies and pastries and anything that you'd put hummus on, chewy candy and granola bars, oh and meat. i love me some solid meat.

-RNA interference. this is quite possibly the most exciting, totally rad burgeoning scientific field that has been picking up my interest lately. imagine being able to knock down any gene you wanted. the implications are crazy. if you care, you should watch this video: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/body/rnai.html

-CDs in cars. yeah, iPod hookups are sweet and all, but you have to change them if you don't have a good playlist, and i'm sick of all of my playlists. my car is stocked with all these old CDs i've left in there all the summers and breaks previous. it introduces a smaller, less random repertoire into my ears as i cruise in happiness, singing to all of the old favorites i'd forgotten about.

-hanging out with more than three people at a time. something changes in me when there's more than four people in a room. i do like one on one, one on two etc, but something about five people or more makes it into a party. everyone talks together, instead of just to one other person, and it's just chaotic enough to be super fun. it becomes fun as the responsibility is more diffuse, and people are just laughing and having a good time not being too serious.

-accents. they're adorable. :) cheerful southern drawl to matter-of-fact brooklyn to lightly korean to queen's english to canadian french to trinidadian to german to indian (but of course)

i sometimes kind of wish everyone had a blog

Because then I could peer into their thoughts, and maybe be able to match some of what they do to what they choose to share with the world- because I always find, at least with myself, that people can be right obvious if they open up a dialogue with the random strangers who read their blog.

I wonder what the world would be like if everyone were made aware of everyone else's inner dialogue. I think it would create a parallel universe, in which all of our choices differ, in a similar manner to as if we went to that funny parallel universe on that episode of Futurama where every coin toss had the opposite outcome but Earth was otherwise the same, and Leela and Fry were married. Given the fact that we had to face everyone's inner drives in day-to-day conversation, we might be much more straight-forward and less wishy-washy about what we want. We might smell the lust of another and take advantage, or bolt before it became too clear. We might not take a chance because we can see what that person sees in every other person. Maybe we'd be too quick to love or to hate, based on one feeling we see of someone. If we catch someone on a day where everything is going wrong, we might misjudge them to be some kind of crabby, angry pug who thinks thoughts in profanities, and fleeting violent fantasies. Maybe it would all be so much easier because then we wouldn't have to fight, and couples could sense the moment when one partner's resolve is breaking and they just want everything to be better, and cuddling to recommence-- maybe then, things wouldn't go too far. Or maybe it'd be easier to see the reasoning behind someone's argument-- maybe it'd be easier to see that nothing, no amount of cuddling or reassuring could make this better, maybe the message would sink in faster.

Maybe there'd be no time to think at all, because we could never get any head-space. Maybe we'd all just be a collection of drives. Or maybe we'd grow to tune it out with time, and then we wouldn't care about it anymore; we'd grow to not care that even teachers and nurses and parents and presidents have slight impure thoughts on the hour (at least), and that teenage boys and girls alike regularly picture genitalia. Maybe we'd end up being the same, but just a little more jaded or more aware of what everyone feels like. Maybe it would make for an all-around better world! Hell if I know.

All I know is that I would be embarrassed if everyone knew what I was thinking all the time.

there is no objective truth. or something.

My Truth    

This is an essay that I wrote in October 2009, and I think it was for a class assignment. I had forgotten about it until I was looking for meaning in my Google Docs. I think there's some pretty neat stuff in it,  despite the embarrassing. I miss when I was forced to write essays about my feelings for class. I do this thing where I talk about "truth" but then I talk about "my truth," which is really more an area of principle.

              
What is truth? This seems like a rather heady question. To me, truth is many things. It is something that is profoundly individual, although it is unequivocally universal. My father says, “Truth is the accordance between thoughts and actions.” This definition seems rather absolute. But to me, truth is neither absolute nor definitive.
            
We spend a lot of time chasing the truth. Scientists are forever in quest of answers to lingering questions, students look for the “right” answer, and journalists look for irrefutable, objective fact. As people, we want to know who and what we are. But is the truth what we think, or is the truth what we see and are able to measure? I know now that there is a difference between the facts and the truth.
             
I went through a phase during which I was disgusted by liars, posers, phonies and fakers (this was during middle school when people actually used these words), and decided that I, at least, would only tell the truth. And I went a good two years, never telling a "lie," but I wasn't entirely righteous in so doing. I found out that you could leave out parts of stories without "lying."  You could tell the truth without capturing what really happened. This type of lying was factual, but it was dishonest. It led me to see the difference between a fact and the truth.
           
A lie, I found, is when you don't believe yourself when you say something. I called in sick in high school a couple of times. According to my definition of the truth, I could've called in sick on any day; with my tainted immune system, I was always down with something or another. But if I hadn't done the homework, or if I was emotionally fatigued, that would be the day that I thought calling in sick was justified. Though I actually did feel sick in theory, it was no more unbearable than it was the day before: I used this "truth" to my advantage in a way that here can be deemed dishonest. Here my father's definition applies; my actions and thoughts were misaligned. But doing this too many times eats at your insides and makes you feel stupid when you have to explain what's wrong with you. The guilt of getting away with it always punished me more than any kind of reprimand.
        
This episode and others like it have convinced me that truth cannot be decided by another for you. Your truth is very much linked to the way you feel. As long as you are not lying to yourself about why you are committing an action, being truthful is not always contingent upon the facts. Sometimes you may have to pretend a little to save yourself from social disaster or to keep yourself going.  You may act like you're happy when really you're terribly distressed. Sometimes you'll have to leave out the facts to better someone else's day. But in these cases, you are still acting according to your own ideals and being some type of truthful.
      
After I had this little epiphany, I decided that I could still be an honest person, without being a self-righteous fact-monger. I just knew that I would not act in a way that would force me to say something that I did not really agree with. It is always more embarrassing to have to explain the fact that you've lied than to own up to the truth. And it is much better to have someone's trust than to have someone's misplaced sympathy.
       
To keep myself honest, I make sure that I am the same person everywhere. Though I may fill different roles, I would be untrue to myself if I said one thing and did another. I try to avoid letting myself become resentful towards others without seeing what their point of view is. If I am really not okay with what someone does, I let them know, rather than letting the pressure build up inside like a soda that's been shaken up.
      
When I am in the midst of a dichotomy, and I don't know what I believe, I take some time. I listen to music, I talk to friends, and most importantly, I write down the way I feel and how I would feel if it were happening to a friend. In this way, I can make a decision as to how I feel, and what I should do. In doing this, I discover and seek my own truth. I look at my problems in more diverse ways and learn from the mistakes of others. The more I grown and learn, the less I think that the truth is a "one size fits all" formula.

becoming real

so my little brother is marching in protest of scott walker's budget cuts that directly affect state employees.
his school-day was canceled because so many teachers are protesting. this whole thing is just making me think of revolutions and rebellions... i'm so proud of the people who are not taking this sitting down. regardless of politics, i think there's something to be said about a unified effort.
but that's all i want to say about that.

i have changed so much in the previous year, ideologically, philosophically, physically and morally, and it's probably good. i've become way more critical and cognizant of complexity, and the lack of simple solutions in the world. i've left this purposefully vague, because it's happened in all areas of life, not just in one sphere.

i know it's really lame to be like blahblahblah i've changed, i've grown. it's cliché. but for some reason, when it happens to you, it feels so specific, like an enzyme binding to an active state, where you are the substrate and the active site is college and the enzyme is your situation.

i don't know about anyone else, but when i got to college, i kind of liked myself: i liked good music, i had good friends, i knew what general causes i wanted to work toward, i could sing, i had skills that i built up in high school like writing. i felt like this being that i am wouldn't really change, like i was just done. a finished product. but of course i wasn't. sometimes i worry that if i continue to change so much, i might just come out on the other side of life as a completely different me than the one that came in.

a huge difference is that i've become so much more aware of my biases, my underlying assumptions about others and myself. i used to think that everyone was more or less the same as me. i thought they had the same internal dialogue, because i'd always kind of held this simplistic notion growing up that any two people could be friends if they met under the right circumstances, that people were pretty much the same underneath everything. i still kind of feel that way, you can't really help it if you've thought that way for so long.

do you ever finding yourself mentally dividing your personal history into eras? some parts of my life i actually refer to (in my head) with made-up divisions like "the musical renaissance circa 8th grade." 

maybe no one cares but me, but i've grown to laugh at my own jokes.

in the post-postmodern existential overhaul era, i've finally realized that people are different from me. and not just in superficial, external ways, but in fundamental ones too. in fact, they could be the same as me in so many ways, they could listen to the same music as me and read the same books and frequent the same web sites and places, but they can still be different. it all depends on your level of analysis.

and i'm not trying to say that this is bad. it's really, really good, actually. it allows me to see the world through different eyes by learning from the experiences of others, by listening to their reactions and take-away lessons. but sometimes... it can be a little disconcerting that everyone is different from you in big ways. it means that there probably isn't someone who just understands about everything. we all have to communicate really effectively to get our points of view heard. 

in light of the fact that everyone i know's differences have been emerging forthrightly before mine eyes, i think i've finally come to realize the joy of my own company. no one in this world will care more about what i have to say than i do. no one will enjoy the songs i write more than me or feel them the way i intended them more than i can. and no one has more control of my destiny than i do. i can sit around and wait for someone who will appreciate how cool i am, and how i think, or i can be that person. i can rely on me, and make my own happiness.

and i think, for the first time in my life, in spite of everything that tends to go wrong—that has been going wrong—i'm really happy.

don't leave me dry

i might be receding into my shell. i'm not really an introvert, but i feel like i've definitely withdrawn from a lot of people i know. i don't know if it is a tangible change or just a mental one. maybe some part of me just has nothing to look forward to anymore. 

i'm not depressed or anything. i just feel alone and i've kind of lost the will to do anything to reduce alone-ness. i like being alone, and i think i got this way because i really like being alone.

but i also feel like the world has changed around me. while i've been alone, other people in my life have grown together, resulting in my further isolation. i do it to myself.

in some cases, i feel like it's better to withdraw than to face the fact that other people have the ability to hurt me, whether they know it or not. this is the other face to the "you get to choose who you see in college" coin. it's really easy to shut people out if you don't want to see them.

some things i wish

i wish that you could tell someone something by incepting a thought in their mind. perchance i wanted my parents to bring me some mexican candy, and instead of having to come out and say that i want them to get it the next time they go shopping, the thought just occurs to them. and then they do it. or don't do it. but i know that it's been incepted.
i also wish that you could meet the people whose libraries you are listening to when you find a good music library on a shared network in a public place. i wish there was some way you could end up meeting and it would be awesome because then they'd show you music, and you could show them music in a mutualistic way.
i wish you could meet your heroes outside of the context that they are your heroes. you could learn about them, but not from afar. when you know what you admire about someone before you really know them, it's always kind of weird. the way the world usually works is that you meet someone and then you realize why they're important. but with heroes, it's the other way around, and things are really awkward. everytime i meet a hero, i always sound silly and young and naive, because there's no way they could know how they've impacted me, and they know nothing of me.
one of my heroes

#16.3-My Brightest Diamond-Hymne...
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i wish my room would change colors with the state of my mind, i wish i could create art of my own imaginings. i wish i could read poetry in every language.

most people like weak milky coffee

please don't laugh at me but i think i have a crush on malcolm gladwell. he seems like the type of man i'd want to marry because he talks about interesting things, and what do you know, i'm one of those people who actually likes people who talk a lot. 

it is my recommendation that you watch this, which is a TED talk that gladwell did about how we don't know what we want, and how people have different preferences, and how embracing these diversities in taste will lead to more happiness. it's very funny and interesting. this and another video about time perspectives prompted me to order books on amazon at 1 AM last night. i ordered the tipping point... which i may or may not already own, now that i think about it, and the paradox of time, and the geography of time, which are novels by malcolm gladwell, phillip zimbardo, and robert levine, respectively. i figure i'm going to be alone for a while (not because of anything, but because this is the nature of my quotidian experience.)

i think i might pretend to want to be a writer for a while, and write stuff for myself, because that's kind of how i imagined college would be for me. this isn't really much of a post, but a thought i've been having. i think it's time for me to really challenge my own beliefs and put all this thinking i do to good use.

a word to the apathetic

now seemed as good a time as ever to make another post. everytime i read something someone else has written it gives me an urge to write something, so here i am.
i feel kind of bad for my last post's lamentations. while they were utterly sound and descriptive of my feelings, i have now gained some much needed perspective -- funny how time and attention to schoolwork seems to do that.
i thought maybe i'd post something to my past and likely future self about the blues.

so to whoever is facing a bout of apathy (most likely future-me looking for answers):

• after reading this, get off of the internet. open up a book, or go to sleep. don't chat with anyone online, don't pick up the phone and call anyone-- sleep, open a book up, read something or do some work.
• if you've been agonizing about a decision for days, even months, think about it for twenty minutes and make a completely logical argument for each side taking out buts, and what-ifs and fantasy-like images. make the choice that makes logical sense for your life on the margin. after this process, pick the most practical one, or propose an alternate solution. DON'T put it off any longer.

case in point: i decided not to go to africa. i know i can go there later and do something more in line with my goals. if i want to learn french, i can still go away for a semester or a summer without setting back my studies right now. after maybe two years of agonizing, i just decided what i knew i would have to eventually come to terms with, and it's okay. it's better than going now, against my parent's wishes, and having to do an extra year of school.

• make a new plan. inject some newness into your life. 

it's up to you what it is: if you're me, it shouldn't be some kind of resolution to do some activity once a week or something, any resolution you make will be too ambitious. just make one tiny little decision, choose to look at one thing differently.

• resolve to not let your perceptions of how others' expect you to act interfere with doing what's right for you. 

even as an opinionated individual, i face this all the time. i will assume that someone secretly wants something from me or expects something of me, when there is no proof of this. i have a tendency to put others first, when i don't even know that i'm doing what they want. well no more! every day this week, i have been setting little tasks that i need to accomplish, and accomplishing them regardless of other people! muahahaha. i am so powerful!

•  think about what your values are. now, think of what you do to support these values. what is the distance between who you are in principle and who you want to be? moreover, why do you possess the ideas you do? who/what instilled them into you? why do you think they're right? go read/listen/watch something that goes against your ideas and try to defend them honestly. you don't have to tell anyone, but justify them to yourself.
• start accomplishing something you need/want to do ahead of time. you will thank yourself later.

sleeping is all i want to do

so i've been languishing on my bed for the better part of three days. sure, i got up to go to these weird appointments known as "classes"-- all of which, this semester, are the definition of crowded. this must be what it's like to not take a language class, and exist as part of the shuffle... of chairs, people, backpacks zipping, rudely before the time allotted has been spent, bells ringing, or not, depending on the building and the time of the meetings.
apathy.
i have no right to be apathetic. i have probably been more productive in this week than i have in all of my time of break. but the feist (this isn't a word? what?) for learning has been much dampened by deep, deep blankness of emotion, activity, teeth (i went to the dentist and gave them a damn good cleaning). i know that i have to be motivated. it's the beginning of the semester and now is the time to care. but i'm just sitting here, sick, and aching and being lame. i played a gig, and was completely out of it the whole time due to sick delirium.
this royally sucks. because normally, i'm so happy to be alive. i wake up excited for the day, for the people i haven't met, for what i haven't learned. i don't know where the blankness is coming from. this mental fatigue.
i think it's the fact that i have come to a point at which i can no longer put off decisions that need to be made in terms of things like study abroad, my major, and to a lesser extent, my band. and thus, it's like all i want to do is languish and dwell, instead of being forced to think about the colloids that should be solid in my life.

2010. a retrospective.

So here I am. I'm in an empty house that has recently been vacated by a few of the better friends I have in the world. My sister and brother are away and there's some intense Nine Inch Nails shuffling on the Bose speakers in the background. The only thing that's novel about this moment is that it's a time that it never has been before-- which is the single most redundant thing I could ever say, I know. Also. It's a straight-up lie, because it's kind of weird that I'm listening to the Bose speakers late at night with my iPod, because I'm usually never alone this late in my house.

In any case, all mood-making language aside, it's a new year and I'm, for the moment, alone in my thoughts.

Queen's "Somebody to Love" has come up in the shuffle. The thing about this song is that I don't know if it will ever not affect me. My dad would say that what's so effective about it is Freddie Mercury's perfect mastery of pitch. Not note-naming-wise, but in the fact that he can just perfectly hit every note in a piercing, yet effortless manner. I'm not sure if it's just that. There's something about the resilience of the song, "I've just gotta get out of this prison cell, someday I'm gonna be free!" and the build-up that crescendos into a descant of voices layering over one another. I'm a sucker for that musical canon. There's just something about the melody starting so small and building into something that everyone can join in on that for me sounds like a metaphor for life. It takes one voice to raise an idea that can change the world. (Inception!)

I think 2010 was a good year, partly because it taught me a lot about what I love, but it was not about finding "somebody" as much as it was about finding out "what." To be clear, finding out more about what I love does not transfer to me being an expert in something or even knowing what I want to do later in life. But it magnetized my compass, and now I feel like I can head toward some kind of direction. I still have ways, ways, ways to go. I need to focus and I need to do more.

Significant things that happened in 2010:
1. The Rose Lights, and the gaining of momentum, and the productivity, and the friendships fanned.
2. I made right choices even though it was difficult for me.
3. I excelled and didn't excel in school. Regardless, I learned a lot.
4. My boy-crazy side resurfaced. Also, I found out I don't have a type.
5. People who I never really noticed became important to me.
6. I passed a couple of milestones.
7. I learned that for better or worse you can't un-learn something. You can only amend the way you think about things.
8. I became a radio DJ with one Becca Gollman at my side.
9. I realized how much I love being a part of the Simpson Street Free Press and how much I believe in it.
10. I made friends with all of my co-workers.
11. I did a some unselfish things that will go unnoticed and a few that won't. I did a lot of selfish things that may or may not go unnoticed. I think it evened out.
12. I was busy. I forgot about important things like taking meds and eating and sleeping.
13. I became more okay with the way my voice sounds.
14. I kept my high school friends :)
15. I ate my words and felt incredibly stupid many, many times. I realized that I'm pretty flawed and thoughtless sometimes. There are some things that I just have less of a capacity for.
16. I realized that I can't do everything and I can't please everyone. I don't have enough time.

A few resolutions:
-Next semester, I'm going to have to cut back on social stuff more and spend more time alone for my own sanity's sake. I won't take more than 15 credits, even though that means I can't take a language. :(
-I will write more songs and sing in a way that I can be proud of.
-I will go to the library more and be less impulsive. I will study the same subject with people I know are better at it than me if need be.
-I won't be stupid about my friendships. I'll be honest about the way I feel instead of picking fights to show my affection all the time. I won't think that hard about things that don't deserve dwelling.
-I will "forgive them even if they are not sorry." In other words, I will try to be less hurt by what others do, and more constructive about dealing with issues in the interpersonal relationships that are important to me.
-I will make a motivational poster of what I want to make of myself and hang it where I can see it so that I don't lose sight of my goals.

Humanity for Sale: The Failure of an Economic Mindset in the Developing World

The following is an essay I wrote for my Global Health and International Society class, in which I word an argument that I've wanted to write about for a while.

Basic economics tells of supply and demand.  With supply and demand comes the concept of scarcity and surplus. When any good is less available than it is wanted, it is scarce. Its value invariably increases. The opposite is also true: when there is too much of a good, its value plummets. Economics offers a cogent lens through which the world can be viewed, but its systematic manifestations often fail to account for the inequalities they create. Increasingly, the earth faces a so-called “surplus” of bodies, in the face of a high rate of population growth. This “surplus” consists of marginalized populations who lack access to basic health needs.  However, the presence of a large population is not the root of the problem: it is their maldistribution, with higher populations existing disproportionately in the global south, and the present global economic system that stacks the cards against them. The global marketplace is rife with mechanisms that drive inequality – creating a world wherein a lucky minority has too much, and a vast majority has too little. These mechanisms are sustained by policies embedded in our current economic system that systematically deny rights from the poor and submit them to disproportionate risk. The following paper will explore the mechanisms by which the value of human life is diminished by structurally violent policies, resulting in negative health outcomes on a global scale in the face of uncharted population growth.

The rapid urbanization of recent decades has resulted in an increase in structural inequality and resulting negative health outcomes. With the expansion of urbanism in the developing world has come the expansion of slums, as a corresponding growth in urban planning has not accompanied population booms (Davis 7). The negative health effects of this rise in population have been compounded by Western interventions aimed at including the developing world in the global market, especially the 1980’s structural adjustment programs implemented by IMF and the World Bank. These programs succeeded only in structuring risk. Contingent upon liberalization of trade, privatization and deregulation, these programs were based on the assumption that inclusion in the world market would allow for growth of the developing economy. In actuality, most developing economies’ manufacture of raw materials does not give them a competitive edge in the global economy. Loans given as part of these programs were eventually paid for with funds accorded by slashing social programs in a time when they were needed most for burgeoning urban populations. The removal of social programs results in a much higher health risk to already vulnerable slum populations. Structural adjustment programs were founded on principles that valued economic growth more than it valued individual experience within the developing world—principles that blindly assumed that economic growth would present a rising tide to lift all boats. In reality, these programs widened the gap between the developed and developing world, creating parallel gaps in health and experience between the rich and poor within developing world urban centers. Other economics-based policies, including the “IMF-enforced policies of agricultural de-regulation” as cited by Mike Davis, displaced rural farmers, giving them no choice but to travel to cities in search of work (10). Just as population began to rise, the need for labor began to decline in most industrial cities—leading to a surplus of labor that eventually settled along the edges of cities. Inherent within all of these changes is an implicit devaluing of the human life of the “excess” population: the manner in which slums are overcrowded and unaided represents an oversight of both the international and national governance. This is exemplified by the fact that reforms in favor of development tend to value the country’s economic stance in the global market over the health of the majority of its citizens. These errors in prioritization—the importance placed on the country’s position on the international scale over its health on a national scale–lead to dire health outcomes for the world’s poor, in the form of increased risk and lack of access to social services.

Attempts at population control in the name of “development” have also reflected implicit devaluing of human life. In the 1970’s, the Indian government, under the leadership of Indira Gandhi, implemented a slew of policies in the Emergency period that undermined the rights of India’s poorest and most marginalized citizens. In favor of “beautification,” slums were broken up and displaced peoples were moved to the outskirts of the city (Tarlo 245), their placement by the government mirroring their placement in society. The Family Planning scheme emphasized more the value of sterilization than it did forethought; what really came of this policy was the creation of a “pyramid of pressure” for sterilization (Tarlo 248). If a government official reached his sterilization quota, he would receive a reward, while failure to meet the quota would result in a punishment. These quotas would be fulfilled by two methods.  An official could force his subordinates to be sterilized through coercion or threat in a top-down manner. Conversely, to avoid submitting to sterilization, the official’s subordinate could fulfill the sterilization quota by exerting pressure on his subordinates to be sterilized. In this manner, pressure for sterilization increased down the “food chain” of social strata, leaving the most marginalized people of the society with no choice but to submit to it. The so-called incentives for sterilization offered by the government exhibited a gross devaluation of the livelihood of those facing sterilization; tins of ghee, electric clocks and radios, and a small sum of money were considered a fair exchange for the right to bear life (Tarlo 250). This gave rise to underground markets where certificates of sterilization were eerily similar to currency. Later, when the Delhi Development Authority had exhausted the number of sterilizations it could obtain from its own staff, it made sterilization or presentation of a sterilization certificate a requirement for settlement in DDA housing for those that were displaced by urban development schemes also implemented by the DDA. The pressure of sterilization closed in on all sides around Indian slum-dwellers as part of an exploitative system that created a motive for the poor to exploit the poorer. In the name of development, the rights of the poor in this society were eroded by a system that directly targeted and grossly undervalued their right to fertility.

            The global market puts the poor at risk by subtly tipping the scales against them and by explicitly allowing their exploitation. In many cases, the poor pay dearly for their attempts to earn a living, giving up their health in the face of poor regulation of business and market practices.  As Scheper-Hughes writes, “The problem is that markets are by nature indiscriminate and inclined to reduce everything—even human beings, their labor, and their reproductive capacity—to the status of commodities” (193). The recent illegal trafficking of human organs shows how an economic system can manufacture risk exclusively to the poor by allowing the impoverished to give up their lifelong health for a quick sum of money, while a wealthy person would likely never even consider such an action. This speaks to the desperation that is arranged by the inequality of this system, and the lack of regulation within the global marketplace.

A globalized marketplace allows also for direct exploitation in the name of efficiency and expediency. Because of the lower costs and regulations, corporations increasingly outsource labor to developing nations. In many cases, this has resulted in a relaxation of both safety standards and accountability in industrial settings. Notably, the Bhopal disaster is an example of a Western company outsourcing its risk. In the early hours of December 3, 1984, a toxic gas leak coming from the Union Carbide pesticide plant covered the industrial city of Bhopal, killing thousands of workers and civilians and leaving many others with lifelong health problems (Fortun 194). Compensatory efforts did not begin to cover the costs of the lasting health effects on the population. The poor of Bhopal lacked the political might that Union Carbide’s legal team had; they had no recourse. In the developing world, failures of regulation coupled with economic exploitation can result in irreversible negative health outcomes for underprivileged populations.

 The above examples represent a mere fraction of the ways in which the global economy gives rise to increasing inequalities between the haves and the have-nots. A measured examination of all exploitation and risk that the current economic system affords is far beyond the scope of this essay; indeed, it is likely impossible.  The difficulty in measurement lies in the fact that the subtle devaluation of the poor underlies the system over which all commerce is built; the economic system is structured on inequality. However, where economic models allow a restoration of balance, there is no such balance in the real world. Use of a solely economic mindset when considering global inequality is a mistake, as a misplaced belief in economic development and growth as a panacea undoubtedly oversimplifies the problem. This oversimplification undervalues humanity, causing a marked decline in quality of life, as the disenfranchised fight to stay afloat, paying the debts with their liberties and their health. 

words i feel were created for my use

lovelorn, adj. unhappy because of unrequited love.

wanderlust, noun. a strong desire to travel.

quixotic, adj. exceedingly idealistic; unrealistic and impractical.

whimsy, noun. playfully quaint or fanciful behavior or humor.

ennui, noun. a feeling of listlessness and dissatisfaction arising from a lack of occupation or excitement.

swell, verb. 1) become larger or rounder in size, typically as a result of an accumulation of fluid. 2) become or make greater in intensity, number, amount or volume. 3) be intensely affected or filled with a particular emotion.

swell, noun. 2) a slow regular movement of the sea in rolling waves that do not break. 3)a mechanism for producing a crescendo or diminuendo in an organ or harmonium. 4) informal, dated: a person of wealth or high social position, typically one perceived as a fashionable or stylish.

swell, adjective: informal, dated: excellent, very good

ameliorate, verb. make better

nightfall, noun. the darker stage of twilight.

disposition, noun. 1) a person's inherent qualities of mind and character. 2) the way in which something is placed or arranged, esp. in relation to other things. the action of arranging or ordering people or things in a particular way. 3) the action of distributing or transferring property or money to someone, in particular or by bequest. 4) the power to deal with something as one pleases

replenish, verb. fill something up again.

candor, noun. the quality of being open and honest in expression.

behest, noun. a person's orders or command.

crimson, noun. of a rich deep red color inclining to purple.

sorrow, noun. a feeling of deep distress caused by loss, disappointment or other misfortune suffered by oneself or others. an event or circumstance that causes such a feeling. the outward expression of grief; lamentation.

dream, noun. a series of thoughts, images, and sensations occurring in a person's mind during sleep. a state of mind in which someone is or seems to be unaware of their immediate surroundings. a cherished aspiration, ambition or ideal. an unrealistic or self-deluding fantasy. a person or thing perceived as wonderful or perfect.

Music Imitating Life or Life Imitating Music

Music is kind of like another way of measuring reality. Just as I can measure my life over time, or by classes taken or places I've lived, I can measure my life by what music I was learning and listening to and singing.

History
To give a brief history, years zero through six were oldies for the most part: Joan Baez and Simon and Garfunkel and songs my mother sang to me when she woke me up, Sound of Music,  and Disney music. Songs from old Hindi movies and snippets of Wham's Last Christmas, and "Kissed by a rose!" and Fleetwood Mac as my first few years of life took place between India and Britain and Illinois and Madison. Music was so ubiquitous in my household and to me, it was normal and natural to break out into song.

In Springfield, IL, my mother had to implement a "no singing at the dining table" rule because my sister and I always singing pieces of songs as our hot food became cold. Throughout elementary school, I sang to myself during worktimes and recess, and sometimes got yelled at by my peers, while my teachers didn't always have the heart to shut me up. (But they had plenty of opportunities to, nonetheless, because I was really talkative.)

My actual point
I won't bore you with 15 more years of history, it suffices to say that I've always felt that we have a natural connection with music and it seems with every year that goes by, it grows stronger.
To me, music seems irreducible. That's not to say that you can't lift a melody and still do it justice-- but it means something different. It means something different with an addition or a subtraction from it, and thus, to me, anyone's cover of a different song is entirely different from the original. And to me, each element is of equal importance in a song-- lyrics or lack thereof, rhythms, melodies -- vocal or instrumental are all on the same plane. You may like a song for only one of them, sure. But each is important to the entire song.

And I think that beyond all of these things that may be compositional arguments, music runs through our veins and in our brains. Sometimes, I'll be going through a rough patch in my day or in my life, and a perfectly applicable song will run through my mind. Sometimes Come on Eileen will pump through my head while I'm taking a test, or Crown of Love will come and sing to my broken heart.

Something I've been wondering about for a long time now (I think I may have asked it in a previous blog entry) is whether the songs that get stuck in our heads are in the right key. Think about it. It's bouncing around in there uncontrollably and at times you just want to say "Get out of my head, you!" But it occurred to me that it was stuck in my head, and maybe I couldn't sing the words or anything, but it was still running like a recording. So I started to wonder if the songs that get stuck in our heads are in the right key. My theory is that even though we might not be able to reproduce the elements of the song, but we remember it right, as if it's a record playing in your head. I've tried to test it by waiting til a song gets stuck in my head and singing it as close to the key as I can. Then I check it with the actual song. And it worked! And it makes me think that music hits us close to the soul more than we can express.

Today I found out that researchers at Tufts University have found that the minor third in music (the traditional sad interval in western music, everpresent in my band's new song, Becoming Real and in pretty much every traditionally minor sad song) is used in Western speech to convey sadness the same way it does in music. This brings up questions about music's effect on life, or life's effect on music-- a more far-fetched-sounding argument. The lead author, Megan Curtis, says she's interested in studying Hindi speakers use of intervals in expression of sad speech to see whether those intervals are different, suggesting it's culturally learned. Else, if Indians do speak in minor third, maybe the minor third is universal. (I'm not sure that she'll find a pentatonic sad tone in Indians.)
They've looked at macaque monkeys that emit higher octave-like tones when they're jubilant, and descending tones when they're sad. Curtis says (on To the Best of Our Knowledge) that the study suggests that speech and music have a common ancestor... maybe singing came first?

It's weird that once a song is sung or released to the universe, you don't own it anymore. It has a life of its own-- it's free to get stuck in some stranger's head. And yeah, that's life, and everything you do always affects someone else somehow, but for some reason, people are realistic with music! The music someone chooses to listen to, alone, when no one's around or when people don't know what you're listening to, is like a direct path to their soul. It's feelings that you can't help but wear on your sleeve. Do you notice that when you meet someone you really like who shares a musical interest with you, you automatically listen to that music more? Or, when you sing a song to yourself and someone joins in, you like that person so much more? I know these are really silly things to point out, maybe I'm overexcited... but I think it's kind of crazy that we have this relationship with music. It's not just the music that has an effect on us, we have an effect on the music, I argue, and music is a very effective means of touching and connecting with one another.

(A link to the Curtis study: http://ase.tufts.edu/psychology/music-cognition/pdfs/Curtis&Bharucha2010Emotion.pdf)

new additions to music library

- janelle monae, The ArchAndroid very catchy, album flows one song into another, danceable and singable win-win-win

- local natives, self-titled

- of montreal, false priest

- cee lo green, the lady killer

-garfunkel & oates... note: hilarious

-putamayo a new groove

soooo excited!!

plans

for this week:

complete homework/projects in timely manner, read for class.

finish planting for monday. finish planting for friday. TRANSPLANT

come up with new and creative ways to eat new favorite staple (hummus).

listen to broken bells, local natives while walking to class. make new exciting playlist for listening on wednesday

try to change default thought processes away from tangible life things to bigger ideas. interact with what is learned about in school.  stop thinking about material things so much. 

get pumped for an excellent show next sunday, and this means-- practicing lyrics that i don't know well so i don't forget them on stage and not spontaneously gaining 10 pounds making dress unwearable

do stuff for hindi class, don't forget to do so

do a really great radio show! 

choose a child 

once school is over:
-keep up with lab work over break
-go on at least one fun day trip; don't forget to enjoy time with friends!
-forget all about the pain of ochem
-RECORD AND PRACTICE WITH THE ROSE LIGHTS. be REALLY productive about this
-BUY genetics textbook and get deals on other texts
-cook things with peppermint in them
-read like 10 books-- create new traditions with self

hmmm

7 blunders of the world according to mahatma gandhi

1. wealth without work
2. pleasure without conscience
3. knowledge without character
4. commerce without morality
5. science without humanity
6. worship without sacrifice
7. politics without principle

reiterating song lyrics and otherwise being inarticulate

lately i've had little to say that's of any worth or any productive worth anyway.
i've been hooked on a feeling (high on believing!) and have just been singing and listening and thinking the same things over and over again. what's funny is that i'm stewing and brewing and not really doing much in the form of doing. anything. i did maybe 3 things this week that i'd say i was proud of. but in contrast to the maybe 134 things that i'm not proud of which are not limited to:

-starting my problem set early and then waiting to 11 o'clock the night before it was due to think about looking at it again
-lying to myself
-overthinking when i said i wouldn't
-underthinking when i said i wouldn't
and it's always the wrong thing that i'm doing the thinking act about!
-exhibiting the fact that i'm stressed in situations where i'm usually calm and collected
-bumping into stuff
-letting someone hinge on my confusion

it just reminds me of the feist song that i'm listening to right now. she says, "ooh i'll be the one to break my heart." she's saying it in the context of a breakup, but i'm saying it in a context of me. i have control over everything in my life, and i'm really the one who breaks my own heart. this isn't even really the case with a lot of people. some people fall for people who give them the wrong idea or something, and then their hearts get broken. no, me, i'm the one who breaks my heart.

sometimes i feel like i'm all talk. i'm always thinking of stuff. i'm always distracting myself into some dream world that exists in this weird musical Fth dimension. i'm always thinking of really good interesting thoughts that i'd be too shy to bring up with the people i want to talk to them about.
i think that all my worlds can be described through song lyrics and poetry-- this isn't true. lately it's been working because i've been holding some rather cliche emotions: the perceived lack of control, apathy, dark humor related to my general hopelessness-- and i know i'm not alone in this.
i've noticed over the course of biocore that people are casually getting meaner over dumber things. not everyone, but i can feel the vibe. and some are addicted to caffeine pills.

 to be honest, the reason i feel like i'm being inarticulate is because i haven't really viewed my life with real honesty in november. i've just been getting by, day-to-day, living the unexamined life. it's not that i don't care about stuff, i care about so many things, perhaps too many. it's that i feel like my life is like a badly written essay that demands structure (similar to the rambling nature of this post.)
everything looks perfect from far away

i hate it when i can tell that i'm being boring, or a broken record. i've been thinking too much about the green revolution and corporations so much that it gets abstracted and i can't even explain it properly (stay tuned for that). and lately i feel like i've been letting it slide when i do something out of line, or mean where i wouldn't before. maybe this is what it's like to be jaded. this is a shitty side of me that doesn't need to have a home here.

it's way too late to be this locked inside ourselves...

so i'm unlocking a little bit.

some things about me that are true.

-if i go out of my way to talk to you, i probably like you a lot more than i let on.
-i'm actually really neutral about a lot of things
-i wish people could read my mind and act accordingly but not as though they are reading my mind.
-there are so many parts of me that i feel i want to improve, but it's hard for me to actually improve. for this reason, i don't appreciate it when people try to predict my behavior, because i want not to be the same me tomorrow as i am today at least in some facet or another. evidently, it does not always work out. changes for me are gradual but real, sometimes as reflected as change in mindset more than a huge shift in actions. i like to do things with the hope that they will inspire me to do other things i want to do, like buy post-it notes or borrow books. i like to surround myself with options.
 -i generally try to avoid helping people when i don't know if i can actually help them. i feel like it's better for us both.
-i have little expendable time. but the time i do have, i do a great job of expending.
-i have a zit on my nose which is in a terrible terrible place because it would be irritated if anyone were to rub noses with me. but rubbing noses is kind of unsanitary.
-i like to walk too fast while listening to music and imagine that everyone is looking at me and thinking i am so cool.
-sometimes i just wish that i'd been a different person so i could do something drastically different in a different place than i am now. i think this comes from a desire to feel what it's like to live somewhere else and to be in a place where people don't know me. i'm sure everyone has the same feelings as i do on this matter.
-i forget what i look like all the time.
-i am pretty sensitive about weird stuff.
-i rarely give up on things, even when i probably should.
-i block things out of my memory quite frequently to avoid dwelling. left to my own devices, i dwell. i need to do things and see people and see the world with renewed excitement everyday in order not to get lost in my own head.