CAS: Creativity

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
-prove to myself that I am capable of doing new things
-improve my skill at art endeavors
-make a nice piece of decoration for my room

Some days ago I decided to do something that I have always wanted to do; draw.
I would never have the courage to finish any drawing I attempted, because as soon as I started anything it would turn out bad and then I would get angry and throw it away. This time however, I decided not to give up until I had nailed a wolf's head, and after one hour of hard and frustrating work, I finally did it.

At first I had started by drawing the mouth from the neck and then following to the forehead, but it became a total mess and did not even look like a wolf. This is the point where I normally give up, but this time I said to myself "get the picture of an actual wolf and don't stop trying until you make it look good", and well, the result was surprisingly good.

PREPARATION: After the drawing was finished I was amazed by my own potential, and decided to put it in a canvas so that it would last longer and I would be able to put it in my room. I went to the store and bought some new painting materials since my current ones were somewhat old and dry, thus I was all set.


Then I went on to put my drawing in a painting. I had painted once before but I didn't have much experience, my mother, on the other hand, had painted through all of her life. She showed me some amazing tricks such as using a spatula to give texture and I used my own style to make things such as the transition from the moon to the night sky. The eye was the hardest part, but with a lot of tension and sweat I got it done without major problems. At the end, the results simply amazed me, and now I am glad that I had the courage to keep going and not give up

LEARNING OUTCOMES:
-If I dedicate myself towards something, I can do it

CAS Activity: Action

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
- learn about swordplay and how it worked
-see if I have what it takes to practice a very demanding sport

PREPARATION: After watching many videos and trying to get to know about historical fencing, I searched on the internet for any events or classes that relate to it; and thus I found "Academia da Espada"

I have always been interested in swords and generally medieval warfare, but I had never tried any activities that relate to this is some way. So, after some searching, I found the "Academia da Espada"; it is a small group in Pinheiros that teaches olympic fencing as well as historical fencing, in fact, the only ones to do so in Sao Paulo (and possibly Brazil).

Historical fencing is relatively popular in Europe and Canada (with over 60 clubs in England alone), but not so much in the rest of the world, so I was really excited when I found out about "Academia da Espada". The classes don't ever really "pause", as the instructor is there almost every day of the year, so I was able to get started rather quickly in some experimental classes; and while I figured that it would be a rather tiring and demanding sport, I was really not imagining that it would demand so much physical effort.
The very basics are a little similar to olympic fencing; in that you stay in a "rest" stance and all of your actions depart from such (this rest stance depends on what historical manual, books written by masters centuries ago now available online, you use to practice, in our case we use Fabris's), and a guard to rest the sword. The rest stance used by us consists of facing your side to the opponent, placing your feet at a 90 degrees angle, and bending your knees. Every action stems from this; walking back and forth (with the right foot starting the movement forward and the left one starting the movement backwards), and all the ways to guard, attack, riposte, etc.

Now, this might not seem too hard, but imagine staying and moving with your knees bent for about 5 hours straight, only resting occasionally when you are not either training or sparring (which is almost, well, never), I can assure that it tires more than any leg press section you can imagine. The first two days were the heavier though, as I was still learning all of the different ways to move, so I would do literally nothing more than walk and run back and forth on the "bent knee" stance; however, after I started to learn rapier (the type of sword used by us) attacks things got interesting. While you still need a great amount of training and repeating, I got to train my aim and actually stick the sword at things, which is way more fun than walking back and forth for hours.  

The community is actually much bigger than I imagined, for now I have met about 15 people, but I suspect that there are more (surprisingly, there are women too). Everyone there shares a common interest, historical fencing, which is very rare in Brazil; so it is a very tight and small community that welcomes anyone willing to try. I just had my first match yesterday, on a "sparring day" in the academy (if you want to be dramatic I guess you can call it a "tournament"), and while I lost every fight horribly (as expect of a 2 weeks beginner), the activity really caught my attention and I pretend to stay practicing for as long as I can. It's going to be very time consuming, especially considering my school activities, but I'm up for it.

LEARNING OUTCOMES:
-It takes a lot of effort to learn a martial art, but it is also incredibly rewarding if you manage to do so
-If we want something in life, we need to get up and go looking for it

CAS Service

CAS ACTIVITIES: SERVICE

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
-Use my free time to make someone's life better, so that I can see how it is manage my own altruistic project

When I finished planning my CAS "Service" activity for this summer I wasn't feeling very engaged and I was not really looking forward to it; I already had my hands full with other things, but then I thought about how helpful it could be to others and how I would love it if someone decided to do the same for me, so I swallowed my complaints and went forward with it. Here is the summary of the experience:

1st Week: Planning

After a day of thinking about how I could help others I decided that whatever I did, as long as it helped other people it would satisfy me; so I went for something simple: I was studying for my mathematics recuperacao during the summer, so most of the subjects were still "fresh" in my mind, then why not help others who may need this knowledge too (I later realized that this was probably not the best of ideas, since a lot of people would be traveling instead of studying, but it was worth a try)? I started by making posters offering free mathematics lessons (about the topics that I had just studied: everything regarding functions and binomials) and tried to spread them as much as I could; I glued them around my neighborhood, asked for people who work in my building to take copies with them and offer them to whoever needed...

While I waited for someone to call me I started to prepare the living room for classes, since I needed to be prepared for a large group of people, just in case. 

2nd Week: Execution

Four days passed before someone called, and it was really exciting when they did; it was a girl called Nicole from the next building, she was in a situation similar to mine and needed help with functions, so we scheduled 2 hours of classes 3 days a week. Considering that she did not have almost any background knowledge on the subject,  she was quite a fast learner, and we were able to get everything done in two weeks (12 hours of classes). I must admit that it was weird at first, teaching maths to someone I had never seen before, but after the first hour everything was flowing smoothly and we were getting to know each other as I taught her. It was a fascinating experience; seeing how glad she was that I was helping her with something that was very important for her life made all the work be worth it, and as the time passed I knew that I had made a new friend. 

Although I was the teacher, she taught me a lot of valuable stuff too, particularly how determination can change one's life. Nicole has very strict parents that do not allow her to do any extra curricular activities, both for monetary reasons and protectionism. However, she was able to convince them to allow her to have acting classes once a week if she spent the whole year without getting less than a 9.5 (out of 10) in every subject. It's been a year and a half and she has been able to keep her promise through a lot of studying, however, if she gets anything less than that her parents will cut the acting classes; she was desperate because as soon as her vacations end she will be seeing new subjects in maths (functions is the main thing) and she was afraid that she would not get the 9.5 this time. While I felt sorry for her, it was amazing to be able to help her out in this situation. I started to admire her a lot, for all the effort she has put in to the realization of her dream.

End

While I am not giving her classes anymore, I know that Nicole will always be my friend, and that something good actually came out of all my effort. 

Below there's a picture of one of our classes, she had to stay some extra minutes this day so it got pretty dark and we had to get some snacks, which ended pretty quickly

LEARNING OUTCOMES:

- Many people face challenges far greater than my own, the project helped me to see how motivation can make things happen
-By connecting with people I can form links that last forever

CAS REFLECTION:

CAS has been very helplful to me, while it usually forced me to do something i didn't want to do, later i ended up realizing the value of what i had done and most of the times i also had fun in the end; i can't think of a better example of this than the play, which i really enjoyed.
Another aspect of CAS that i really like are Mr. Barbosa's classes. In the last two classes we did activities like thanking our classmates and complimenting them. This seemed forced and silly in the start, but it turned out to be something beautiful and in some way, it made us feel like we were closer together as a group.
Overall, CAS is a class that has surprised me much during these last months, and i hope it keeps bringing good surprises.

CAS ENTRY: PLAY
- At first I hated being in the play. I would have to miss a Friday night and a Saturday, so by the time that I was telling the bus driver that I wouldn't be going back on Thursday, I was already regretting the decision of signing up for light management; to make it worse, the spotlight gets really hot and I would have to be standing up the whole time.
However, when it was 18:00 and I entered the theater, my mood changed completely; everyone was working and collaborating, and the atmosphere was really nice. So I decided to start helping Luca to tape numbers in the chairs, this took about 40 minutes. After that, me and 3 other backstage guys got together to bring the scenarios from outside, and even though it was raining we had no problem.
Then at 20:00 the play started, everyone was a little nervous, and I suddenly felt a little shiver in my spine. But I don't have many problems with anxiety, so I dealt with the "stage" fear (I wasn't even in the stage) well enough.
The play was beautiful, and at the end of it I couldn't wait for the next day

CAS QUESTIONS

INITIAL SELF REVIEW:

-What are you really good at?
I consider myself good at learning. I also consider myself very good at writing and I like my paintings (even though other people usually don't)

-Name one skill you've always wanted to develop in your life but you haven't yet.
Precision in my movements, I am too clumsy and sometimes break stuff accidentally

-Name one activity that you would like to try but you haven't yet. Why would like to try this?
Hang-Gliding. It must feel great to be flying through the skies with total control over yourself.

-What's different about you now compared to what you were like when you were 10 years old?
I am not as immature and ignorant.

-Describe the kind of person you think you will be after school
A calm person, probably with very unusual interests, such as historical fencing and painting. Maybe working as a perfumist

CREATIVITY:

-Are you involved in any creative or artistic endeavors?
I paint sporadically, so far I have only completed two paintings, but I really enjoy the activity

ACTION:

-List any sports, clubs, groups, or teams in which you are currently involved:
Historical Fencing

-How are you involved
Participant

-How committed are you to the activity?
I practice 2 times a week and read Fabris's and Capo Ferro's manuals in my free time

-What goals do you have in terms of your performance?
I do it simply for fun, but I hope to become as good as I can get

-How will achieving this goal result in a personal growth?
If I can show to myself that I am capable of becoming good at this, I will probably see myself as more capable, and thus have greater self esteem

SERVICE:

-List the global issues that concern you the most
The glorification of faith based beliefs, bigotry, repulsion for skepticism, general stupidity, lack of education, media manipulation, and the waste of human lives.

-How are you involved in finding a solution to these issues?
No idea yet, maybe I will write a book or something