Volume 4 2009
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CITY TECH WRITER Volume 4 2009 Outstanding Student Writing From All Disciplines Jane Mushabac, Editor in Chief Cover: “Keyboard” by Jessica Hernandez Art Director: Lloyd Carr New York City College of Technology City University of New York Preface What’s it like being an x-ray technologist at the Hospital for Joint Diseases? What’s it like seeing your uncle on an old I Love Lucy show with Desi Arnaz? What’s it like being from Cameroon and the Bronx? What’s it like in a Chinese bakery? What was it like watching CNN on Election Night 2008? The student writers of City Tech Writer Volume 4 share their pleasure in new technologies and their memory of old dances. They celebrate thermodynamics—and family resilience. They bring thoughtful questions to bear on predatory lending, faulty $50 nylon slings, and a bedbug epidemic in New York. They’re grateful for the words of Descartes and Florence Nightingale, Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Oscar Hijuelos, Toni Morrison and Ha Jin. As always, the juxtaposition of writing from different disciplines and a variety of cultures and moments in time reminds us of City Tech’s great span of interest in our world. Reader, don’t just hold this book in hand. Read it and be enlightened, provoked, and amused. I want to thank the faculty throughout the college who inspired fine writing, and selected and submitted nearly two hundred fifty pieces of best writing from their students; Professors Mary Ann Biehl and Nasser McMayo whose ADV 4700 students produced sixty appealing cover designs; Graphic Arts Program Director Lloyd Carr who, as before, coordinated the graphics, instructing and leading GRA 4732 students and GRA 3513 students respectively in formatting and printing the cover; and Prof. Steve Caputo and printers George Pompilio and Peter Pompilio, who approach this task with a commitment to excellence. I’m grateful to President Russell Hotzler, Provost Bonne August, and Dr. Stephen Soiffer for their invaluable support and encouragement from the top; and the President’s Executive Assistant Marilyn Morrison for her help and thoughtfulness. Professors Candido Cabo, Walter Brand, Nina Bannett, Richard Patterson, Johannah Rodgers, and Reginald Blake graciously helped me think through questions of many kinds; Karen Lundstrem and Rezaul Hoque introduced me to new computer tools; and English Department Office Assistants Lily Lam and Laura Kodet have been not only gracious and generous, but resourceful and wonderfully efficient. Most of all, however, I thank the student writers whose work has been selected for publication in this volume. They make teaching a great pleasure. Their writing is direct, bold, and memorable. Jane Mushabac, Editor in Chief TABLE OF CONTENTS Each listing provides the title and author of a work, and the professor and course for which it was written If I Exist, Then What Am I: Descartes’ “Meditation II” Angeline Boodoo Professor Rodgers, English 1101 X-ray Vision George Rodriguez Professor Mushabac, English 1121 Being Part of History Annupa Sookdeo Professor Lebowitz, English 1101 Barack Obama’s Dreams from My Father : A Long Way to Myself Svetlana Alisa Paskhina Professor Harris, English 1101 Lending on Borrowed Time Melissa Krzywicki Professor Espinoza-Sanchez, Law 1202 Summary of the Nobel Peace Prize Winning Report on Climate Change Ryan Jaipaul Professor Lansiquot, English 3773 The Cookie Lady Kristina Esposito Professor McGuinn, Nursing 2210L The Old vs. The New Helen Yeung Professor Budny, Restorative Dentistry 1115W Bedbugs in New York City Hotels Marcia J. Campbell Professor O’Halloran, Hospitality Management 3502 Culinary Tourism: A Strategy for Rural Development? Akane Naka Professor Phillip, Hospitality Management 3502 Damn Samson Gong Professor Schwartz, English 092W Cynthia Nicola Samuels Professor Berger, Speech 1330 Bridging Generations through Popular Culture in Oscar Hijuelos’s The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love Daren Dowlat Professor Hellman, English 2000 Fleur de Sel with a Grain of Salt? Jennifer Contreras Professor Goodlad, Hospitality Management 2305 Chinese Bakery Sue Cheng Professors Jacus, Hospitality Management 1204 A Poor Man’s Truth Melissa Lebruin Professor Rudden, English 1101 The Idea that Wealth Brings Happiness Ashley Alioto Professor Hall, English 2001 The Undeniable Race to Happiness Seung Lee Professor Schwartz, English 1101 The Pursuit of Happiness Blaise Tega Professor Schwartz, English 092W Philosophy Journal Joel Arbaje Professor Brand, Philosophy 2101 A Mark for Life Kwon Ellis Professor Smolinsky, Speech 1320 Safety in the Construction Industry Stanley Wu Professor Mushabac, English 1121 Buildings Jesse Gibbs Professor Hirsch, English 092W Lost in Calculation: The Thermodynamic Miracle Joseph Roxas Professor Brahimi, Mechanical Engineering Technology 2430 Mad Genius or Rotten Apple? Exploring Time Travel Through Wormholes Gayatri Dhavan Professor Vázquez-Poritz, Physics 1433 A Mathematics Major’s Musings Alma Cabral Reynoso Professor Singh, Mathematics 1475H Nomadic Herders Aryuna Shoynzhonova Professor Fox, English 1101 A Psychiatric Analysis of the Film What’s Eating Gilbert Grape? Diana Santos Professor Keane, Nursing 2130 The Struggle for Power Jonathan Hilzinger Professor Bannett, English 2150 A Promise I Keep Aeisha Elchoum Professor Rodgers, English 1101 Restrictions on the Free Speech Rights of Inmates Barbara Reveron-Morales Professor Donsky, Law 4900 Really Cool: We Go to School George Rodriguez Professor Mushabac, English 1121 Always a Bridesmaid, Never a Bride: George Saunders’s World of Losers Denis Yusupov Professor Goodison, English 2001 I Am a Writer: Chapter One Marlon Irizarry Professor Rodgers, English 1101 If I Exist, Then What Am I: Descartes’ “Meditation II” Angeline Boodoo “Meditation II” by Descartes questions all the writer’s former beliefs and reflects his insatiable drive to find the one conviction that will serve as a foundation for the rebuilding of his knowledge. He separates all attributes of self (senses, imagination, and soul) and focuses on the importance of the intellect in determining the reality of existence. Descartes searches his inner consciousness to discover what he is. His writing shifts from the certainty of his existence to solving the question of what he is. The opening paragraphs resemble ramblings of an individual lost in a forest of misconceptions, desperately searching for clues which would aid in a swift exit out of his state of fear and confusion. His intense questioning mimics a person on the verge of a mental collapse. His mission involves finding certainty or knowing with certainty that “nothing is certain.” He believes that everything is fictitious and questions the existence of our bodies. He even asserts the possibility that our existence is merely a “state of sleep.” Descartes also attempts to “credit” his uncertainties to a “God who causes these thoughts to arise in my mind.” Even though he begins his second meditation with tremendous doubt regarding the credibility of his existence, Descartes is genuinely convinced that his ability to perceive these thoughts is enough to certify his existence. As paragraph 3 closes, Descartes has come to terms with the belief that he does exist. The very fact that one questions his existence is proof enough that one does exist. The acceptance of his existence is compounded by the realization that his existence is “necessarily true” every time he chooses to express it. Descartes moves from doubt to certainty regarding his existence. After establishing that he does exist, Descartes now ventures to explore what he is. He agrees that he is a man, but then seeks to consider: what is a man? He recognizes his physical attributes of hands, arms, etc., and even considers his “soul.” The former were perceived through the senses and the latter was just like a wind or flame. Descartes also comments on the frailty of the imagination which only originates through perception which is inadequate to even determine if one is asleep or awake. He affirms that he is still a “thinking thing,” but admits that the preceding were still ineffective tools to establish effectively who he was since all these perceptions are subject to change. Descartes then embarks on his wax experiment to determine if we can know about something through our senses or by some other means. The wax in its original state is defined by its color, shape and smell, but it becomes evident that these characteristics change as the wax is melted. Even the imagination can construct only limited images of what characteristics the wax can have after being melted and molded. To the observer, the wax continues to be “itself” even though it was changed by the heat. Through this experiment Descartes is able to verify that the reality of the wax is acknowledged not by the senses or imagination, but through understanding what it is. When we understand its components and characteristics, we can in turn recognize what it is and the knowledge we gain of it will be clear and precise. Descartes then confirms that to grasp the concept of our own selves one must move beyond what we sense to what we think. Our knowledge, according to the writer, is derived from our intellect and not our senses or imagination. Descartes affirms this intellect in the way he judges what the figures outside his window covered with cloaks and umbrellas will be. Through intellect, and not through his senses, he is able to determine that they are people and not machines controlled by springs. In his conclusion, Descartes is at peace with the knowledge that he does exist because he is a “thinking thing”; if he can perceive thoughts then he must exist. He establishes that his mind and intellect by far outweigh his imagination and senses in terms of clear and distinct perceptions. The senses give us the information of what is being observed, but the mind helps us understand what it is. Descartes does not discredit the other attributes of the body, but admits that without the operations of the human mind a thorough apprehension of what something is will prove to be unreliable.