Friday, July 27, 2007

End of week three

So this is me in my office. The Department of Interior Design has done an EXCELLENT job of hanging my paintings and generally making the place look good.
I HATE my I-Mate phone and its camera. In fact I hate EVERY PART of my I-Mate K-Jam phone. I am putting it here on my blog so that the whole world will know NEVER to buy one.
The camera is dreadful, the phone is unreliable.

Now that that is out of the way, back to the week. On Thursday we had a writing session to work on our papers for the Conference on Interactive Design to be held during the Design Indaba next year.
It was a really good opportunity for me to meet with some of the staff, and to engage in critical disucssion. Although, I did make at least one person very angry.
Now, now, CATTS and others who know me - you're not supposed to say "Gosh, did it take so long?"
Anyway, we made peace. And I am very glad that the person was brave enough to confront me and set the record straight immediately. I really hate it to learn days, months or even years later that I had offended someone, when, if I had known immediately, I could have made reparations!
Nevertheless, what I learnt from the occasion, is that we, as a faculty, need to learn the elements of academic debate. If we are going to get onto the international stage, we must learn to give and take sharp criticism - and also leant to do so without giving or taking offence.

3 comments:

Andrés said...

Hi Johannes,

Nice to see you are having a good time there. And nice to see you keep a memory of your second best fight against Matti Tedre, or was it a draw?

Johannes Cronje said...

Hi Andres! Thanks. No, Matti won clearly and fairly - that's why he's a doctor now!

Tinfoilstar said...

Good heavens... either there is indeed something wrong with your camera, or the colour scheme in your office is not too lekker...

Well, all the best with your endevours. Happy to see that you are settling in and unsettling everyone else!!!