Seventh Meeting 11/8

Denily and I met for our 7^th time this week (and this time, when I say ‘this week’, that means I am actually writing it relatively shortly after our meeting! Amazing, huh?) in the usual place outside of 1873 at the usual time. ‘Twas a blustery day outside, but thankfully it was warm enough that we didn’t have to go inside.

Naturally, since we met on National Public Transportation Day, we talked about public transportation! The only problem is that I just lied, and it was not actually National Public Transportation Day. In fact, I doubt such a holiday exists, but if you believed that (you non-existent reader, since I know you don’t read this), then you might need to go check your bedroom; I hear gullible is written on the ceiling. But seriously, Denily mentioned how she had experimented with public transportation the previous week and told me that she made it all the way to the airport and back, with the DART as part of the trip. She was trying to make sure she knew how to do it for whenever she flies. This discussion led us into discussion about public transportation in Caracas. Denily said that she almost never takes public transportation back home because it is too dangerous. She says that it is too crowded, and people might try to rob you while you’re on the bus. What was most interesting about her description of public transportation was that she claimed that the danger is a new phenomenon. She said she used to be able to ride without these fears. It just goes to show you what trouble a guy like Hugo Chavez can do in 12 years (I’ve mentioned before she is not very fond of Chavez). She believes her country is very corrupt, and it certainly seems that way based on how she describes everything, and I definitely agree that Chavez isn’t exactly my ideal for a president.

Speaking of presidents, we talked about the election as well. Before coming to TCU for the IEP program, Denily worked in a news station for about 5 years. When she watched our elections, she was very impressed by how we counted votes and how you could see individual counties and states and know the exact number of votes cast for any candidate. She says in Venezuela, they don’t get all of those details. I think they only get to see the final result…and with corruption, who knows how exact those numbers are?

We of course talked about what each other did during the week, and one thing Denily mentioned was her experience with LEAPS. She and 3 other IEP students went to Mission Arlington, where they helped with various projects. What was interesting was that she said she had never done anything community oriented like that while in Venezuela. America seems to be obsessed with community service. There’s nothing wrong with it, obviously, but I often wonder why we care so much about doing community service. Most of the time, we say we do it because we enjoy helping other people and seeing them improve, but isn’t there some ulterior motive? In high school, everyone feels an obligation to be part of some community service so they can put it on their college application. In college, there is still that pressure, especially for those planning on graduate school. Even if we are doing community service because we enjoy the fact that we get to help people and they appreciate us, isn’t that an ulterior motive as well? What if we did community service that wasn’t fun, where the recipient of our goodwill didn’t appreciate us and even became frustrated with us? Would we still do it? I don’t think we would. I think we should have better reasons for doing community service than our personal pleasure, the recipient’s thankfulness, and a pad for our resumes. Just something to think about.

So yeah, after a good meeting, we said goodbye and plan on meeting next week as well. Hope you have a good week, invisible reader! You are awesome, even if you don’t exist!