Ernest Alba's Blog

Superhumans don't exist.

It's so comforting to know that people are never as great as we think they are. That is, even the greatest humans are still just human. There is a student in my globalization class who is well-spoken, knowledgeable, and persuasive. In a class of twenty-something students, she stands out above and beyond the rest. This, despite the fact that we have philosophy graduate students from France, Harvard graduate students, and even a government official taking this class - people whom you would expect to have insight into globalization and economic liberalization and to lead the conversations. But, no. This graduate student, named Gabi, with whom I had previously taken another class and looks to be no more than 23 or 24 years old is the star of the show.

I decided to look her up on Google. At first, I was impressed because the first link that came up was an Amazon link to a book, in which an article of hers has been published. Then, I saw other links to newspapers and journals in which she has been interviewed. In my head, Gabi was rapidly becoming a superhero. How could a graduate student already be able to impart such wisdom? I decided to get to the bottom of the whole thing and dredged up her curriculum vitae (her academic resume). It turns out she is no younger than 29, she has a Master's Degree in City Planning, and she began her Doctoral Studies only after spending several years working in the field. Everything made much more sense now. Her alertness, her poise, her hand gestures all were indicative of someone who knew what she was talking about. Now that I think about her in this new context, she really isn't as impressive as I had imagined, though she remains a person I respect for all the reasons I just described. Nevertheless, I hope that by the time I'm her age I'll be much better at what I do then she is at what she does. I can imagine that when she was an undergrad she was worse off than me. Not talkative at all. Shy. Dutifully doing work, but not wanting to create a network of business friends. Yet, she managed to get where she is now. With my not completely anti-social nature, always improving, and real determination to create something out of myself, I really hope to be at the point she is within the next three or four years.