I've gone and figured out my future!
Eureka!
I love the way things come together. The fabric of life is so delightfully woven as to give you an answer when you least expect it, especially when you’re not looking for it. I think I’ve figured out what I want my Chinese studies master’s degree to revolve around specifically: Green design. I don’t know where to start, there’s so much to say on this.
During spring quarter of my sophomore year in college, I had to write a mission statement for the admissions committee to the Industrial Design program that I wanted to be admitted to. I wrote about my love of design and well-crafted things and I wrote about my fledgling knowledge of the world’s environmental problems. I’d just finished an Environmental Chemistry course and was passionate about making the environment a better, more sustainable place. I was in that glossy, optimistic phase of life where it doesn’t matter how you do something, just as long as you know you WANT to do it. I was accepted to the program, immediately became disenchanted, overwhelmed, confused, and doubtful of my passions or how to apply them after graduation. When I did graduate from the program, I was grateful to get a job doing anything, and secretly surprised that I managed to get a job in the same field as my degree. The rosy dreams of making the world a cleaner place were long gone.
It is true though, that every time I read an article about green design or sustainable community planning, something would flutter deep in the recesses, calling out that it was still down there, just stuck under a bunch of unused gray matter. And then, I woke up to the disappointment of my job. It was an amazing job, it just wasn’t what I wanted to be doing and I didn’t know what I wanted instead. I grasped at straws; moved around within the company, feeling restless and embarrassed at my disillusionment with “the dream job”. I was sent to Hong Kong and China to work in-person on some projects of mine that were having development issues. I fell head-over-heels in love with the potential I saw in China. I came home, my brain overflowing with the opportunities, at the time not specifically understanding what they were; just knowing they were there.
I thought I could participate, on some level, in the development of China. It seemed that economically, it was well on its way, but socially, there were issues that were being ignored. I thought of the young women, younger than myself, I’d seen in the factories, and it wasn’t that they were leading horrible lives; it just seemed to me that they had little choice for any other kind of life. I attended the Toy Fair in New York in February of 2006 and my ears perked up during a talk on social accountability. At the time, I had already applied to the China studies graduate program at the UW and was waiting to hear their verdict. After the talk on social accountability, I thought maybe I could create a career based on China-US relations and Chinese support of workers. Or something along those lines. I always had bits of doubt, though. I had spent so much time working on my design degree and I really wasn’t ready to throw it all away, but how could I possibly merge a design past and a China studies future?
I just found my answer. A friend recently piqued my interest and reminded me of a story I read about William McDonough, a pioneer in green design and co-author of the green movement’s bible, Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things. McDonough is a world-renowned architect and designer and one of his many current projects involves designing a green and completely self-sustaining village in a heavy agricultural district of Liaoning Province, here in China. In doing further research on this particular project, I came across the China-US Center for Sustainable Development. And, it seems too good to be true, but, the center’s mission statement is the following:
“Our mission is to accelerate sustainable development in China and the United States through a new form of cooperation among the business community, governments, universities, research institutions and non-governmental organizations - based on nature's design principles and focused on results.” (Found at the following Web site: http://www.chinauscenter.org/default.asp)
And, to add convenience to my excitement, the center posts its physical address as being in Portland, Oregon, a fact which guarantees many a road trip if I’m attending the UW next autumn. I couldn’t be happier: a potentially successful merger of my design background with a China studies graduate degree.
I think this entry is only beginning to scratch the surface of the possibilities, but as mentioned before, it looks like I’m back in the glossy, optimistic phase of life – and let me just say, it feels great! It’s so nice to be back.
