Happy New Year!

From everyone at the blogging team,

Have a wonderful new year!

Llamaland!

Every year, for one day during the weekend after shopping period, the freshmen of Timothy Dwight College are rounded up, loaded onto two yellow school buses, and are taken to a mysterious location two hours south of Yale (some have guessed that it might be New York). Rumors trickle through the freshmen in the weeks leading up to the event.

"I've heard it's some sort of paradise!"

"An upperclassman told me there were llamas there!"

Surprisingly enough, these rumors are almost true. It's called Llamaland by those who have experienced it (hey, it says it on the free t-shirt, so it must be true), and it's the sprawling mansion and garden estate of a retired Yale professor of Egyptology that is good friends with TD's Master Thompson, or Master T for short. It's become a tradition and a wonderful bonding experience for almost two decades of TD freshmen.

As a Master's Aide, I got to go along for the ride (much to the jealousy of my classmates) and help set up for the event. As staff, we had a whole separate bus to ourselves, and it felt like my days in middle school again, when enough people had been dropped off at the end of the day that only the cool kids were left and we each took a seat for outselves.

Once there, we unloaded the massive charcoal grill from the back of the bus and cooked up some beef burgers while the freshmen played volleyball, waded in the pool, sunbathed, and saw how close they could get to the llamas. (The answer is actually very close--llamas are rather peaceful animals.)

But after lunch was when the training began. One of the most important missions of the Master's Aides during Llamaland is to pass on one of Yale's most hallowed traditions: razzle-dazzle football. A combination of touch football and ultimate frisbee (anyone can forward pass), razzle-dazzle is one of the key sports in Fall IM's, and with Master T's passion for the Tyng Cup, our traning necessarily starts early.

We instructed the freshmen to head onto the adjacent field, taught them the rules, and challenged them to bring out their best squad of freshmen athletes to challenge the upperclassmen. They chased hard, and dived for tackles, but to no avail: we were just too darn fast. So, to even the odds a little bit, we allowed the freshmen to field a team consisting of... the entire freshmen class. 100 eager freshmen vs. 20 of us? I've won tougher fights.

We fought with everything we had. We used every trick in the book. We even cheated. And despite our overwhelming odds against us, well, we lost. Some freshman had the bright idea of forming a protective human shield around the runningback, and crushed us with the strength of numbers.

But the day wasn't over yet. Since Master T was retiring next year, and this was his last Llamaland, there was only one way we could honor his dedication to Timothy Dwight College for over 35 years: by throwing him in the pool.



All in all, a good day was had. I napped on the bus ride home, brought huge bags of chips back to the common room, and best of all, had bragging rights to last me all of first semester.

Fall At Yale

If ever asked

about the fall

a yellow leaf

I kept from Yale

would tell it all

Christmas on the New Haven Green

The best place in all of New Haven is the New Haven Green. When the city was originally planned in the nine squares, the center square was set off as public land, forming the Green we know today. I think its a refreshing place, and nothing's better than walking down Temple Street, then cutting through the Green, on my way to 9:00 am section in LC.

Well, what else could I have done when I heard the news that there was a special Christmas celebration today on the Green? It had all of my favorite things, in order:

1. Christmas
2. celebrations
3. the Green.

So, I went. And it was a blast. Cars were lined all the way up Temple Street as families came out in droves for the festivities. There were carousels and Santa visits for the kids, a "take your photo in this winter wonderland" stand, and best of all, a massive Christmas tree, lit for the first time tonight in speckles of red, blue, and green.

As a college student, it's hard sometimes to get to see and interact with real townies. Well, here I saw a different side of New Haven. First of all, there were lots of children--you rarely see those in our explorations around the restaurant districts on weekends. But there they were, bundled up, cared for by their parents, and having a great time. It was a good thing to finally get to see after a semester at Yale; it wasn't so long ago when I was one of those children, being cared for by my parents back in Fort Wayne.



The best part of the night was a "hayride" in the back of a tractor that drove us around New Haven Green. About 20 of us piled on, kids, adults, and students. An energetic 20-something waved his glowstick in the air and decided to conduct us in singing carols. As the tractor started its engines and pulled us around the Green, our group of strangers sang "Jingle Bells," "Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer." Then we ran out of songs to sing, and laughing, I started a rendition of "The wheels on the tractor go round and round..." In an attempt to move back to a Christmas songs, we tried "O Chirstmas Tree", but no one knew the words. "O Christmas tree, O Christmas tree...", pause, laughter, mumbling. I spontaneously made up some lyrics. "We're riding round New Haven Green... uh... I took a shower, I feel so clean!" We were all in good spirits as the ride came to a close.


As we got off the tractor in single file, we wished each other Merry Christmas and went our separate ways. I walked back down Temple Street, only to notice that the walkways across the Green, near Center Church, were lined with candles. (They do this every Thursday from 6-9, so take a study break next Thursday and take a walk to the Green.) It was a beautiful sight to walk home to.

In the end, a great way to kick off the Christmas season (thought finals does dampen the prospects a little.) It's refreshing to break out of the Yale, and even the TD bubble once in a while.

Tour of Yale: Street View Edition

I was browsing the internet one night in-between homework assignments, and I noticed that Google had released Street View on Google Maps for New Haven. I had a lot of fun tracing my walk to class virtually and spotting favorite restaurants and stores, so I thought I'd share it with you guys.

My day always begins at Timothy Dwight College, the best residential college at Yale. No, seriously. We're a consistent front-runner in the Tyng Cup standings for intramural sports, we have the longest serving master and deans of all the colleges, and freshman get to live in the college starting the first year instead of Old Campus, so we have the most family spirit. It's hard to describe, but my residential college has grown to be such a part of my life that I couldn't imagine college without it. A library, dining hall, upperclassmen to approach for advice, frisbee in the courtyard and intramural sports, a dean who watches your back academically and otherwise--I find it to be a very supportive and healthy environment.

View Larger Map

If you spin 180˚ around, you'll see Silliman College, our hated rivals across the way. They are the largest residential college at Yale with a $10 million renovation with an amazing basement (think basketball court, movie theater, and slate buttery tables you can write on with chalk). Both of us have freshmen who live in the College instead of Old Campus, but that common bond only makes us even stronger rivals. We had a rather intense snowball snowball fight just yesterday, taking advantage of the minor Snowpocalypse that hit New Haven.

Up next is the New Haven Green, which I traipsed across last year every time I went to my Philosophy of Mind class in Phelps Hall. This actually New Haven property, and it's basically the heart of the city. New Haven, when it was originally planned, was designed in a grid of 9 squares (like a tic-tac-toe board) and the center square was reserved for the Green. It's a beautiful place both in the spring and the winter--I like to walk off the path and crunch in the snow. If you travel a bit forward, you'll see one of the bus stops for CT Transit, New Haven's public busing system, which I take to go to Mathcounts tutoring at a local middle school.

View Larger Map

Cross the green to the west and you'll bump into Phelps Gate, one of the entrances to Old Campus and one of the classic images associated with Yale. Whenever you book a taxi or shuttle, they come to Phelps, so it's sort of a transportation hub and common meeting place for groups getting rides off campus. Phelps Tower is also the home of the classics department, randomly enough. I didn't know there were classrooms here until second semester freshman year.

View Larger Map

This is Claire's Corner Copia, at the corner across Old Campus and in the middle of a nice shopping and restaurant district in New Haven. Claire's is famous for it's "Claire's Cake," a rich coffee cake with walnuts and fruits inside and a decadent frosting. Claire's Cake is as popular as pizza among student groups enticing people to come to their meetings. Browse around and you'll find Samurai, a popular sushi place, and a local theater which puts on professional productions.

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And what's a tour without Gourmet Heaven? Know as "G-heav" to the most intense customers, Gourmet Heaven combines a high quality general store, take out food, and 24 hour service all into one. It's located on Broadway, another nice shopping district that has the best stores in my opinion. You can find A-1 Pizza, another 24 hour place (get the pancakes), Cutler, a CD shop, and Ivy Noodle, the best Chinese place around (it's kind of hard to see here, though).

View Larger Map

And finally, a virtual tour can't be complete without a cool Street View trick/explanation of Commons. The domed building in the background is Commons, the largest dining hall at Yale and the one that looks the most like the Great Hall from Harry Potter. While I prefer to eat at my residential college, I find Commons great for the quick bite to eat or hot breakfast in the morning. Big events are usually held here, like the Freshman Christmas Feast and Sophomore Dinner. There was also a great Chinese New Year meal here, complete with Peking opera performers from New York. Above in the dome are is the President's Room, a beautifully furnished space where our TD Master, Master T, held a private concert for the Fellows and Students.

View Larger Map

Now for the fun part--if you back up and move forward, you can race the blue Bulldog Bus that's in from of the Street View car that took these pictures. These buses are available to pick you up at Union Station, or take you up Science Hill or to the Medical School.

Okay, hope you enjoyed the Street View tour. Of course, consider coming to Bulldog Days--it's infinitely more fun than this post :)

Chubb Fellowship: Wynton Marsalis

There are moments that are fun and come often and regular, like birthdays, or Christmas. There are moments that make you smile, like finding a quarter on the ground, or hearing your favorite song on the radio. And then there are some moments so rich, so impossible, that you can hardly believe they're happening, even as you watch.

Today was one of those moments. Today, on the coin of the Timothy Dwight Chubb Fellowship, about 50 TD'ers, over a steak lunch at Union League Cafe, listened to the musings, and trumpetings, of Wynton Marsalis.

I had been waiting for this moment since we got our welcome letters to Timothy Dwight College over the summer. "We're having Wyntom Marsalis during second semester," it said. All I had to do to sign up for this private lunch with Wynton was to go into the Master's Office on Friday morning and sign my name on a list. Leaving Philosophy of Mind a little early, I hop across the New Haven Green to Union League Cafe, one of the nicest restaurants in New Haven, and a participant in the excellent Restaurant Week.


I walked down Sherman's Alley and found the side door for the cafe. It was locked, warning me that "Sorry, but the restaurant is closed for a private event." Hey, I thought, I'm part of this event! Let me in! Fortunately, I spotted a few fellow TD'ers who were crossing the street in my direction, heading into a larger, ornate entrance. I followed them inside.

I get in line, chat with TD'ers, and unexpectedly have my coat checked by the restaurant staff. Wow, I thought, this is the real deal. People are dressed in suits and ties, and my green jacket and button up shirt makes me feel a little bare. And there he is. The man himself. Chatting with some students and faculty.

When the meal began and he spoke, I was in awe. He spoke of the Jazz Attitude--how you have to keep your individualism--"If you got a flat head, you got a flat head"--while balancing the swing, keeping everyone in line, balancing the voices of the band members. He talked about growing up in New Orleans, and how he loved the town, how it shaped his life, and how Hurricane Katrina made him realize how much one can love a place, without realizing it. He talked of his views on rap music--ignorant, almost unmentionable, and certainly unimaginable 30 years ago.

He talked about his father, how he was a musician, and how when he started playing his own gigs and realized he had more fans than his father, that something was cooking. (He didn't mention that he went to Julliard at 17.) He talked about how the blending of cultures in New Orleans, Creole, Africans, descendants of slaves, white, with tensions of band music, funk music, all sort of strings pulling music into syncopated rhythms, improvisation, the art of jazz. He talked about how raising the scale by one half note was so hard--what was so close together was so far away, like a man and a woman. He talked about raising 20 and 18 year old sons, and the conversations they had, the cultural clashes. He talked about music education, calling for a revolution, raising standards and making a more educated listenership, and more educated public, so they could appreciate real music.

And then he played. You could hear the way he talked in the way he played the trumpet--both forms of communication it seemed, expression through sound. You could hear his personality--confident, yet modest, sure, steady, not afraid for a flourish or two. The trumpet was vintage, it seemed, not shiny like trumpets played by middle school students, but dull, with character.

My jaw was dropped the whole time. I was stunned. The delicious steak and pear, bacon, and Roquefort spinach salad faded from mind as I watched a master just be himself.

Thanks for Timothy Dwight College and the Chubb Fellowship for making this happen. This is a memory I think I'll cherish for a long while. With moments like these, you can't help but love TD, and love Yale.

If you would like to read more about Wynton, here's a link to a Yale publication's bulletin on the Chubb Fellowship. It has a resume of sorts--it will blow your mind.

Update: Our good friend, and past DJ of the Week, Anya, sent us this lovely picture of her, Ming, and Ari with the man himself! (Max: Actually, they were all DJ's of the Week!)

Featured Yalie: Reid Magdanz

This is perhaps the most epic blog post of all time.

The other day, I was sitting in my room with Mike, Jake, and Max, and there's a knock on the door. In pops Reid, with a zip drive. He plugs it into my laptop and shows us a video. We're stunned.

Over Thanksgiving, Reid decided to make a video about his life in the wilderness. For those of us who don't know, Reid comes from Kotzebue, Alaska, which is above the Arctic Circle. It's point A on this Google Map:


I tried to find the distance from Kotzebue to here. Google said sorry. "We could not calculate directions between Kotzebue, Alaska and New Haven, CT."

Well, Reid decided to make a video about his life in Alaska, giving a great vision of what it's like to live there and the adventures he goes through on a regular basis. All pictures were taken by him and his family, and some close friends. It's probably the most amazing thing I've ever seen. Here's Reid himself:

* * *

My mom was a city girl from Southern California. She always knew she wanted to leave the city, and after her time at UC-Santa Cruz she took the little money in her pocket and took off for Alaska.

My Dad grew up in Omaha. He was working as a photo-journalist with the Des Moines Register when he was given an assignment to photograph a school group from Northwest Alaska. He fell in love with them and soon found a grant that would take him to 250-resident Shungnak, Alaska for a yearlong photo assignment. Upon his return to the Midwest, he realized he couldn’t live in the Lower 48 anymore and was soon back in Alaska to stay.

I have lived my whole life in Northwest Alaska – 14 years in the town of Kotzebue, 4 in Nome long ago. Each has about 3,000 residents and neither is connected to the outside world by road, but only Kotzebue lies 30 miles above the Arctic Circle, and only Kotzebue is 70% Alaska Native. Kotzebue is the regional hub of the Northwest Arctic Borough, an area the size of Indiana with a population density of 0.177 people per square mile.

Now, less than a week after our first snow here in New Haven, Connecticut, I would like to take you on a 6 ½ minute journey to northern Alaska.

***



[UPDATE: The audio was unfortunately blocked on Youtube. I guess the pictures will have to suffice :)]

We start with Kotzebue itself. An aerial shot and one of our two main streets. The Miss Arctic Circle competition. Front Street at freezeup and 20 below. My house, its front door buried on Christmas day, its back wall bright in spring.

Next we go into the country. I am regularly asked why I live in Alaska and why I want to go back. It isn’t for Kotzebue. My parents don’t live there for Kotzebue. We live there for the country. We live there for trips to the Duck Blind, padding a canoe along the shore, preparing for a hunt, building fires on clear, warm autumn days. We live there for the tundra, picnics on the beaches, freely migrating herds of caribou half a million strong. We live there for driving on the frozen ocean, ice fishing, the pink light of winter afternoons, and the beauty of freezup.

I live in Kotzebue, but Maniilaq River is my favorite place on the face of this Earth, although I only get to enjoy it for three weeks each spring. I talk with old Iñupiaq ladies born in sod houses in the wilderness, whose parents told first-hand stories of the coming of the white man. I read the history of Alaska in our log cabin, bought by my parents in 1989. I take walks through the trees and across the tundra near the cabin. I boat into the snow-capped mountains of the central Brooks Range and up other rivers leading into the Interior of the state. I climb some of those mountains and create a tarp lean-to to dry out gear after a wet hike.

Then we return to Kotzebue or, more specifically, to the Iten’s camp, 25 miles away and accessible only by boat and foot in summer or snowmobile in winter. Ed Iten is one of the world’s top dog mushers and a perennial contender in the Iditarod, the premier sled dog race in the world. His son Quinn grew tired of being homeschooled at camp and now lives in my room, going to school in town. While at the Iten’s we make runs to the woodlot at 40 below, admiring the pink light of high noon in the Arctic. We feed dogs a foul-smelling concoction of meat and oil. We collect our own wood and help Ed prepare for local races.

Next we go to one of Alaska’s tourist traps. While taken from a road, the pictures of Denali National Park are still spectacular, including a moose and the mountain itself.

Finally, we take a backpacking trip in some of the world’s most remote country. A Cessna 206 flies my family 150 miles from Kotzebue, crossing not more than half a dozen cabins on the way. We hike 25 miles up a stunning remote river valley and into a pass. At our final camp, the GPS says we are 50 miles from the closest village and therefore 50 miles from the closest road.

And absolutely last, we climb aboard Alaska Airlines for the return flight to Anchorage.

I hope you enjoyed this short trip to the Last Frontier, to the Land of the Midnight Sun. Please come find me in the dining hall, in my room (H-20), in the courtyard, or anywhere else if you want to chat about Alaska or anything else.

As for the current world, both Josh and I have higher resolution versions of this movie if you’re interested (I used huge pictures). Also, a good reading week to everyone. For better or worse, we’ll be home soon.

Reid



[BONUS: Here's a video interview you might enjoy that I did with Reid. Check it out!]

Dining at Yale

Imagine gathering some of the finest students in the nation in a picturesque hall, with long wooden tables, paintings of august personages framed on the walls, and simple chandeliers hanging from the vaulted wooden ceiling. Then add to this picture, delicious food: organic milk, loaves of bread and hot soup, fresh lettuce and arugula with a splash of balsamic vinegar, quiche, quarters of roast chicken, tricolor pasta, Brazilian marinated steak. Multiply by 12 for the number of residential colleges, add one for Commons—the “great hall” near the center of campus—and multiply by 3 meals a day. The final product is Yale’s dining system.

The dining hall is probably my favorite part in my day. After a lecture or an intense seminar, nothing beats going to lunch with the people in your class, or just hopping back “home” to have lunch with your residential college friends. And since your swipes work at any residential dining hall as well as Commons, its easy to set up a lunch date with a friend and chat, or get a quick meal at the dining hall closest to your next class. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, I get to combine all these elements—the students in Directed Studies like to stop by my college Timothy Dwight after lecture, because the Whitney Humanities Center is only a block away.

Let me show you some of the offerings available for dinner in Timothy Dwight dining hall:

A delicious green bean dish and chilaquiles verdes


tostones (fried green plantains)


Roast chicken with red beans and rice


Our fresh food cabinet: kiwis, pears, apples, oranges, soy milk, soy yogurt


My delicious balanced meal
(and a free notebook from Yale College Council on the left)

There are also soups (Italian Wedding Soup is the best), fresh breads, Cheerios, a whole table of dressings like balsamic vinegar, sesame oil, and soy sauce, hot coffee, juice, soda, and of course, ice cream. And if you honestly can't find anything you like, the staff will grill you something, like a hamburger or an omelette, on the spot. And there are tons of random events that make food even better--Sundae Sundays, birthday cupcakes, apple bushels, candy apples for Halloween. And finally, thanks to the Yale Sustainable Food Project, as much of the food as possible is organic--an experiment that started in Berkeley, giving the college the reputation of having the best dining hall on campus (they still hold the title in my opinion).

Candy apples... mmmmm

But beyond the delicious food and the beautiful settings, what’s best is the company. The conversations I’ve had over meals have been amazing—every Yalie brings something unique to the table, so to speak, so the conversations are lively and fun. The geography spread alone is enough for many conversations, since most everyone is from a different state. Politics, last night’s philosophy reading, and current events can pop up along frivolous college student banter—I distinctly remember talking about pancakes on election night, when our dining halls opened for a special Election Night Breakfast at 10 pm.

What was the inspiration for this post? I got back to school a little early from winter break last year, and so I invited the rest of the TD early arrivals to Sitar, a nearby Indian restaurant for lunch. We were all excited to see each other, chatting about our vacations over to naam bread and marsala, laughing at each other’s jokes. And someone made a comment: “You know what, this is like the TD dining hall.” I thought about it for a bit—good food, fun stories, great company. She was right.

(P.S. Zach Marks, who also works at the admissions office, sporadically writes a column on how to make your own recipes from the ingredients available at the dining hall: this one’s particularly good:

http://www.yaledailynews.com/articles/view/17571)