Tag Archives: rants

01.21.13
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When it Rains, it Pours…

That awkward moment when you realize that you have the WRONG email address on your blog’s contact form and have therefore not been receiving emails that people submitted through your website. (That just happened to me.)

And that other awkward moment when you go into the old email account that website contacts were forwarded from (I could have sworn I deleted that account!) and find an email from literally the last person on earth you want an email from (seriously, I would rather have had a sketchy email from a Central Asian dictator). As you’ve probably guessed, that just happened to me, too.

This just really hasn’t been my evening…

01.06.13
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I Hate the GMAT (and the GMAT Hates Me)

This is a rant; don’t read it unless you want to read my whining about a certain standardized exam!

I’ve been very annoyed all weekend because I took the GMAT on Friday. The GMAT, or Graduate Management Admission Test, is often used by business schools to screen applicants. I am applying to an academic program that requires it, so I took it. However, I’ve been angry because I did not receive the score I wanted. None of the prep questions I did, including the official GMAT software available on the official website, even remotely resembled the questions I saw on the exam. I felt very rushed on the math (no calculators are allowed, so I did lots of calculations by hand) and towards the end, I didn’t even understand some of the questions. (Did I mention that the test is adaptive, as in if you answer some questions correctly, the computer program gives you increasingly harder questions?)

What really annoyed me was the verbal section. Verbal is my thing, if you know what I’m saying. I’ve always been better with words than with numbers, so I expected to do well on the verbal section of the GMAT. I was worried while taking the exam, though, as some of the sentence correction questions (basically, you choose the correct wording for a sentence out of five options) simply did not have a correct answer. Really, what’s a person to do when all the given options have equally atrocious grammar?

I’ve been so angry ever since. I feel like I wasted both money (the test registration fee is $250!) and time on this exam (both the time I spent taking the exam and the time I spent studying). I never thought I would say this, but I love the GRE. For me, at least, the math was a lot easier and the verbal section actually made sense.

12.29.12
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Blast from the Past: Stop ‘Hacking’ Everything

This post is old, but good (if I don’t say so myself): Can We Please Stop Trying to ‘Hack’ Everything? I’ve seen posts recently about ‘hacking’ language learning (can’t be done, people, so stop trying); ‘hacking’ public school (in this case, it was used a euphemism for acting like a helicopter parent and helping your kid cheat); and ‘hacking’ web development (again, there’s no substitute for just sitting down and actually spending time playing around with programming languages).

This absurd notion of ‘hacking’ represents what is wrong with the young generation in America today: people are unwilling to take responsibility for their actions and put in the hard work and effort required for most endeavors.

I’m so annoyed right now, thinking about all of this. I think I’ll go knit or play violin to calm down.

11.12.12
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Incompetence

One of the things I despise most is incompetence. I have no patience at all for incompetent people.

Unfortunately (for me), I have encountered a fair amount of incompetent people, both in academia and out. That’s why I found this passage in Robert Harris’ Archangel so amusing (and sadly accurate).

‘What’s he saying?’ demanded Duberstein, who was considered a world authority on Soviet communism even though he had never quite got round to learning Russian.

It’s sad but true: academia seems to tolerate – and even reward – incompetence in a way the non-academic world does not. And yes, I am aware that there are incompetent people in the private sector (and even more in the government sector), but academia is just a whole different world. The tenure system rewards only those who toe the official line (if you have a radical new theory that goes against the views of major scholars in your field, you would do well not to publish that theory until after tenure, or else you risk not getting tenure) and it also does not allow incompetent people to be fired, as they would be in a company.

Consider this: can you imagine an accountant who did not know general accounting practices? Or a tax lawyer ignorant of modern tax law? Or how about a doctor who did not know human anatomy? We all believe (or, at least, would like to believe) that these people would be fired (and possibly sued).

Yet while on my study abroad, I had a tutor who was writing a doctoral dissertation in Russian history and he, like our esteemed (fictional) Dr. Duberstein, had never managed to properly learn Russian. Keep in mind that he was (allegedly) basing his dissertation on Russian archival sources.

I am sympathetic to people who develop an interest in a field late in their undergraduate years and discover too late that they do not have the requisite language skills. I have met such people, people who suddenly discovered a passion for Russian literature, but had never taken a Russian language class. I recognize that I was really, really lucky in being able to take (and learn) a foreign language that matches my interests so well. But if a person does not have the required language skills to do research for a dissertation, that individual should first acquire the requisite language skills. It’s not easy, but it can be done.

11.09.12
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I Feel Like I Got Hit by a Bus.

Cady (played by Lindsay Lohan before she went crazy) right after Regina gets hit by the bus. That skirt would have been SO not allowed at my school, though. We had a very strict dress code.

So, remember this scene from that film You’ve Got Mail? (Sorry I can’t embed it; YouTube rudely informs me that “embedding [is] disabled by request”.) Basically, Tom Hanks’ character tells Meg Ryan’s character that The Godfather is the best movie ever and that there’s basically a Godfather reference to everything and anything.

Don’t get me wrong, I love The Godfather. But the way Tom Hanks’ character in You’ve Got Mail feels about The Godfather is how I feel about the film Mean Girls. Seriously, Mean Girls was my life, and there’s a Mean Girls reference for everything. It is such an accurate portrayal of the average high school experience (at least in America) and my high school was rife with drama, just like in the film. (We even had an experience when all the girls in my year had to get together and talk about stuff that bothered us as a group. It was weird and strange and only fueled the negative feelings we had for each other. But hey, in retrospect it makes a great story.)

Cady (played by Lindsay Lohan before she went crazy) right after Regina gets hit by the bus. That skirt would have been SO not allowed at my school, though. We had a very strict dress code.

Anyway (big spoiler here!), at the end of the film, the mean popular girl gets hit by a bus. Luckily, she doesn’t die, but still, getting hit by a bus would really be terrible.

And that’s how I feel right now. I literally feel like I got hit by a bus. You see, that’s what happens when you stay up and worry about the election, like I did, and then are unable to sleep because you are not so pleased with the result of said election.

So yes, I feel absolutely tired today (and I felt even worse yesterday). I haven’t written for National Novel Writing Month or studied foreign languages for the past two days.

But hopefully I’ll feel better soon, and will get back to regular writing on the blog.

And, further proof that there’s a Mean Girls reference for everything: at the end of the film, the principal says something like, “I couldn’t be happier that this school year is over.” Well, personally I couldn’t be happier that this election cycle is over. No more ads and no more polling (my household was polled so many times) for four more years!

09.19.12
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A University Whistleblower

So I realize I am not an actual whistleblower. I just liked how dramatic the title of this post sounded. But I was rather incensed at the falsehoods in this article about science students at my alma mater and could not resist writing something about it.

The article can be found here and I would highly suggest reading it before reading this post, as this post will not make much sense without it. The article is about science undergraduates at my university and I am qualified to speak on this subject because I myself was a science student during my freshman year. I intended to major in chemistry back then. However, I discovered two things after first semester: first, I missed history so much and second, the chemistry department was incredibly hard to work with and was more interested in researching than teaching a bunch of undergraduates.

Continue reading →

09.15.12
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Link List – American Diplomacy Edition

I have a fascination (bordering on obsession) with embassies. When I was a freshman at my university, there were quite a few career events with the State Department. I went to all of them and loved hearing about the Foreign Service. I had dinner with a diplomat who was posted to Romania during the overthrow of Ceausescu and listening to his foreign service stories was fascinating. To make a long story short, I would love to be a foreign service officer someday.

As I’m sure you’ve heard by now, there have been many attacks on American embassies and consulates in North Africa and the Middle East. The first attack was on the consulate in Benghazi, Libya, and it left four American diplomats dead, including our ambassador there, J. Christopher Stevens. That happened Tuesday and I’ve been too sad and angry to write ever since. I think there is a lot more to what happened than meets the eye, and the US media is doing a typically sloppy job of reporting. For example, this story from The Independent (a UK publication) says that US officials had advance warning of the attack, but neglected to tell this crucial bit of information to the diplomats in Libya – I have not seen this mentioned in any US media. If that is true, then it is a crime our government should have to answer for.

So, the first link is a tribute to Stevens by one of his friends, Persian writer Roya Hakakian. It’s a beautiful piece of writing, except for the ending, which cuts off rather abruptly.

Nicholas Kralev has an excellent article on Foreign Policy called America’s Other Army. The bottom line is being a diplomat is a lot more dangerous than one might initially think. Mr. Kralev has also written a book (with the same title as the article) that I desperately want to read. Unfortunately, it is inordinately priced and not in ebook form. I believe the book is self-published, so he ought to consider offering it as an ebook.

This article, Bunker Mentality, has everything you would ever want to know about embassy design and security. Be sure to take a look at the accompanying slideshow, too.

And finally, an article about how US consulates are more dangerous than war zones.

If you’ve made it to the end of this, congratulations. Enjoy exploring this fabulous little resource from the State Department called “Discover Diplomacy.” It’s wonderful because you can see photos of US embassies around the world. Here’s Moscow.

06.29.12
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Yet Another Post Talking about Women, Work, Children, and Life

And by “yet another,” I mean on the internet as a whole, not this blog specifically.

So this is what happened. Anne-Marie Slaughter wrote a super-long article titled Why Women Still Can’t Have It All. If you haven’t read the article, I’ll save you the time and give you the condensed version: she’s bitter that all her life, she planned to have a high-powered career (an excellent goal, in my opinion) but once she got there, she realized that there are only so many hours in a day and the more time you spend working, the less time you have to spend with your family. She thinks that American society needs an overhaul so that women can “have it all,” so to speak.

(Okay, so I skimmed in the middle and towards the end. Correct me if I misinterpreted Slaughter’s argument. But her argument is not the point here, as you’ll soon see.)
Continue reading →

05.05.12
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Every Kid Needs an iPad – Really?

I am blogging while watching a movie on TV in a hotel, so I hope this post turns out to be coherent.

This article represents what is wrong with the world today. I cannot imagine why any child needs an iPad. You know, when I was younger, I didn’t have an iPad, or a computer for that matter. Yet I still turned out fine and managed to stay entertained. Here’s what I did when I was younger instead of using an iPad:

  • Ran around outside and played. My best friend lived next door to me so this was convenient.
  • Wrote. I was always writing stories, remember?
  • Read. I’ve always heard that good writers read. This is probably true.

By the way, the movie I’m watching is The Day After Tomorrow. It’s really bad. For apocalyptic scenarios, I prefer 2012. At least it has some Russian spoken in it. The Day After Tomorrow has absolutely no redeeming features whatsoever.

02.09.12
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The Best Blog Post Ever, From Penelope Trunk

While making the rounds of my usual blogs yesterday morning, I came across this priceless post on Penelope Trunk’s homeschooling blog. It’s called Books I Hate and it is amazing. Granted, I have not read two out of the three books on her list, but I can relate.

Here’s the strange thing about Penelope: when she’s right, she right, but when she’s wrong, she’s so very wrong. Try as I might, I simply cannot get behind the idea of doing poorly in school or getting plastic surgery and I find it more than a bit insulting for someone to suggest that I need plastic surgery to succeed in life. And letting kids play video games all the time is just stupid because young kids don’t know what’s best for them.

But back to the post in question. You should read it because it’s awesome. And hilarious.

12.19.11
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Pet Peeve: Bad Translators

Bad translators perpetrate bad translations, and that’s reason enough to be annoyed by them. Once, I was flipping through a translation of Bulgakov’s The White Guard and it was talking about Christmas and Santa Claus on the first page. Nowhere in the original does Bulgakov write about Santa Claus or Christmas!

But what prompted this post is a certain Polish translator I follow on Twitter. She is very nice and I have chatted with her a few times. Since she’s a native Polish speaker, I always assumed that she worked into Polish from English. On her resume, though, she says that she works into English and I discovered recently, while browsing her website, that she cannot write in English.

I don’t want to make a blanket statement and say that a non-native speaker can never, ever translate into a second (i.e. non-native) language – because that is simply not true. There are a rare lucky few who manage it, but the vast majority of us (in my opinion) cannot. I would not trust myself to translate something into Russian, but I can definitely translate from it. If you are going to translate into English as a native Polish speaker, you need to be like this wonderful woman, Ewelina. She writes a blog in English and her English is at least as good, if not better, than mine. (If you need a Polish to English translation, here’s her website.)

Bottom line: if you are translating into a language, make sure you have near-native fluency!

12.16.11
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I Was Ahead of the Blogging Curve

I’m still stuck at my university. In their infinite wisdom, the administrative officials always, always, always schedule the history exams last – thus, I am stuck here with very little to do until the end of next week. I almost wish I had lied about having a major surgery in order to take the exam early. And yes, I know it’s not nice to lie, but it’s also not nice that I have never been able to go home early like the anthropology and psychology and math majors are able to.

So, in my spare time – because you can only study so much American history without wanting to freak out and go crazy – I have discovered that a lot of my friends have blogs. It’s kind of funny to see my peers posting their innermost thoughts on the internet because I’ve been blogging forever. And by forever, I mean since high school. And I didn’t post my innermost thoughts on the internet, of course, but I was posting about politics and current events and my life.

Anyway, the point of this was to say that I’m ahead of my time. And how I’m annoyed about being stuck here. My friend E. is home already. My friends I met last year while studying abroad are having mad crazy adventures in Europe.

And I’m hungry. So I’ll stop my whining so I can go find food.