Sofa Muoz

Green Group

Mentor Sage Monologue

Society has become more global, before you were aware of your immediate surroundings, now you are aware of much more, distances have become shorter, communication has become much easier, the amount of information has exploded, especially in the last 10 years, but more information doesnt mean more knowledge, in some ways we are less certain about what we know and what we dont know. The signal has become confused the noise. English ahs become more dominant, it was already but now it has become much more dominant. Technology has exploded as well. Some gadgets have come and gone in my lifetime. Cassettes, Fax machines.

I worried about political instability in Bolivia. I cared a lot about stability. I worried weather I was going to succeed in the US, first as a student and then as a professional. I worried about not being mediocre. I cared a lot about developing my intellect and my spiritual values.

I became a very good student, academically. I learned English really well by the time I finished high school, I was bilingual. I applied and got a scholarship to study in the US. I relied a lot on my moral compass, a very humanistic sense of life. By a mixture of hard work and a little bit of luck I achieved what I anted which was to go to the US, get into a top school, go to a top graduate school, and then become a world authority in my field. And then in my personal life, I made and kept very strong commitments to a stable family built on trust and strong values, and to the end I kept very close links with my family and friends from my childhood.

Society is more dynamic, it changes faster than what I imagined, I thought it was going to be more stable. I live in a more cosmopolitan world than I imagined, and I am part of a global, cosmopolitan, sort of new class which was smaller before. The world as a whole is a lot wealthier today that I would have imagined, for example China, it used to be really poor, but now its a world power. People worried about nuclear war, and now theyre worried about climate change. When I was in college, high school people worried about nuclear war.

My current goals are to make sure my daughters have a bright future and that they also develop a strong sense of moral compass and intellectual ambitions so they are better prepared for the future, which I cant imagine must be like 50 years now. That is a major goal, because professionally I have done most of what I intended to do. I also dream about, once I retire changing gears, and doing something different then what I do now. I also dream about returning to society some of the good fortunes I have had, giving back what I have gotten. I dream in living in a more just world, better then the one I found.

Life was exciting, eye opening, simpler than nowadays, an age of inspiration, of dreaming about the future, it was challenging, discovering ones self, a time of spreading wings and searching for new horizons, a time when I made very good friendships, a time when I discovered many things that I liker (science, math, and engineering), discovered that it was easy for me to learn languages, he learned English, that got him into college in the US. Time I started going out with girls and dating, discovered that I wanted to do things beyond high school.

When I was younger, our family didnt have nearly as much money as we do now. We lived comfortably, and certainly had more than the average Bolivian, but we didnt have much to spare. I lived with my older sister, younger brother, and younger sister. My parents decided to invest in a good education for us all because they knew about the importance of education. We all went to a private school, and we were all signed up for after school English classes, although I was the only one out of my siblings that finished all of the courses. I was a very good student, by the time I finished high school I was bilingual. I applied and got a scholarship to study in the US. My dream was to go to school in the US. Most of my fathers side had gone to college in the US, and talked highly about their experience there. Some of my friends had visited the US before, and I remember being incredibly jealous of them. One of my friends had the opportunity of spending a year of high school abroad in the US, and he would send letters to me telling me about all of his experiences there. I remember wanting to go, but my family simple did not have the money.

Back then I worried about political instability in Bolivia. Times were tough, there were many revolutions in the government, none of us knew what would happen to our country. I cared a lot about stability. I was worried whether I was going to succeed in the US, first as a student and then as a professional. By a mixture of hard work and a little bit of luck I achieved what I wanted, which was to go to the US, get into a top school, go to a top graduate school, and then become a world authority in my field.

My current goals are to make sure my daughters have a bright future, so that they are better prepared for the future. That is a major goal, because professionally I have done most of what I intended to do.