Regional Geography

The video we watched of the squatters living in an unfinished skyscraper was unlike anything I've ever seen before. In a country with such high population rates and a housing shortage, people have gotten creative and made homes in this 45 story building where they share what would have been office spaces and bathrooms.  Over 2,500 people have moved into the dilapidated skyscraper and made a home out of it for their families. They have rigged electricity that the government does not provide for them and built small stores on almost every floor.  The people have not been evicted because the government of Venezuela knows of the housing shortages, yet does not fix it.  

I feel ashamed that a country with so many oil resources has such high rates of poverty and no one is fixing it.  It shows the corruption in the government through an extreme although innovative example.

The problems in Venezuela with housing and the lack of response to the problem by the government has led people to become squatters.  The using of the abandoned buildings was a good idea by the original squatters.  The vacant buildings can house many of the countries it is a shame that the government did not think of this solution to the housing problem and vacant building first, if they had, they could have made sure they were safer for the residence.  The idea of a vertical city springing up in this building is also an interesting one.  Not only are squatters living in these buildings but creating businesses and other services for the residence.

In life, I constantly find myself comparing situations with what I read and what I know. Imagine this skyscraper is the Prudential in Boston. How could something meant to be so great fall to its death (and to peoples literal deaths)? One day there is a massive financial building occupied with bankers and lavishness. The next day there is a skyscraper in the form of a house. Housing shortages are happening everywhere and Venezuela is being hit hard in this situation. Imagine visiting this country and asking where someone lives? "Oh, I live in the Tower of David, which used to mean a whole lot more."

This video shows ingenuity of a persons mind and plastic bottles. This is a use of something that seems to useless but plays a very large roll in daily life of the people. This plastic bottle filled with water and placed in thecut out of tin roofs created natural sunlight for the the people in the poorest communities. This cut power bills and it also created a safer living situation for the people. It shows the use for something so useless in our area of the community but so usefull to other areas of the world.

this is a great invention, however the use of these light bottles would be restricted to environments where water never freezes. however, in regions which are economically in trouble where it is generally warm, it can be a cheap source of light in a normally dark building.

people making the best of their situation and being inovative and creative is insperational and the rest of the world should follow suit

This was a very sad story to read. It's a shame that many Dalit students feel ostracized at elite Indian institutions, so much so some go as far as to commit suicide. This is a terrible personal loss for the families and neighbors of the students. But it also is unfortunate news for the country as a whole. India's economic and social growth likely depends on moving beyond old views on class and cate.

This is interesting in that it's not some silent discrimination, but an extremely overt one where many of these people are being told to their faces that they will not be allowed to pass. My greatest respect goes out to those who fight the hardest for what they want and they must keep trying to achieve it, but sadly those in a position of power in the society were direct barriers to their progress, causing their hope to be lost and the Dalit students to commit suicide.

Even though the caste system was abolished, the habits of discrimination are still incredibly prevalent. Discrimination towards people from rural backgrounds at the country's elite colleges has had such an impact that dozens of students from what would have been lower castes are committing suicide. Professors look down on these students, refusing to offer aid and even changing grades so they fail. The aboriginal students that fail face lifetimes of debt and are worried about disappointing their family, so sometimes they take their own lives instead. 

Centuries of the caste system have imprinted itself into the Indian people. Since India has only been free of it for a generation, older people continue to discriminate.