Gone with the semester

It’s 17^th of November of 2009 and I’m at the last weeks from my academic year, I have slept only a few hours the last days and my brain is working just by inertia – I don’t know when it’s going to stop working I’m going to collapse –. Definitely I have some words to write about this academic year, I hope that you don’t get too much bored while I do a self evaluation about my performance in the year – and also the things that I had to say about the year also –. Well, let’s begin this stuff (yeah dear followers I’m working under Judy’s Justice Hand pointing at me...it’s only a joke Judy)

This year definitely there are two options: or I have been lazy about academic things or the year is more difficult than the last one. Or maybe are the two of them? I don’t know, I don’t think that I have been lazy along the year, but maybe I haven’t been as organized as the last year – but I don’t really remember of been at such high level of organization my last academic year –. So I am inclined to the second idea: this academic year is more difficult than the last one; and that could be very reasonable if you think it for a little, because I have been through better professor that also have been more demanding at their subjects.

How can I say that? Well because this year I needed to take more seriously some subjects or I couldn’t exempt from their exams – for example the Statistics II or Linguistic exams...they were awful, I don’t want to do an exam never in my life again – but I need to recognize that the ones that I were the worst subjects were the worst because I didn’t put too much effort in them – yeah, maybe that’s the real reason of why I had to do those exams –. That’s why I putted more effort this last semester, even if that the subjects of this semester are the worst in my two tears at the university (obviously English is not included in the subjects I’m talking...because English with Judy has been one of the best ones of the year).

So, concluding finally, I can say that from all of what I have written before – and using the last neurons of my brain remembering things about the academic year –. You can say that the year has been a lot more complicated than the other one, or maybe the last one was easy one purpose so you could pass one year and then get through this hell of stress and knowledge. But I can’t complain too much about this amount of pressure because I love what I’m doing and I can only expect of what’s going to happen the next year when I’m going to get at the specialities – people says that those are the real thing that you must be scared of –.

Well, I think it’s enough for now...Farewell!

Anthropology...we need to talk

Dear Anthropology:

I need to tell that we need to talk; because this can’t be any longer...there are some things about you that I don’t like too much. I know it could be a little bit difficult to accept them and change, but I need to tell you.

I think that you’ve got problems about using new technologies for investigations – except about the physical anthropology that use biogenetical technology or archaeology with their dating methods – but generally you use the same ways of investigation as a century before, well more than that, especially in ethnography where is very primitive the way of recollecting information; if you could use something more than a field diary – maybe a notebook and internet could be a good idea – as your only testimony about information in field work. Oh! And please use software to analyse quantitative and qualitative information.

Know, I’ve got to tell that you’re very narcissist about the knowledge you produce or the interventions that you don’t do when you have the tools in places where are problems that you investigate. Maybe if you could develop a diffusion of anthropological knowledge at schools or common people then more people could know about the great work that you’ve done along the years; also if you could have more interest about the things that are happening in the places that you go for research, not only to analyse but also to look for a solution for the problems that people have.

At least there is one thing that you have, and I don’t like, it’s the fact that there are so many concepts that says the same things every time but with different words. That makes very difficult to learn about education...so please decide one concept per idea yes? Because that could be easier for everyone who is studying anthropology, and also it could be good to evade some banal discussion about concepts... yeah that could be a good idea to do.

That’s all of what I wanted to say, but while I was writing... I realized it isn’t your problem to be like this; it’s from the people that do anthropology. If they could read this and do some of the things I said it could be awesome!

Well, see you around Anthropology ;)

Money...the dirty money

The theme for today is... $ Money $ Yeah, that thing that make people do a lot of things – even stupid things – and is a question that every people tell me when they know what I’m studying, generally it’s because they don’t know what anthropologists do; so here I’ll explain what I think what anthropologist do for LIVING!

It’s a little bit difficult to say what specifically anthropologist do to earn money, because...they can do anything that can be investigated – I’m not joking, if you do a review of the thesis from the faculty you’ll see that it isn’t a joke –; but how can you have the resources to do studies of almost anything in the world? Well the answer is: FONDECYT. FONDECYT is a fund of resources destined to scientific investigation, but I don’t know if scientific investigation can be done in all the things that FONDECYT really finance... It’s incredible because it can be from an investigation for using removable energy to the analysis of a “whale culture”; things that can’t be connected participate for funds at the same institution, you really get a surprise at this.

Obviously FONDECYT isn’t the only way to do investigations; there are other kinds of funds from the State or Non-Governmental Organizations. The last one is the other place where anthropologists usually do researches but the kind of investigation you do are restricted to what the NGO do, so it isn’t too much free for investigations. But the paradise of resources for investigations – talking only about the things you can investigate – is at the University, because you can do investigation of whatever you want without thinking if the research is useful or not.

The problem to get that paradise of resources and time for investigation is that first you must be a professor of the University and that could be a little difficult because you must do classes and be very good – even if your students don’t think so –, and also an old one so no one could think about questioning about what you do. Tell me if that isn’t cool, the only reason for not doing an investigation is that weren’t resources – but that is almost impossible.

So, concluding, there are two ways of earning money:
1. – FONDECYT
2. – Professor

Getting the true of humanity doesn’t have a price, for anything else there is FONDECYT

Like my second home

Now, using my last amounts of energy of the day, I’m going to write for you about a place I spare almost most of the time in the last two years: my Faculty.

That place where I have to read, study and stay at a chair is the Social Science Faculty. It’s a huge building with a really bad problem of acoustic design, as well as a little library to study so it’s really noisy, oh and don’t forget about the little laboratories and the low amount of money that the Faculty have to do things. But the most important problem is the problem with the classes; it’s really a chaos because they have two problems: or the professor is really bad or the thing that treats the class is really bad. I thing that with this there’s a lot of work to do don’t you think?

Well, the academics have intervene in the matter with the official tools they have – like MECESUP or Bicentenario’s Project – which gives a certain amount of money to invest in improvements like sending professors to study or constructing new parts of the faculty; maybe this are good for the first things to do because you take care about the tools you need to give a good education but there is another problem first: the plague of postmodernist professors at the faculty giving classes.

A solution for this could be the decrease of this kind of professor because you need them to give a full education but in such amount! It’s too much I think, we need more scientific professors so we could have a more serious work and most of the careers at the faculty could be taken seriously from people that don’t understand many things that anthropology or sociology treats.

I think that’s all of what I can say about my second home...that needs to be fixed.

A lot of harmonic sounds

Now, after a “Listening Test“and getting the blog actualized, I’m going to write about a typical topic: Music... Don’t you think it’s a little easy to talk about something so big? And also it’s something that you usually talk with people that you don’t know. Well, whatever, concentrate at what Judy’s Han of Justice tell us and do the blog.

First, if you ask me about what’s my favourite music I could say that it’s pretty difficult to say which music I listen more; but generally I listen Alternative/Indie Rock or Britpop lately – well, I say lately because I had pass through Heavy Metal style also –, and I think it’s a great sort of music because they have a little bit of aggressive things from rock properly but it isn’t something so excessive like in Heavy Metal. It’s like an all time style for listening.

If I had to choose a band or singer from all of the music that I choose; maybe I can say that Interpol, Radiohead, Suede or Coldplay. Ups! They are four and I need one. Well, I stay with Coldplay because is the band that I have listened more from the three and also because I love most of their songs – specially the first ones –; they compose a lot of music and with many instruments so it’s almost like listening an orchestra from all the instruments they use, so it’s a real pleasure to listen songs like “Yellow” or “In My Place”.

My favourite song...incredibly this one is a really easy answer: Evil – Interpol. I don’t know why, I just love this song. Maybe because it start slow and gets faster trough the song...I don’t know, it’s just perfect for me J

I’ve gone to many concerts in my life but sadly not one of my favourites bands, because they don’t usually come to Chile; but I’ve gone to Iron Maiden’s concert, Stratovarius also, and many of Chilean rock artists – like Los Tres, Los Bunkers, etc. –.

And finally, so you could rest your eyes, I play the bass. I think it’s a great instrument and it sounds so low and great when you play it well that I feel better than when I play guitar or other instruments.

Sorry if it was a bit long... See you around!

The magic beyond genes

Today I’m going to talk about something that many people don’t know...The magic beyond genes. Yes, maybe some people may think that a bunch of molecules of DNA aren’t that kind of spectacular; but in reality they have a great potential to explain many things that happens in the world – specially about health things – but actually, they can also give information about social organization...and that’s what I’m going to talk today.

As you can see in http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/sep/26/india-genetics-genes-science the studies about genes are very big, but can give a lot of information about people, medical history and even social organization.

This news talks about a big investigation at Indian society – the whole subcontinent – so it was about a billion of people that were under the investigation. The investigation was about an analysis of the genome of people from the subcontinent, considering that at the subcontinent there’s a lot of diversity about people; but thanks to the genetics exploration they could discover that most of the people of India comes from two principal groups: one from Europe and Middle East, and other from China.

Also, it’s known that Indian people are so much that is a little obvious to find endogamy at this population, so we could expect a lot of recessive genetic diseases; and the most of the scientists says that it’s because of the marriage system at India: they marriage between cousins. But if you look a little bit closely you can say that’s more complicated than that...

Actually, the reason of the high frequency of recessive genetic diseases it’s more because of the socio-political organization at Indian society: The caste system! Yeah, the fact of been under the caste system makes that even people living in the same town don’t exchange genetic materials – even it’s difficult to see social contact –; so you can say that’s what makes that at India’s genes there’s a high frequency of recessive genetic diseases.

This kind of things, about the influence from culture on biology or biology on culture is what I’m studying and expecting to investigate in future.

mmmm....Fooood!

Today in the menu we have one of my favourite things: FOOD! Tell me if food isn’t one of the best things of the world; especially when it’s a good food...Well, as you can see I like a little bit eating food; but it’s just that food can be so good. It’s just awesome. But if I had to choose for my favourite food it’s when things turn a little difficult, maybe because I like most of the food so I can’t choose between different foods... Well, whatever, I must choose this time (it’s Judy’s Justice Hand pointing at me) so I can say that my favourite food is pasta I think so.

Yeah, I like them, maybe because of the taste or the texture or well...I really don’t know well why but I can say that I love eating pasta at a restaurant or in my house, maybe I could say that pasta is a food that I love eating with my family, but I can go with friends also – but it’s not very usual because it’s a little expensive in comparison with pizza –; at the restaurant I usually ask for something like lasagne or ravioli or fettuccine maybe with some sauces like the Bolognese Sauce or Alfredo Sauce, and when I want something different I usually ask for some exotic sauce – like with seafood or champignons –, and when I eat pasta at my house I usually eat fettuccine or lasagne – both of them are really easy to do, but I think I’m better cooking lasagne –.

Well, I must think about if foods trigger memories (again... Judy’s Justice Hand); but I think that are the places where you eat that can trigger memories, not the food because you can eat food in many places or can be different in different places. But are the places that trigger your memories, because you say: “Oh! Here is where I ate that spectacular fettuccine with Bolognese Sauce!” but it doesn’t work the other way.

Now...what all of you people were waiting for...Pablo’s Perfect 3 Course Meal!!

1. Caesar Salad. A delicious salad that it’s also light, because the main course can be a little heavy :P
2. Lasagne. Garfield’s favourite pasta, and also mine... it’s just delicious because it has pasta, Bolognese Sauce, White Sauce and cheese. A really great combination.
3. Ice cream. A delicious combination of different flavours of ice cream with chocolate sauce...just delicious.

Well...if you have some space at your stomach after eating this menu...call me so I can tell you which other foods are good to eat ;)

If you want to come...

I’m not very inspired today...so maybe I won’t write what I usually do (some people would be happy for that); well for today I have to do as a tourist guide for everyone who doesn’t live in Santiago – where you should go or something to do... it’s something a little bit difficult to tell you where to go because I usually think about places far from Santiago to visit, maybe because I think that Santiago it’s a boring city for tourism. Let’s begin.

Our starting point is Plaza de Armas; the main square of the city, it has some drawers and there you can visit the cathedral – a bit old and boring for but well...you have to if you are a visitor – the main office of Correos de Chile and the National History Museum which you must visit to now a little about Chile. Now if you look at your left you can see Ahumada Avenue, where there is a lot of shops for shopping– be careful there are some thieves around there so always look for some of your important things –. Now, after some walking through some streets we are now at Cerro Santa Lucía, but I don’t think there is anything amazing there to see... better follow me. We are now getting on a Transantiago’s bus – you must go through this if you come to Santiago – and after some combinations we get to Cerro San Cristóbal. Here if you look at your left you’ll see the cable railway, which we are going to take so we can get at the top where we can have the complete view of the city (the smog is included in the pack) and also see the Virgen María’s statue, whenyou get down you can pass for a little picnic at the Japanese’s garden – a very nice place to take a break –.

Oh look at the hour! It’s very late you should go back to the hotel, we can continue other day ;)

Addicted to...

I thought a lot about this, because I couldn’t choose an addiction from all that I have – or maybe I don’t know pretty well which my addictions are –; but well...it doesn’t matter all of this meaningless writing; the fact is that I can say that I’m addicted to...hugs.
Yeah...it’s kind of weird to think about hugs like that, but I think that if there is one think that isn’t biologically necessary is hugs. The fact of hugging is something that I’m really addicted, because – I don’t know – it fells great and pretty comfortable.
The hugs are something that I like the very most, so I try to hug when is possible. I could say that I never rejected any hug; I don’t know why but they make me feel very good and relaxed. So sometimes I can be a little nuisance.
This addiction started since...I can’t remember. It isn’t something that I have decided one day when I woke up; it’s just something that I liked from my entire life. So I can’t tell how it was before, because well...I can’t remember when I was just a baby.
Having this addiction isn’t something that I would regret, because it isn’t something that could hurt somebody, or it can? Well, since I don’t think is something bad I think I don’t have to beat this; I think that it can be a little...depressive if I beat this addiction, don’t you think? Only if you become too obsessed to hug – like trees or maybe anything that moves – it can be a real pain in the ass for other people; but I think that I have it under control, because I don’t go around hugging everything in this world. If you start to hug trees or that kind of crazy things then go to a psychiatric.
Well...see you!

Transantiago

Well today I won’t write something like what I like or something from my past, I’ll write about the public bus system from where I live. Nothing too incredible, it’s kind of boring for me...well, whatever, here I go.

What can I say about Transantiago? Maybe I should start from what was before, the “yellow bus’s system”. It really was awful that system, I think it was more chaotic than the one is running today; because the buses were more pollutants than the Transantiago’s buses – air pollution and also noise pollution –. Also the yellow buses had awful drivers, but most of Transantiago’s drivers are also from the yellow buses...some things doesn’t change don’t you think? Well, but even with that you can’t say that the Transantiago’s drivers are worse than the yellow buses; because they stop at every bus stop to any person – especially to students –, not like the yellow bus’s drivers that stopped everywhere and usually didn’t stop to students.

I think that in many ways Transantiago is better than the “yellow bus’s sytem”; even if the routes have changed – think that was really chaotic at the beginning of the implantation, but when you get used to them it’s not that horrible – you supply that with the fact that 2 of 3 travels are free within 2 hours. I think that can’t be bad; it’s just that it’s a little chaotic because of the change of routes; maybe if you change the routes things would go better.

Also at the beginning; there weren’t enough buses for the amount of people that use the public transport, as well as the fact that before there wasn’t a good synchronization with the buses so you saw all of the buses at once and then a lot of time passed until more buses came. This last one hasn’t improved a lot along the years, but it has...a little...but it has.

I think that if you do a really good change about some routes and improve the circulation of buses then you can improve the system; so people won’t have to go in the bus with so many people, like it's today.

Well, this is it...I’m not too inspired today to write.

Something more than just a visit

To think about other countries or other places to live is something that I had questioned to me sometimes. Well, I think that this kind of thinking is just about curiosity; because I would like to visit almost the whole planet (I wish I could do it).

If I have to choose one country for something more than just tour around I could say that I would like to live in England…specifically in London.

Why? Well I like the cold weather because I don’t like to sweat, and I can put on something warm to feel much better; I wouldn’t have any excuse to drink a delicious hot chocolate. Also I think it’s because the environment and the buildings are really cool, and I love the Underground.

Also there are many of my favourite artists, so I could easily go to a concert of them; there is so much to see like Stonehenge, Liverpool, Cambridge, Oxford, Manchester and many other, well London itself is a place full of places to visit.

If I could live there I would like to be a professor from Cambridge or Oxford University – I can’t say which one is better –; that would be really cool and I could have plenty of resources to do investigations, but for that I must study a lot. I could start doing a master’s degree in one of those universities...is something making some noise in my head just now.

The only thing that I don’t like from England is the political system they have, because I don’t like parliamentary government and also the royal family – I think they are useless for the people from England –. I think that if England would have a socialist government I wouldn’t think twice to go and live there.

Well but just to go and visit England or other countries, first I have to work and earn the money. That could take some time...I hope I could save that amount of money.

The day before last term

I was already on vacations, enjoying the last day before starting classes again. There I was lying in my bed; then I didn’t expect to have a term like it was.

It was the start of my second year on university, studying anthropology; and all I knew were the classes that I was going to have: Anthropology III, Latin-American History, Elements of Physical Anthropology, Psychology, Statistics II and Linguistic; well and also exercises at the university’s gym. That was the term that was planned; I have good impressions from some classes and other ones were just awful.

The good ones were obviously Anthropology III; where I learned about Materialistic Theory – Hegel, Marx, Kroeber, Steward, White, Harris, Godelier, Habermas, Gramsci and other ones –, it was a difficult class because the professor was really hard at the evaluations but his classes were so cool that you can’t complain; also was Elements of Physical Anthropology; where I had a review from the different fields were Physical Anthropology develops, imagine how I liked that I decided to take that specialty also; and Statistics II; because I think that the professor is a great person and that statistics are really important for my professional work. All the other classes were just too boring or just bad…I really don’t want to comment about that; I don’t want to remember that.

With the exercise at the gym, it was really great; I had a difficult time with assistance at the beginning but it ended pretty well. It helped to me, because I started this term a diet to lose weight so the exercise was just perfect to help with that. I lost 10 kilos along the term so I’m really happy about that.

I had some difficult times at the end of the term with Statistics II and Linguistic, because I had exams in both classes; so I had to study until the very end. But everything went well and I didn’t fail in anything else. The only thing that I have to say is that in the last weeks of the term I was really stressed because I had too much work to do for the different classes so I was unable to sleep well; I have to thank to the cappuccino vanilla from the university, they helped me to stay awake.

Then, when everything was over I had two short weeks of vacations and now I’m already into another term…I really wanted longer vacations.

How could I imagine all of these would happen lying in a bed at summer?