Week 13: Diversity & Inclusion IV (Motorcycle Diaries)

Good evening or afternoon or anytime of day that you may be reading this. Since this blog is up after the 9 day Thanksgiving break I had and two to three weeks after the last time I posted something, I will spill out of bit more detail of how the last few weeks went including the semi-relaxing Thanksgiving break.

Before the break, every class was starting to approach the conclusion of their respected courses. Throughout the week for my English class, I was working on brainstorming and setting up for my big first draft for the third and final major assignment in the class. Along with preparing a big paper, I had to prepare to a huge Calculus exam on Thursday. Ever since the beginning of the semester, Calculus has presented a lot of challenges to me which is odd since throughout high school I enjoyed Mathematics. With the Calculus exam behind me, my mind was excited for the Thanksgiving week ahead. The Saturday leading into the break presented some anxiety and stress before my actual break could get started. On Saturday, I spent several hours trying to complete my rough draft for my final assignment in English. After being drained of my mental energy, I fortunately had an entire week to gain back my energy and stock my belly up with some nice Thanksgiving day food. I got to contribute somewhat to Thanksgiving by making Pumpkin pie which turned out a lot better than I expected. The Friday after Thanksgiving was not filled with Black Friday shopping but with Christmas preparations. I got to put Christmas decorations on the Christmas tree we just got. After Friday, I made my journey back to Georgia Southern to prepare for the final two weeks of the semester. Now to do the usual, I will go over the few weeks in my FYE class sessions.

Over the last four FYE classes, we have been going over the same general area of topic dealing with the film of Motorcycle Diaries which came out 10 or so years ago. We watched the beginning portion of the film in class, but we as students were tasked with watching the rest of the film during our free time. The film 'Motorcycle Diaries' is essentially about two guys from Argentina journeying by motorcycle and various other ways of transportation up the countryside in order to go through places like Venezuela and Chile in order to journey up South America's western coastline. Aside from watching the film, we learned about the main character who essentially is 'Che' Guevara who was a major figure of the Cuban Revolution after Che saw many injustices throughout his countryside trip. In one of our classes before the break, our class was presented a TedEd video that displayed both sides in regards to supporting and opposing Che Guevara's actions as a human being throughout his years in cultivating the Cuban Revolution and sparking many different places to fight against their governments, flawed systems, and countries. As usual, our class was presented a handful of questions regarding Che and the movie we watched. Some of the questions reflect back to our current day society in modern day problems like justified armed conflicts and the even the use of firearms in today's world. While we were not able to tackle all the questions, the questions gave the class and me a chance to reflect on the amazing lives that we are given in this country and not take what opportunities we are given for granted as we have it so much better in the United States than billions of people do around the globe. Thank you for reading and I'll write since again in the near future.