Song of the month - Gypsy by Lady Gaga

As a way to conclude the external journey blog, I would like to finish with the song Gypsy by Lady Gaga. This is one of my favorite songs ever, and definitely Lady Gaga's best song. It's about traveling the world, and feeling like a gypsy, which I can relate to our own internal and external journeys.

My External Journey

The English Literature course, which is titled “Journey in Literature”, was essentially divided into two categories: Internal and external journey. In the external category, students had the opportunity of discovering different types of features that distinguish countries and cultures, which was accomplished by creating a personal blog and writing about topics, films, lectures, and essays studied in class. However, the internal category was a more personal one, and made students discover their own emotions, struggles, thoughts, and generally their own personal journey throughout the semester.

Before starting this literature course, I strongly believed this class was about traveling through the world, and capturing different works of literature from diverse countries and cultures. I was definitely not expecting to discover inner journeys within myself, or even different perspectives and opinions of foreigners regarding my own country. However, now I understand the importance of discovering, recognizing, and studying cultures before actually embarking on a trip and visiting other countries. Throughout this external journey, I understood how ignorant and biased tourists can truly be when they travel, including me.

Even though the topics discussed in class were very enjoyable, I believe the external journey entries on the blog primarily confirmed and portrayed the course’s main objectives. By promoting independent thinking, researching, and reading, students had the opportunity to reflect on individual topics through a blog, and somewhat relate their inner journey as well. My favorite entry was “A Small Place: Colonialism in the 21^st Century”, which was inspired and related to Jamaica Kincaid’s “A Small Place”; mainly because I had the chance of learning about neocolonialism, and exposing the topic to my fellow classmates and friends. Another entry that I enjoyed writing was the “Day as a Tourist: Internal Tourism” post, because students had the opportunity of becoming travelers in their own country, which sounded ridiculous at first, but after writing the post, it really captured the essence of the external journey.

People should embark on similar external journeys and create these types of personal blogs. Although it sounded like an assignment at first, it truly became a tool for me to analyze and express my own quest throughout the semester. It definitely also improved my writing and communication skills, specially since I've never had the opportunity of writing a public blog. Finally, I strongly believe the main objective of the course was achieved, which was submerging and learning about our journeys, regardless if they were personal, external, or physical, and thus becoming a traveler rather than a tourist. 

My Internal Journey

Throughout the semester, the students were assigned to express their daily thoughts, struggles, and conflicts in a personal journal. However, we were not supposed to think about our writing process; instead, students had to express their first and initial thoughts. After each journal, we had to draw a symbolic compass where we expressed how we felt mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually throughout the week. My first impression of this journal wasn't very positive, mainly because writing and expressing my thoughts is definitely not my forte. I feel this is due because I’m a very logical and perfectionist kind of person, therefore, going for the jugular, expressing my initial thoughts, and not thinking about my writing is extremely hard for me.

The rules about writing in this journal were very simple. First of all, we always had to keep our hand moving, regardless if we weren't writing consistently or coherently, and kept changing subjects. I feel like that was the most important rule because it forced us to write our precise thoughts in the moment, and to not over-think. Another rule was to forget spelling, grammar, and punctuation while we wrote the journal. This part was definitely the hardest for me because, as I said before, I’m a very logical person, and I tend to over-think and perfect everything. During the first few weeks, I used to forget about these things, however, it was inevitable for me to cross out words when I wrote them incorrectly. It really took me a while to adapt to these rules and start forgetting about spelling, grammar, and punctuation, and although I didn’t notice at first, I understood how these things distracted me from writing my thoughts and emotions.

Writing daily journals made me realize many aspects and attitudes of me that I previously did not know of. It’s very strange to go back and read my old journal posts, and see how college actually influences my emotions daily. Throughout my inside journey, I discovered a great amount of my thoughts were directly related to college work. In fact, the vast majority of my compasses also portrayed my anxiety due to tests and projects, which made me feel stressed out and exhausted all the time.

Although this activity was a burden during the first few weeks, at the end I realized how important this experience really was; I was able to identify the factors and circumstances that stressed me out and gave me anxiety. Also, by pouring my heart and soul through those journals, I had the opportunity of discovering how my mind changes constantly. It’s surprising how much I actually learned from myself while I was writing; every single time I read my old journal posts, I immediately get transported to that specific moment and I feel the emotions that were taking over me. I believe other people should have some sort of diary where they can pour their thoughts into a notebook, and self-evaluate their life throughout a matter of weeks as well.

Panel: "Mini Sagas: My Creative Process"

Last Tuesday, the English Department of the College of General Studies of the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus presented a conference titled: “Students Interventions in General Studies: Interdisciplinary Projects and Creative Initiatives”. This conference consisted in the participation of students –currently enrolled in English courses– presenting their writing projects to an audience. One of the panels was named “Mini Sagas: My Creative Process”, which was formed by students from the PSAE program supervised by Dr. Mildred Lockwood. 

This panel exposed a very creative and stimulating concept called “mini sagas”, which was invented by Brian Aldiss, and is basically a short poem made by a maximum of 50 words. These mini sagas contain a well elaborated topic or conflict, therefore, most of the students from the panel talked about their personal experiences. The topics presented were related to bulimia, racism, religion, expectations of finding a husband, and ecology. Some poems were very tragic and touching, and others were extremely hilarious; however, they were all limited to 50 words or less. 

These mini sagas were very impressive, especially because students are limited to put across a complicated and meaningful topic in a short amount of words. Although these poems appear very vague and simple at first, everyone was surprised when each student explained the true meaning of their mini saga. I genuinely think that writing with alternative methods such as mini sagas is very clever, mainly because you take a different approach toward a specific issue, which makes it entertaining and unconventional.

Panel: “Immigration and Puerto Rico Today"

During the week of the 24th of March, the English Department of the College of General Studies of the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus, presented a conference titled “Student Interventions in General Studies: Interdisciplinary Projects and Creative Initiatives”. This conference mainly consisted with different presentations and panels from students currently taking English courses in the university. One of the most interesting and controversial panels was titled “Immigration and Puerto Rico Today”, which exposed the point of view of immigrants that move to Puerto Rico just to study and receive an education at the University of Puerto Rico.

This panel was supervised by professor Petra Avillán and consisted of two students originally from the Dominican Republic and currently taking the intensive English course at the University of Puerto Rico. They discussed the social, political, cultural and economic issues that immigrants –especially from the Dominican Republic– have to face due to the xenophobia that many locals feel toward foreigners. The students also shared their personal experiences, and how difficult it’s for an immigrant to feel accepted and respected in Puerto Rico. It’s very unfair for Dominicans to be discriminated against, especially due to the fact that the Dominican Republic is right next to Puerto Rico, and both countries share similar traditions, cultures, beliefs, customs, and even the same language. Some immigrants just move to Puerto Rico looking for a better life, yet they face issues and obstacles that make it hard for them to become successful in the island.

The most shocking story came from one of the students, when she shared the experience of her participation in a beauty pageant. Although she was clearly representing Puerto Rico on the show, one judge told the student that she basically didn’t win because she was Dominican. I was infuriated when I heard this because sometimes people tend to be extremely ignorant, especially in Puerto Rico where xenophobia against Dominicans is widely seen, and I believe it’s completely unfair to judge others according to their nationality or ethnicity. These comments are present in our everyday lives, which we can constantly hear on derogatory jokes against Dominicans. This story was absolutely necessary, and I believe more immigrants should speak out and make their voices be heard.

Finally, I genuinely admired their courage for speaking out in the panel, and exposing such a sensitive topic in front of a huge audience in a language they’re recently starting to learn. Although they’ve been taking intensive English for a year, I was quite impressed with their ability to speak and write so coherently. At the end of the presentation, both students offered real solutions regarding this social issue in the university, and the audience completely understood the difficulties of being a foreigner in Puerto Rico.

Song of the month - Amsterdam by Imagine Dragons

Amsterdam by Imagine Dragons is one of those songs you'd have in the back of your head when travelling through Europe by train. It's really magical and inspiring, no surprise they're one of my favorite bands.

Traveler or Tourist? "The Rum Diary" Reflection

The Rum Diary is a film based on the novel by American journalist Hunter Thompson, which portrays the story of Paul Kemp, a young, American writer that finds a job writing horoscopes with The San Juan Star newspaper during the 1960’s in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Kemp moves to the island mainly because he wasn’t a successful journalist back in the United States, but later finds himself struggling and battling alcoholism, as we can perceive when Kemp says “I tend to avoid alcohol….[Drinks a bottle of alcohol] …when I can”.

As many other foreigners, Paul Kemp came to the island for the first time without any knowledge about the island’s issues, history, status, culture, and traditions; he was only interested in his job offer, and came to Puerto Rico to take upon that opportunity. However, Kemp later meets Bob Sala, another reporter from the newspaper that offers him a place to stay, and Moburg, who was always inebriated. Soon he also meets Hal Sanderson, a wealthy entrepreneur planning to build a hotel in the Caribbean island of St. Thomas, and his fiancé Chenault, who becomes romantically interested towards Kemp throughout the movie. Chenault then hires Paul as a journalist to write good reviews and articles promoting his venues, but when Kemp starts relating and bonding with Sala, he becomes aware of Puerto Rico’s reality. However, although Kemp wanted to write about the island’s problems and issues for his newspaper, it was very difficult due to his job position, mainly because these deep issues could affect the tourism industry.

In the film, Paul Kemp starts off being a tourist because he wasn’t interested in Puerto Rico’s people and culture, yet we can see him transition into a traveler throughout the movie because he submerges into the island’s issues and realizes the poverty and struggles Puerto Ricans face on a daily basis. However, Sanderson definitely stays being tourist because he felt very alienated from Puerto Rico, and we can see that when Kemp says "I will need a place to stay" and Sanderson responds: "That is easy. I will find you something with a view." Sanderson was only interested in his business and basically having a great view and a private beach, which is clearly not the island’s reality.

The Rum Diaries can be directly related to Jamaica Kincaid’s A Small Place because, as Kincaid portrays, many tourists are very disliked by locals due to their attitudes and sense of superiority, which is seen when Sala gets in trouble with the locals because he tries to get special treatments for speaking English. Another aspect is that tourists tend to disconnect emotionally from the places they travel to, and just focus on the main attractions and their own tight schedule, which can be seen when the random tourists are interviewed at the bowling alley and they say “We never leave the hotel. It is not safe. But you are having fun, right? Oh yeah, lots of fun!”. Tourists usually ignore the reality of countries, and tend to stay their entire trips in resorts and five-star hotels, instead of taking the time to truly explore, adventure, and experience the country they’re getting to visit.  

Day as a Tourist: Internal tourism

Last weekend I had the unbelievable opportunity of going to the southwestern part of Puerto Rico. Being born and raised in the metropolitan area has limited my interaction with other towns in Puerto Rico. In fact, this road trip was literally my first time in the west side of the island, which is embarrassing coming from the fact that Puerto Rico is barely 100x35 miles squared. However, although it’s a small island, Puerto Rico is distinguished by its magnificent beaches, tropical forests and unbelievable sights.

I started off the day at five in the morning, when a small group of my best friends called me. We had been planning a road trip for a few weeks now; therefore, this was the perfect opportunity for me to visit somewhere completely new and explore it from a tourist point-of-view. My friends got home, picked me up, and we started our road trip towards Cabo Rojo. On our way there, we had the opportunity of admiring the beautiful and breathtaking Puerto Rican countryside; at this point, I was starting to notice the lack of landscapes in the metropolitan area. It took us about two tedious hours to arrive to our destination: Playa Sucia in Cabo Rojo.

Playa Sucia is one of the best beaches in –not only Puerto Rico– but the Caribbean as well. The beach is located at the southwesternmost point of the island, and it’s surrounded by salt flats, hidden caves, limestone cliffs, natural bridges, and exotic fauna. The name of the beach is directly translated to “dirty” in English, which is ironic and somewhat misleading. Playa Sucia has gorgeous teal waters, gentle waves, and warm, white sands. Visitors can enjoy these unmatched Caribbean sights, and escape the busy and distracting modern-day disturbances from the city.

One of the best features of this beach is mainly the fact that there aren’t any oceanfront hotels, bars, restaurants or houses. My friends and I felt in complete bliss, this beach is purely heaven on Earth. Fortunately, we arrived to Playa Sucia very early, around 9am, and the beach was completely quiet and uncrowded, so my friends and I settled in a shady, cozy spot to spend the day. Although we had planned to hike and explore the hidden caves, natural bridges, and rock formations, we stayed in our comfortable spot the whole day, just talking, admiring the view, and overall being lazy. We also dipped into the crystal-clear waters, which was very relaxing.

On top the limestone cliffs, we could enjoy a spectacular view of the Caribbean Sea uniting with the Atlantic Ocean. Unfortunately, my friends and I didn’t get a chance of visiting the famously-known Los Morrillos Lighthouse because it was getting pretty dark by the time we decided to leave. However, the road trip was definitely worth it, my friends and I felt as if we had left Puerto Rico and we were being tourists in a whole new place. I strongly believe you don’t need to travel to other countries to be a tourist, people can simply travel and explore locally, and still enjoy the overall experience as I did.

Traveler or Tourist? "A Room with a View" Reflection

The film A Room with a View, adapted from the novel by E. M. Forster, was released in 1985. This movie follows the story of a young, British girl named Lucy Honeychurch and her uptight, much older cousin and chaperone, Charlotte Bartlett. While on their holiday trip to Italy, Lucy and Charlotte stay at a pensione, where they meet Reverend Beebe, the novelist Miss Eleanor Lavish, Mr. Emerson, and most importantly, his son George Emerson. These people portray the forward-thinking ideals of the time, as Lucy and Charlotte came from the repressive, proper, and conventional English culture. In fact, when Lucy and Charlotte complain about not having a room with a view in Florence, Mr. Emerson offers to change rooms with them; only to come off as strange and tactless. However, throughout their journey to Italy, Lucy and Charlotte have a chance of bonding with the other people from the pensione, specially when they visit the countryside.

It’s during the trip to the countryside where George embraces and passionately kisses Lucy as she approached him in a barley field; Charlotte witnesses the act, and immediately stops the intimacy. Upon returning to England, Lucy accepts a marriage proposal from the wealthy, yet snobbish Cecil Vyse. However, she soon finds out that George and his father move nearby, which disrupts her relationship with Cecil, resulting with Lucy breaking off her engagement. Lucy then makes plans on visiting Greece, and although she wanted peace of mind, Lucy later reunites with George. Towards the end of the film, we see them traveling back to Florence –as the genuine travelers they really are– and staying at the Italian pensione where they first met.

Different quotes and conversations throughout this film convey the qualities of being a tourist and a traveler. In the beginning of the movie, when Lucy and Charlotte are eating with the other English people from the pensione, Eleanor Lavish says one of the most important, yet understated quotes of the movie: “It is only by going off the track that you get to know the country”. This specific quote can easily relate to Jamaica Kincaid’s novel “A Small Place”, mostly because many tourists choose to visit the superficial, exotic and exterior sites when they travel, instead of “going off the track” and actually immersing into the cultures, traditions, history and issues of a country.

Another quote that caught my attention was definitely when Eleanor Lavish told Charlotte: “Smell! A true Florentine smell. Inhale, my dear. Deeper! Every city, let me tell you, has its own smell”. I believe in this moment –right when Eleanor and Charlotte got lost–, they were experiencing and living Florence in a physical and outer aspect; regarding our human senses. Instead of drenching themselves into the raw and realistic Italian culture, Eleanor and Charlotte affirm Jamaica Kincaid’s standpoint of how tourists are often alienated from real issues when they travel to a new country; they are both stereotypical tourists throughout the film. I believe Jamaica Kincaid would respond to the people staying at the pensione with a bitter and angry tone, mostly because their trip affirms her perspective of how tourists are selfish and rude towards the local people, which is perfectly presented when the priest yells at the Italian driver and his girlfriend for showing affection while they were riding the carriage in the countryside. Lastly, the film ends with an open quote, when the girl at the end says: “Don't you agree that, on one's first visit to Florence, one must have a room with a view?” which suggests how tourists are always focused on –not literally the sightings–, but that distant, careless and superficial attribute of the country they’re visiting.

Song of the month - Go Do by Jonsi

"Go Do" by Jonsi is, without a doubt, one of the greatest songs I've ever listened to. Every time I listen to this track, I can't help but visualize myself traveling the world, feeling joyful and carefree. Highly recommend it!  

Helping - "Down on the Island" by Jim Cooper

The eighth chapter of Jim Cooper’s “Down by the Island”, which is titled “Helping”, narrates the author’s experience with Puerto Rican students cheating on their English tests, but claiming they were basically “helping” each other. The author claims how Puerto Ricans are the friendliest and most hospitable people in the world, which can clearly be seen in how students help their classmates get good grades. This was completely surprising for Cooper, mainly because in the United States, college students were taught to be competitive and ambitious toward others, whereas in Puerto Rico, students took a different and more compassionate approach.

In this chapter, Cooper narrates how Puerto Rican students did not realize the severity and consequences of their actions; what these students called “helping”, was actually cheating. In fact, when Cooper asked students why they were looking at their classmates’ papers, students would genuinely say it was because they were really desperate for the answer in order to get a good grade. However, Cooper also criticizes how teachers and professors promote this kind of behavior in their students.  Tests were specifically made to evaluate students regardless if they dominated the material or not, which actually promoted students to do anything just to receive a good grade.

To prevent “helping”, as Cooper portrays in this chapter, students should be judged on other activities that promote independent thinking, such as group projects, open debates and discussions, and oral presentations. Although tests are important because they measure the student’s capacity of understanding the material, teachers should also implement these other measures and techniques; testing should not be the only system to decide whether students fail or pass a specific course. By valuing independent thinking, rather than testing and grades, students wouldn’t need to cheat or “help” in their college courses.

Teaching English - "Down on the Island" by Jim Cooper

During the 1950’s, a young professor from the United States named Jim Cooper went to the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez to teach an English course. As he began teaching in Puerto Rico, Cooper encountered many issues involving the education in “El Colegio”, as locals refer to the UPR Mayagüez. First of all, students didn’t even take English courses seriously, mostly because they underestimated it and thought everyone passed automatically. However, this was completely untrue. Most students didn’t speak English at all, unless they came from bilingual private schools or emigrated from the United States.

This issue clearly portrays Puerto Rico’s political status and educational public system in the 1950’s, mostly because the English language was completely foreign to people who were raised in rural areas of the island. In fact, even English professors didn’t know how to speak English fluently. Many had very thick accents, which made the teaching progress even more difficult for students. Jim Cooper even criticizes when Puerto Ricans mispronounced words, such as “feel” and “fill”, among others.

The process of settling English as a second language in Puerto Rico has improved in the last few decades due to the large amount of exposure from the internet, television, media, social websites, movies, and music. However, the approach for teaching English was completely different in the early 50’s. Therefore, it’s very clear how older generations speak a minimum –or none– English, compared to younger generations who have been exposed to the language from a very early age.

"A Small Place": Colonialism in the 21st century.

Jamaica Kincaid’s A Small Place is a short and simple-written book narrating her own story as she traveled to her homeland of Antigua.  Inside this exotic and fascinating Caribbean island, Kincaid portrays her bitter and disappointing attitude towards the “new Antigua”. She criticizes the loss of social values and the corruption involving the government and the higher classes in Antigua’s society. Jamaica Kincaid clearly articulates the crisis plaguing other developing nations as well, such as African and Caribbean countries that have yet to overcome issues involving the negative legacies of colonialism and slavery.

The topic of corruption is, by all means, the most discussed and influential topic of Kincaid’s novel. It’s impossible to compare powerful nations such as the United States and Great Britain, to developing countries in South America, the Caribbean, Southeast Asia and Africa. We are currently living in a world where wealthy nations exploit, control and enslave other countries by economic practices instead of using whips and chains. This term, also referred to as “Neo-colonialism”, was coined by Ghanaian president Kwame Nkrumah to describe the economic, social, cultural and political practice of using capitalism, business globalization, cultural imperialism and –international– economic arrangements to maintain colonial control. In other words, the essence of neo-colonialism is that sovereign states, although theoretically independent, are still subjected to economic systems and political policies directed from outside, mostly by powerful and greedy nations.

Despite the decolonization that occurred after World War II (1939-1945) was over, former colonial powers continued to apply economic arrangements with their former colonies to maintain political and economic control. Imperial practices were mostly done by the United States, and the empires of Great Britain, France, and other European countries. However, these practices can also be traced back to the discovery of America, where Spain, Great Britain and Portugal colonized and exploited countries by bringing slavery and taking all the natural resources back to Europe.

Neo-colonialism is also based upon the idea of breaking up large and united territories into small, non-viable states which are incapable of independent development. Therefore, these territories must rely upon imperialist nations for internal security and even international affairs. This idea can be traced to the separation of the former Yugoslavia, Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, where socialist and communist regimes were in control. It’s no surprise the United States, and other capitalist nations, were involved in these issues. The Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union is the perfect example, mostly because it wasn’t a war between two powerful nations, but rather between socialist regimes and capitalist democracies.

Lastly, another facet of neo-colonialism is the disproportionate involvement of multinational corporations in developing countries. Many capitalist businesses invest an immediate and large amount of capital, but instead, these corporations just exploit the natural resources of developing countries. Privatizing and restricting national resources –and their access– has an influential role on local and national scales, such as unemployment and poverty, which results in the underdevelopment of these countries. Therefore, corruption and crimes involving the government of developing countries, such as Antigua in “A Small Place”, isn’t a local issue, but rather a web of economic interests linked to wealthy, imperialist countries. 

Hello! And welcome to my blog!

My name's Edgar Guzman, I'm nineteen years old and I live in Caguas, Puerto Rico. I am currently doing a biology major at the University of Puerto Rico, as well as conducting research at the Comprehensive Cancer Center of the UPR Medical Sciences Campus. As a pre-medical student, it's no surprise I have lots of high aspirations and goals in life. However, even though I'm more of a science kind of guy, I'm also very into geography, traveling and history. 

10 places I've traveled to:

U.S. Capitol - Washington D.C.

Santa Monica Pier - Los Angeles, California

*Columbia University - New York City

Curaçao, Dutch Antilles

Six Flags New England - Massachusetts

Aruba, Dutch Antilles

Yale University - New Haven, Connecticut

Culebra, Puerto Rico

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

St. Thomas, U.S.Virgin Islands

*Columbia University - New York City

Last year I had the amazing opportunity of getting accepted at an internship at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons. I spent six whole weeks taking medical school level courses, going to conferences related to medicine and public health, and doing clinical rotations in different hospitals throughout Manhattan. However, the most exciting part was the fact that I spent my whole summer living and breathing New York City. Although I've been to the city plenty of times before, it was always for a limited amount of time, so this internship gave me the opportunity to become independent and self-sufficient. I was able to learn about the people, culture and diversity of New York, which made me fall in love with the city. I really wouldn't trade my experiences last summer for anything in the world. I could definitely see myself living here in the future.