Hi folks,
Here's my friend, Chang'aa's own take on his Ph.D. By the way, the first part
was just for my ego, so you can skip it ;-)
Enjoy!
Katim
----------
> From: Chang'aa Mweti <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: "Ph.D" ordeal.
> Date: Monday, October 25, 1999 8:02 PM
>
> Brother Katim!
>
> Greetings from Chang'aa Mweti. I hope that you are doing fine. Last
> Monday, I defended my dissertation!! I tried to let our "African Association
> of Madison" know the news but when I sent the e-mail it bounced back to me.
> Therefore, I am sending this to you as a friend and if you think it is
> appropriate, you can re-send the message to our members.
>
> Otherwise, have a nice day guy. It is because of guys like you that people
> like me got some kind of motivation. I had checked out your dissertation
> sometime back and it was great honor to see that a brother from the
> continent like other brothers/sisters had attained that level of education!
>
> I have been emotionally drained. Read what I had told all my friends.
>
> Keep in touch.
>
> Sincerely,
>
>
> Chang'aa Mweti
> 1498 Martin St
> Madison, WI 53713
> Tel: 280 0966
>
>
>
>
> >Date: Fri, 22 Oct 1999 12:40:52 -0600
> >To: [log in to unmask], [log in to unmask],
> [log in to unmask]
> >From: Chang'aa Mweti <[log in to unmask]>
> >Subject: "Ph.D" ordeal.
> >
> >My family members, my friends, Kenyans & Friends of Kenyans, African
> Association of Madison, Ladies and Gentlemen!
> >
> >I lack enough English vocabulary to thank you for the kind words of
> congratulations I have received from you, some in private mails, a few in
> public forum, and telephone calls as well. Although I can not write the
> names of everyone here, I just wanted you to know that I have been very
> appreciative of your words of encouragement. Before I continue, I want to
> tell all of you a story, whose theme will be "the benefits of struggling".
> Okay, here we go!
> >
> >Once upon a time, a man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day, a small
> opening appeared, and he sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as
> it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then, it seemed to
> stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could
> go no farther. Then the man decided to help the butterfly, so he took a
> pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon. The
> butterfly then emerged easily, but it had a swollen body and small shivering
> wings.
> >
> >Now, the man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that at
> any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to support the
> body, which would contract in time. Neither happened!
> >
> >In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a
> swollen body and shriveled wings. It never was able to fly. What the man in
> his kindness and haste did not understand was that the restricting cocoon
> and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening
> was nature's way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its
> wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom from
> the cacoon.
> >
> >Therefore, my fellow country men and women and friends of Kenyans wherever
> you might be, in Kenya or outside Kenya, sometimes struggles are exactly
> what we need in our life. If God allowed us to go through our life without
> any obstacles, it would cripple us. We would not be as strong as what we
> could have been. And we could NEVER FLY!!
> >
> >Why am I telling you this story? It is a powerful story which can be
> applied in different life situations which might be very challenging and not
> just the "Ph.D ordeal" I have hinted above. For those of you who may want
> to know more about "ph.d" path, I refer you to Prof. Edari's positing of
> July 20, 1998 whose title was "What's in a Ph.D?". I can forward it to
> anyone who would like to read what our insightful Mwalimu had written.
> >
> >For those of you who are moving towards that path, my advice is that do not
> despair. When things seem to get tough, don't quit. Once I listened to a
> motivational speaker who said a sentence which has stuck in my mind for a
> long time. The speaker said, "When problems come, some people break,
> others break records! Once I read a Russian proverb which says, "The
> hammer shatters glass, but forges steel"....meaning when problems of this
> world hit someone who is delicate, fragile, weak, breakable, those problems
> shatter this individual like glass, but the same problems hitting an
> individual who is strong "inside", that individual is "forged, molded,
> created, shaped, into steel! In God's power, we are all meant to be steel!
> >
> >When I was finishing my Masters degree in Whitewater, Wisconsin, I was told
> that the more you go down south, the more you encounter prejudice. People
> being mean to you and all that sort of thing. So, with a friend of mine, we
> decided to go to Louisville, Kentucky. In one of the southern states, I was
> in a "bathroom" (toilet), combing my hair. There was a guy near me who
> looked at me not in a friendly manner, and said, "Where do you come from?"
> I said, " I come from Kenya". Then he said, "In this country, they teach us
> to wash our hands after we have used the bathroom". I said, "In my country,
> they teach us not to pee on our hands!" He smiled and said, "That is a good
> one", and we shook hands in the bathroom and became friends. What I am
> saying to all of you out there, is that personally, my own sense of humor
> (humour), helps me sail through any nasty remarks because you would find
> good and bad people wherever you go in this planet. I am telling you this
> story to pave way for a very strong philosophy of life which can help
> anyone. Read the paragraph below!
> >
> >This is the strong philosophy of life: 10% is what happens to you in this
> world. What the system can do to you, what anybody in power can do to you,
> what your enemies can do to you and so on. The good news is that 90% is how
> you react to what happens to you!!!!! As you can see, you have the upper
> hand. We therefore need to be strong individuals. Not necessarily physical
> strength, but be strong spiritually, emotionally, and morally. Set your own
> goals and achieve them, and do not ever buy any negative label stuck on you,
> because if people look at you and say that you are "dump" and you listen to
> them, you will be "dump" because you will start acting according to their
> expectation of who you are, and that is wrong! If you do not do well in
> something, that is not the end of everything. Change your strategy and move
> on without dwelling on the failure. In fact, once a philosopher said, "If at
> first you do not succeed, change your definition of success!" Ha ha ha....
> I had to make some of you chuckle if not laugh loudly!!!!
> >
> >What I have shared with you so far is what I tell my audience in the many
> public speeches I give here in Wisconsin, and elsewhere. I am sorry if I
> may have bored some people, ( I hope not), but quite sincerely and in good
> faith, I believe that what I have said so far, may help some people in
> different ways.
> >
> >Let me tell you all, a little bit about myself. When I was in standard
> two, "grade two", at Mbitini Primary School, in Kitui district our math
> teacher Mr. Musembi, came to our class and said, "If I give you two cats
> today, and three cats tomorrow, how many cats of yours will you have
> altogether?" Many of us raised our hands. "Chang'aa", he said. "Six", I
> answered. Everybody was shaking with suppressed guffaws, thinking that I
> was dump. He came towards me to hit my head with his stick. (Some of you
> out there know that teachers used to do that kind of thing) "Sir", I said,
> "before you hit me, at home, my father has given me another cat. So, if you
> give me your five cats, plus that one of mine, don't I now have six cats of
> mine?" He looked at me, smiled and said, "there is something wrong with
> you!". He never hit me! This story is told over and over in my home town of
> Mbitini and Mr. Musembi is long retired but every time I go home he says,
> "This boy used to give me a lot of troubles in classroom!" To him, I am
> still a boy and I do not refute that.
> >
> >The short story above may at least help some of you understand why I chose
> this kind of study. If you want to do something of the magnitude of a
> "dissertation", I think it would be helpful to choose a topic which forms
> the core of your interest. For me, I have been telling stories since
> childhood. Stories help break abstract notions into concrete, and anything
> told in a storyform is easy to conceptualize because stories appeal to
> peoples' emotions.
> >
> >I successfully defended my "dissertation" this week, on Monday October 18,
> 1999, at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. I was in the school of
> Education, Curriculum department. Like many of you out there, I went
> through many obstacles. It's full title: " The use of Stories and their
> Power in the Secondary School Curriculum Among the AKamba of Kenya". I
> spent half a year in my home district of Kitui, doing my research in four
> schools, namely: Kitui Boys Sec, Mulango Girls Sec, Mbitini Girls Sec, and
> Ikanga Boys Sec. Although the study was not about "gender issues" per se, I
> felt that the study would be less susceptible if I balanced my choices of
> schools. That is why I chose two boys and two girls schools.
> >
> >For those of you out there who may be interested in "storytelling
> methodology in teaching", get in touch with me privately and I can share
> with you some stuff! I will keep those interested informed and also forward
> the "abstract" in due course! From the African perspective, I think this
> kind of study may aid curriculum theorists like Salia-Bao, (currently or
> formerly) head of the Department of Education and Teacher Training at the
> United Nations Institute for Namibia. In his book, "Curriculum Development
> and African Culture", he explained some of the problems that face African
> Education. He claims that the curriculum development in Africa is based on
> western curriculum theories, some of which are not related to African needs
> and culture. Salia-Bao (1989) touches the field of my interest
> (storytelling), when he says, "Although folktales and riddles could achieve
> the same objectives as inquiry learning, they are not used because there is
> little research on how to use folk-tale methodology in teaching" (p.55).
> Therefore, my study will be a move towards that direction since it attempts
> to show that "African storytelling" which has sustained African communities
> for centuries, can be effectively applied in classroom as well.
> >
> >In conclusion, should any of you come to the state of Wisconsin, feel free
> to contact me, and other Kenyans here in Madison. Or if you come to visit
> Prof. Edari, at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, let us all get
> together. There is a restaurant here in Madison, owned by a guy from
> Jamaica. It is called "Jamerica", and they serve "goat curry!" ....(Karibuni
> = all welcome) for non Kiswahili speakers!!!
> >
> >Once again, thank you all.
> >
> >Peace,
> >
> >Chang'aa Mweti, Ph.D
> >1498 Martin St
> >Madison, WI 53713 (U.S.A)
> >Tel: 608 280 0966.
> >
> >E-mail: [log in to unmask]
> >
> >
>
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L
Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
