Wall from the GWRC

The following post was contributed by Benton Scholar Erin Huiting ’17. She recently utilized Benton Scholars’ “Mini-Grant” funds to complete a volunteer-based research project in Uganda.

I came across the Denver-based non-profit Women’s Global Empowerment Fund (WGEF) as a young, curious student almost seven years ago. However, I still remember meeting the founder, Karen Sugar, with such clarity – her voice was kind and welcoming, yet overcome with raw despair. She spoke of a 23-year long civil war in northern Uganda that led to millions of internally displaced people (IDP), of which women and children were disproportionately affected. Today, even as a recovering post-conflict region, female education levels have remained extremely low and young girls are not actively encouraged to stay in school. This has left many women illiterate, and as a result, both economically and socially disenfranchised. In response, WGEF partnered with a community-based non-profit Volunteer Action Network to provide women of post-conflict northern Uganda with microcredit loans and social programing. After hearing this story, I became WGEF’s first volunteer. Little did I know this was the beginning of one of the most impactful experiences of my life.

Throughout high school, I found myself at several fundraisers, performances, and collaborations emphasizing WGEF’s work. I remained involved with WGEF as I left for college, and during my senior fall, Karen invited me to accompany herself and WGEF to the northern Gulu District of Uganda. After a long day of travel, I found Karen discussing her work in social justice amongst a group of women. One of which was writing an article for Marie Claire magazine about WGEF’s partnership with Urban Decay Cosmetics’ initiative to empower women, while the other women were apart of Urban Decay’s design and communication team. Given that I had personally witnessed the struggles of WGEF starting-up as a non-profit, meeting these women was a moment of both a joy and relief. Their support would enable WGEF to continue providing resources and information for the women of northern Uganda.

The next morning, I hopped on a ‘boda boda’ (motorbike taxi) and met everyone at WGEF’s opening of the Gulu Women’s Resource Center (GWRC). The center provides women a community meeting space, as well as computer and life skill trainings to facilitate conversations and develop solutions to relevant issues. There was a strong sense of pride and excitement as we watched the center open. The same day, I was introduced to one of WGEF’s clients, Akello Grace. I learned that despite spending more than 15 years in IDP camps, she is now an entrepreneur, community leader, and district council representative fiercely advocating for women’s rights. Grace remains one of the most powerful, selfless individuals I have ever met.

Riding on the boda boda, photo by Arnelle Lozado

Cutting the ribbon to the GWRC

From left: WGEF program associate Okumu Kevin, client Aloyojok Prisca, program associate Arena Monica, founder Karen Sugar, and client Akello Grace

The trip coincided with WGEF’s annual drama festival ‘Kikopo Pa Mon’ (creating a voice for women), where women perform dramas, dance, and song in the local Acholi language. Performances have previously focused on the issues of inequality, education inequity, HIV, and violence. Because these issues are sensitive and difficult to address, this unique opportunity allows women to communicate directly with men and community leaders in a stigma-free space. This year, the women chose the theme “Access to reproductive health care is my right.” While all of the women’s stories left me inspired, I was in awe of the younger girls who performed. Two girls in particular stood out – they were from a nearby primary school and chose to recite a dialogue demanding proper access to sanitation and menstrual care in schools. The audience cheered in support.

Photo by Arnelle Lozado

Photo by Keb Doak

On the flight home, I couldn’t help but smile and be overtaken with gratitude. I had the privilege to meet and listen to so many extraordinary women and girls from the Gulu community, and witness a sisterhood that enables women to find their voices. I am forever grateful for these moments and these women. And although there is much left to be done, I know the women of this region will persist and continue to accomplish great things. This is just the beginning.

Flying over Lake Victoria, Uganda

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Week 2 Prompt: Cars 

CARS — Cars aren’t just transportation. It’s almost a truism that they signify freedom and individuality in whatever society they’re driven, regardless of what “freedom” or “individuality” means locally. For example: open access to the Nürburgring allows Germans to probe their tolerance for danger and speed; Cuba’s relative economic isolation in the 20th century forced car owners to develop innovative ways to keep their vintage American imports running; even in the Soviet Union, car ownership was permitted but carefully managed in what Lewis Siegelbaum called a “Faustian bargain.” But changes in the culture of cars are now appearing, and definitions of individuality and self-expression face yet further refinement. In the United States, there is growing enthusiasm for driverless cars–suggesting mere occupancy (rather than operation) might now be sufficient to express individuality. Meanwhile, in Europe, fallout from the emissions scandal has prompted Volkswagen to speed-up its development of electric powertrains–good news for global CO2 emissions, but guaranteed to eliminate the rumble and gurgle of gas-powered cars. (Whither “POWER!” as Jeremy Clarkson would yell?) This week, observe and listen to cars. Do people use cars to express some aspect of their individuality, or are they simply a way to get from point-A to point-B? How do people commonly interact with cars–as taxis, rentals, privately-owned consumer goods? Are cars viewed as good for society or a nuisance that must be contained and managed?

Sabrina Farmer

Due to restrictions on walking in many South African National Parks because of the danger of the Big Five, automobile travel is the way that most visitors get to see the parks. If you are going to be driving through a national park, the best mode of safari-style travel is in the back of a game driving vehicle (GDV). GDV’s are essentially a truck with a raised bed that is lined with seats, shaded by a sun roof and enclosed with helpful side panels that keep passengers safely away from any dangerous animals. Instead of being cramped in a van pressing your face (or binoculars!) to the window to try and spot an animal, GDV’s allow you to feel the wind in your hair, the dirt in your mouth, and the sun in your eyes. Do not forget your sunglasses or sunscreen, and maybe a bandana to cover your mouth. Since I associate national parks with outdoors experiences, driving in GDV’s allowed me to feel like I was experiencing the nature of the park more, even though I was not actually walking around in it. However even in GDV’s, automobile traffic could not be avoided. People come to parks like Kruger National Park to see the animals, so naturally when a pride of lions is next to the road the cars flock to it and create a traffic jam. Fortunately, those in GDV’s often have a higher vantage point and these jams do not reduce animal spotting ability. During these jams, I often found myself wondering what impacts the presence of so many cars were having on the animals and their stress levels. As tourism increases even further to Kruger and other similar parks I think that traffic management and limitation will become an even greater issue.

Sean Corrigan 

My biggest lesson in Hong Kong car culture came, unexpectedly, from a lecture in my computer science class. Our professor was explaining “if statements” to us. During his explanation, he said that unlike in the West, people in Hong Kong take a much more practical and economic approach to deciding whether or not to marry someone. In the C programming language, the evaluation looks like this:

if (<He has a car> && <He has an apartment>)

<Marry him>;

else

<Don’t marry him>;

Meaning that if your potential husband has both a car and an apartment, you should marry him. Of course, this block of code was just a light-hearted take on a marriage decision process that showed us how a programming concept works. While it was mostly a joke, it highlighted that in Hong Kong, car ownership is a symbol of being in good enough financial shape to support a family.

Regina Pimentel

The most noticeable thing about cars was the fact that driver’s seat in New Zealand is on the right, and they drive on the left side of the road. This makes crossing roads a slightly stressful situation because you have to look right first, then left. In Dunedin, the city I am currently studying in is home to a large student population; therefore, most of the cars seen around my apartment are gently used or look like older models of cars. As an abroad student, there has been a heap ton (NZ term for “a lot of”) of talk about buying a car for weekend road trips and general adventuring around New Zealand. I hope to buy a car or find a friend with one in order to adventure out during my stay here. Most people seem to have the same relationships with cars. It’s not about the color, model or year of the car but its whether it can take you to the beginning of a hike, or to a beach on the coast etc. Most of the people here look forward to the activities done after you get out of the car, so in a way having a car is having the freedom and access to explore and adventure.

Here is a picture of a hill in Dunedin that I took from a bus on our way to Signal Hill.

Ben Kelsey 

Cars are, in a sense, paradoxical in Japan. Some of the most easily recognized Japanese brands in the US are those of car manufacturers (Toyota, Nissan, Honda, Mazda, to name a few), and I think there’s something of a conception of Japan as a powerhouse of safe, reliable, efficient, and inexpensive cars. Both of the last two cars my parents have owned have been Japanese-made. And yet, cars seem to be much less of a cultural icon in Japan than they are in the U.S. Car ownership is not uncommon, certainly, but it’s not a given, either.

I’ve spent the vast majority of my time in Japan in large cities, with the traffic that inevitably comes along with that. For this reason, my experience may be skewed, but cars are certainly not the main mode of transportation. Subways, buses, and trains are the workhorses of transportation here, and they faithfully, punctually, and efficiently carry their many passengers to and from work every day. The suburban image of driving into work is certainly not the norm, even in the residential area on the outskirts of Kyoto where I’m living.  That being said, every few houses has a car in the driveway, but in the driveway they seem to stay for the most part. In the city, the roads are usually full of cars, but they are still outweighed by the traffic of foot and public transportation.

I’ve been lead to believe that obtaining a driver’s license is a notoriously difficult, time-consuming, and expensive process in Japan, and while I do know at least one person who has one, the rate of 16-18-year-olds who have one seems to be extremely low. And can anyone really blame them? Who wants to learn how to drive and buy and maintain a car when you can ride 200mph trains in comfort instead? Either way, I suspect that many people just don’t want to go to the effort.

Perhaps another reason for the relative lack of car use might be the different conception of space and the destination in Japan in comparison with the U.S. While the suburbanite dreams of taking off on a road trip to see the vast, open, free unknown waiting just beyond the neat edge of their lawn, explorable on their own terms by means of their motor vehicle, might still resonate in the U.S., in Japan it feels much more as if that which is desired hides in some nook or back alley, tucked into a valley next to a river, hidden from view by a sliding door or the delicate branch of a flowering tree. The destination cannot be reached by road, nor does one need to go far away to find what is sought; rather, one should look more deeply into what is already present.

On a more concrete note, the trend of driverless cars is one that might seem particularly suitable to the technologically adept Japan, but I suspect that it will not prove as exciting here as it might in the U.S. My guess is that driverless trains are more likely to catch the attention of discerning passengers and investors, as these serve a much larger portion of the population, and have a much larger market. Driverless buses may, admittedly, be appealing, as well, but I find it hard to imagine Elon Musk pitching driverless cars to a crowd of people whose wallets all contain a Pasmo (“a rechargeable contactless smart card ticketing system for public transport,” according to Wikipedia) but no driver’s license. I assume you would still need a driver’s license to drive a driverless car? Right?

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Week 1 Prompt: Walking (Paths) 

Paths and trails, whether around a city or on a college campus, raise surprising ethical, moral, and practical questions. From an act-utilitarian perspective, almost any pathway is “good”–so long as it is pleasant to traverse or speeds people to their destination. But, from a Kantian perspective, the categorical imperative suggests we should only use paths than anyone can use–e.g., the more people who walk a dirt trail, the more the environment is damaged, and the less likely it is to remain passable. Meanwhile, landmark disability rights legislation, including the ADA in the United States, stipulate that all pathways must be accessible to people with limited mobility–suggesting it is immoral not to construct paths from durable surface materials. This week, pay attention to one of your usual walking paths. Notice its physical, moral, and social dynamics: Where does the path go, and whom does it help connect? Is it accessible to people with limited mobility? Can anyone walk it, or is its use controlled? What is the surface material? Does it take you directly to your destination, or is it a wandering route through a park, designed to maximize pleasure with beautiful views of nature?

Sabrina Farmer

The first half of my program was spent in the South African savanna, primarily on Kruger National Park. Kruger is home to the “Big 5” or the five most dangerous and difficult animals to hunt: lions, leopards, African buffalo, elephants and rhinos. Because of this, you cannot walk around freely within Kruger and instead have to be behind fences at all times. For the research I was assisting in, I got to be among the lucky few who have the opportunity to walk around the park on animal formed game trails, with rifle-armed guards called “game guards” for protection. Pictured here is my game guard Philly as he is directing us to slowly walk away from a territorial bull elephant. Walking within Kruger was a stressful experience while at the same time being pinned behind fences made me feel very cooped up, so my time spent in Kruger was a challenge!

Sean Corrigan 

All Colgate students have a special relationship with the hill. There are a few ways to climb it, including Persson Steps, the path by the library, the stairs behind up to Curtis behind Dana, and a couple others. Some junior and senior students walk up the hill every day for classes, some evade the climb by taking the Cruiser on most days. If you’re anything like me, you leave your room at the last minute and get to class just on time using the most efficient route you know. Any small increase in efficiency gives me an extra couple minutes of sleep, and that is something I value deeply. These extra sources of efficiency include cutting across patches of grass, taking the cruiser when available, and leaving on time

While Colgate’s hill can be a challenge on some mornings, it is quite small and its slope is quite shallow when compared to the hill at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. This sharp difference in hill size and steepness brings with it an interesting set of challenges and opportunities. Their network of pathways, staircases, and elevators is quite impressive. Slopes and sheer cliffs too steep to build a path on can be worked around by taking an elevator up to a walkway. One part of campus includes a series of escalators, similar to the Persson Steps of the future.

These escalators are at the bottom of the giant hill. Their main purpose is to help students overcome the psychological barrier to starting their climbs. Another part of campus boasts a staircase to nowhere, which I found when I thought I outsmarted Google Maps.

The above staircase ended at a cliff, where it was only a 20 to 30 foot drop to my destination. I swallowed my pride and hung my head in shame as I took the extra 10 minutes to go around the hill that had defeated me. The view going around the hill was nice, though.

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Finland was the third and final country that the ’19 Bentons visited during our trip abroad in May of 2016. The Republic of Finland is internationally recognized as having very high per capita income, rich quality of life, comprehensive education, ample economic opportunity, opportune social mobility, and ingenious technological innovation. Thus, it was the ideal place to learn about how tech startups begin, develop, and impact the world. By visiting some locations where entrepreneurs gather to discuss and develop their ideas, the ’19 Bentons were able to expand upon many of the concepts learned during our classes Emerging Global Challenges and Innovation in the Digital Age.

Finland, like Estonia, is a nation where the government actively supports citizens who pursue entrepreneurial endeavors. This practice is one reason behind Finland’s high standard of living. Another reason is that Finland has a number of entrepreneurial accelerators, places where innovative thinkers assemble to collaborate on their projects and receive guidance from more experienced individuals in the startup sector. Certain accelerators even have a program where one can apply for unique funding and mentoring, where they will be helped to transform their vision into reality. One such place was Startup Sauna.

Pictured both above and below, Startup Sauna offers a variety of workspaces, including cozy work houses (above) and toasty saunas (below) for both public and personal projects.  Originally founded in 2010 as a branch of the University of Helsinki, Startup Sauna advertises that they are a “5-week accelerator program focused on finding the right product-market fit and go-to-market strategy.” (http://startupsauna.com) Their accelerate is unique in that they take no equity and do not charge for their program. Teams can select from either a grant of 1000€ or free accommodation during the program. Their accelerator is the foremost one in the location of the Nordic and Baltic countries, Eastern Europe and Russia. To date, Startup Sauna has received over 4,500 applications and raised over 100 million dollars for their projects.

Some of the skills that Startup Sauna students learn include generating ideas, evaluating market opportunity for those ideas, conducting research to evaluate the user’s needs, prototyping the product, designing its interface, and finally, translating that design into actual program code. From there, designers release the beta-version of the project and gather user data from volunteers, which designers use to innovate further. This seemingly redundant process of collecting data and refining allow for the creation of optimal, user-tailored products with progress with time. But this gradual progression is not the only way innovation occurs.

This incremental innovation is what we see with gradually sharper screen displays, slightly faster processors, somewhat bigger hard drives, and incrementally sleeker designers. However, this type of growth is not what has yielded the most powerful of our time. Indeed such innovations are the result of disruptive innovation, innovation which upsets the status quo, makes old technology obsolete, and permanently changes how business is done. One such example is wireless internet: instead of being restricted by the length of a cable, users anywhere in the wifi field have access to an limited source of information. Another example is the automobile: instead of riding horses or bicycles, the car displaced such technologies and gave rise to an entirely new industry. In more recent history, Tesla Motors has launched the electric car, in hopes to reduce car emissions. What will be next? The overthrow of the gasoline engine though water power, solar power, or wind power? One day, will we be able to transmit energy wireless, or even extract it from space as Nikola Tesla thought was possible? While that has yet to be determined, the key to innovation is not allowing your vision of what is possible to by limited by what is present.

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Benton Scholar Jenny Lundt ’19 knows chess. She’s also an experienced traveler. So, during the winter of 2017, she combined her interests into a Benton Mini-Grant project. Her proposal took her to South America, where she “backpacked through Peru with a chess board.” Chess, she discovered, isn’t just a game. It’s a way of bringing people together, facilitating communication across cultural and linguistic barriers. What follows is Jenny’s reflection.

I started like I had done a thousand times before.

The usual things. Clothes, shoes, shampoo, trail mix, portable charger: all find a niche in my backpack after a plethora of experience being hauled around the world. But this time was different. This time, I would be traveling with a chess board.

Throughout the course of my world travels, I have found that chess is global. No matter your race, gender, age, or ability, chess is played. For instance, during a visit to Ukraine last summer, I joined a tournament of old men, simply by motioning. This made me realize how a game about war is also connected to peace.

As a Peace and Conflict major at Colgate, this really interested me and made me want to learn more. So, I applied for a Benton Scholars “Mini Grant” and made chess the purpose of a trip. For three weeks during the winter of 2017, I backpacked through Peru with a chess board, setting it up wherever I was and waiting for an opponent. There was no clear plan, other than  to wait and see if anyone wanted to play.

The experience was everything and more I could have hoped for. A few highlights:

• A game with an English teacher on the beach of Chancay over ceviche and cold chelas. As we played, he told me how desperately he wants to visit the US some day to live “the American dream.”
• A game with a Peruvian driver with a knack for jokes who told me my Spanish was some of the best he’s heard in a while (still unsure if that was a joke?).
• A game with my friend Luke, a true “third culture kid” whose father grew up in Mozambique, his mother in Ireland, and he in Peru. We sat as the sun went down over the beach in southern Lima and laughed about the wonders of our life for giving us this moment.
• A two hour game with the father of my friend,  played on the balcony of his roof. We hadn’t been able to connect before that moment, but those drawn-out seconds in the open, humid air made us steal small, knowing smiles at each other for the rest of our stay. There was a deep mutual respect for each other after that. We had battled our intelligences out in a grueling match.
• A game with Antwon, a Frenchman in my hostel room, who was coincidentally traveling with another Frenchman named Antoine. We played on the ground and sipped mate and laughed.
• When I got horrible altitude sickness in Cusco and was bedridden for 24 hours. The Peruvian man working at the hostel came to check on me, bearing a gift of coca leaves. He looked around for something near me to rest them on, as I was too weak to move so he used my chessboard as a table, resting the leaves delicately on top. He joked, “Wow, chess is giving you life right now.” I was too ill to even explain the irony of his statement.
• During a long bus ride through the country, I listened to an audio book to occupy the time. A main plot line was the progression of how a father and his son would play chess together to bring them closer together.
• Traveling through in the darkness in the midst of the tallest mountain range in Peru, on an overnight bus, I was trying a little too hard to stretch out my legs and accidentally kicked the top off the chess game, spilling all 32 pieces all over the sticky bus floor. All of the little children scrambled around me trying to literally pick-up the pieces of the game. Their smiles and shrieks made the 12 hour journey so much easier as any nervousness I had about being on windy roads in the mountains that much easier.
• Waiting for my flight down to Lima from Cusco (my altitude sickness got too severe) with a Danish couple playing their handcrafted chess board, with pieces representing different figures of Incan history and glory. I picked up the king, probably Atahualpa, and admired the intricate carvings and paintings of him dripping in gold.
• When the flight attendant at the end of my trip confiscated the board because she thought it was a bottle of pisco, Peruvian brandy, then refused to give it back. It was forever lost to Copa Airlines.
• Spending 5 nights on busses, my chess board and I experienced a lot. Aman sitting next to me on a bus peed in a Coke bottle. I threw up on myself because I was so ill. Oceans, lagoons, deserts, lakes, mountains, volcanoes, villages, metropolises, ruins. The game board was awkward and inconvenient to carry, but it became an additional limb, as I had to figure out how to schlep the tube around.

I confirmed my theory and came away with experiences that I would never have predicted. Whether it was physically playing the game or the physical proximity that the occurrences lead me to, I can say with complete certainty that this adventure brought me to people and stories I wouldn’t have had otherwise had.

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