Global Meet & Greet

Global Meet & Greet is a bi-weekly event initiated by the International Students and Faculty Services (ISFS) in partnership with Office Education Abroad (OEA) at Ohio University. Starting from this quarter, the event aims at bringing international students together so they can meet, talk, have free food and fun.

Held at Walter International Educational Center (room 106) which is a new home of ISFS, the series welcomes many international and domestic students to share their culture with each other on a given theme. For example, the theme of this week (Nov 9) is Thanksgiving which is one of the most important holidays in the U.S.

Decorated with thanksgiving postcards, students can write down their thanks to sponsors whose generosity made the event happen. "I really enjoy the food, especially pumpkin pie. It helps me understand about the traditional food they have in Thanksgiving Day", said Yahan, a Chinese student in Biology Sciences.

"The aim of the event is to bring international and domestic students together so they can socialize with each other. And also for us, we can provide necessary information they need regarding travel abroad opportunities and other international students issues", said Jascene Dunkley, Graduate Assistant at ISFS.



Participants said it is not the first time they attend the event and they definitely don't want to miss the next one which is on Nov 15 from 4-5pm with the theme of Finals Week.

Ohio General Election on Nov 8

Ohio General Election will take place tomorrow (Nov 8). Ohio's voters will decide the fate of candidates and issues on their ballot, according to the State official website.

Senate Bill 5, known as limiting collective bargaining rights, is equivalent with Issue 2 in the referendum, remains as a hot topic in agenda.

Advocating activities and campaigns, with the enormous support of social media are being conducted everywhere for a NO on Issue 2.

Ohio University students can vote from 6:30 a.m. - 7:30 p.m on Tuesday, Nov. 8 at the following places:

1. Baker University Center

2. Jefferson Hall Library

3. City Hall

4. Community Center

View Where to vote in a larger map

Going to India

It was such a great news when the International Entertainment Education 5 (EE5) Conference awarded me a scholarship worth $1,500 to attend the conference in New Delhi, India from November 17-20.

The conference will bring communication professionals, artists, public health practitioners, entertainers and students together to share their experiences working in the field. The theme of this fifth conference will address social and health issues that affect the world’s most vulnerable groups: women and children.

Entertainment Education is a communication strategy of purposefully creating messages that are both entertaining and educational and embed in oral traditional communication, media and innovative technologies to address social issues. EE aims at changing people's behaviors towards social change and transform lives of people.

Get Ready for Drinks at Halloween Block Party in Athens?

Athens, Ohio, has been called one of the most haunted places on earth. Being famous for its annual Halloween Block Party, this year the city is expected to welcome thousands of people from all walks of life on Saturday, Oct 29, starting from 7pm in uptown city of Court Street.

Besides music, costume competitions, dance...attendants can't miss having beers in one of many local bars in Athens throughout the night. How do Red Brick Sports Pub, Casa Nueva, Tony's Tavern, The Pigskin, Jackie O's Pub&Brewery...to name a few prepare for upcoming Halloween night?

Below is a map with location of each bar and their preparation for the exciting event.


View How Bars in Athens Prepare for Halloween? in a larger map

In contrast with my initial thought, among 11 researched bars, only Casa Nueva has Halloween Bash on the same day and Red Brick Sports Pub has promotion and dressed up staff; the remainders are only concerned about security (Pigskin) and serving capacity of the staff given the huge amount of customers (Buffalo Wild Wings, Cat's Eyes, Jackie O's). Many of them will close as usual with no extended hour.



Bartender of Jackie O's is concerned about available food and drink to serve its maximum capacity of 299 people.



Anyway, Halloween is still in the air at Jackie O's and Casa Nueva with decorations of pumpkins.

Từ Ảnh cho Google Maps

(Casa Nueva)

Từ Ảnh cho Google Maps

Từ Ảnh cho Google Maps

(Jackie O's)

Homecoming Parade in the Street of Athens

Homecoming week started off on Oct 10 but its peak was the parade on Oct 15 in the main street of downtown in Athens: Court St.

Having people waken up on Saturday morning is not easy; however, if you happened to stop by Court St. last Sat, you would see hundreds of people gathered on the two sides of the street. It seems that they have been there for long. The reason was known and confirmed: people longed for the parade, one of the most exciting events in the small town of Athens.

The opening of the parade was the march of about a hundred students with trumpets.

Followed by were marching groups of student organizations such as African Students Union or International Students Union and local organizations.

Athens News, a local newspaper, have consolidated comments of students via social media such as Twitter with the mostly used hashtag: #OUHC 2011.

Below is one of the videos shot at the event:

Athens in the fall

Athens, the small city (it is actually the college town with the presence of Ohio University) located in Southeastern Ohio, is most beautiful in the fall.

The scenery turned yellow and red just over a night. Leaves falling down from the tress that made a marvelous carpet on the surface of roads. It tells us the fall is coming with mild wind, sunlight and a little bit chill. It is actually the most pleasant season of the year, not too cold and gloomy but yet sweaty like summer.

Here are some pictures randomly taken at OU campus and Stroud Run State park in Athens.

From Occupy Wall Street to Occupy OhioU

Occupy Wall Street protest has headed to Ohio University campus under the name of Occupy OhioU on the occasion of Homecoming week (Oct 10-16).

The first event took place on Sunday, Oct 16 at the lawn nearby Alden library. There was about 20 participants including OU students and local people. The students set up tents with an attempt to "occupy" the area 24/7 the upcoming week. Participants formed as a circle and took turn to share their concerns over the protest at Wall Street and its spread to the entire country.

One student brought an article from a blog which indicated JPMorgan Chase bank donated $4.6 million, the biggest donation in its history, to New York Policy Department to strengthen security in the city.

OU President, Roderick McDavis, said the demonstration didn't bother him and he thought it was great to have students and faculty to express their thoughts and feelings on the issues of American time.

Can Political Issue Affect Students?

Followed up with the previous post about Senate Bill 5; a recent poll on The Post, OU student-run newspaper revealed that 26% of the total 57 responses think that Student Senate should not waste time on partisan politics.

Frankly speaking, many OU students do not really care about SB5 because they think it is purely political and there is no evidence showing quantified loss caused by SB5 on students. Students might protest against something intangible like tuition increase but "collective bargaining rights" is sort of a vague perception. If OU disseminates information about SB5 to students and its possible impact to the school, the level of understanding can be reached, even neutrally.

We will wait to see final decision of OU Student Senate to take a stance on SB5 or not. It will be hard for Student Senate to survive over criticism if they disappoint many students who keep demanding to add this issue to their agenda.

A tribute to Steve Jobs

Co-founder and former CEO of Apple Inc., Steve Jobs died on October 5 after eight years struggling with cancer. A screenshot of Apple.com today paid a tribute to Jobs with his portray picture and a simple line: Steve Jobs 1955-2011.

Apple's statement about Jobs's death:

Apple has lost a visionary and creative genius, and the world has lost an amazing human being. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor. Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple.

Social media today is flooded with news about Jobs's death that comes across all sorts of media. Significant among them include FOX News, CNN, ABC...CNN iReport dedicated its section for people to share their stories, videos and photos with Jobs and how Jobs or Apple's products has changed their lives.

Jobs's speech at Stanford University commencement in 2005 was once again hit by mass audience. His words from the speech "Stay hungry, stay foolish" is a motto of a great person whose innovations, inspiration and courage will forever remain with us.

Do OU Students Really Care about Senate Bill 5?

Senate Bill 5 (SB5) is now a very controversial political issue in the State of Ohio. Signed into law by Gov. Kasich in March, SB5 will limit collective bargaining rights of public employees. Ohio SB5 veto referendum, known as Issue 2, is scheduled to appear on the general election ballot in November to repeal SB5.

Athens County, the poorest county of Ohio is expected to suffer from SB5 as most of its public employees are working at Ohio University (OU), the largest employer of the whole county. A protest of about 250 OU students took place on campus in March to oppose the cutting budget proposal of Gov. Kasich in higher education sector which OU belongs to. Last Wednesday, more than 50 OU students showed up at the OU Student Senate weekly meeting to speak out on SB5 and request the Student Senate to take a stance on it.

However, the above mentioned groups of students is modest compared with the total of 20,857 students, Athens campus alone. A large number of students do not care or even know about SB5. Many students think it is a political issue and not directly affecting them. "OU students are no different than most people in the world. A lot of people don't pay attention to politics", said David Smith, a student at OU. From the side of OU Student Senate, they seems to have the same opinion said by President Kyle Triplett : “The opinion of the Student Senate executives is that it’s not Student Senate’s role to get involved in issues that are purely political".

We will need to wait for an official figure to know exactly how many students really care about SB5, how many of them sign in form to vote against it and for them SB5 is just a State issue or OU-related issue.

Can vote, why can't drive?

Women in Saudi Arabia may now vote, as declared by King Abdullah last Sunday. This would be for the first time in the history of Saudi Arabia that women have the right to vote and run in local election due in 2015. For the women, it is a remarkable stepping stone in line with the Arab Spring - a rebellion wave of protests in the Arab world since last April. For the rest of the world, it is a victory in the field of gender and development for women to be on an equal footing with men.

While the news still heats up, the first reaction of many people is whether Saudi Arabia women can now drive. Many argued that voting is not enough if women are still prohibited from driving. The news is therefore becoming debatable: why granting women the right to vote, but not the right to drive? Women's rights is always a controversial issue in the Muslim world. However, it was argued that the issue was not being viewed from within, but rather influenced by Western perspective. For example, veiling is negatively viewed by Western as violating women's rights while many Muslim women are proud of wearing it as part of their culture and tradition.

Back to the voting issue, the declaration might be a manipulating action in response to the heating protests and international pressure on women's rights in Saudi Arabia. In the field of gender and development, we talk about practical gender needs (PGN) versus strategic gender needs (SGN); if voting right lies within SGN, is driving right as PGN just a matter of time to be met?

So, you can vote but remember I still have to drive you to polling station is exactly reflective of the nature of the issue.

"Life is being complicate even by online"

I'd like to start this entry by quoting the top headline of my JOUR314/514 classmate's blog: "Life is being complicate even by online" and "Can't we live simply?"

I had to restore my Twitter account which was abandoned for the last two years. The latest and also the only tweet I made was on October 2009.

The reason for my Twitter restoration is not because I am afraid of being left behind in the world where social media is dominant. I am not an anti-fan of social media. In contrast, I acknowledge and highly appreciate the big impact that social media brought about in transforming society and the way we communicate and interact with others. However, to acquire an appropriate understanding of social media is not easy. I find it complicated, perplexing and beyond the limited thinking capacity of myself as an individual. Simply enough, social media is a collective product of millions of brains. Can you confidently say that you understand what's going on in the heads of social media creators, developers and users? To what extent it will go forward?

I just read an online article named "Basic principles of online journalism: I is for Interactivity" and I very much agree with its main thesis "the rise of interactivity means thinking about how you can give control to your readers". I think the greatest thing about social media is that it breaks the circle that encompasses every single person to join a circle of collective individuals in the chain of the society. It is the I as "Interactivity", not the I as "I" that makes social media an appealing shared platform for all participants.

"Life is being complicate even by online" is not a critique of social media but a double-faced statement of its nature: complex and interesting.

US top national universities

US News has just released rankings of the top fifty national universities. The top ten comes not as a surprise because of the familiar names of these universities. The first ranking, as usual, goes to Harvard University. Harvard University was one of the oldest institutions in the U.S., founded in 1636, it now boasts of the most prestigious alumni all over the world.

Together with Harvard, Princeton University as member of the Ivy League ranks the first. The next rankings in the top ten belong to: Yale University (3rd), Columbia University (4th), California Institute of Technology (5th), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (5th), Stanford University (5th), University of Chicago (5th), University of Pennsylvania (5th) and Duke University (10th).

The rest of the rankings include:

#11 Dartmouth

#12 Northwestern

#13 Johns Hopkins

#14 Wash U in St Louis

#15 Brown

#15 Cornell

#17 Rice

#17 Vanderbilt

#19 Notre Dame

#20 Emory

#21 Berkeley

#22 Georgetown

#23 Carnegie Mellon

#23 USC

#25 U of Virginia

#25 UCLA

#25 Wake Forest

#28 Michigan

#29 Tufts

#29 UNC Chapel Hill

31. Boston College

31. Brandeis

33. College of William and Mary

33. NYU

35. U of Rochester

36. George Institute of Tech

37. UC San Diego

38. Case Western Reserve

38. Lehigh

38. UC Davis

38. U of Miami

42. UC Santa Barbara

42. U of Washington - Seattle

42. U of Wisconsin - Madison

45. Pen State

45. UIUC

45. U of Texas - Austin

45. Yeshiva

50. George Washington

50. Resellaer Polytechnic Institute

50. Tulane

Ohio University ranks the 124th among the national universities.

Paw Paw festival

The 13th Annual Paw Paw Festival will take place from September 16 to 18 at Lake Snowden in Albany, Ohio. The main purpose of the festival is to promote the sales of paw paw which is one of America’s largest native tree fruits. Paw paw looks like mango in shape with tropical flavor of avocado, mango and custard-apple combined. Paw paw has many seeds and it is grown in Southeastern Ohio and other parts of the country.

The festival is a good occasion for the paw paw growers community to get together and share experiences in planting trees. Through educational activities, residents of the region will understand more about the fruit, appreciate its unique flavor and give recognition to the native Americans who grow and preserve the fruits.

Friday Night in rural Appalachia

I took a van to Johnson Road in The Plains where Hannah House is situated. Hannah is one of the two houses that belong to Good-Works, a local organization in Athens, Ohio. Good-Works was found in 1981 aimed at helping poor people in rural Appalachia, one of the poorest parts of the States. They provide shelter for homeless people to stay temporarily before they can find a cheap place. Good-Works also helps with maintaining houses, planting vegetable, making friends with the seniors, teaching computer skills, etc. for the poor.

The event I came today is called Friday Night Life which takes place every Friday from 5pm to 8pm. Residents of the Timothy House get together with residents of Southeast Ohio to talk, participate in recreational activities and have dinner. The dinner is made thanks to the generous donation of the church, local restaurants and individuals.

Right after the dinner was camp fire where we burnt marshmallow. The kids were excited to know that I am from Vietnam. They asked me to teach them how to say "hello, thank you, mom and dad" in Vietnamese.

The event brings a great sense of community and everyone is part of a big family. See you all next Friday!

A typical scenery in rural Appalachia

(Photo Source: Internet)

Guest speaker

It is always a great idea to bring guest speakers who are practitioners in your field to the class. It is even more beneficial for journalism students to interact with journalists because journalism is all about reality. That's why we were so excited to welcome our guest today: Marshall Allen who is a reporter for ProPublica. Within such a limited time, he shared his "Do No Harm: Hospital Care in Las Vegas" project collaboratively written with Alex Richards for the Las Vegas Sun. The series covered stories related to health care in Las Vegas, which, according to Allen, is twenty years behind other places in the U.S.

Being humble, Allen shared how the initial assignment turned into a great work regardless of many constraints during the investigative process. It was not the multimedia interactive applications (they are cool, though) that mattered. It was the story that mattered. No matter what type of media being used: traditional or new media; the story and its verified truth still play the most important role in winning audience.

Photo source: http://businessjournalism.org/2011/02/11/goldsmith-prize-nominee-check-out-hospital-safety-data-available-in-40-states/

A lonely leader

Okay, as said in the previous note, we planned for the big event which was the opening convocation at Chatham University last Sunday. The main purpose of the event was to welcome new and returning students. Chatham has initiated a program named Global Focus which will focus on one country or one region every year for students to obtain understanding of selected country or region. More information about the program can be found here. This year, Vietnam was chosen because of two reasons: 1. Vietnam is globally interesting and 2. Vietnam has its presence in Pittsburgh through the Vietnamese Community. I supported the program as an intern, mainly to kill my time in Pittsburgh. Pitt is a very charming city, everything looks so ancient with numerous churches. It might be exaggerated when saying that Pitt is as beautiful and elegant as DC. But you know, after spending two months in NY, returning to Pitt is just like going to the countryside. I guess NY is the only place worth living in this country. Everywhere else is so dead and boring.

Back to the event I mentioned earlier, most Vietnamese students in Pitt are pursing PhD in University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University (I have no idea of CMU until my boyfriend keeps talking about its first ranking among top engineering and CS schools in the States. It now ranks the 6th by U.S. News). I, again, acted the role as the leader to call for people's contribution to the convocation. Sometimes I hate myself for doing that. If people don't fucking care, why should I try to beg for their forced kindness? I was so fed up with event management - the thing I tried to give up a million times when I realized my previous job - as Communication Assistant - was exactly an entertaining crap. Every job has its own crap, though. Crappy bosses count!

I emailed the whole group shortly after a meeting with coordinator of the program. It was only a week left before the event took place. I thought it was impossible and deep inside, I didn't want to invest a hundred percent of my time and efforts into an anticipated failure. My boyfriend did not allow it happen. He insisted that we could do it and it was only the matter of time to have people's attention. Sadly enough, he was right. Mobilizing resources is tough at the first place but you don't need to worry about anything else once resources are allocated to the work. Being a leader is easy, some might argue that, all you need to do is just point out your finger and as a miracle, somebody will make things done in a way you wish. Easy huh? No way, being a leader is probably the hardest thing. You have to be very firm and assertive, you have to know what you want to achieve with no second of hesitance. On the other hand, you need to be very flexible, open-minded and supposed-to-be nice and understanding. "I understand you fully. You are absolutely right", be careful, the hidden part is "BUT you still have to do what I asked". As a leader, you have to take the main responsibility and be prepared to take the opposite side against others. Nobody likes a leader. Nobody wants to make friend with a leader. Instead, they want to stay away as much as they can. Being a leader is equal to being lonely and even aliened. Can people really avoid being leaders? I guess the answer is as hard as can you deny your identity. Leadership is an inborn ability that is granted to a minority of people otherwise we will have a bunch of leaders with no followers.

(Cont)

Fish out of water

I have a feeling that I am like a fish out of water. When I was in my home country, I thought that I was staying in a well while I should be in an ocean. Now I am living in a supposed-to-be ocean, the feeling has yet stopped occupying me. Ironically enough, being in a well is even better than being out of water. Being in a well, you still have some water to breathe in.

It is not true. Water is everywhere here. I can turn on the shower non-stop and stand under the water for half a day. I can drink as much as I can. People love water because it’s everywhere with no cost. Damn, I still have a feeling that I am out of water. Where is my water? The answer I guess does not lie in artificial sources of water, it should come within my cells.

This idiom “fish out of water” reminds me of a book’s title named “Saving fish from drowning”. I have never read this book but I was very much inspired by the talk of its author, Amy Tan. She said “saving a man from drowning then you will be responsible for the rest of his life”. Damn true, so stay away from people’s business. Hey, the connection between my rambling thoughts and this book’s title is, I guess, I am studying development which means I (should) make life of other people better. Better is so vague, what’s the fucking better mean? I guess the word is invented for those whose vocabulary is limited (like mine). When you know nothing to say, you say “better” just like you say “nice, good, wonderful” million times during any single day.

So when I said I am out of water, the first question should be asked is “So what’s wrong with you?”. Yeah, what’s wrong with me? I have nothing to complain about. I am living in a country that millions of people dreaming of setting their foot. I have education, not just primary, higher education in a world-class system which, I guess, any kind of degree produced from it can deceive anyone. I have family. I have friends. I have a wonderful boyfriend (I use singular form here). My health is good enough to climb up Mt. Washington (I am now in Pittsburgh and here Mt. Washington is as well-known as White House in DC). My appearance is definitely above the average, to be modest . So why shouldn’t I be happy? Why should a “nothing-to-worry-about” I can’t help crying in my heart? Well, I figure out here. Nothing’s wrong is fucking wrong.

But wait, what’s the connection between the above paragraph and the one above it, I should have a very bad score on my writing exam. No word is about neither “fish” nor “water”. Hold on, when I say “I have family”, I do think of my mother who loves fish of all kind. She is a great fish raiser. Her fish always double or triple themselves after only a few weeks. Her secret is, I guess, she never lets the fish out of water.

So why I let myself out of water?