To go along with the pictures below

#19

As high school students at NCSA, who cannot have cars, we have had many intimate experiences with public transportation. Such experiences include Jamaican men making drug deals on the phone while we ride in the back seat and a man who was talking about drinking something that he did not know what it was. Once we we're in a situation where our taxi driver was pulled over and arrested, and we had to call a new cab to take us back to School. For this commonweal project we decided to venture into the world of public of transportation, risking our lives and career's as artists to unveil the interworking of WInston transportation. This day Jan 12th 2009, more commonly known as national pharmacist day, we went through the arduous process of signing out, and waiting for our taxi, about 45 minutes later, we we're on our way to the Clark Campbell transportation center.



Please go along with the pictures according to the story :)


After signing out we waited for the taxi.

Mazena flicking off our taxi after making us wait for 40 minutes in the harsh winters.

The taxi costed approximately $6, just to go from school to downtown (about 2 miles).

We we're the only white people when we arrived at the train station

The bus driver made us sit in the back, because we were white.

Except not really

The bus ride was about 2 hours and included many scenic views such as

thruway, and the mall.


To conclude our anecdote about public transportation, we would like to make a few humble observations. We we're not impressed with Blue Bird cab company, because they took so long to come, and charged so much. We were however, quite surprised with the quality of the bus system. The facility's we're well kept, and up to date, and you could travel to several places in Winston-Salem, for a relatively cheap price of $2. The only criticism we have of the bus system is there should be more bus stops throughout Winston-Salem. I can see how the Winston-Salem bus system is beneficial to many locals, but from our bus ride, most people slept, and nobody talked to anybody. Although it would be very beneficial for the environment if more people took part in public transportation, I don't think that social capital would be better off.

Public Transportation

Photobucket Album

Comparing Starbucks and Krankies

#11
There are many differences between local owned businesses and big corporations. Our commonweal team went to downtown Winston to observe and investigate these dissimilarity's.

We went to star bucks coffee to compare large business to small business, service was slow and the workers did not seem to care for the happiness of their customers.

Leaving starbucks and acknowledging the


Bad store hours

Krankies had better service and store hours than Starbucks, it is open at least 12 hours everyday and thursday-saturday it is open 24/7, while the latest Starbucks is open till is 5p.m.. The differences between these two company's are staggering. We believe that the reason for this is that Starbucks has many locations all over the world, while Krankies must struggle to survive. Social capital would definitely be increased if more time was spent at local businesses such as Krankies in a community. Doing this gives local people jobs, and a place like Krankies brings people together through concerts, poetry readings, or just a nice cup of coffee.

Moving stuff out of room

http://photos-h.ak.fbcdn.net/photos-ak-snc1/v1978/10/70/717750363/n717750363_5669639_2324.jpg

This is my roommate Corey and I moving all of our stuff out of the room, it raised quiteee a lot of interest on the hall

Super Bowl Scandal

#4
It was super bowl Sunday, and the game was heating up. The connector was packed with hormonal teenagers, eyes glued to the television. The smell of pizza and soda pop clung to the air. You could feel the intensity from the moment you walked in the room. You’d think that in such a hectic environment, no one would even notice a one dollar bill, lying in the middle of the room. (This dollar bill was planted there by us, in order to observe whether or not people attempted to return it to its owner). However, the dollar bill was found by an unwitting subject, who -- in a demonstration of great integrity -- yelled out into the middle of the chaos “who’s dollar bill is this?” Later that night, when the game was coming to an end and there were less people around, we performed the experiment again. This time, it yielded a different result. We watched as someone picked it up, and casually slipped it into their pocket. Our hypothesis is that the first person was sub-consciously pressured to attempt to return the dollar because of all the people around. However, the second time around, there were less people to inhibit the subject – less people who would notice them pick it up and keep it. We also believe that in a closely knit community with lots of social capital, such as NCSA, people are more likely to return the dollar bill because they are well-acquainted with their peers and their surroundings. In an off-campus area, less people would have returned the dollar bill because they would know that it belongs to a stranger, and therefore feel unobligated to return it.

Packed Kitchen

#8

Our group had decided to have a community event in our very own connector. The goal of this event was to get as many people as possible into as small as space as possible for a certain duration of time. This would represent overpopulation, by doing this project we hoped to improve social capitals in a few ways. The people that we're involved in our experiment will hopefully better understand the suffering people that live in in overpopulated country's such as China and India. They may even go as far as having intention to want to help these country's. And creating community events such as these help the community grow as a whole by giving people opportunities to interact with one another.

#2
My Days without the Phone
For about a week (168 hours) I went phoneless. Two of those days were intentional, but the rest of the week was because of a tragic phone breakdown. Either way, it was extremely difficult for about three days. During the three day hump when I was phoneless, I experienced hallucinations, depression, and the feeling of being ostracized. After school on the first day, it was fine because I was busy with rehearsal; but once I got out of rehearsal I had no idea where anyone was. I couldn’t call or text anyone to find out where they were, so I just ended up going to my room. Needless to say, I felt like a loser. The absolute worst thing about not having a cell phone is wanting to call and communicate with someone and not being able to. The world is getting so small yet everyone is so spread out and in their own worlds. Even at the School of the Arts when we all live together, people get so consumed in things and you can’t find anyone anywhere. Along with the solitude, there also were times when I would feel a tremor in my leg and would dive into my pocket thinking that it was a vibration from my phone. Every time that this would happen, I felt like I was going crazy. Though winter term is an inconvenient time to not have a phone, regardless this was very hard for me to do.