IN DECEMBER OF 2007 PARALLEL UNIVERSITY HELD A GIVE AWAY, WE SET UP GUERILLA STYLE OUT SIDE OF MO JO’S COFFEE SHOP ON THE SIDEWALK.  THEY WERE VERY SUPPORTIVE OF OUR EFFORTS AND ENDED UP MAKING SPACE FOR US UNDER COVER OF THEIR PATIO, THEY ALSO DONATED SOME ITEMS FOR GIVE AWAY!

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OK the holidays are over now, and this class is sitting back with brandy and cigars as it were just musing on the experience.

Some of those musings according to me have to do with how uncomfortable people are with getting something for free, there is a distrust. This is interesting to me for two main reasons, one, it implies that people’s experience tells them that nothing is free (there is always fine print), and two that by being more giving (providing more experiences where things really are free as one example) we could shift the paradigm of expectation so that people might feel justified and natural in expressing their outrage at small print and false promise. I see this as being completely in line with the goals of Parallel University, because it is not only our institutions we create, but also our social environment via our expectations.

A couple of things that happened with this project: As I alluded to above, people in general were suspicious of “free”, but many of the people we met “got it” in short order, and immediately looked at it as a call to “pay forward”. I don’t really know the history of that term, or its meaning, but I think it means that one accepts a gift gracefully and then pays back the generosity to someone else in the future. (I don’t know and I’m not Jewish, but I think this a a big part of that tradition) Some people took very small gifts from us and brought back more valuable things to give away to others. For example an amp, a cd player, and some hand made glass dishes. To my way of thinking this shows how much people really do want to engage, and to give, but are not encountering situations that allow them to offer just what they happen to have, and offer it in the spirit they want to give it.

One of the other things I noticed was that people asked “who are you with”, it seems that a give away needs a sponsor (institution?)to be validated . The second day we did this we had fliers from Parallel University, and when we said “we are with PU” that put people at ease.

I am happy to say that those who read the flier (which was most everyone) seemed really happy about the whole affair. The bottom line seems to me that we all tend to be really uncomfortable with the idea of “something for nothing”. This implies a real lack of creativity/ownership (pun not intended but helpful) and insight about what is something and what is nothing in the first place.

Class Summary: Give something away for free and see what happens.