Today I appreciated having the opportunity to discuss the first half of the book we're reading this quarter, Happiness is a Choice You Make. It left me with a mixture of emotions, and I listed the questions that came to my mind while I was reading as the discussion questions. The book made me think a lot about ethics, personal values and beliefs. I could only answer these questions with hypothetical situations, so I greatly appreciate my peers sharing personal anecdotes about family members and loved ones. I know for many of them, this discussion was very personal and emotional, and I just want to say that I appreciate and respect their decision to be vulnerable and open with the class for the sake of our learning. It takes a lot of courage to share and disclose what many of them contributed, and I am forever grateful. Meanwhile, we have been making slow but steady progress on our HAP, Recipes for Life. We shared with the class that we would love for them to reach out to their EP's and ask for them to contribute, so I hope those recipes will be rolling in soon. In the meantime, I have been trying to collect recipes via asking friends who I know are close to older folks to help me out with this project. It has been working decently well so far as I have gotten two responses in the past week, so fingers crossed for more responses and further success! One concern that Andrew and I came across for our HAP is providing a photo of the completed dish for each recipe. I previously thought that we could simply find a photo online, but Andrew reminded me that there would be copyright issues tied to doing that. Currently, we are pushing folks to submit photos of the dish along with their recipe, but I think our backup plan is to prepare the dish ourselves and then take pictures of it. This definitely sounds like a time-consuming and expensive process, so I'm hoping we won't have to resort to that.
Today we went to visit folks at Casa de Manana. I had the pleasure of speaking to a man in his 90s who was involved in the US Navy for most of his life. During my time there, Edward shared with me his rich life experiences. I learned that he traveled to many parts of the world and worked various positions in his life, most of which were related to education. He also shared with us his passion for photography and how he once considered being a photographer for National Geographic. It was really interesting to hear about Edward's experiences growing up in Hawaii and how it was almost a given that he would follow his father's footsteps of going into the military. I'm glad I was able to spend time with Edward and share bits and pieces of my life with him and vice versa. In the midst of our discussion, Edward talked to us about career prospects as many of us are graduating seniors. I think it was at this moment that I realized how different the job market is for us now compared to back then. In response to many of us telling him that we did not yet have jobs lined up for post-graduation, Edward replied that we "better hop on it." I know he didn't mean harm with that comment, but it definitely induced a lot of stress and anxiety for me at the moment. I don't know if older folks understand the employment struggle a lot of people in my generation are currently experiencing, but it is a very disheartening process, to say the least. I am not sure if people think that we're just being "lazy," but I can personally attest that this is not the case. Encountering job listings for entry-level positions that require bilingualism and years of experience while compensating with salaries that are barely over minimum wage has left me feeling like my Bachelor's degree and years of hard work in higher education are virtually worth nothing. To top it off, people simply scrape up our lack of employment to the fact that we simply are not trying hard enough. Sorry if this seemed like a vent, but it has been quite a stressful quarter trying to finish up my degree, working part-time and trying to find a full-time job post-graduation. I feel happy for older folks because they did not have to work so hard to find a job back in their days, but times are different now and I just wish more people understood that.
Today we went to visit folks at the Bayside Community Center! I had the pleasure of speaking to two women who had very different experiences growing up. The first person I spoke with was Lisa, a Filipina woman who immigrated to the United States in her 20s. She told me that she studied nursing in college before immigrating to the US and practicing. Something that really struck me was how she talked about only having to focus on her studies while she was in school and never having to work out of necessity. Her first and only job ever was being a nurse. This was really surprising to hear given that most people these days work multiple jobs before finally settling on their lifetime career. After telling me about her younger days, Lisa agreed to contribute a recipe to my cookbook project. She shared with me how to make pinaket, a famous Filipino dish from the northern region of the Philippines where she is from. The second person I spoke with was Zenny (I'm sure I'm misspelling her name so please forgive me). She also immigrated to the US from the Philippines after studying agriculture in college. She told me about how she worked for one of Jack in the Box's offices after she moved to the US and how the company treated her very well. Something I took away from our conversation is the importance of giving back to the community. She told me about how she donates money and volunteers for causes that mean a lot to her (e.g. Operation Smile, sponsor programs). When we had to say goodbye, she gave me a hug and a kiss on the cheek, and I think this moment of shared affection and love will be something that I will remember for a long time to come.
This quarter I decided to dedicate my healthy aging project (HAP) to collecting recipes with significance and memories attached to them from older folks and documenting these recipes in a cookbook that will later be printed and distributed to contributors and the general public. Along with each recipe, I hope to attach a small paragraph or description of the contributor and what that recipe means to them. Through this, I hope to highlight the importance and intersectionality of culture, tradition and cuisine while also encouraging younger folks to learn how to prepare these significant dishes so that these recipes stand the test of time and live to tell meaningful stories through their continued creation. Today I had the opportunity to further flush out my healthy aging project proposal in greater detail. I think having this time in class to focus on and talk to my professors about my project really helped me figure out the immediate next steps I need to take. Also, I was able to gain insight on how the logistics and funding for printing the cookbook would take place. I definitely think my biggest challenge will be working to gather recipes from all the people who are interested in contributing. This is something that I believe should be done in person with a student recording and writing down what the older person is sharing. The only drawback to this method of collection is that it is very time-consuming and requires a lot of hands on deck. Even though I am only one person, I fortunately have very generous classmates who have already offered to help me with my project! Now that my vision for the project has been further clarified and is becoming increasingly more achievable, I am excited to get started and hear about all the wonderful recipes people have to share.
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Grace TranWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
June 2019
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