Hott

It was 81*F at 11am, whooo wee.  The nights lately have reminded me of sleeping in the upstairs bedroom at Mom's house on Omaha Street.  The nights that are so sticky that even the sheet feels like it's suffocating the prospect of peaceful sleep.  The greatest difference is the occasional breeze that breaks through the open windows as respite from the dogged heat in PE compared to the constant hum of a fan to cool the night in the States.  We all had reading to do this morning, so we slathered on the SPF 45 and ventured up to the roof to read our lit.  At 1, Taylor and I booked it to class.  Considering it usually takes almost exactly an hour to walk to campus, I was pleased that we had a few minutes to spare once we fought the incredible wind blowing us in the opposite direction from campus.  Lit was mostly a discussion of Disgrace by Coetzee.  He is a prized South African author, and the novel is the epitome of South African literature, addressing questions about all aspects of the human condition.  It is an easy read with so much depth.  I would recommend it to anyone interested in questions of race, sex/gender, relationship to “the other” including people who are different or even animals, and much more.  After class I went to volleyball and came home to veg out.  I am very tired tonight after a long day yesterday and the sun and wind picking on me today :)

 

Now, I am listening to a playlist of Friday of Country Fest 2011 as it is my method to discern which day I would like to attend with my sissy (who I miss dearly).  Friday sounds like it would be a great day with shows from Steel Magnolia, Gary Allan, Miranda Lambert, Justine Moore, and Craig Morgan.  Sorry to say for those of you who don’t enjoy the cold and snow, but it’s very hard to remember that it’s not summery weather at home.  I often imagine grandparents at the fair, floating down at Riverview, and wonder when the county fairs are scheduled, and then I remember that it’s March.  

Culture for Bruce

Mary West, our literature prof, spoke about the themes of community verses the individual in Disgrace.  I anticipated the other themes she brought up, but the individuality theme came out of nowhere for me.  She asked us, upon reviewing the book again, to see how Lurie, the main character, changes from serving his own needs, regardless of the consequences, to living within a community and taking responsibility for his actions’ effect on others.  She said he changed from having a Western idea of individualism in which he just felt entitled to whatever he wanted to, embracing the idea of African communalism.  It is truly a concept one cannot ignore while living here, but I still did not pick up on it in the book.  I thought that his impulsive and reckless actions came as a result of letting his pure emotion guide and justify any action.  

I felt myself becoming very defensive when Mary West described a selfish and community-destroying man as embodying a Western individual.  She has accused our class of failing to understand certain South African points of view, and I think she fails to see the very important way that meeting individual needs allows one to serve communal needs.  Those who take care of themselves first are often heckled as being selfish, but if one is not okay with herself or does not take the time to know who she is, how can she adequately aid another?  I am saddened at the picture of the Western person that Mary West drew, and her obvious pessimism about American altruism and sense of accountability while ignoring our dedication to service demonstrated by our weekly service.  I am not saying that individualism is better than communalism; I just want to point out that we are not evil Americans because we are an individualistic culture.