For this weeks blog , I've decided to talk about a major milestone in everyone's life. The purchasing of a first car. This Seen as a tradition in media be it movies or tv series as well as a major stepping stone into adulthood and ownership, I personally looked forward to this moment as to own something that belongs to me, something I bought for myself through hard work and grit. Unfortunately this step came abit sooner than expected for me due circumstances that I could not avoid. I found myself living in msida whilst attending mcast in mosta this proved to be a major disadvantage due to the hard ever changing timetable and to put it in appropriate language the crap bus system. I had a certain amount of money in my bank account and set out on looking for a car for me.
This was the second time I had to comedown to a decision that would affect my future. Should I purchase a reliable second hand car or purchase a car I would like and end up paying via a payment scheme or a loan. From the first time I saw the Volkswagen Beetle on the tv series charmed I've wanted to have it as my first car it was and still is a dream of mine, to have my beetle outside my house however when looking into it I found myself with gel options go for something I can't afford right now of buy a car that I could afford now and think about the future. After speaking to various people, including friends, family and researching online I weighed up my options and came to the decision that a first car, especially for a gozitan in Malta should not be a brand new car because apart from it being beyond my financial grasp it would be a risky move from my end knowing I had hardly any driving experience in Malta. Therefore I had to ignore what my heart wanted and went with my brain and bought a reliable second hand car that was within my price range.
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Last Thursday Ali Farzat, the political cartoonist mentioned in the previous post was invited to visit the Institute for the Creative Arts to have an open discussion with the students. As degree students it was compulsory for us to attend and to be honest I was not that keen on staying at first. Surprised by the turnout of the number of students in the hall I started thinking that I might have underestimated what an influence this cartoonist is to some. The only issue during the talk was the language barrier between us as the translator could not fully translate what he was saying and fully show the emotions behind the words.
Farzat stated that "An artist must practice what he preaches". I agree with this statement since there is no point in drawing something for the whole world to see if you don't believe in it yourself. If Farzat agreed with the political system and all the other misfortunes the country has gone through he wouldn't be illustrating it. Through his drawing he is able to portray images understood by any language. He focused a lot on the current issues in Syria and how the Mafia benefits from such events, another act of greed by people who have power. Almost all the tragedies happening at the moment seem to be revolving around politics and this is what Ali Farzat tells us in his cartoons. Instead of carrying guns to defend his country he carries the most powerful weapon of all, a pencil, which allows him to express himself and show the world the truth in a single image. After he was assaulted by the Syrian forces for drawing a cartoon ridiculing president Bashar al-Assad, he remained in Syria for another month living in fear. Farzat mentioned that if he wasn't know for his cartoons and illustrations and if people didn't like his art, he would of been killed without anyone noticing. Although its hard for us to truly understand what he and his country have been through, we can definitely agree on the fact that we all want peace, not only for this country but the entire world. He couldn't of ended the talk any better by saying " Syria will forever remain for the Syrians" and no one is going to take it from them no matter who and how powerful they are. When first looking at the term 'power from below ' my mind immediately thinks about politics, more specifically corruption although it is also commonly associated with situations where the little guy stands up against the big guy. A David versus Goliath battle. When we talk about power from below we often think of it as a lower 'level' person tries to voice and act on their feelings and beliefs while attempting to make a difference for the better.
When writing this blog , I found myself thinking of a recent situation I faced. The idea that power from below can change structures is true yet sometimes difficult to achieve. During my first year of the course myself and a couple of other students failed a subject which was one of the most difficult subjects Being used to a systems for as long as I can remember where resits are held around two months later I was now faced with the impossible. For some reason the Institute wanted the student who failed to re do their work from scratch and resubmit the new work within 10 days. Now this is difficult to do with just one subject let alone having two or more within the same period. Even if it was just an exam and we had to study for it the deadline was impossible to reach whilst presenting work of good quality. Not knowing why other students never said anything about it I decided to take a stand. It was also the perfect opportunity to do so since when the resit brief was issued, the particular lecture took a mistake in the deadline date and wrote September so students started asking questions. As mentioned in the previous blog post, students at Mcast most of the time have no say in things so this was a win or loose situation. We were either going to make them listen and ask for the deadline to be extended hoping it will or else fail the subject again. After numerous emails and meetings with some members of the administration we managed to extend the deadline till September. Today, all students at the institute who fail a unit can submit their resit work in September, same as almost all the schools in Malta and Gozo. This shows how even though students are treated as the lowest level in the system's triangle, if they have enough courage and good intentions they can manage. References Piven, F. (2008). Can Power from Below Change the World?. [online] Asr.sagepub.com. Available at: http://asr.sagepub.com/content/73/1/1.abstract [Accessed 4 Nov. 2016]. |
Rita Curmi2nd year Student Archives
May 2017
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