Category: Introductions (Page 1 of 2)

My name is Duron Crichlow, and this is my third year of being at New York City College of Technology. I may look young, but I am honestly 20 years old. It may be crazy to see that, but it is most definitely true. Anywho, I’m a hard working student that never gives up. I may have stressful times from the last 3 semesters, Summer, Spring and Fall, but no matter what, I will always keep moving forward.

Also, I work on a acting company called Extra Mile Clients. It’s when you get into a set where they show the film crew filming a movie or a show, and you get to be part it by being background. What background means is that as the film crew starts rolling the camera and focuses on more onto the star of that movie, or show, you would sometimes see a lot of people who aren’t speaking sometimes and you would sometimes hear screaming, gasping, talking, etc. I’ve been working with the company for 1 year and 3 months. As those times go by, I’ve been making great money.

From my Summer vacation, I went to an island called Saint Marteen. In that island, it was split into two sides, West Side and East Side. In the West Side, it’s called Saint Marteen, which was the hotel that we stayed in, and in the East Side, it’s called Saint Martin. My favorite time in the island was when I had my first alcohol drink when we went to a beach. The funny thing about that island is that the age of drinking is 18. The first alcohol drink was Rum Punch. After drinking the whole Punch, I did feel a little tipsy, but it was fun.

Fun fact about me is that I want to be a great competitive video game player. I wanted to get really good onto 4 fighting games. Those games are Pokken, and Super Smash Bros for Wii U. Pokken is Pokémon game, but it’s not the type of Pokémon game you would think of. It doesn’t include poke balls, items, or gym battles. You would instead see 2 Pokémon characters going head to head with their own fighting styles. For Smash Wii U (Short for Super Smash Bros for Wii U), it’s basically a 4 player party game where you get to play as the characters that were created by Nintendo, Sega, and Namco. How they make this as a competitive game is because this game can do 1v1 matches as well, and once you play it like that, you mind would be blown away.

I am going to enjoy learning more about Science Fiction. If things are about to get complicated as I go through the classes, I’ll just keep on working really hard. Though of course, I will enjoy knowing more on what Science Fiction truly is!

Hello everyone, my name is Marco.
This is two days late but I’m posting it so everyone can get to know me a little.

I’m an illustration and Graphic design major and I’m in my 4th year of college. When it comes to my career and professional life I have two big interest. The first is concept art. Design characters and stories for video games and stories. For my senior project in my major I’m actually going to be developing a concept art book. Where I have to develop characters, settings, weapons, vehicles, and parts of the story.

My second big interest is street wear. I’ve designed shirts and other products on my own and with friends for small brands before. But my dream is to create my own personal brand with my illustrations and designs. I have a brand and site already it’s called (Four Shadow) the name stands for “things to come” the idea comes from foreshadowing in stories and in art. I’m working on my first shirt and a couple other small products to sell.

My site (marcogalloart.tumblr.com)

This summer I spent mostly working. I worked full time the whole summer at a Michaels art store. I worked as a framer which was cool because I get to use my hands and build things, and I didn’t have to deal with costumers much.
Now that summer is basically done I’m quitting this job because I’m going interviewing for a few internships and I’m going to start working for one of them as a designer.
I got a dog right before Summer started as well so she’s kept be pretty busy. Taking care of her and training her as much as I can. She’s a rescue from north shore animal hospital in Long Island. She was about a year and a half when I got her so she’s not two yet. She’s awesome, but a handful because of how much energy she has. She’s a golden retriever and Australian Shepard mix. Other than that I spent the rest of my free time with my girlfriend or participating in Spartan races.

I’ve been running since I was in high school. I wish our college had a team for running but it doesn’t. So last year my brother and I and a group we started, began running Spartan races. This summer we’ve done 4. Two Spartan supers and two Spartan supers. We have 3 more races this year. A beast this September, and a super and beast in October. The goal for me is to get two trifectas. A trifecta Is when you finish a sprint, super and beast. Sprint =3 to 5 miles, a super = 8 to 10 miles, and a beast = 13 to 15 miles.

Those are my interest, and big details about me.
My biggest weakness I feel as a writer is knowing how to punctuate correctly? How to structure sentences correctly, and make my writing look nice.

My background using open lab is pretty good. I’ve been using it for maybe three years? For my art classes mostly. And my page is connected to my portfolio site.

My favorite science fiction series has got to be Star Wars. Other than that there’s like small series that are mixtures between science fiction and fantasy like Avatar the last air bender, and other anime series that I love. Maybe dragon ball z that had a lot of technology that doesn’t exist has a lot of science fiction elements to it as well.

Science fiction connects to my major because i use it in my character designs. Inventing things that don’t exist like flying ships, and weapons, and the characters that use them.

My expectation for this class and semester are to broaden my knowledge of science books. I feel like reading these books is going to help me come up with ideas for my art. And because this is a writing intensive class, I hope to better my writing skills.

A few of my team blitz members and I after we ran the last Spartan super in Boston.

Time is a very interesting thing, when you have a large quantity of it you look at it and say to yourself you still have time to do other things before doing the one thing you need. And when you are out of time that is when you remember that something was due but yet it is not because in your mind you knew it said 8/28 which is a Sunday but before that it said Saturday and now we have a 24 hour time paradox. Was it due a few hours ago or a day from now? With one I have more and with one I have run out. Funny thing is, I always hated time-travel due to several things in how it may or may not work. One being you go back to where you were and change something for basically a first person perspective and move on with your life and yet you cannot do that because you time-traveled so you cannot exist because you would not need to time-traveled if you ‘fixed” your earlier mistake. Then you have the whole second you time-travel were you have to change things while dancing around yourself and everyone else so they do not see you at two places at the same time or your other self. This also leads to the end of existence for the time-traveler in the current form because events would have gone differently, but then you have a paradox, things went the way they did because of the time-travel so it must have happened. Without the meddling of the other self-things would have gone the stander way vs the “better” way and yet it is not possible. As much as I wish it were possible to go back and make sure that this was done before Saturday 8/27 11:59 PM.

So with all that out of the way, let me begin anew with saying that I normally am ahead of time and do things in an orderly fashion as possible. All of which this post is not going to be as it seems, with the way it is going. The other thing that I am know for is losing track of time if I am working on something and other are lined up after it. At my work over the summer this was not a problem for it meant I would go from task to task without stopping. I simply would be reminded when lunch was by the others around me and then when it was time to leave, unless I had to finish up tasks. So for me switch over mindsets to school and stricter self-regulation is a bit of an issue, one that is now being corrected just a bit too late.

I am a mechanical student for how long is difficult to say, l have lost track. I do what is required of me by the classes outlined by the bachelors program and have taken many classes pertaining to my major as well as supporting classes. I can however tell you that I have at least taken 4 to 5 semesters already and during the summers either worked or took more classes. Over this summer I worked in a company in Manhattan that did work on internal building systems such as air ducts and sprinkler system designs. Needless to say ever few of my classes helped me to do such specific work other than AutoCAD which is a program for making drawing. What helped me the most was the years I spent with my father working as a general contractor putting in floors, pipes, sinks, lights, wires, walls, and many other tasks. It was an office job and took some getting used to the atmosphere of it. Apparently I was a bit too talkative which I never understood due to my past where talking to people was a problem and then I look up at how much I have written and realize that I write like I talk and that is like a never ending waterfall into a bottomless pit.

Overall I enjoy many subjects, activities and places. For many years I would draw aircraft, spacecraft and land craft that for the most would not really work or would be unreasonable to make or use. When I realized that I started to think about designing better craft that would work and because of this I have done less drawing vs the books filled with unusable things. Often it is because I wanted it to be perfect and I would spend too much time on what should have been simple sketches. Things improved with the advent of technology and me being able to have it. Reading also was something I did for long periods of time prior to technological advancement and lack of people to do other things with. Also free during lunch at public school helped a lot in both of these things. For many years I would go to summer camp and saw many things. I went to museums, shows, plays, sports, and lessons on a variety of things. I still go Broadway shows, operas, music halls and circuses. While I do not love all of them based on what I saw I do find most of them enjoyable and with notice different things for high above. Most shows are designed to be seen from directly center and in front of the stage, so when setting high above and to the side you see things differently. Such as the stage work that is done with the automated moving sets that run on grooves and the trap doors. You can see the foreground and the background at the same time vs what is intended to be seen. Other than this things I generally watch shows that range from light hearted to you just witnessed mass murder before your eyes or worse. Really depends on what mood I am in and often neither would phase me. The ones that do, are generally something that no one would think would be, even if they know me. Also as said before I enjoy Star Trek, Star Wars, Stargate and many other shows in many different formats. They also range from sci-fi to slice of life and even I do not remember all of them particularly the ones that I saw before 1999 and some after. I lose track of things it seems, just do not give me a star-ships. Or do, it would be a funny episode if I lose it somewhere in time. The title would be Time Trek.

What your strengths & weaknesses as a writer, reader, & thinker?

As seen from above one thing I am bad at is organizing things in a way that other people can understand what is in my head. Because basically this is what I wrote based on what I had going through my head at the time which is affected by the time, what I did, and what I thought would be fine to put down. So a lack of source material is not a problem for me stopping it at a good time is. Also I go very broad with my thoughts, yet I also go deep in certain areas. I tend to keep my mindset about something and spin it that way for the rest of a piece. In reading unless I get into the story I tend to just read it but without any passion for. Unlikely Harry Potter which I flew from book one to which ever was the one before the current new one.

What do you enjoy/dislike most about writing, reading, & (critical) thinking?

In writing I sometime cannot find what I want to write and get lost in it which is why I currently going with free writing style to just get ideas out. Other than that I often hate set page lengths for writing assignments because sometimes I cannot write 4 pages about a paragraph reading. However I do enjoy sometimes coming up with new ideas for something I read and wondering about what was meant by a piece or what surrounded it during its writing and how it affected it. And in reading I like certain things but I cannot tell you want they are, you have the same things in two different books and yet I may hate one and like the other I would have to go though it first.

What is your background with using OpenLab & technology more generally (it’s OK if you don’t have any!)?

I worked on open lab for a course in my first semester for an English class named being in Brooklyn and posted work on their related to the work we did.

What’s your experience with (and interest in) Science Fiction? Favorite books, short stories, movies, TV shows, games?

I have seen many film, shows and read many books based in Science Fiction and enjoyed many of them. Such as Star Trek, Star Wars, Stargate and many others. I found that I enjoyed the freedom it gave the writers to come up with ideas and use them in interesting setting. With people of the time going “like that is ever going to happen” and then seeing that it did in one way or another. Still waiting for star-ships here.

How do you see Science Fiction connecting with your major and career interests (&/or personal interests/hobbies)?

I love to look at the ideas behind something both in reality and in science fiction and see what i can come with. I take ideas from many sources and put them together in my mind to create something else that works. I look at how the fictional world led to creating a cretin piece of technology or ideals and then see what would happen if i change it a little bit and speculate on what it would be then. I enjoy thinking about all the amazing ideas that were put into these books, shows and films, while at the same time i think about how many times the ideas were the same. How today we have reached a point where we simply improve things vs making highly innovative ideas. we simply build on what was already made and while that too needs advanced minds to do right it is not the same as making a new idea from nothing. Often times i would come with a story in my head and look at it and see all the pieces that are similar to other things i have seen and read. All i do is pull on other ideas but create an original story based loosely on others. Now is it considered original or is it stealing the work of others. How many original ideas can exist in the same world, are everyone thoughts different? Or do they all head down the same road, just looking in a different light and time. how many times have you had an idea and then go online just to see if it exist somewhere? Overall i look at Science Fiction to get new ideas and to think about what i see and come up with my own conclusions.

I watched many shows while growing up at a young age like star trek and saw what at the time seems like endless possibilities for the future. Science Fiction can be made possible, look around you at everything you have, you could go back in time to Star Trek the Next Generation and see all that you have today. Touchscreens, cellphones, video calls, medical scanners, robots, ai, computers that can do complex tasks and talk to you. That is what I wanted to make possible to do something helpful one day.

What are your expectations for this course/semester (what you think you will learn and what you hope you will learn)? Any questions? Some of you had some great questions about science fiction today (e.g., what makes something science fiction vs. fantasy), so feel free to ask stuff like that here. Maybe your classmates will weigh in and give their thoughts on your questions.

I think this course will teach me more about myself then anything in the world, due to the way my mind works. How it linked certain things together and how it tried to cover other up.Science fiction makes me think and imagine on many possibilities. Other than that I expect to find out more about books I have yet to read and a subject that I love. To have interesting conversations about many things and for all of it to be on time. To understand more of the world through the writings of others. Thank you

Sit, Think & Wonder

Peace everyone,

Just exactly who is Tajay Douglas?

Long story short, he is an island kid raised in the greatest city (New York City) on Earth.  Tajay aspires to be a writer, in fact this past summer he finished his first full-length, fantasy novel. YES! After three long, exhausting years, “Like the Petals in the Meadow,” is completed.  Even with dreams of being a creative writer/novelist, Tajay majors in Hospitality Management as a day job. You may ask yourself, how exactly does a writer major in Hospitality Management. Originally, entering College Tajay dreamt of being a Chef, therefore chose Hospitality as a career path. However, couple years in and frustrating hours given world of Culinary, Tajay passion for food simply faded into the wind. Now, Tajay has always had a knack for writing, but didn’t realize his potential until taking a creative writing course at City Tech. It was then Tajay realized his ultimate talent.  The way the mind work is extremely fascinating, simply put an individual is able to create an entire world, civilization through their own image. Even so, Tajay remained in Hospitality Management for the reason to seek a career in Travel & Tourism, simply as a plan B. The idea to travel the world and study cultures, experience lifestyles and enjoy all of mother Earth great garden, brings a sense of light to the soul.

In the many years spent at CityTech, Open Lab has been the most user friendly network of the entire school systems. Despite only having two classes which used open Lab (Wines of the world & Art History) prior to Science Fiction, Open lab has been super helpful in terms of class notes access ( mainly PowerPoint), networking with classmates and instructors, and most importantly, more useful tool than blackboard.

As strange as it may seem, I’ve always pondered on ways I will survive a zombie apocalypse, alien invasion, rise of the machines, and/or hostile takeover by the animal kingdom. I can list all my science fiction favorites, but the list will be endless as I love all things science fiction.  No matter how old (Nasuferatu), or new (The Martian) anything sci-fi draws my attention. Over the years I’ve seen some good movies (The Matrix) and seen bad (Resident Evil). I’ve also read better (A Clockwork Orange), and binged on the most current phenomena(The Walking Dead). Science Fiction is my escape from the real world. To sit and wonder “what if” or “What would I do,” makes science fiction worth the obsession. I feel this class will not only improve writing skills, but open my mind to more wondrous sci-fi.

As much as I love Science Fiction, my all favorite will forever and always be fantasy. Although I do wonder the difference between the two, as recently learning both aren’t the  same.

-Love and Light.

Hey.

A little about myself. I am currently a concrete inspector. I am majoring in construction management and should be wrapping up soon. Between school and work, I have little time to myself. Nonetheless I feel very fortunate. In both, I find myself among driven and altruistic people. They discourage me from being feckless and complacent.

I put my pants on one leg at a time just like you. I enjoy watching movies and television with close inspection, knowing that every sight and sound has purpose. One of my favorite science fiction movies is The Thing. I listen to loud music when I drive and soft music when I cook in the morning. My brother used to have a massive comic book collection that I would read over and over again. I gave drawing a go when I was younger; I still doodle if I’m trapped in a boring lecture. My favorite book is Catch-22. “It was love at first sight. “

I don’t write often though I do enjoy it. Words are indelible so I try to pick them carefully. I’ve only used OpenLab sparingly, let alone any social media. Thanks to the influence of good friends and good teachers, I used to be a voracious reader. Living in upstate NY briefly, I would commute an hour each way to work through snow with my head buried in a book. There was sparse traffic and I almost never ran into another person walking. Some of my favorite books are still misshapen from the snow that wet the pages.

I don’t think science fiction ties in directly into my vocation, but it is an interest of mine. I’ve always enjoyed a strong story, science fiction not excluded. Douglas Adams’ Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy being one of my favorite series. It’s a ludicrous comical series. Through his tales of space, Adams taught me that sometimes the best way to express life’s tragedies is through comedy.

Hi. I’m Moises. Moises Taveras, specifically. I’m 12 years old(19 really) and incredibly serious(sarcastic). This is my second semester of college and boy oh boy have I had the longest first year ever. There was this really awkward part in the middle of the whole thing where it was really hot and I never went to school but it was fun nonetheless. But in all seriousness, butts.

OK now I’m actually going to be serious or at least as serious as I can be.

I am 19 and this is my second semester. Due to problems with another college, I ended up unwillingly taking the fall semester off. In the meantime, I worked, and worked, and yeah you guessed it, worked. But I also made time to do some other stuff, none of it terribly exciting nor incredibly mundane. I went to a concert here and there, saw my favorite comedian on tour(check out Make Happy on Netflix for that show) and went to Comic-Con.I’m a simple man. I enjoy days spent in parks with friends rather than incredible journeys across post-apocalyptic wastelands(read: New Jersey).

I’m very fond of stories and will take them in any shape or form. Books, TV, movies, video games and especially music have transcended fun pastimes to become a way of life. Just to give you a feel for the kind of person I am I’ll list some favorites in each. My favorite book is The Road by Cormac McCarthy, my favorite show is How I Met Your Mother, my favorite movie is (500) Days of Summer, my favorite game is Infamous and my favorite song is Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen. So I have an eclectic taste, if you don’t mind my bragging. Yes, that does mean I like country music too. No, that does not mean I’ll listen to your mixtape.

To be completely honest, this was the best summer of my life. I’ve probably had better times as a kid in the Dominican Republic but this was the first summer in a long time where I was free to do what I wanted and as a growing person, the liberty to do what I want when I want was too intoxicating to pass up. As well as all that, it was the first summer in years I wasn’t tied down by school and my longest summer thanks to school letting out in May. Speaking of which, literally the day after I took my last final, I jumped on a plane and traveled to San Francisco for a weekend. That was the farthest I had ever traveled from home and I did it by myself. It was for a variety show/concert some guys were putting on. It’s really hard to summarize but it was the best weekend of my life. I saw the house from Full House!You remember this song?

Well he showed up and song that song. And he threw thongs at us. I may have caught one. Then we sang the Pokemon theme song. It was surreal.

What followed was pretty mild. I just saw a lot of friends who moved for college. It wasn’t about what we did, just doing it together. I know, super corny, but I loved every second of it. I’m a people person; so long as I’m in the company of good people, I’m fine.

500+ words in and this is hugely impersonal so let me fix that. I’m the youngest of the two kids my parents had, my older brother is 8 years older than me, and he has an adorable son whom I love till the ends of the earth. My family primarily hails from Dominican Republic and I’m actually the first born in the U.S. I’m a guitarist with delusions of grandeur and a closeted romantic so ladies hit meup, but don’t actually because I’m deathly afraid of you. I am an open book until I’m not and if you feel like you can’t quite get a grasp of who I am, ask to see my writing. I’ll be really shy about showing it but nothing captures who I am more than my writing or my playlist.

Sidenote: I’ve been listening to Hamilton obsessively for two months so please talk to me about Hamilton.

Because of the humor that can be derived from it, my writing is commonly self-referential and meta. So to round out the rest of the bullet points because I’ve droned on and on:

1. I work at a security firm.
2. I want to one day work in games.
3. I’d like to move to San Francisco.
4. For the winter break, I will likely head to Canada with some friends.

I believe I’m a strong writer. I can definitely write a lot but I think the defining thing about my writing is my voice. I think I found it fairly early on and really latched onto it and I think that’s a good thing. But since my writing is in my voice and that’s in my head, I can ramble quite a lot and my work can become unfocused. As a reader, again endurance is my strongest quality but I have a hard time retaining information when I blast through stories so I prefer to take my time with books. As a thinker, I overthink everything so my mind is super active which is good but it really inhibits my ability to actually do things like make proper sentences out of those thoughts. My favorite thing about writing is the subtle therapeutic value in it. As a person who exclusively whole asses(sorry for the cuss) his work, it feels good to get it all out there. Reading is just fun because it’s actually a gateway into a new world. I don’t like it for escapism, just the fun of discovering new albeit fictional things. Thinking is my least favorite of the bunch yet it’s the one I do most so what does that say about how I value my time haha. Oh man, I’m on 900+ words. I should probably wrap this up, shouldn’t I?

ALRIGHT ONE LAST PARAGRAPH LETS GO! My experience with Openlab has been short but pleasant. I still find it’s ultimate utility lost on me(I’m sorry I know you’re directly involved in it) but I can’t say bad things(1000 words woo!) about it.  My experience with Sci-Fi goes all the way back to my childhood so i’m familiar with it but not intimately. My tastes are too wide to be pinned down so i’ve dwindled recently but I’m taking this course in hopes of reinvigorating that side of me. My favorite sci-fi movie is probably Ex Machina, my favorite book is probably Fahrenheit 451 and I can’t provide satisfactory answers for the rest so I plead the fifth. As a Computer Engineering major, I hope to be directly involved in making science fiction less fictional. I can’t tell you exactly how I will since i’m still learning so just wait for it(that’s a Hamilton reference, I couldn’t help it). Alright, I think that touches on just about every base I could possibly touch. Enjoy your weekends and i’ll see you all Tuesday!

Fear me…but lets be friends!

My name is Emmanuel Rodriguez and I’m a Biomedical Informatics major here at NYCCT. This is my fourth year here but i still have some classes to go since I switched majors a few years back. I was born in the Bronx but raised between there and Queens.  For me, this was the best and worst summer due to personal circumstances but I’m finally moving on with my life to get where I want to get going. I spent this summer playing handball and working in between the semesters to pay the bills. I want to visit the Colorado Rockies this winter and enjoy the serenity of the mountains.

One of my main interests is bicycling. It had helped me lose the weight I gained after I finished my enlistment in the US Army. I’ll bike just about anywhere  where my feet can take me now. I also took an interest in PC building not too long ago and built my own computer. Crime or medical dramas like The Knick and True Detective are my favorite; or comedies such as Broad City or Workaholics. Pizza is my vice, as I can’t get enough of it. Lastly, I began to learn physics on my own from free lectures online.

My “battle station”

Writing is important to me because events during my enlistment had affected me in ways I couldn’t comprehend. I realized that writing about these experiences helped me accept  what happened and spilling my emotions on paper really gave me the help I needed. I welcome critical thinking and writing because its can be beneficial to get a different perspective of your work from someone else so you know what message your sending with your words. This is my first time using OpenLab and it seems pretty straightforward, nothing confusing about it so far.

I am a casual fan of science fiction since I saw Back to the Future as a kid, but Cloud Atlas is absolutely my favorite. I also like alternate timeline science fiction, but the cliche of the Nazis winning WW2 and ruling the world is sort of played out. I’ve only started reading sicence fiction books like Brave New World and Dark Prophecy.  Science fiction can become real life the sooner we make discoveries like nuclear fusion in physics and human genome manipulation in biology (although the ethics of the latter can be debatable). I hope that these leaps in science will be made in our lifetime. I want to learn a lot in this class about the different fields that cover science fiction, maybe even write one of my own.

Hello all, my name is Pellegrino which some of you might know as a brand of mineral water that is mildly popular. My name is actually Italian for “pilgrimage”, which I guess my pilgrimage is to find a career at this point in my life. 😀

My hobbies include playing video games, watching movies, reading comics, practicing guitar, drawing, and eating food. I have a lot of projects that I have planned out, but most of them are on hiatus. I would like to eventually make my own video game, that’s a big goal of mine, but other than that it would be nice to make a phone app, write some comics, and maybe even make my own gaming YouTube channel at some point.

I currently am unemployed, but would like to find an internship related to my major (partly because it’s an actual prerequisite for one of my required classes). I used to work at a grocery store, but the company recently went under so I decided to focus more on acquiring an internship and working on school. The main company was A&P, in case you were wondering; I worked for a Waldbaums, a sister company of Pathmark (the more well known supermarket). In any case, I’m working on getting better as a programmer and am doing small projects at home in order to practice.

Honestly, I didn’t really do much during my break. I did take 3 summer classes in the same month, so that was a bit of an interesting experience to have that much work crammed in such a short amount of time. After that month past, I just relaxed at home or went out and played Pokemon Go (I’m currently level 23, if anyone was interested). I also went to Florida for a week, but that was mostly a visit of family and to escort my grandma there to see her daughter/my aunt.

This is me this summer at a gun range in Florida…I forgot what gun this was but it was super fun to shoot and looked crazy cool!

I enjoy being creative and having my voice be conveyed with writing…while at the same time find it tedious to convey it; same with reading, it’s fun to learn about stuff but feels like a chore sometimes compared to more readily available mediums (like movies and TV). I have used OpenLab for only one class before, Technical Writing; it was alright, but I just thought of it as an alternative version of BlackBoard.

I love Science Fiction, whether it’s the classics like Jules Verne or the more modern like Marvel & DC. I have a huge list of favourite Science Fiction properties, some include War of the Worlds, Harrison Bergeron, Back to the Future, Dr. Who, and Megaman X (I think that covers one for each medium). Science Fiction is very much connected to my major because I work with computers, which is an ever emerging technology that constantly changes and could even change the “science fiction” to “science fact”.

I hope to get more analytical with some science fiction stories (like Brave New World, which I read but hardly remember anything about it since it’s been a while) and to also be introduced with some new stuff related to Science Fiction. Also, I hope to get a more creative writing course out of this, since I only took the general education English course and Technical Writing, which just talked about structure and form of documents.

Overall my strengths & weaknesses as a writer, reader, & thinker can be broken down like this:

Strengths:

1. Organized
2. Well-versed diction
3. Stickler for grammar
4.  Proof-read everything I produce

Weaknesses:

1. Take a long time
2. Find it difficult to stretch stuff out if needed (like page requirements)
3. Really prefer working at home

Anyway, hope to have a good semester! (And maintain my 3.8 GPA…)

I’m a Computer Engineering Technology student that is eager to learn about anything technology related.  I enjoy learning about technological advances happening anywhere around the world, and most of my interests in technology revolve around computer programming and computer hardware.  My hobbies include sports (mostly basketball), woodwork, programming, and building computers.  I am currently unemployed, but I am looking for an internship.

My goal for the future is to find a well-paying job related to my field in order to support my family financially.  My family and I originally had plans to travel to the Dominican Republic over the summer, but that trip was cancelled.  So instead we went to Pennsylvania and stayed with a relative over there for a couple of weeks.

 – This is a picture of myself during my first semester at NYCCT.

I suppose my strengths as a writer, reader and thinker is that I am able to come up with ideas to jot down, analyze any text to a good extent, and expand on ideas.  On the other hand, my weaknesses are punctuation, mostly the use of commas and semi-colon’s, determining the correct definition for a word, and sometimes I would get stuck on an idea that just never gets me anywhere.  I enjoy writing that involves creative expression, such as poetry.  I dislike reading completely, yet I still do it anyway because some novels/stories are just irresistible.  I really enjoy (critical) thinking because that is where the core of any work that you do comes from and it also helps you discover new ways to manipulate your way of writing.

My experience with OpenLab involves a lot of posting due to projects that I have completed in my major courses.  There are currently a number of them posted for the public to see, and most of them aren’t too complex.  So far I’ve never had any issues with OpenLab relative to posts and commenting.

I don’t have much experience with Science Fiction but my brother seems to be obsessed with the genre, so I thought “why not take a course on it?”  I have seen popular Science Fiction films such as “The Terminator”, and “A Space Odyssey.” My expectations for this course is to help me understand why people are interested in Science Fiction, or how popular films revolve around the genre.  I look forward to reading the novels and articles hoping that some of the content would catch my interest.

Kon’nichiwa Minasan! -> Hello Everyone! I am majoring in Computer Engineering Technology at New York City College of Technology. This will be my third year in this major. I was born and raised in ECUADOR(with the sun burning all 365 days of the year). I came to the United States of America in 2012 and graduated from high school(again!) in order to learn the new language English of course (which did not take me very long). I graduated with honors and obtained a scholarship to continue my studies in college which led me to City Tech. Among my interests,hobbies, and passion is that I like to read. I would say that I have a DECENT knowledge of several books and authors. I  especially enjoy reading fictional books and graphic novels, those are some of my favorites. I also LOVE, but literally LOVE, going to the gym. That is like my second home(well now third after school and home). It might seem unbelievable but what motives me to go almost every single day is that almost two years ago I lost 60 pounds by working out when i was in a wight range i wasn’t comfortable with and made me insecure and now since i lost all that weight i have a new goal which is  my current goal, which is to build muscle(even tough it might sound weird, but well that is just me) and grow stronger. I also love Math, its my favorite subject, I  don’t understand why many people that i met through my experiences seriously dislike/ hate it(it breaks my heart a little). I find so much joy solving problems and helping my friends and classmates to understand a particular math problem. Another interest i have is programming.  I’ve always been involved with programming, I even have previous knowledge of programming from my country when i took classes when i was in high school. The thing that I love about programming is that it involves some logical thinking to solve a problem, you really have to think to find the solution and you get the utmost feeling of accomplishment when you find the solution. In the future, I aspire to become a famous hacker and be chased by the FBI(just kidding).

During the summer break I was working two jobs: one at Chipotle (please seriously do not say OMG  I LOVE CHIPOTLE, CHIPOTLE IS MY LIFE….) in which I have been for two years, and the second one in Micro Center in which I got to meet amazing people and gained a lot of knowledge and experience regarding new technologies. For the upcoming winter break, I am planning on going back to my beautiful country, enjoy the flaming sun, the ocean, and spend time with my loved ones that I miss so much.

I could say that my strengths as a writer is that I can write a significant amount of pages without getting tired or bored. I like to use sophisticated words in my writing so I would make my paper more appealing and interesting. Most of the time, I have all the ideas accumulated in my head and I just put in paper before running out of them. However, one of my weakness is that when I turn my paper over someone else; they find several grammar corrections or words that do not belong there. Another issue when writing is finding out how to translate some words from Spanish to English in order to make a sentence comprehensible. As a reader, I personally enjoy reading different kind of books because it is a great way to expand my vocabulary and have a better understanding about life. I will literally never get tired of reading books. I have read some famous science fiction books such as Fahrenheit, Star Wars, Doctor Who, and Star Trek. The science fiction author that really catches my attention for his writing style is the author Ray Bradbury.

I have previously had some background with OpenLab. I created an account for my English Composition 1 class and since then I have used the account to browse and read posts of other students from City Tech. You definitely can find really interesting materials in OpenLab. I RECOMMEND IT TO ALL OF YOU!

Personally I prefer reading fiction books over non-fiction books. I find it very creative and brilliant the way in which an author can describe a story or come up with several ideas and put them together in a book only using his/her imagination. I believe that Science Fiction has a small connection with my Computer Engineering major since this genre also involves talking about the future, technology, and the power of technology on humankind.

For this reason, what I expect from this course is to learn more in depth the specific concepts of science fiction and have the opportunity to read other famous fiction books, analyze them and understand the meaning of the books we read during class. To end I would like to ask: if fiction is related to imaginary events that have not occurred in reality, why science fiction talks more about the future and the effects of technology on the human race that are happening in the actual world?