Cultural Blog 3 - Avenue Q

Shepherd University Music Department put on the Tony-Winning musical Avenue Q. It was fantastic! The cast was amazingly talented. It’s hard to believe they are just students.

Avenue Q is a hilarious musical that touches on real life issues, like graduating from college and becoming an adult, which is easily relatable to my life now. The show has a mix of humans and puppet characters like Kate the girl next door, Rod the Republican, Trekkie the Internet sexpert, and Lucy the slut, who all are helping Princeton, a recent college graduate (with B.A. in English) find his purpose in life. It is basically just the grown up version of Sesame Street.

I ended up seeing the show twice, because it was that good. You can’t help but enjoy every moment. My favorite songs are “It Sucks to Be Me” and “Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist”.  I love how the show takes the more taboo things in life and just throws them all out there in the open, but I guess it’s ok to have full on sex scene if they are puppets right? Now enjoy the video below of the Broadway Cast singing "Everyone's a Little Bit Racist".

Cultural Event 2 - NOH8 Photo Booth

Back in January I had the chance to participate in Shepherd’s NOH8 Photo Booth put on by Multicultural Student Affairs. It was a great program. It was a simple, but effective program; it spreads the message on our campus, any form of hate will not be tolerated. You can see my best friend Rogelio and I standing against hate and being goofy.

The NOH8 Campaign was started by photographer Adam Bouska and partner Jeff Parshley, as photographic silent protest against California’s Proposition 8. The photos feature subjects with duct tape over their mouths, symbolizing their voices being silenced by Prop 8 and similar legislation around the world. You can learn more about the NOH8 campaign here.

Along with the photo booth, they also had a raffle for NOH8 merchandise. I ended up winning a tote, wristband, and stickers!

Cultural Event 1 - Children of Uganda

On January 15, I saw the amazing performance of Children of Uganda’s Tour of Light, put on by the Performance Arts Series at Shepherd. It was extraordinary!

Tour of Light transports you across Africa’s vast cultures through song and dance. It is vivacious and fun. You cannot help but smile as you watch the performance. They sing in Swahili, Luganda, Ryunyege, Kinrwandan, Ruto, Zulu, and English. 

Not only to they teach you about African culture, but they raise awareness of HIV/AIDS, and fund to educate, feed, and clothe their brother and sisters in Uganda. All the performers come from extreme and vulnerable conditions. Many of them are orphaned, affected by poverty, or has one or more family members living with HIV/AIDS. However, tragic their stories are, they do not let it affect them. Each time they’ve been at Shepherd, I saw nothing but pure joy and gratefulness.

This was my second time seeing them perform. They came to Shepherd back in 2012 when I had just started working for Program Board. The kids were so joyous when they arrived on the campus. They immediately hugged us as they got off the bus. Many of them had never been to the US before, it was heartwarming to see them enjoy things like ice cream, full buffet at the dining hall and bowling for the first time; many things we take for granted. It was a moment I will never forget, and definitely reaffirmed my love for programming and Shepherd. 

Faculty Review

I believe my faculty review went well. I received some good feedback and I now have a greater understanding of the importance of copyright. I appreciate the advice. I plan to do a SWOT analysis on the challenge that didn’t work like Jason suggested. I also plan on doing one for the whole campaign. I’m getting very excited for the BIG event next weekend. I’m looking forward to fine tune the rest of my project and then present in April. Almost there!!

Progress - March 3

My capstone is still going well. I plan to start the “Why I Relay” stories on Facebook next week. In my meeting with Matt we discussed how I can translate the stories onto other social media platforms without them being exactly the same. My plan is to make Twitter the platform here followers can share why they relay and Instagram will be graphic photos with quotes from stories I have collected. I’m really excited to create a more personal atmosphere. The event is sneaking up on us. We are now a month away (AH). We have Paint the Town/Campus Purple I event coming up after we return from spring break. I am also working on getting the Instagram off the ground so when the event is here, student will already be following it. I have also completed my cultural experiences. I just need to write them.