I'll preface this by making an assertion which I have no intention of supporting in anything resembling a comprehensive fashion as I would be expected to in any FLA assignment. Halloween is definitely the best holiday ever. Just a few hours ago I walked into downtown to witness the annual "thriller parade." Essentially, a horde of choreographed people in zombie costumes parade down main street dancing to thriller. It just doesn't get any better than fake blood and guts grooving to classic pop music. Not that the Halloween spirit is a purely off-campus sort of a thing. Students were allowed and advocated to wear costumes to class on Friday; and while not overwhelmingly taken advantage of, I do appreciate the levity of the idea, as well as of those who participated. Also, some of the costumes I've seen around this weekend have been truly well done, like a Beethoven costume I saw someone dressed up in on their way to a sorority "Boo Ball."
More than just ghouls and goblins, I've certainly had an interesting weekend. Friday I had my second Calculus exam, which went went well, and after that, I was relieved to look forward to a great prospective weekend. I only have a final copy for a paper (already mostly finished) due Monday, and I told myself how much I would enjoy the experience of what I was about to embark on. Some readers may be familiar with the political satirists Stephen Colbert and John Stewart. The more stalwart fans among you may recall that these two hosted a "rally to restore sanity," and a, "march to keep fear alive" this Saturday, in Washington D.C. As insane as it sounds, I was planning on being in attendance.
Two fraternity pledge brother and I loaded up the car to head out Friday after our last classes. Everything was going great, we felt good and enthused, until about thirty minutes north of Charleston West Virginia. Here I would like to pause and do something I generally try to avoid: give advice. Never, ever, ever, stop paying attention on West Virginia roads, even interstates, not that the interstates really feel as such. Sparing any of the details, the car (I was not driving) wrecked and was inoperable as far as a continued drive to DC. Thankfully, no one was injured in the accident, but still, sometimes things just don't pan out like planned.
The important part of this, I suppose, is to note that if I had to be in a car accident, I don't think I could pick two better companions. We ended up spending the night in West Virginia and returning to Transy the next day; and I wouldn't ask to be stuck in the middle of nowhere in West Virginia with anyone else. Which is cool, cool to note how big of a deal friends are, and how amazing and supportive peers really can be, especially in this stage of initial independence in life. Also, at least I got to come back to Lexington to see the Thriller Parade, very important that.
To end on a lighter note, my fraternity pledge class recently went through the process by which we receive "big brothers." Basically mentors, big brothers act to teach and support pledges and later members by showing them what it means to succeed in the fraternity, socially, academically, etc. Also, beyond the functional aspect, they are generally people with whom one has a special connection, and are overwhelmingly, by some strange phenomenon, amazing people. I am proud of and happy with my big brother; and am even more excited to continue to get to know him as well as all of the other fraternity brothers.
So, to summarize, Halloween is awesome, don't wreck in West Virginia, if you DO wreck in West Virginia, try to take something meaningful out of it, and big brothers are cool. If you can pull a cohesive theme and message out of all of that, then you are a more effective analyst than I am, congratulations. But these are some of the things affecting me now in this Halloween season; and whether the good or the bad, I'm loving it.
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Sunday, October 24, 2010
A Weekend in...Purdue?
So, I'll try to keep this blog pretty short and sweet without extrapolating too much on random sentimental notions I have about my weekend. But first things first, here's what happened. The traveling Quidditch team here at Transylvania, which I am of course an enthusiastic part of, had its first tournament today. Saturday afternoon the team carpooled the 4.5 hours to Purdue university in Indiana, spent the night, and Sunday was the tourney itself. So, one could argue that my weekend was interesting. One could argue that it was nerdy and not cool. Most of all though, I would argue that it was a lot of fun.
I drove one of the vehicles, my little 1999 Toyota Corolla (great car, highly recommended) with a full load of five people. Which was cozy to say the least. But it was actually a great enough group of people, and an enjoyable enough ride, that even when extra room opened up in other cars, we stayed together. I feel as if I'm not supposed to admit to this in a public forum as a male, but we definitely spent at least an hour jamming out to Disney music; which I'm not ashamed to say. Also, the conversation, serious and, well, not so serious, couldn't have been beaten. Even just by the time we arrived at Purdue, I was extremely happy that I could honestly call my teammates friends as well.
And then it was morning. Play commenced for us at 10:30AM and continued all day. We played a total of seven matches, losing 5 of them (although twice to the same team, once in round robin and once in playoff games) and winning two. I chased as usual, and did a surprising amount of seeking as well, which despite the inherent frustration, I believe I actually enjoyed. We did catch the snitch 4 of the 7 games, unfortunately it's only weighted 30 points in "muggle quidditch" instead of the 150 from Harry Potter. Overall Transylvania played in such a way that we can fair be proud of our games, even most of the losses. We were never slated to win, being a school of 1,100 going up against schools of over 20,000 like Purdue, West Mich, Illinois State, etc. And although I bled in three different places, ended up taking 3 ibuprofen, and am currently exhausted beyond belief, I had a really good time. Which is what it's all about.
With any luck I will be able to get pictures from people and figure out how to add them to this blog within the next few days, at which point I hope the full comic and yet strangely intense visuals can bring some entertainment to someone, or at least to myself. As for now, I have homework to finish, and a bed which looks more compelling that it has ever looked before!
I drove one of the vehicles, my little 1999 Toyota Corolla (great car, highly recommended) with a full load of five people. Which was cozy to say the least. But it was actually a great enough group of people, and an enjoyable enough ride, that even when extra room opened up in other cars, we stayed together. I feel as if I'm not supposed to admit to this in a public forum as a male, but we definitely spent at least an hour jamming out to Disney music; which I'm not ashamed to say. Also, the conversation, serious and, well, not so serious, couldn't have been beaten. Even just by the time we arrived at Purdue, I was extremely happy that I could honestly call my teammates friends as well.
And then it was morning. Play commenced for us at 10:30AM and continued all day. We played a total of seven matches, losing 5 of them (although twice to the same team, once in round robin and once in playoff games) and winning two. I chased as usual, and did a surprising amount of seeking as well, which despite the inherent frustration, I believe I actually enjoyed. We did catch the snitch 4 of the 7 games, unfortunately it's only weighted 30 points in "muggle quidditch" instead of the 150 from Harry Potter. Overall Transylvania played in such a way that we can fair be proud of our games, even most of the losses. We were never slated to win, being a school of 1,100 going up against schools of over 20,000 like Purdue, West Mich, Illinois State, etc. And although I bled in three different places, ended up taking 3 ibuprofen, and am currently exhausted beyond belief, I had a really good time. Which is what it's all about.
With any luck I will be able to get pictures from people and figure out how to add them to this blog within the next few days, at which point I hope the full comic and yet strangely intense visuals can bring some entertainment to someone, or at least to myself. As for now, I have homework to finish, and a bed which looks more compelling that it has ever looked before!
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Transy Meets Fall
Ah yes, it's that time of year when the leaves begin changing to a glorious plethora of colors, the air feels fresh and crisp, and plaid shirts once again come into stylistic play. Of course, it's also that time of year when tests are hitting one after another, papers seem to fly toward due dates at lightspeed, and there are a thousand events to go to every single day. But hey, we all have to appreciate the natural fall lest the academic fall get the best of us.
In all seriousness though, I'm quite excited about all of the activities going on, those that I have and have not been able to participate in both. My weekend started Saturday by meeting up with a few of my friends at UK around midnight on Friday. Fun tip, Christian Student Fellowship at UK has free pancakes for anyone and everyone every Friday night at midnight; it's great stuff. After staying and catching up for far too long, I slept four or so hours before leaving for Nicholasville to participate in the "Delta Dash." One of the sororities on campus, Delta Delta Delta, hosts a 5k run/walk as a philanthropic event to raise money for St. Jude Children Research Hospital. I'm not exactly a runner, so while I did run instead of walk, my 26:20 time was nothing to be extremely proud of, although my small contribution toward the great cause definitely was. Overall the Deltas raised over $4,000 in charity, which is absolutely awesome, not to mention indicative of some of the very good things that can come about not just from the greek community, but from any collection of concerned students.
In addition to a great event to start the day off, I ended it with fall festival, an off campus party to celebrate the new pledges to my fraternity. After a great time there, I've come back to a sleepy and homework filled Sunday; something which I'm quickly learning is quite the norm in college. I am excited though about the coming week. From an Indian cultural experience at the international house, a volleyball tournament, and a talk from a Princeton professor, to the Kenan lecture about cosmopolitanism, this week is full of events that I'm excited to attend, and anxious about fitting into my schedule.
As far as developments on campus I'm not directly affiliated with, The Bakkai rehearsals seem to be getting along splendidly from all that I've heard. For anyone not familiar, The Bakkai is originally a Greek Tragedy that has been modernized and adapted to a musical format for the purpose of a performance at Transylvania. I will postpone giving any more information until I have a chance to see it myself, but even from such a brief description one can appreciate the interest there. Also, the improvisation group on campus recently completed auditions for new members and will be rehearsing for their first performance in late October, some laughs that I'm sure many people will be grateful for with midterms fast approaching.
So that's October, just as I remember it from the good old days that consist of all of a year ago. Busy, beautiful, and more busy. But in a certain way, in a certain sense, the aesthetics of staying busy in an individually significant way seem to have as much merit as those of nature. The combination of the two...well, let's just say I'm a big fan of October!
In all seriousness though, I'm quite excited about all of the activities going on, those that I have and have not been able to participate in both. My weekend started Saturday by meeting up with a few of my friends at UK around midnight on Friday. Fun tip, Christian Student Fellowship at UK has free pancakes for anyone and everyone every Friday night at midnight; it's great stuff. After staying and catching up for far too long, I slept four or so hours before leaving for Nicholasville to participate in the "Delta Dash." One of the sororities on campus, Delta Delta Delta, hosts a 5k run/walk as a philanthropic event to raise money for St. Jude Children Research Hospital. I'm not exactly a runner, so while I did run instead of walk, my 26:20 time was nothing to be extremely proud of, although my small contribution toward the great cause definitely was. Overall the Deltas raised over $4,000 in charity, which is absolutely awesome, not to mention indicative of some of the very good things that can come about not just from the greek community, but from any collection of concerned students.
In addition to a great event to start the day off, I ended it with fall festival, an off campus party to celebrate the new pledges to my fraternity. After a great time there, I've come back to a sleepy and homework filled Sunday; something which I'm quickly learning is quite the norm in college. I am excited though about the coming week. From an Indian cultural experience at the international house, a volleyball tournament, and a talk from a Princeton professor, to the Kenan lecture about cosmopolitanism, this week is full of events that I'm excited to attend, and anxious about fitting into my schedule.
As far as developments on campus I'm not directly affiliated with, The Bakkai rehearsals seem to be getting along splendidly from all that I've heard. For anyone not familiar, The Bakkai is originally a Greek Tragedy that has been modernized and adapted to a musical format for the purpose of a performance at Transylvania. I will postpone giving any more information until I have a chance to see it myself, but even from such a brief description one can appreciate the interest there. Also, the improvisation group on campus recently completed auditions for new members and will be rehearsing for their first performance in late October, some laughs that I'm sure many people will be grateful for with midterms fast approaching.
So that's October, just as I remember it from the good old days that consist of all of a year ago. Busy, beautiful, and more busy. But in a certain way, in a certain sense, the aesthetics of staying busy in an individually significant way seem to have as much merit as those of nature. The combination of the two...well, let's just say I'm a big fan of October!
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Reflections on a Month
So, we have all officially been attending the university affectionately known as Transy for a full month now. The weather has gone from the sweltering 90's to the brisk 50's, classes have transitioned from reading syllabi to exams and formal papers, and we lonely freshman have gone from awkwardly wandering around a campus of strangers to being able to greet at least 10 people on the way to every class. So what's happened? What do I remember? What sticks out to me?
The people stick out to me. My new freshmen friends Justin, Tony, Christian, Nick, Chris, Kayarash, Daniel, etc, etc, are some of the coolest guys I've had the pleasure to get to know in my 18 years of existence. I actually just went this evening to the airport to pick one of them up, a guy I can scarcely believe I only met a month ago. Comradery is just so much easier to build up with a group of guys that I'm with and around on a day to day basis. This is also true of the upperclassmen. It means something different than my high school friends, to have guys that I not only go to school with, but eat with, hang out with, go off campus with, and so much more. Needless to say, my facebook friend list has grown exponentially in the past 30 days!
Random ventures stick out to me. Whether it's to Tolly Ho (A nearby restaurant at UK) at 2:00 in the morning, to the Kentucky River to go diving and swimming, or UK's Christian Student Fellowship on Friday night at midnight for free pancakes, I find that I'm regularly exposed to so many more opportunities now that I'm not living at home. I'll make a confession here and admit that I like video games; indeed, one could call me a gamer. At least, one could before. I literally have only played a video game twice while I've been at Transy, once of which was in a LAN party setting with a fraternity and hardly even counts. That's not to say that I've stopped liking video games, I've just had so many better options that I can't seem to find time for it. To be certain studying takes up a lot of time, but shenanigans with the aforementioned amazing people make up for it in a way that keeps me not only sane, but in many ways truly content, if at times exhausted.
Quiditch sticks out to me. I've already made a post about this wonderful eccentric little sport, so I won't elaborate too much, but I must say that I love it. This Wednesday I try out for the traveling team, wish me luck!
Classes stick out to me. You probably don't believe me; but they really do. I have actually learned things. I've actually done things. My classes and my out of class work in them actually feel constructive! Hopefully this is an attractive thing about Transylvania, I know that in my position, this was something specific I was looking for in a college. To throw some specifics out there, I can now integrate by parts, trig substitution, and partial fractions because of Calculus 2, I can manipulate vectors in more ways than one would ever want to because of Physics, and I've written two essays defending justice and analyzing the democratization of intimacy in my Philosophy and Fundamentals of Liberal Arts classes respectively. Objectively, while this sounds kind of lame, I'm glad that if I'm going to go through the ordeal that is college, I can at least be proud of what I learn and proud of what I do. I'm glad that I respect this institution as a way to learn, to do, and to think, as well as a place to live.
Greek Life sticks out to me. It's a fact of life here at Transy that it pervades campus in a way that adds flare and spice to the routine of things. Whether or not it is a good thing is a subject for an editorial, or at least a different post, but it is certainly something I can appreciate about the character of campus. Whether it's a candlelight, a party, a philanthropy, or the 5k I'm running for one of the sororities next Saturday, the Greek system has certainly reared it's face powerfully in my first month here.
So these are all just a few things; to fully delineate my beginnings here would keep me an additional three hours writing about a bunch of details that are probably insignificant anyway. But hopefully, these observations and anecdotes show what sticks out to me most, college, and what it means to be there.
The people stick out to me. My new freshmen friends Justin, Tony, Christian, Nick, Chris, Kayarash, Daniel, etc, etc, are some of the coolest guys I've had the pleasure to get to know in my 18 years of existence. I actually just went this evening to the airport to pick one of them up, a guy I can scarcely believe I only met a month ago. Comradery is just so much easier to build up with a group of guys that I'm with and around on a day to day basis. This is also true of the upperclassmen. It means something different than my high school friends, to have guys that I not only go to school with, but eat with, hang out with, go off campus with, and so much more. Needless to say, my facebook friend list has grown exponentially in the past 30 days!
Random ventures stick out to me. Whether it's to Tolly Ho (A nearby restaurant at UK) at 2:00 in the morning, to the Kentucky River to go diving and swimming, or UK's Christian Student Fellowship on Friday night at midnight for free pancakes, I find that I'm regularly exposed to so many more opportunities now that I'm not living at home. I'll make a confession here and admit that I like video games; indeed, one could call me a gamer. At least, one could before. I literally have only played a video game twice while I've been at Transy, once of which was in a LAN party setting with a fraternity and hardly even counts. That's not to say that I've stopped liking video games, I've just had so many better options that I can't seem to find time for it. To be certain studying takes up a lot of time, but shenanigans with the aforementioned amazing people make up for it in a way that keeps me not only sane, but in many ways truly content, if at times exhausted.
Quiditch sticks out to me. I've already made a post about this wonderful eccentric little sport, so I won't elaborate too much, but I must say that I love it. This Wednesday I try out for the traveling team, wish me luck!
Classes stick out to me. You probably don't believe me; but they really do. I have actually learned things. I've actually done things. My classes and my out of class work in them actually feel constructive! Hopefully this is an attractive thing about Transylvania, I know that in my position, this was something specific I was looking for in a college. To throw some specifics out there, I can now integrate by parts, trig substitution, and partial fractions because of Calculus 2, I can manipulate vectors in more ways than one would ever want to because of Physics, and I've written two essays defending justice and analyzing the democratization of intimacy in my Philosophy and Fundamentals of Liberal Arts classes respectively. Objectively, while this sounds kind of lame, I'm glad that if I'm going to go through the ordeal that is college, I can at least be proud of what I learn and proud of what I do. I'm glad that I respect this institution as a way to learn, to do, and to think, as well as a place to live.
Greek Life sticks out to me. It's a fact of life here at Transy that it pervades campus in a way that adds flare and spice to the routine of things. Whether or not it is a good thing is a subject for an editorial, or at least a different post, but it is certainly something I can appreciate about the character of campus. Whether it's a candlelight, a party, a philanthropy, or the 5k I'm running for one of the sororities next Saturday, the Greek system has certainly reared it's face powerfully in my first month here.
So these are all just a few things; to fully delineate my beginnings here would keep me an additional three hours writing about a bunch of details that are probably insignificant anyway. But hopefully, these observations and anecdotes show what sticks out to me most, college, and what it means to be there.
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