Community Involvement

And now, on a completely different note, today was a most interesting day. I went to my Community Partner's site today to work on my Technical Consulting class, and was pleasantly surprised at the level of devotion that the folks there had for the job that they were doing. Considering the fact that I've been working with technology from a developer's perspective for so long, doing things from the consultant's perspective has revealed technology in a different light to me. This whole [new] perspective has further amplified the main idea that I have been having—technology is useless unless it can serve people's needs. Broadly speaking, the field of Computer Science can be split into Systems and Theory; Theory is where computer scientists develop new concepts and ideas to further define the theoretical bounds with which we as computer scientists can operate in, while Systems makes use of the theory created to create real technology that can be used to help enhance people's work processes, be it for fun or for profit.

I've always seen myself as a Systems person; something about getting into the nitty-gritty that makes me feel happy. At the same time though, I love to read up on current advances in theory so that I can further improve technology to do even more, thus releasing us humans to spend more time doing what we do best—innovating and inventing. Needless to say, this consulting course is just starting, but I find myself slowly enjoying the process, and have re-found that lost spark in me that I once had, the spark in me that loved to help others. Sometimes, life does give one strange surprises and can open one's eyes to things that one has never seen before.

Another interesting thing happened today that made me feel really pleased. I'm currently taking a StuCo course, Introduction to Traditional Chinese Music. Now, if you actually know me, you might wonder why the blazes am I taking such a course, considering my history. Honestly, I just miss my traditional Chinese music. But I digress so much. The pleasing thing was that the instructor invited me to conduct the course for next semester. Of course I agreed—one of the things that I like to do is to spread Traditional Chinese Music around, not in an evangelistic way, but more of a sharing way.

Alright, I've already spent too much time writing this; I need to work on some essays that are due soon for my take-home exam. Until next time...