life’s not a paragraph

so the planning sessions have began for this year’s (well technically next year’s) trip to el salvador. if you haven’t seen my previous post about this, i am going to be the student trip leader for the 2012 alternative winter break trip to el salvador. we are going to be spending a few days in san salvador and then we are going to spend the remainder of the time working with habitat for humanity. my roommate this year went and she had the most amazing time! when she came back and told me all of the stories and showed me all of her pictures, i just wanted to hop on a plane and go back with her. i didn’t think i was going to be able to go, though, because there is a history class attached to the course and since i didn’t have any room in my schedule, i had basically given up on my hopes of going to latin america, tucking that dream away for the future. until, i was approached by carolina, the director of S.O.U.L.S. who was also my facilitator on my mississipi alternative spring break trip, and she asked me if i’d like to be the team leader for the trip this year! after a lot of careful consideration, i went with the obvious decision of YES! I WILL ACCEPT THIS ONCE IN A LIFETIME OPPORTUNITY! and the rest is history.

we’ve had our first meeting, filled with pupusas and ice breakers. the group seems great! now over the summer it’s my job to figure out the pre-trip volunteer opportunity and design some tshirts for the trip! i’m going to come up with a few designs and then have the rest of the students vote on them! i’m sure this will only be the first of many updates about my trip– so stay tuned!

my job at the new england school of art and design has given me a lot of opportunities. for those of you are looking at the school now, you will see me (along with some other great people) featured in the new viewbook! it’s kind of a strange thought. my face…in a book. strange people seeing my face in that book. i am not quite sure if i like the idea, but it’s kind of cool!

molly and i had a photo shoot last week for the booklet. i had to pose with my computer and a bunch of “notes”. i am so used to being behind the camera. i love taking photos of other people, but i rarely am the subject of photos. i am not particularly photogenic like some people who can always take a beautiful picture. while molly was taking pictures, i tried to be as natural as possible. whether or not that’s going to help me on the photogenic side, i have no idea, but hopefully a great photo will come out of it! if this booklet is going to be sent all over the country (the world even?), i just don’t want to look awkward. haha

up here in beantown (that’s one of boston’s nicknames for those of you who don’t know), we were lucky enough to have amazing weather for easter this year. it was kind of a surprise because these past few weeks of april weather have been rather uninspiring. but sunday was the perfect day to celebrate the holiday with my family.

since we don’t usually have any set plans for easter (and this year my grandparents decided to go on vacation a little earlier than usual), my parents and my aunt and uncle decided to celebrate easter in boston… italian style. i know what you’re thinking; you’re right. we had lunch in the north end.

since my cousin goes to school at the massachusetts college of art, boston was a perfect meeting place for everyone. my sister came in on saturday and we had a little shopping session and a sister sleepover on saturday night. my parents came in early on sunday (they brought me my sandals! yay!) and we took a walk from my apartment to the north end. it’s a good hour walk, but we took our time because the weather was so nice. it was so great to see the sun!

we met up with my cousins at the restaurant and we had a delicious lunch. i had the gnocchi with pesto. it was incredible!! i tried not to eat too much because i wanted to save room for pastries. i mean, you can’t really go to the north end and not have pastries! we tried modern pastry but it was closed, so we were forced to walk across the street to their rival mike’s (modern’s my favorite, but mike’s is pretty awesome too). after eating a plate full of gnocchi, i probably ate the largest cannoli i have ever seen in my entire life. it was massive but oh so delicious! i got pistachio one. my favorite. yumyum. it was worth every calorie. haha

it was really nice to just relax in the city. it’s the first time i’ve been able to do it in a long time. granted, my mini-escape forced me to sit down later and pump through six straight hours of homework, but it was worth it. living in boston limits the amount of time i get to spend with my family,  and it has really made me appreciate the time we do have together more. i am so lucky that they are not too far away and are able to come down for the day to visit (and buy me food. hehe). it’s just nice to know that even though i don’t see them very often, they are always there. maybe this summer they will come down more often… hmm mum? what do you say? 🙂

seeing that i have been doing homework for the past six hours or so, i’d say that it’s that time of year again. one more week of classes and then finals week… oh yea, it’s definitely that time of year. it really hasn’t quite hit me that the semester is almost over. the weather isn’t helping me either. except for the occasional warm day, the weather has be rather dreary. i feel like it’s still march, or maybe the 80 degree weather in georgia just spoiled me.

i think i am doing pretty well homework-wise. it’s not going to be an easy week that’s for sure. i’ve got a personal catalog due on thursday for my graphic design II class. i am almost done, but i haven’t figured out how i want to bind it yet (that’s kind of important haha). i have a final type experimentation project for wednesday. i am almost done with that too! 🙂 yay! but i have to print it (another important element). my last assignment for this week is my spanish paper. ten pages about el salvador. almost done with that too. so see? i’m doing pretty well. except i’m only almost done with all of them. meaning i have to finish all of them. then i have to prepare for finals and my portfolio review! so much to get through in the next two weeks, but then… IT’S SUMMER! woohooo!

for now, i am treating myself to beauty and the beast to take a break from all the thinking. 🙂

yesterday i was lucky enough to discover from my computer typography teacher that the designer luba lukova was going to be giving a lecture today at the boston public library. there’s a poster that’s been hanging up in the hallway by the printers for the past few days about it. i looked at it, but i never really read it. thankfully, marie-anne mentioned it yesterday in class or else i would have missed this awesome opportunity.

ever since i learned about her work in my history of graphic design class last semester i have been a huge fan of luba lukova. originally from bulgaria, she has lived in the states (specifically new york city) for the past twenty years or so creating incredible design which calls attention to major global issues like poverty, hunger, ecology, human rights and oppression. the thing about her work that makes it so inspiring is its simplicity. she often creates two or three color posters which have hand drawn images. it all sounds boring i know, but this woman knows how to combine symbols, icons, photos and illustrations to create a clear and undeniable impact.

i really can’t do her justice, so here are some of her works from her social justice 2008 series:

see? incredible. these really are images that you will never be able to get out of your head.
during the lecture, she went through a portfolio of her work and talked about each piece in her little bulgarian accent. she mentioned some of the design elements– why it was effective, why these lines work here/there– but she mostly focused on her concepts, the reasons why she chose the images that she chose.
honestly, luba is brilliant. you could tell that this process was just so natural for her. creativity and design are her life, and she embraces and loves them fully. when asked about how she lives off of an artist/designer salary, she simply stated that she goes with her gut. she will turn down a huge commission if the requirements of the design are too restricting. and she said it’s all about connections. her enthusiasm and passion have allowed her to meet a person who knows that person, who works for this person, etc. it’s all just a chain. she said that she tells every student who asks “how do you ‘make it’?” to follow your heart and stay true to your design.

obviously, she’s a lucky one. not everyone can make it. but her story of being a foreigner, arriving in the land of people who want to “make it” and her success as an internationally recognized designer (with work that has been placed in museums!) is pretty inspiring, especially to a young designer like me who’s interested in social justice and the non-profit world. she is that example that proves that talent, enthusiasm and pure passion can get you anywhere you want to go in life.

this past friday was suffolk university’s community services office’s 14th annual day of service. S.O.U.L.S., or suffolk’s organization for uplifting lives through service, is my second home after the new england school of art and design. we got a good half of my alternative spring break trip to go with us. 🙂
my group went to the greater boston food bank. friday was actually a day full of firsts. this was my first time participating in service day, my first time at a food bank and my first time in south boston. they were all great firsts. we worked in the back sorting food by category, so that the organization could distribute them to other places equally and efficiently.

i was in charge of the fruits category. not many fruits came down the conveyor belt though so i helped my friend nicky with juice. because there was A LOT of juice. there was probably about 7 boxes worth. it was a little overwhelming. but during the lulls we danced and sang to the radio.

overall we sorted through over 6,500 pounds of food! which is impressive until you know that the morning group sorted over 8,000 pounds. 🙁 but hey! we did our best and we helped out some people in need! i would really love to go back there because all of the people we met were super nice. the man that trained us has been working there for 15 years! it must be such a rewarding job. i would love to get involved with an organization like the greater boston food bank when i graduate.

for my spanish class this semester, we have to give two presentations to the class. my first one was about sor juana ines de la cruz, a mexican nun from the colonial days. she’s actually a very interesting person. she challenged accepted catholic ideals as a young nun. pretty impressive i’d say.

now i have another presentation about el salvador. this one is a little bit shorter but it has to be just as thorough. i still need to do a lot more research but so far i have found that this tiny little country (its about the size of massachusetts) has such an interesting and sad history. they have gone through so much. colonial hegemony, indigenous slavery, civil war. they have so much history. its really fascinating.

and now, by some luck, i have been given the opportunity to go to el salvador. alternative winter break is a program similar to alternative winter break but instead of going during spring break,  you go during winter break! there’s a class attached to the awb trip, so i am going to be the ta (teachers assistant)/student leader for the trip! i am so excited! and i am taking is as a sign that since i was assigned el salvador before i was even offered the position that i should definitely go. i’ve always wanted to go to latin america! el salvador– here i come! (but i have to get through this presentation first) 🙂

in my computer type class we were assigned to create a beverage company and create the packaging for it. that required us to choose our beverage, find an existing bottle that we liked, and decide on the name, colors and logo of the drink. we could pretty much do anything.

i decided i wanted to do something tropical. my roommate and i were brainstorming, and she thought of aloe vera juice (something new on the health food scene apparently). i love the way aloe vera leaves look, so i though why not? i’ll make aloe vera and mango juice.

i wish i could say violà and it was done beautifully, but design doesn’t really work like that. so i am struggling along trying to grapple with the excess white space i have in my current design. i think i kind of got stuck on one idea, which now, i am realizing, isn’t completely working. i think i need to start doing more work in the beginning stages. i am awful at sketching. i just want to get on the computer and start messing around, where i really need to start spending more time with a good old fashioned pencil and paper to flesh out my ideas.

one of my favorite professors says that the thumbnail/brainstorming stage should be extensive and exhaustive. i should have all of my ideas on paper in rough form. basically i need to design vomit all over my sketchbook before i start doing the actual design work. i am starting to realize that the process i am currently working with (which is not at all exhaustive) is not working, and it ends up causing problems in the long run. this is a habit i really need to change. it’ll be for the better, but it’s going to be hard to do.

unfortunately, i really can’t accurately describe my trip down to athens. it’s one of those experiences which you have to experience to fully understand. i can give you some general details though, which will hopefully give you a good idea of what an incredible time i had while i was down there.

i’ll start off with how much i love the south. i discovered my love for the south last year when i went to mississippi, but georgia just renewed my feelings. after the first day, i was ready to pack up my bags and transfer to university of georgia (i know i wasn’t the only one either). athens is the home of the university of georgia, which is a state school of about 30,000 kids. athens-clarke county has the highest concentration of PhD.s because of the university; however, at the same time, athens-clarke county is the poorest county in the country. that’s right– the entire country. poorer than detroit, than the bronx, than three counties in texas that border mexico. 38.8% percent of the population lives below the poverty line. that’s INSANE! and yet, many people who live there don’t even know about the state of there county. one would like to think that if statistics were released nationally, they would also be make everyone aware locally. Spencer, the Habitat coordinator, said that it’s not the case.

to go along with the irony, the poorest part of the city is literally four blocks from downtown. four blocks from quaint shops and restaurants to impoverished, drug dealing neighborhoods. the dichotomy is astounding to say the least. we were working in the poor neighborhood, and to actually see the difference, to watch the changes as you drive, is probably one of the most surreal things i have ever witnessed. it took me a while to process it. i really think i fully understood what i was seeing until after i came back to boston and reflected on my time there.

the habitat crew was amazing. habitat for humanity is an incredible organization, but this team was so wonderful. they made us feel so at home and so welcomed. they do some pretty incredible things too. not only do they build houses for hard working families, they also help out the community by building wheelchair ramps and fixing up old homes for the older community. they have taken some pretty radical steps to help alleviate crime as well. in addition to the homes and the other programs i just mentioned, they purchased an section 8 apartment complex that was a center for crime and drugs. although the tenants had destroyed the place and were usually drunk before 9 am, they told them they could stay but they would have to pay rent. all of them left, which has allowed habitat to clean them out and fix them up. they are going to be used as transitional housing for people who would like to eventually be eligible for a home.
their simple act of fixing up these apartments and welcoming hard working, kind people into them has created a little crime-free bubble around the building. as opposed to 500 police calls in eight months, there have only been two or three. what they are doing is making a visible difference in the community and it was amazing to be a part of.

we worked mostly on their newest development, a cul-de-sac of six or seven houses that will be called carpenter’s circle. we took a small tour of a previously finished development and i cannot wait to see how this one will turn out. there were only two houses half-way built while we were there. but we helped with outdoor stuff. we all got the chance to roof too! i hammered in a row and a half of shingles! we all we were really courageous and conquered our fear of heights. after a half-hour on a roof or a ladder, we got so comfortable, it was a piece of cake. this experience of challenging ourselves and stretching out limits really made us all question what else we can do in our lives. the possibilities are endless. and after seeing what athens area habitat does in their community to make a difference, i know that i can do some incredible things as well! 🙂

Jittery Joe's Coffee- the starbucks of athens, but way better.it's all about the teamwork!

since i am still processing all that happened in ga, i’m  going to give yall a few photos to give you a preview. all i can say right now is that i was right. it was incredible.

first look at the worksite!

we roofed that house!

i ate wayy too much on this trip! our last stop was waffle house! yum!