MAIL from Smith - Few Important Matters

Hi Sir,

I hope you’re doing well. I am sure you’re having a good time with your new batch as the ED deadlines approach soon.

I’m very sorry I couldn’t write to you earlier. Whatever time I have after classes, work and extra-curricular activities, I spend it doing homework. I am in an advanced introductory Chemistry course, an accelerated beginner’s French course, an intermediate-level math course and a writing intensive course. Although my chemistry course is introductory, it is for students who have prior background in the subject. Almost the entirety of the syllabus is quantum mechanics so this is a course I have to put a lot of effort into it.  You had advised me to use A-level credit to skip the intro courses but upper class people who have used AP/ A-level credits have advised me against using it for Chemistry but I am using it for Biology and Mathematics. It is possible to graduate in 3.5 years because lab science courses have 5 credits so you end up with around 18-19 credits per semester and one needs 16 credits per semester to graduate in 4 years. I also am taking a 200 level Math course, which is Calculus III. For this course, we are looking at problems which have 4 variables and plotting curves with 3 variables in two dimensions.

I cannot even begin to tell you how much I regret not finishing a research paper. Almost everyone I have met here has finished a 15-20 pages long research paper as it was a requirement to graduate from their high schools. It does not matter if you’re a STEM major or a social science/humanities major, you’ll have to write equal amounts. For my chemistry lab, I have to write a 6-7 page long lab report for every project. For my Writing Intensive course, I will have written about 40-50 pages by the end of the semester. My Writing Intensive Course is reading intensive as well and the amount of reading I had done in your class was beneficial to me for handling the reading load here. Also, I learnt how to work on several assignments at the same time while working with you. That proved to be a very important skill here.

I applied to be an early student researcher and I got selected. Two first-years will be working on the project. The project is under the BioMath department and I will mostly be working in a Spatial Analysis Lab. I will be analyzing demographic changes in mangrove vegetation in Belize. I am very impressed by the amount of research going on at Smith given how small it is. Even if all students cannot get into research in their 1st year, almost everyone can do research as a sophomore.

I ran for the Senate of Student Government Association and got elected as a representative of my area in the campus. I will be attending the Seven Sister’s conference in Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania on 12th November. I also gave a presentation to the Board of Trustees during their campus visit a few days ago. Students asked for more financial aid from them and I was part of the international student group, which asked for more financial aid for international students. I am also part of the Student Government Curriculum Committee.

Speaking of financial aid, I have found no truth to the statement that Smith is reluctant to give financial aid to international students. I have met many students from different parts of the world who are on a financial aid package similar to mine and I have also met some people, who are not paying anything at all.

Sir, you should encourage every female student of your class to apply to Smith. While academics at Smith is challenging, the academic environment is very supportive. I have never before lived in an environment, which focused so much on health and wellness. Please give my e-mail id to any student who wishes to apply to Smith.

Take care of yourself. Good luck with the applications for Fall’17. I really hope someone from this year’s batch gets into Smith. Hopefully I will see you in summer. I will check in from time to time until then.

Best regards,

Bushra

POETRY DAY - SAT II Mocks Should NOT be forgotten

Please work on SAT -II Mocks.

It's a great day as well. So, I just assigned Tahsin with poetry reading from the following sources.

1. Metaphysical Poetry [John Donne, Herbert, Andrew Marvell] Use poetryfoundation site. 
2. Emily Dickinson 
3. Elizabeth Barrett Browning [Her verse novel Aurora Leigh]
4. Elizabeth Bishop [Everything she wrote glitters with wit and passion]. 

   

A Working Report I loved reading

Here is a working report that I thoroughly enjoyed reading. Please note that the writer's excitement is quite visible in the report. Let me add that she has spent an entire TWO hours on the road to reach our class. I am very much impressed by the fact that Basma has NOT let the stress become overbearing. Well, here is the report. [I have decorated this particular post with a picture of Antonia looking into the distance as she is ensconced in tufts of grass.] 

Sir,

As you have signed, I am currently reading "My Antonia" and "The Great Gatsby" simultaneously. I am on the 7th Chapter of My Antonia and I am really enjoying it. It gives a vivid picture of the lifestyle in the prairies of Nebraska. It is exciting to experience Jim and Antonia's friendship as it keeps blossoming even through their language and cultural barriers. As for "The Great Gatsby",I have just started reading it. The context seems a slightly more advanced but I am liking it so far!

After coming back from class, I was eager to watch "A street-car named Desire". So I did! It was my first ever black and white movie and I absolutely loved it.  The complexity of Blanche's character intrigued me. The flamboyancy of the characters made it very enjoyable to watch. 

Basma

Three Versions - Three Determinants

The three of them were asked to take a sojourn around the near-most art gallery in Dhanmondi. They came back with images, discovery, and metaphors.  

SHILPANGON

The art gallery we visited today is “Shilpangon”.  The first paintings that I saw today comprised of scenarios from mountainous regions till rural Bangladesh. One painting that caught my eye in particular was that of a river. The reflection of the pink twilight sky on the shimmering water is what had attracted my attention. Paintings of the sunset sky were common and did not stand out as much as the river painting that I mentioned. Next, I saw somewhat abstract paintings. Amorphous shapes and strokes resembled the facial structure of people. What stood out for me was a long faced shape of a man/woman with the neck resembling that of a giraffe’s. It was a black and white sketch and looked like a well-pictured cartoon character. What I saw next was the memorable segment of today’s outing: different forms of the human body were intricately portrayed across small canvases. The object, presumably a woman was seen to position herself in a variety of forms. Each painting was done on a black background, with the woman being painted in white. Shades of blue were present here and there. Overall, this being my second art exhibition to visit, I was quite impressed by the painter’s work. I would have liked to see more variety in his scenery painting but the depiction of the woman in her different postures, probably made up for it. 

Shilpangon: Smell of Solitude  

The place seemed quite spooky as first. It looked as if we were invading into a haunted house, the doors were open as if anyone could break and enter we thought- until we realized we were in the wrong floor and a watchman came to direct us to the studio. As he opened the lock it felt as if the smell of solitude and creativity hovered around me. The room that we first entered to was full of 26x15’’ paintings or bigger, the painter worked with reflections and different expressions of the sky, the scenic beauty almost all the time see to involve water sides and boats or mountains. One painting that caught my eyes was how few people were warming their bodies around a fire pit with mountains standing firm behind them and a few small pieces of loose rocks in the bottom of the cliffs. Another exception was however a night road, some colorful vehicles carrying passengers to their destinations. The next room was fool of faces- the expressions, forms and structures were made as if each face is telling a story of its own. The adjacent room had the colorful bodies portraying women’s beauty; each stroke shows a form of intimacy of the painter towards each of the figures. The last room was full of boats, standing as a bunch or stating singularity with pride through the sketches of pens or merely pencils. The painter used watercolor mostly and he has a unique technique to mean the reflections of the land on the water bodies- the distributed lines resting calmly in black-blue or violet shades.

An Art Exhibition

I went to see an Art exhibition this morning. 

We come across this majestic looking party center that is still booked for weddings. As we enter the very left corner, I was confronted by art already before going inside the exhibition. We climb up the stairs and the man working tirelessly opens the door with his bundle of keys in hand. The moment we inside the room, I see a big colorful painting that captivates me the most throughout the most. It was depicted with many shades of blue; a dark brown simple boat in the middle of the ocean and closer to the sandy island, under the white shiny sky. Next I am met with a series of small, tiny frames telling me a story of life in the seas or oceans with simpler boats back in the day. The colour varies compared to the first as it was whiter and empty compared to the arising blue in the entrance. After the whiter and less dramatic paintings, I was surrounded with darkness by the paintings that were as remarkable as the first one. It showed the shadowed conflict of purple and black, with rocks and pebbles underneath. From the darkness, you can see three big mountains which grabs the attention of the painting itself.

Another painting which was breathtaking was a river with contrasting colour to go with the sunset in the picture. The sun was about to go down, and we see clear black water around trees and serendipity. The clear black water reminded me of the Ganges that has been destroyed by dirt and pollution. After the contrasting images of nature, I came across faces. These faces were usual like ours. They were crafted differently. Each had a way of expressing. One face was white and the background had a strange black to interpret what the face actually meant. One such took me by surprise was a face that looked as if it was a cage. The dark brutal colours on the face would scare you away if it were true. But to me, the intentions of the pictures reveal the darkness we try to hide under our majestic looking faces.

As we are almost about to wrap up our small amusing day out, the other section of the exhibition was the anatomy of the human body. These painting described the woman body and captured the moments of women that are simple yet blissful to look at. One such painting was the back of a bare women as a thin cloth is wrapped around her exposed body; she looks front at the darkness hoping for something to come and take her away.

There Might be Typos in the Titles - Correct on your Own

1.       In the light of what we know

2.       Sea of poppies

3.       A streetcar named desire

4.       Moby Dick

5.       Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf

6.       Love Song of J.Alfred Prufrock

7.       Reading Lolita in Tehran

8.       The Stranger

9.       The Metamorphosis

10.   The Namesake

11.   Battle by Scrivener

12.   The Wings of the Dove

13.   Pride and Prejudice

14.   The Glass Menagerie

15.   Rape of the Lock

16.   Wuthering Heights

17.   The hour of the star

18.   Mac Flecknoe

19.   To kill a Mocking Bird

20.   The Lord of The Rings

21.   Jane Eyre

22.   Nineteen- Eighty- Four

23.   The Kite Runner

24.   A Thousand Splendid Suns

25.   The Great Gatsby

26.   Of Mice and Men

27.   The BFG

28.   His Dark Materials

29.   Harry Potter

30.   The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

31.   The Book Thief

32.   Great Expectations

33.   The Hobbit

34.   Wolf Hall

35.   Tess of d’Urbervilles

36.   The Crucible

37.   BirdSong

38.   How to be a Man of Genius

39.   Frankenstein

40.   Fingersmith

41.   Game of Thrones

42.   A delicate balance

43.   House of Mirth

44.   The Stand

45.   One hundred Years of Solitude

46.   The Mad Woman In The Attic

47.   Interpreter of Maladies

48.   War and Peace

49.   Gone with the wind

50.   The Lowland

51.   The Curious Incident of the Dog in the night time

52.   A Doll’s House

53.   The Awakening

54.   My Antonia

55.   Age of Innocence

56.   To the Lighthouse

57.   Brave New World

58.   Timepass

Work Schedules for the Next 7 Days

Tuesday = Reading reports + possible essay submission (2 items)
Wednesday = Subject Test Mock = 2 Subj; Reading reports
Thursday = Reading reports
Friday = Reading Reports + 10 Essays
Saturday = Reading Reports + 10 Essays
Sunday = Reading Reports + 10 Essays

Topics can range from Medieval towns in delta-Bengal to invention of razors, to streets and people in Old Dhaka. 

200 Pages of Reading and 20 Pages of Reading

   

Nothing LESS shall do.