An Interview with Professor Cristina M. Kiss

by Cynthia Nwaiwu

It was a delight spending time with an economics as well as ESL professor who also has the capability of occupying the position of a course advisor. It wouldn’t be wrong to say that professor Kiss is very energetic and has the high teaching qualities because she happens to teach in another school outside McDaniel College. Kind-hearted and strict she would describe herself, and it seems there are a whole lot of interesting things we don’t know about her. What else could she possibly tell us? Let’s see!
M: Please, kindly give a brief description of yourself
CMK: I come from the sunny side of the world, the Philippines. I got my undergraduate degree in economics, magna cum laude, from the University of the Philippines, where I also did my graduate studies in economics. After short stints at a research institute and a private bank, I joined the Department of Economic Research of the Central Bank of the Philippines. The pivotal point in my life was when I attended an IMF training course in Washington, D.C. An economist from Hungary also happened to be there, and he could somehow later convince me to change my surname and make Hungary my home.
In terms of character, I’d say that I’m both outgoing and reflective. I like being with people but I also love silence and reflection. I believe in always trying to do one’s best: seize the day, bloom where you are planted.
M: What is it like to teach three courses and still be a course advisor?
CMK: I guess all these tasks and roles call for a desire to help the students develop their potential, and make choices compatible with their goals. And I do care about the students, so it all just flows from there
M: Can you say that upon waking up in the morning, you have a great desire to get into the classroom? Has teaching been that fulfilling in your life? CMK: Well, I am indeed very passionate about teaching. I find it a very rewarding job. But equations, graphs or neologisms are not exactly the first things that I think about when I wake up in the morning. Maybe, after a good cup of coffee. (Laughs).
M: What do you do to motivate your students to study and get really involved in your course work?
CMK: First of all, I believe that every student is different, that every student has potential, and it is the teacher’s job to unlock that potential, to draw out that capability to do better. That’s what education means: educate, to draw, lead out. And to be able to do that, the teacher has to create the proper environment, to provide the right inputs – in just the right measure, to encourage, to challenge. I do give a lot of thought to each lesson. I try to anticipate when the students might need to understand the concepts better, to analyze, and work them out on their own. I also encourage questions. Overall, the twin recipes of rigor and kindness seem to have produced quite good results.
M: How do you think higher education has changed since you have been teaching? Why do you think it has changed?
CMK: I’ve not really been teaching for that long to discern any major changes in higher education here. But I’d say, and this about education in general, an important ongoing change would be the ever-increasing availability of online resources, which I consider to be both a boon and a bane. A boon because the internet has really opened up a whole new world of learning opportunities for students, and teachers as well. A bane because the deluge of ‘data-on-demand’ can also somehow drown concentration, conscientiousness and creativity.
M: Hypothetically, if you could travel in time to teach - long ago, or the recent past, or the future - which of them would you choose? Why this choice?
CMK: I would love to go back the time of Socrates, the age of bare-knuckled quest for truth and enlightenment. But then, I would most certainly, and happily, be a student rather than a teacher. (Smiles)
M: Besides being an excellent professor, what else do you consider yourself to be an expert at, moderately good at, a total mess at?
CMK: Thanks. People say I’m quite good at organizing. I like looking at the big picture, as well as ironing out the details, and then putting everything together. It seems I had the knack for this early on. As a high school sophomore, I organized a field trip for the entire bunch. I guess I’m moderately good at cooking, and decidedly miserable at winter sports. Nem olyan szeretem a hideget! (Laughs)
M: During your vacations, do you completely put away the books and take a breathing space from the whole education business?
CMK: Well, I normally don’t fill my valise with Macro, Micro or TOEFL textbooks. (Laughs) But I do make sure there’s a book or two in my traveling bag – historical, inspirational or fiction plus the latest issue of The Economist. So it may be said that I don’t leave teaching-related stuff behind altogether when I go on holiday. Education is an ongoing process, for teachers too.
M: How do you think your career as being a college professor has/will influence(d) your children educationally.
CMK: I guess every new mother becomes, or is re-born as, a teacher. So, my profession wouldn’t change the equation that much, I think, when the time comes. My Mom isn’t a teacher by profession, but how she has taught us about life!

Students and Alumni Get Together

by Cynthia Nwaiwu

Every spring and fall, students from over twenty countries attend McDaniel College Budapest to pursue a courses in different areas of interest. This diversity brings into existence a unique and fascinating relationship among students, making the school a better place to learn. When high school seniors visit McDaniel College Budapest, they are hoping to make the right decision that could change their lives. All these things were taken into consideration, and the need to invite the alumni back became obvious. A dialogue with a graduate provides the opportunity to ask questions from someone who has been there, had experience and is now working towards his or her goal.
The get-together which took place in room 220, on 18th March, 2010, at 5:45pm involving five alumni, and undergraduates and a faculty member. The alumni were: Orsolya Bader, class of 2009, Peter Gazda, (2008), Andre Butler-Payette (2009), Dadvey Zargaran (2008) and Estefania Luraschi (2009). A lot were discussed during this Open Forum. A political science major, Orsolya Bader, who is still on the go and engaged in job hunts, and keeping her options open, happily shared her thoughts and recommended Geneva to political science major students who would later want to do internships or work in this field. She said, ‘‘Geneva is a good place for you.’’ Andre Butler-Payette supported her idea as he had an internship at the Human Rights Council Geneva, and has also worked for the United Nations’ High Commission for Refugees. He commended McDaniel College Budapest for making his courses interactive, creating friendships and close bonds that still exist after college.
Dadvey Zargaran, now married, encourages students not to give up in whatever difficulty they may face in their studies.
Peter Gazda, who was already in law school before graduating, views life to be more much difficult outside of college due to competition. ‘‘I am happy I got a great theoretical background in political science, which is a good basis that I can rely on’’, he said.
Estefania Luraschi is currently working in a chemical company as an account receivable collector. She is also looking forward to graduate school and tells students who are interested in going to graduate school to start searching early. She wished she had known more about graduate schools before graduating.
Most of all, the Alumni appreciate the great amount of information and experience the got from McDaniel College Budapest’s professors. Dadvey Zargaran noted: ‘‘I learnt good things from them.’’
The forum ended with Dr. Mathew Adamson’s request from the Alumni to help in listing the do’s and don’t that new students should know about Hungary. The list ranged from learning about Hungarian national holidays and culture, to understanding the social norms of European university students. It was fun to see former classmates reunite. Refreshments weren’t an exception, as we popped champagne and ate sandwiches. How else could we have enjoyed this reunion?

How We Dress Is How We Will Be Addressed

by Ruth Odusami

As discussed in part one, the way we dress says a lot about us and can significantly affect our lives— though dress alone is not everything. How the wearer carries the dress is very important.
Dressing can be subjective and ambiguous. How an outfit is perceived by people depends very much on how the wearer brings it to life. Let’s not forget that packaging is very important. As noted earlier, our “packaging” is the way we dress up for others to see. It does affect how other people perceive us, especially when we are meeting people for the first time, the way we look is important to give first impression.
Imagine you are to interview someone for a job, and this candidate, someone applying for a position as teaching director, comes to meet you in a polo T-shirt. How would you react? Personally, I might feel offended that he is not respecting himself by dressing so casually for such an important meeting. It will affect my decision, and most likely I will throw his job application aside. In this situation, an interviewee is expected to dress formally. This is basic courtesy and common sense. Besides annoying job interviewers, bad dressers can discredit important events. To make major events highly dignified, dress code is introduced, where people are expected to dress elegantly to match the tone of the event.
We now know that our way of dressing affects our life and people around us, but we don’t have to spend a lot of money to get the best clothes in a store and dress nicely all the time. It doesn’t make sense to go shopping in a fancy dress. Our dressing should go along with the occasion all the time. For example, wearing a dress when staying at home to meet a friend does not make sense; we can wear casual dress for going out with friends; dress for work should not be confused with dress for an outing. We have to make a choice of clothes that goes with the occasion. Fashion awareness is always helpful. Dressing brings out the person in us.

The Perfect Plagiarist and the Masters of Art

By Mona Monsefi

The Ludwig Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts are exhibiting some of the most famous masterpieces of art.
The Ludwig is hosting Glenn Brown’s paintings. There have always been stories around Brown’s artworks. He was nominated for the Turner Prize in 2000 but didn’t win the prize because he was accused of plagiarism. One of his paintings was very similar to a science fiction illustration by Tony Roberts. Brown is an English artist born in 1966. He adheres to the Appropriation Style, which means he adopts, borrows, recycles or samples aspects or the entire form of man-made visual culture to create new artwork. Many critics and artists defended him after the accusation of plagiarism. The chairman of the Turner Prize jury told BBC that the painting was not a form of plagiarism. He said: “Glenn Brown has frequently used the work of other artists in developing his own works, but that is true of Picasso too and this is not new.” He was right. Brown appropriates and borrows images by other artists such as Rembrandt and Salvador Dalí.
The aim of Appropriation is to create a new situation and give new meanings to a familiar object or an existing art work. But it raises the question of originality and copyright. Some professionals argue that as long as you give credit to the original artwork and artist you can recreate their works, but some critics believe that Appropriation Style destroys art. Artists such as Glenn Brown think differently. In 2009, Brown claimed that "to make something up from scratch is nonsensical. It’s impossible to make a painting that is not borrowed , even the images in your dreams refer to reality.”
Now, one has the opportunity to view Brown’s original paintings in the Ludwig Museum. If you go there, be ready; you may find your favorite painting hanging on the wall of the gallery but under the name of Glenn Brown! (Left and below: examples of Brown’s work—the second is deliberately set upside down.)
Another rare opportunity for art-goers is presented by the Degas to Picasso Exhibition: the Museum of Fine Arts is exhibiting fifty-five paintings from Pushkin Museum. They are from the mid-nineteenth century to the early twentieth century , the beginning of the Avant-garde. They are outstanding paintings by well-known artists: Degas’ Dancer, Monet’s Bridge over a Pond of Water Lilies, the Tahitian paintings of Gauguin, In the Prison Courtyard by Van Gogh and Picasso’s Harlequin and his Girlfriend.
This collection was hidden away by Stalin in the vaults of the Pushkin and Hermitage museums during the Second World War. Part of it was exhibited in 1978 in Budapest for the first time. It is exhibited now for the second time and no one knows when it will be exhibited again. Viewing the original paintings by masters such as Courbet, Corot, Renoir, Matisse, seeing the trace of their brushes on the canvas, is not something that you can experience whenever you wish. The show runs until 25th of April.

Fashion and Gender: The New Man in Society

By Kelechi Ahunanya and Sylvia Nwosu

How is the sexual identity of men changing?
“A man with a shaved armpit?...ugh!!!”. This is a stereotypical response of conservatives. The fact is, hitherto some men have frowned upon the idea of shaving any hair in their body–except, of course, to trim or shave their facial hair. And one stereotype is to see this change as a sign of femininity triggered by the fashion world. Sounds like something you’ve heard before right?
Anyways, shaving the armpit is just an aspect of the new trend. For the past decade, the identity of men has changed. Research show recently that more men are removing their chests, armpits, and groin hairs. The drift of guys with tight and skinny pants, slim or athletic (but necessarily muscular) bodies, and clean-shaved or smooth skin has won the day!
But we wonder, why the change in men’s identity? It seems that there is a new ideal for ‘A Society Man’. (See for example: Masculinity Reconstructed: changing the rules of manhood: at work, in relationships and in family life. New York: Dutton. Courtesy of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrosexual#cite_note-20)
Here are some responses from some students, about the change in men’s appearances these days. One may argue that the responses are gender biased:
Aylin, a female student at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics said: “Some guys look very strange in skinny jeans while others look good. Personally, I'd probably never date a guy who wears skinny jeans.”
“I'd say if you are trying to avoid looking really ‘metro’, then you would only wear skinny jeans if you can pull off the ‘alternative’ look. Think artist, rock band members or the like.” says Rex, a male student of McDaniel College Budapest Campus.
“I instantly think identity crisis” Says Lyn, a female student of the Budapest Semester in Mathematics. “And… how can their package fit comfortably in tight skinny jeans? Seriously…ugh!” She concluded.
Jerome, a male medical student at the University of Szeged, thinks that guys are less smelly when they clean shave their armpit. So perhaps It’s just a question of personal hygiene.
From what I gathered on-line via FaceBook, MySpace and Twitter, most girls have reservations about guys in tight pants. Either that the guy is ‘metro’, ‘gay’, or he is ‘just being himself’.
Guys, what do you think these responses mean, and what’s your opinion?

Reflections on the Violence in Nigeria

By Nwosu Chinelo Sylvia

It is hard to live in a society where being an indigene matters more than being a citizen when it comes to your rights to enjoy certain privileges at the local, state and federal levels. Jos is the capital of Plateau, a state in the Northern region of Nigeria.

Since the January 2010 episode of a religious crisis, which resulted in the loss of many lives, the army has been in charge of security in Jos and other parts of Plateau State. Unfortunately, in the early hours of Sunday morning 7th March 2010, people living in three villages in a community near Jos were shot and butchered in cold blood. Causalities were mostly women and children; women were hacked down as they tried to cover and protect their children with their bodies. Little babies were snatched from their mothers and thrown into the burning flames set by these monstrous attackers.

These were defenceless, unprotected people who died without knowing why or how. Some were butchered in their beds while many more were killed while trying to flee from the attackers, people who feel their victims do not deserve to live and do not deserve the lives they have.

In a nation where its democracy is very fragile, calling for a military state of emergency in yet another federal state in the country has the effect of increasing scepticism towards the future of Nigeria remaining a democratic nation. In three years, three similar killings have taken place, but no one has been prosecuted.
This recent killing have left some unanswered questions in the minds of the Nigerian citizens. Who killed them? Why? What motive? Accusing fingers are pointing towards the military, the politicians, community leaders, and religious extremist groups.

World Cup Analysis, Groups C & D

By João Salviano Carmo

This time we will visit group C and group D as we continue our countdown to the great party. Less than 100 days to go till the ball rolls again!

Group C (FIFA, 2010)
- England
- United States of America
- Algeria
- Slovenia

The 1966’s World Champions, when England hosted the tournament, have failed to repeat the feat ever since. This time around they come to the World Cup as clear favorites after an amazing qualifying phase where they won 9 out of the 10 games played. Wayne Rooney is also at his top shape ever, performing wonderfully lately and is surely looking forward to be one of the main stars this summer.

The USA will be competing in the world’s biggest tournament for the sixth time in a row. After reaching the final eight in 2002 they want to show that they can do it again, especially after their display in 2009 in the Confederations Cup. Can they go back into the quarter finalists’ elite?

Twenty four years later Algeria is once again back in the World Cup. After knocking out Egypt in a play-off (who shortly after became the African Champions) there is great expectation to see what they can do now in the grandest stage of them all.

Playing their second World Cup since becoming an independent nation, Slovenia goes to South Africa as the least experienced team in the group. Will their players overcome the lack of experience and surprise the most frequent customers of the World Cup?

England is by far the main favorite in group C. They are expected to go through to the next round with ease and lots of goals but the USA team has been improving and displaying some nice football lately and are entitled to dream about the top spot in the group. Algeria and Slovenia are hoping to use their outsider status to squeeze past the favorites and get an unexpected pass to the final 16.

Group D (FIFA, 2010)
- Germany
- Australia
- Serbia
- Ghana

“Football is a game played by 22 players. And in the end Germany wins.” (Gary Lineker) The three-time World Champions and 2006 third place finalists, besides having been in four other finals (the most recent one in 2002), can never be discounted from anyone’s top favorites in any tournament. With players like Ballack, Klose and company we can expect a strong Teutonic team once again.

Australia’s Socceroos come to this Summer’s competition in great style. After moving from Oceania to the more competitive Asia qualifying zone, Australia surprised everyone by winning it with great ease. After impressing with their beautiful football in 2006 under the guidance of the great manager Guus Hiddink, will they be able to go one step further and reach the quarter-finals this time around?

Serbia’s White Eagles made an impressive campaign in their qualifying group to South Africa. Beating France to reach the top of the group, Serbia reaches its first final phase as an independent nation and with players like Vidic and Stankovic they will surely be looking forward to impress and to qualify for the next round.

Ghana’s Black Stars, after qualifying at the top of the African zone, and after reaching the Africa Nations Cup final earlier this year, reach their second World Cup looking forward to continue their great performance in Germany 2006. In the first ever African World Cup Ghana will aim at going at least one step further and reach the final eight, cementing their impressive form of lately.

This will be a tough group. Even if Germany appear to be the main favorites nothing is guaranteed in a World Cup. All four teams have what it takes to move to the phase of 16 and will surely battle on the pitch for their right to keep their dream of winning this year’s tournament alive!

For Those with a Taste for Adventure, Hungary Is a Delight

By David Van Tassell

As a law abiding American citizen, I have been encouraged by my teenage predecessors (mainly in American college movies) to take up the mantle that represents a youth's sense of adventure and discovery. That mantle is portrayed in my trip to Europe.
When I was offered the opportunity to study abroad here I took it immediately. No, I did not know that much about Hungary, but my general train of thought was that this country could be a base of operations for my jumping around the countries within the European Union and Serve as a very good place to do so since my wallet would be going on an extreme diet in order to get here. Well this is all true.

However as time passed I started to realize that while trips to Barcelona, Venice, Athens, and Paris would still be amazing, there is also a lot to find right under our feet. Hungary has a long history, and because of this there are great opportunities for us to explore a deep history and culture in our own backyard.
Just this past weekend I went to Pécs, the European Cultural Capital of 2010. There were a plethora of different sights to see during my two days there including the Early Christian tombs dating from the Roman Empire and a mosque turned into a cathedral at the end of the Turkish Occupation in the late 17th century. This summer when tourist season starts I am sure that this small city will be bustling with people wanting to see all that I saw. Of other opportunities available for countryside travel, Assistant Director of Student Affairs Margo Kovacs recommends a trip to Lake Balaton when the weather gets better. Besides swimming, boating, and fishing, the Siófok resort is also known as “The Party Capital of Hungary”.

Even within Budapest there are numerous festivals and other events celebrating and showcasing Hungarian Culture. Travel guides and online resources provide major tourist locations to visit, but some of the best exploring can be done with you and your friends, Budapest offers many hidden treasures for adventurers.
The proximity of all these locations not only allows us the ability to make quick weekend trips, but these trips are also less taxing on our wallet then traveling to other countries. While a normal one-way ticket from Budapest to Lake Balaton costs 3000HUF, those of us with a student card can benefit from a 50% discount on their ticket. Adding a room at a hostel totals round trip travel and room to about 6700HUF! Considering what activities were previously mentioned, this is definitely an ideal weekend trip for any student.