An Unexpected End and Unexpected Friend

The death of Ashoke was very surprising to me, but even more surprising was the way that Gogol responded to it. Ashoke's death begins with stomach pains that seem like they would call for a visit to the local walk in rather than the hospital. I believe that Lahiri made the illness a sudden heart attack purposely so that Gogol could not go see him in time. Even if he could go back, I do not know if Gogol would have. He loved his father, but he may have played it off. When his sister, Sonia, finally told him that his father died, he aborted all else and made the trip to have his father buried. One of the defining moments of Gogol's final break from his Bengali culture is that he did not shave his head in deference to his father. 

However much Gogol wants to leave his Bengali culture behind, it always comes back to him again in one form or another. This time, Moushumi was the one to deliver it. Gogol realizes that this is just another Bengali girl, but he is interested after a date or two. The amazing part is, because he has blocked out his culture and the parties that came with it, he did not even realize that Moushumi was the girl in the corner who only read. Looking back with his new "refined" tastes, this quiet, studious girl might have been more attractive to him. His hatred for all of the partying and yelling with food in one's mouth is not present with Moushumi. I cannot wait to see how Gogol deflects his Bengali culture after chapter eight.

Big changes for Nikhil

The Namesake has changed greatly from chapter one to where I am now, at the end of chapter six. Nikhil has changed greatly as a character as well. In his time at Yale and Columbia, he began to move even further from his parents. He decided to mostly avoid The Bengali culture that he grew up with. He hated the large dinner parties with huge families and annoying kids. Most of all, he hated how his mom made obscene amounts of food for the whole party and never catered to her guests. He is disgusted that his mom eats with her mouth open most of the time. 

Aside from disliking the Bengali culture, he in fact loved the American culture and the mixtures of European heritage and influence. He enjoys the diverse architecture that he sees in New York City and other cities outside of Boston. He might like these different designs solely because of his parent's hatred for them. Many of his decisions are for the same reason, for example him changing his name instead of leaving it as Gogol. Also the complete Americanization of his whole life, for instance his English accent and when his parents speak to him in Bengali, "he waves and drives off, pretending not to hear" (150). Even his girlfriend, Maxine, cannot believe that he is related to his parents. The interesting thing is that he is happy with that, and he is glad to be disconnected from his parents. 

Throughout chapter six, Nikhil seems to be doing pretty well. He has a girlfriend that he loves and her parents seem pretty awesome. He has been at a lake house and has had one of the best times of his life. He loves the lifestyle that the Ratliffs live, but he is harshly reminded of what awaits him at home when he encounters one of the Ratliffs neighbors who tries to ask "at what age he moved from America to India" (157). She even believes that "the climate wouldn't effect [him], given [his] heritage" (157). He is offended by her upfront nature, but keeps his cool and escapes her sharp questions. Nikhil has endured a lot of pressure, but it seems so far that he is being repaid with a new pseudo-adopted family and separation from his parents.

Ashima's Homesickness

Throughout the first chapters of The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, Ashima is consistently homesick. She does not just long for her home itself, but also the culture and traditions of the Bengali people that she lived with. She often feels alone and deprived of all of the great things that she had at home. She often looks past the great parts about America and if it is more advanced, she claimed that she likes the old way. Obviously there is a lot of stress that comes with moving to a new country, but she hides from the challenges rather than embracing them. When she has her child, Gogol, she feels more alone even though the baby occupies a lot of her time.

Her husband Ashoke does everything that he can to comfort her, but he is confined by the ritual and tradition of Bengali culture. He often wishes to say something nice to her, but there is only so much that he can say. He works long hours as a teacher so that they can live in a small apartment and have food to eat. She should be grateful to have friends around her and a healthy child to take care of. I hope that she can relieve herself of this feeling of regret and homesickness for my sake as a reader. Maybe when she goes home, she will realize that she lives in a really favorable lifestyle and be appreciative of what she has.

Consciousness vs. Rationality

Notes From Underground has led me to contemplate the difference between the importance of consciousness and rationality. The underground man thinks that consciousness is more important than rationality because, "Once you have two times two makes four, here is nothing left to do or understand" (Dostoevsky 32). He believes that once you have realized something through rational thought, a man would be restricted to contemplating the fact.

Rational thought is the ability to make decisions for ourselves and believe that we have made the right choice. On the other hand, consciousness allows us to perceive what consequences our actions have. I agree with the underground man because without consciousness, discovery, inventiveness, and knowledge would seem useless. The urge to discover is what pushes me to work hard throughout my life. Although I view the value of consciousness differently from the underground man, who thinks that, "corporal punishment is still better than nothing" (Dostoevsky 33), I also believe that it supersedes rational thought.

The ability to realize the implications and analyze them is all that keeps me sane. The underground man's audience think that rational thought will lead them to a utopian society of crystal castles. The underground man satirically mocks them for thinking that there could ever be a perfect society. I agree that like wind moving around the world from high to low pressure, the status of the world consistently shifts and will never settle evenly. Rationality would allow for the world to settle like so, because if everyone had "correct" morals and true rationality, everyone would have the same opinions to better the world and themselves. Consciousness allows us to be aware of ourselves and our personal needs and to have the drive to better ourselves.

Telling Their Own Story - TFA Essay

Chimamanda Adichie, Nigerian author and speaker, describes how a stereotype can, “make one story become the only story” (Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: The danger of a single story). Kay Olan, a Native American oral storyteller, and Chinua Adichie, author of Things Fall Apart, strive to shed light on all angles of Native American and African culture. Olan tells stories about her culture through the symbols provided by nature such as trees and animals. Olan and Achebe use the art of storytelling to provide a more equitable portrait of their people. They tell stories about the other side of stereotypes such as brutality and abuse, juxtaposing them with prosperity and independence.

Although the people of Ibo and Native Americans have moments of war and brutality, calling them brutes would be misleading and untrue. Once the missionaries had disturbed the peace in his village, “[Okonkwo] had brought down his war dress, which he had not touched since his return from exile” (Achebe 199). Achebe shows that Okonkwo has not used his war dress in almost a year, but “He had shaken out his smoked raffia skirt and examined his tall feather head-gear and shield” (Achebe 199), showing that he takes great care and respects the war culture of his village. Similarly to the way Achebe tells all sides of the story, Olan shares that “There were times when there were conflicts, some of them were small some of them were big, but… there was a great deal of sharing, our networking systems ran far and wide” (Olan). She shows that the intricate culture, language, and art of the Native Americans is often overlooked because of their more exciting war stories. The colonists and missionaries created the single story of brutality among these native peoples upon arriving in their homeland and Achebe and Olan express the story from a new point of view.

Contrary to the popular single story, Native Americans and Ibo people were prosperous and productive in daily life and over the course of their history. Every night, “[Okonkwo] uncover[s] his second wife’s dish and beg[ins] to eat from it. Obiageli [takes] the first dish and return[s] to her mother’s hut. … Nkechi [comes] in, bringing the third dish” (Achebe 45). Okonkwo’s hard work allows him and his family to live in a large compound and eat three meals each night. Also, he even has, “two barns full of yams” (Achebe 8). Achebe uses the excess of food to show Okonkwo’s, wealth and prosperity. Achebe creates Okonkwo’s prosperity along with his meager beginnings to display social mobility and possibility for success. In the interview, Olan shares that “[Native Americans] have ceremonies that go on throughout the year, and when we have these ceremonies, we come together to give thanks, appreciation, and love” (Olan). Olan notes that the Native Americans have measured their prosperity in a spiritual light, rather than material like the yams of the Ibo people. Olan and Achebe dispel the stereotype of brutality with evidence of the survival of Native American ceremonies and the success of Okonkwo.

Olan and Achebe use abuse to show a complete, realistic story of their native people. In the Ibo tribe, when a man beats his wife, he is not reprimanded whatsoever. Many citizens, although distraught when, “without further argument Okonkwo gave her a sound beating and left her and her only daughter weeping” (Achebe 38), no one stopped Okonkwo, or even spoke up about the event. The Ibo people believe in a strict hierarchy within the family, and will do whatever it takes to keep that tradition. In her interview, Olan acknowledges that some reservations are plagued with domestic abuse, like some homes in the Ibo villages, and a look of shame comes to her face. She feels that some of her own people have tarnished the reputation of Native Americans with a few instances of domestic violence, and that they aid the people who created the single story of Native Americans. The authors believe that these small stories of abuse must be told in order to appreciate the full story.

The Ibo and Native American people take pride in their independence, and in both cases the independence allowed their native roots to survive in spite of oppression. An Ibo man asks one of the Christian missionaries in defiance, “What is this god of yours, the goddess of the earth, the god of the sky…” (Achebe 146)? Achebe uses the anonymous man to stand for the skeptics and the traditional people of Ibo. They have a strong identity with their natural gods because of their dependence on the harvest and the rainy season. Olan shows that the Native Americans have retained a strong identity when she insists that, “Many people do not realize that we are still here, that we know who we are” (Olan). The native people of both civilizations have endured great hardship, and even through the tempest of deportation and destruction, their independence and identity stand.

Achebe and Olan verify or dispel stereotypes about their people by telling their own stories of brutality, prosperity, abuse, and independence. Olan defends her culture to preserve it for herself and her loved ones. She wants to make sure that her people are not left for the history books. Achebe knows that, at the time he wrote this book, many of his readers would have no knowledge of the sophistication and civility of the people that he wrote about. He had to create a new story to oppose the stereotypes of savage, uncivilized people. Achebe and Olan create a full and clear depiction through storytelling in which they can articulate all angles through characters and the places themselves.

Things Are about to Fall Apart

Things Fall Apart has helped me learn some interesting characteristics of Ibo society, such as how their economy works, what kinds of human characteristics are valuable to them, and the kinds of food that they eat. Things Fall Apart show many interactions between families and friends. Often in these meetings, there are negotiations and ritual greetings. When someone walks into your house, that person often comes with, "a kola nut, some alligator pepper and a lump of white chalk" (Achebe 6). In Ibo, the people pride themselves on being more civilized, where as other neighboring villages, "haggle and bargain [for a wife] as if they were buying a goat or a cow in the market" (73). When Ibo men are negotiating, they often use sticks, representative of a certain amount of cowries. Many of the Ibo people are able to climb the social ladder by having more wives and yams. In the Ibo society, social hierarchy is not based as much on how many cowries you have, but how successful you were in the past years' harvests. The Ibo people strongly value hard work, because it often means making more money when planting and harvest come around. They also value a person who is strict, but not ruthless, and someone who has respect for one's elders. The Ibo people have an interesting negotiation format and eat and dress very differently than modern Americans, yet we have very similar moral values. 

We live on a knife's edge

Gian Giudice, a theoretical physicist, delivered a very interesting talk about the seemingly precarious situation that our entire universe is in. I first heard about the Higgs boson particle, I knew that it was a huge leap in theoretical physics, but I had no idea what kind of effect it would have on the way that we look at the universe. The Higgs boson particle was observed in the particle accelerator when scientists collided protons. This particle seems to prove that the Higgs field, a big cloud of undetectable, omnipresent energy that gives matter its mass.

All of this wouldn't be very interesting, except for how closely it relates to our lives. The Higgs field has a consistent density that makes particles have just the right mass, but also allows them to have such a mass, that they can actually stay together. Giudice explained that, if the field had a density only double what it is, the only possible element would be Hydrogen, and we would not exist.

Another phenomenon that you need to understand, is the Ultra-dense Higgs field. This field is like the normal Higgs field's evil twin, billions of times denser than the normal field. This field, because of something called Quantum Tunneling, can basically jump around throughout the universe. Giudice explained it like a bubble in boiling water, it appears, almost out of nowhere and grows until it reaches the surface. In a similar way, the ultra-dense field pops up in any place in the universe and expands at light speed until it, again, pops into a new place in the universe. The issue with this is that if it popped up next to earth, we would be destroyed completely and all of the atoms in it's grasp would dissociate and be destroyed, but the likelihood is very low.

As Guidice put it, our universe is like a group of campers that pitched their tent on the edge of the cliff, and its on loose dirt. He revealed that we really have nothing to worry about, because we would be long gone before there is even a small chance of it coming to us. In all, the talk was very interesting, and Guidice proved his absolute genius, while keeping a sense of humor alive.