Have you ever been left almost entirely to your thoughts for
12 hours or more at a time? Something about long international flights makes me
sort of melancholy. I get much more sensitive to emotional stimuli, which
mostly come from movies and music. I just
watched the Perks of Being a Wallflower, which is based off a book I read in
high school. Both the book and the movie made me cry, but crying on an
international flight is significantly more awkward than crying while reading
alone in your bedroom. Y’know?
Anyways, I’m in the air right now on my way to Tokyo, where
I have a one hour layover before I go to Manila, which is my final destination.
Why are you going to Manila? you ask. Or maybe you’re asking, Where is Manila.
Well let me tell you.
Manila is the capital of the Philippines, and I am going
there for the 2013 Microcredit Summit. And what is microcredit? It’s the fairly
new poverty reduction strategy of giving out small (micro) loans (credit) to
people who would never be eligible to receive credit from a traditional
financial institution. These people would not get credit because they are too
poor to offer collateral, and they are in need of credit because most of them
are able to become self-sufficient if they have access to capital and some training.
Some people criticize microfinance. After all, like
everything else in the world, it doesn’t work every time. There are many things
that can go wrong, depending on how a microcredit institution goes about giving
loans. In general, though, it’s not uncommon to see a 98% repayment rate of
microcredit loans. It’s pretty phenomenal. I’m excited to go to this summit and
learn more about what it’s all about, how it’s going, what ideas people have
for the future, etc. There will also be a lot of incredible networking
opportunities for me, since many of the participants are leaders in the field
of development.
I left Detroit Sunday at 3:30 pm EST, and I arrive in Manila
10:10 pm Monday in whatever time zone that is. It’s only about 18 hours of
travel (isn’t that AWESOME after the 45 hours it took me to get to
Hazaribag??), but I cross the date line, so I kind of lose out on my Monday.
Coming back, I’ll leave Manila at 7:00 am on Friday, and I’ll arrive in Detroit
at 12:25 pm the same day. I’ll actually arrive in Detroit an hour before I
leave my layover in Japan. Time travel is strange.
This blog post is extremely overdue. I know because my mom
has been reminding me often. :P
Here are some of the biggest things that are new in my life:
- I started teaching my PE class
- Jeff and I adopted a kitten, who we named Archer
- I met with the director of the PhD program I want to do
- I’m going to Manila!
I already talked about Manila, so I’ll talk a little about
the other things.
My PE class is just a blast. I have wonderful students who
are eager to work themselves hard and who do what I tell them to, even when
it’s just drilling basics until they can’t hold themselves up anymore. (Did I
mention that the class is on aerial silk and conditioning? Holding oneself up
probably makes more sense if you know that they’re working on aerial silk
skills.) It also gives me more time to train myself. After a year of having
inconsistent access to circus, it’s a relief to have at least an hour per week
when I can work on my own movement and strength. I’ve also been better about
running on Mondays and Wednesdays when I’m not teaching and don’t have to be up
early. I’ve been forcing myself to get up when Jeff gets up (or when he leaves
for work, on my late days). I’ve overall been feeling happier and healthier
with my schedule.
Kitten! Archer is the perfect cat. Okay, we’re working on a
few things, but he’s seriously the best cat I’ve ever met. And he’s obsessed
with me. It’s mutual, though, so that makes it healthy, right? He loves being
around people. He’s happiest if we’re within his sight, and he’s really
happiest if he’s snuggled with us and getting his belly rubbed. He purrs a lot
and he likes rubbing his face against our faces. Plus he’s adorable and soft
and just too precious.
PhD? I met with Chris, who single-handedly runs the
Interdisciplinary Evaluation PhD program at WMU. He was also the program’s
first graduate back in the day. He started out a little bit discouraging, but
as he got to know me while we talked, he got much more encouraging. The
downsides: the program is getting increasingly competitive; the biggest
consideration for admission is GRE scores (and I’m not great at standardized
tests); he is the only faculty for 50 students. The awesome parts: the program
often has its students work at the Evaluation Center, which is world-renowned
and gets contracted to do exactly the kind of work that I want to do; it
generally takes students about 4 years to complete the program; the students
are pretty close-knit and about half of them are international students; the
program is pretty much exactly what I want to do.
I’ll try to post some updates during the Summit about what I
learn and do there. The first day (Tuesday) is actually an “Ending Poverty
Retreat,” for which I am acting as a scribe and discussion facilitator, and
they are even giving me a stipend for my work! I can’t wait to be there and dig
into great energy and discussion about things I’m passionate about. What could
be better?
