Epistles

It’s been a busy one (big surprise, huh?).  I can’t believe June is ending—I feel like my summer’s just starting.  Just to give a flavor of the calendar for the past month, consider two flights to Spain, eight hotels in thirteen days there (don’t forget two ferry rides to and from Morocco!), a three-flight / two-day journey home, and then another  three flights as I flew up to Oregon for work, back home for my brother’s graduation and then back to Oregon “for good” for the summer. 

So while I fully intended to write about my trip to Spain right when I got back—so it would be fresh and then I could write a shorter letter for the rest of June—obviously that didn’t happen.  That and I kept chickening out.  It’s quite difficult to write about travel without instilling envy in the reader and/or boring them to pieces.  But I persevered!  In interests of length, my thoughts about Spain are attached or you can go here for the goods. 

Okay, lame excuses and long explanations aside, what’s been going on? 

 

After Spain I had two four-day forays at home. 

The big event of being home was my brother’s graduation.  It was a nice ceremony—there were only two beach balls and all the speeches were brief.  James looked very handsome and delivered his part of the closing inspiration with eloquence.  It sounds very maternal to say that I’m proud of him, but I am so I’ll say it anyway. 

There are a lot of people of my class year with siblings of my brother’s class year, so hearing all the last names made me feel really old.  These were the *freshman* of my senior year.  And now they’re all heading off to college and whatnot.  Jeepers. 

Other than James’s graduation, nothing terribly exciting happened at home.  I hung out with my family.  James and I biked all the way from El Segundo to Santa Monica one morning.  I finally bought a new pair of running shoes.  Some friends and I went out to dinner and then saw “Get Smart.”  The usual.  :)

 

Right now I am in Salem, Oregon, doing a summer REU in math at Willamette University.  This is similar to what I did last summer—basically I do research and get paid for it.  What is math research, you say?  It’s pretty much like advanced problem solving.  There is some kind of problem and you are looking for the solution and/or a proof of a solution.  Questions in mathematics multiply like rabbits, so there’s never a lack of material to work on.  That, and mathematicians are constantly inventing/discovering new ideas that require definitions and theorems and connections.  One of my friends from Budapest is also doing research this summer and has a pretty good description of math research on her blog: click here and then go down to the second list of bullet points. 

In a nutshell, my research involves finding the obstacle number of graphs.  A graph is a mathematical object, basically a bunch of points (vertices) connected by lines (edges).  What we’re interested in is how many shapes you need to block or obstruct the “non-edges,” that is, all the lines you could have drawn between all the points but didn’t. 

Non-math highlights have been playing board games and watching at least ten math students/professors attempt to get a bocce ball out of the top of a very large prickly holly tree.  All of the Willamette researchers (there’s six of us total) have had group dinners once or twice, as well as some serious hearts competition.  This weekend there was an international music festival on the riverfront in downtown Salem.  I saw some dancing, taiko and listened to an excellent folk quartet that plays music from the Ukraine.  Next weekend I’m planning to head up to Portland to visit a friend.  I’m looking forward to a nice quiet summer, with time to start my post-graduation planning (eek! already? yes.) 

There are many ways to summarize travel.  We’ll begin with…

 

A) The schedule:

Madrid – Segovia* – Madrid* – Seville – Puerto de Santa Maria* – Tanger – Costa del Sol – Granada – Ubeda* – Valencia* – Madrid (El Escorial*)

* = concert night

This works well for organizing the trip, but not so well for description.  Then we have…

 

B) The sights:

El Parque del Retiro in central Madrid with palaces, fountains, lakes and a gorgeous rose garden, the famous aqueduct in Segovia, also its cinderellesque Alcazar, the Prado and work by the Spanish masters including Goya’s dark paintings, a flamenco show, Seville’s cathedral, the Kasbah and Medina in Tanger, resort beach in Puerto Banus, the Alhambra and its legendary gardens, Valencia’s old town, the City of Arts and Sciences with an opera house that looks like a set from Star Wars. 

 

Happily, traveling is much more than sights.  Otherwise all travel writing would be the same and eventually, rather boring.  Hence I present…

 

C) The stories 

- Josu.  Josu was our Spanish guide and loves loves loves to talk.  He regaled his bus with his own personal version of Spanish history, tidbits about cities and stories about his experiences as a tour guide.  He’s been a tour guide for over twenty years and you can tell he loves it.  

- in Segovia, a group of us toured the alcazar and went to the top of the main tower.  We’re climbing up this narrow spiral staircase when there’s an ominous chorus of voices.  Sure enough, it’s the class of forty-some Spanish schoolchildren we saw earlier, on the way down.  We had to wait it out as all these kids came down past us.  Loud and crowded.  Yay for spiral staircases. 

- My roommate Emily got sick, which isn’t funny so much as ironic because it happened on this year’s domestic tour too. 

- gelato gelato gelato YUM! 

- At the concert site in Ubeda, Mitch inadvertently discovered that there was a voltage difference between two railings when he rested his hands on both of them and was violently shocked. 

- After the flamenco show in Seville, about half the orchestra  followed Josu across town as he led us towards the “good places” to go out.  I ended up with a group of about eight people and we had quite an adventure finding a place.  Finally, thanks to Levi’s bravura, we got passes to an outdoor bar and after looking pathetic at the door, a nice bouncer let us in.  It was a great night—out under the sky, having mixed drinks and chatting with a Brazilian exchange student who’s studying in Seville and wanted to talk to some people in English. 

- Our first night in Valencia we had dinner in the hotel.  The vegetarians at our table had started cutting up the fruit and Kirsten (the orchestra’s president) had continued, cutting into a peach.  Suddenly she shrieks, jumps back and there are EARWIGS all over the table.  There was a nest of them in the peach.  It was the vegetarians (Mitch and Christy) who saved the day, trapping all the loose earwigs under the unused water glasses.  The hotel staff moved us to a new table and we got about six plates of free dessert as their apology. 

- The same night was “no-talent night.”  No-Talent Night is the often-epic always-ridiculous orchestra talent show.  It was somehow appropriate that No-Talent Night “Spain Edition” took place in the hotel’s disco, with all of the lights going.  Our conductor did his usual mime, Levi sang falsetto (causing Josu to cringe and actually leave the room), “A Plus Entertainment” made everyone cry by singing “Good night orchies…” and it was everything No-Talent Night should be.  Two acts that deserve special mention: The five-person, ten-minute rap about our trip that incorporated the annoying announcement from the Moroccan ferry that began “Ladies and gentlemen, we would like to inform you…”   And our final act was story time with Josu.  He was dragged center stage, sat down in a chair and requested to tell a story.  So he told us about the time he toured Rita Marley (Bob Marley’s wife) through Morocco, and lost the last dreadlock of Bob Marley in a taxicab in Madrid because he didn’t realize there was one more suitcase. 

- the guides that Josu had arranged for us in Valencia were…interesting.  My guide had candy-red hair. 

- It should be noted that trying to order Chinese food in Spanish is just about the weirdest thing ever. 

- Our beach day in Valencia made me realize why people go gaga over the Mediterranean coast.  That afternoon was *perfect.*  The sand was soft, it was sunny, the water was just right for swimming, the beach was shallow, there was ice cream…you really couldn’t ask for better. 

- After the beach day, Emily got some of the people in St. Olaf’s Ceidlh band together and had a jam session in the park next to the hotel.  Irish music turned into folk music in general and we ended up sitting around and singing everything from “Swing low sweet chariot” to “Sweet Baby James.” 

- We weren’t supposed to have wine with dinner on the nights we performed, and it was on the last night that we found out we weren’t supposed to have wine *ever* if it was a group dinner.  As this last night was our farewell dinner and it was *after* the concert, we were understandably annoyed.  Happily, thanks to a clever (or oblivious) wait staff, our dessert was a lemon sorbet – champagne concoction.  Heehee. 

- Those of us who were on the Delta flight, with a 4-5 hour layover in Atlanta, were a little jealous of the Continental folks who left Madrid after us and were supposed to arrive in Minneapolis an hour and a half earlier.  At least we *were* jealous until we heard that their plane from Madrid to Newark was two hours late and they all missed the connecting flight.  Three people had to wait until the next day—everyone else got home later than we Atlanta folk.  Irony? 

 

Some of the stories are funny and some are serious.  But they all contribute to that final fund of travel experience that results in reflection and…

 

D)  The serious stuff:

I’ll just plunge in and say that once you have lived (or possibly traveled extensively) in a foreign country, travel changes.  Everywhere I went in Spain, I kept being drawn back to ideas, observations and attitudes I gained in Budapest.  Comparisons abounded.  For me, it was a bunch of random flashbacks—they have the same kind of pedestrian lights in Spain as in Budapest.  Or when you go to the grocery store, you don’t just pick up your fruits and vegetables—you have to get them weighed before you go to the check-out.  When I went into the post office in Seville, hoping to get only the necessary extra postage for my postcards (instead of buying whole new stamps), my experience with trying to change money in a Hungarian bank paid off.  I knew that you had to find the number machine, press the transaction you want to make, and then go to the window when your number is called.  I also got a Spanish phone card to work on the first try, which is better than any of the times I called home in Budapest. 

I remembered aspects of abroad life that I’d forgotten about, mainly the problem of communication.  I speak about as much Spanish as I do Hungarian, and while Spanish is similar to French (which I do understand), communication was still a game and not just a given.  On this trip I recalled the thrill of being able to communicate with someone despite a poor vocabulary: Saying “Buenos Dias!” to the truck driver and having them say it back.  Having a woman ask me “Aseos es aqui?”, understanding in my head without translating and then waving my arm in the appropriate direction saying “Si, si!”  Successfully buying a phone card after talking to a newsstand owner, a woman in a tabaco shop, and finally the man who sold it to us—using hand waving, writing down numbers and discovery of the words we needed along the way (me: “so ‘cabin’ means public telephone…I hope.  I wonder if ‘tarjeta’ means card.  ‘telephone tarjeta?’”).  My conversation with a local shepherd on the road from Valencia to Madrid wasn’t succesful in conveying ideas because neither of us quite knew what the other was saying.  But it was still meaningful to me because we were both trying so hard to talk to each other, despite the language barrier.  

Finally (and I noticed this even while in Budapest), tourism feels quite different after you’ve lived abroad.  When we reached a new place, I always felt like my first priority was to settle down, find a grocery store, and get oriented.  I didn’t really want to go out and eat at fancy restaurants or even see all the sights.  I was pretty content to ramble, eat lots of baguette and watch the locals.  Seville was ideal—it was a festival day when we arrived so there were lots of people out and about and Emily and I just wandered the streets, getting lost, taking it all in. 

 

Our day in Morocco brought all of my travel experience and attitudes together into one unified, multicolored collage. 

We arrived and I remembered that this was Africa and we were in Muslim/Arabic country.  As we walked the streets to lunch with our eccentric guide in robe and fez, I felt like a complete foreigner.  Little things like Arabic writing on signs and children selling candy were uncomfortable.  This place was crowded and strange and I was definitely not going to walk around alone. 

Then we had lunch.  Hands-down, the best meal of tour.  Our lunch in Morocco consisted of bread, a tomato-base soup with cinnamon, kebabs, a pile of couscous and chicken, terribly unhealthy fried pastry things and delicious mint tea.  My kind of meal.  And somewhere in the middle of it, I changed my mind.  I was partially encouraged by Emily, who wanted to walk around on our own.  But I also started drawing on a confidence rooted in my Budapest experiences.  After being stranded on a Romanian train platform in the middle of nowhere, after having someone try to steal my purse, after having to work up the courage to do something as simple as buying a train ticket…well, walking down a street with beggars and pushy salesmen isn’t so scary anymore.  Emily and I agreed to start with the guided tour and maybe branch out on our own. 

After lunch, we went back to the hotel and waited around until the tours left.  While waiting we chatted with our guide Abdul…in French!  We talked about language and being American.  Abdul complimented Emily on her accent and told me that I looked “classic,” which was meant that I looked more French than I did American.  Whether or not he was sincere, it was still gratifying because I had been making a deliberate effort to appear less American and more European in our travels. 

The tour began.  It was mostly a ramble through the tiny alleys of the Kasbah, with a stop to view the strait and Spain on the other side.  Then came the unfortunate part of the tour.  Unsurprisingly, the tour guides were in cahoots with a local rug shop and we were all dragged in for an “art show.”  That’s when Emily and I decided to leave.  We sneaked down the stairs but were stopped at the door and could only get out after idling in the shop for five minutes and then firmly claiming that we had a right to go. 

Emily and I were never unsafe in Tanger, but the next couple of hours were definitely less than comfortable.  Because of the time of day there weren’t many women and children in the streets.  At one point we practically speed-walked through a street when we realized we were the only women there.  Josu had said that the girls could wear “anything they wanted” in Morocco, but we would have been under considerably more scrutiny if Emily hadn’t changed out of her tank top and if I had chosen to wear shorts.  As it was, we were very obviously checked out by several men—a complete looking up and down.  While it wasn’t threatening, it did feel very demeaning and not comfortable at all.  We ducked into an internet café (the cheapness of internet was compromised by the ridiculously confusing Arabic keyboard) after wandering around a bit, which turned out to be a great way to beat the heat, wait for more women to come out on the streets and hear the Muslim call to prayer. 

We really enjoyed walking around after that.  Emily bargained for shoes.  I bargained for a scarf.  We ran into some other orchestra members and chatted.  We found the row of spice stalls and charmed the spice seller with our inane French. 

Speaking French was truly interesting.  It was not only easier to communicate, but it was the ticket to an instant smile.  At least three people seemed surprised that we were American, even though we were clearly not locals.  The spice seller said that we didn’t have American faces.  But there may have been more…speaking French was just one way that Emily and I made a deliberate effort to blend in.  We walked arm in arm and spoke French to each other.  We were walking to the beach, when an older man said something to us in French, clearly expecting us to understand.  He seemed surprised to hear our English and conveyed that he had been complimenting us (although it was a confusing conversation…something about a Moroccan proverb about walking dogs?...I still think he might have been trying to hit on us).  Having the ability to fit in, even just a little, was really powerful.  It made me wish I had learned more Hungarian when I was in Budapest, because that kind of “belonging” would have been really awesome. 

After walking on the beach, it was getting late and we needed to get back to the hotel for dinner.  I thought I knew where we were on the map, but we stopped in the nearest hotel and asked for directions anyway.  One look at us and our destination and the concierge suggested we take a taxi.  So we did, ending our day with a hair-raising trip through the streets of Tanger in one of the tiny turquoise taxis that infest the city. 

I made the most of Morocco, taking charge of my worries, enjoying the color, and being as non-obtrusively-American as possible.  At the end of the day I think Emily and I were justifiably proud of ourselves. 

 

I’ll finish with the music, because this was an orchestra tour after all:

 

E) The songs

Our first performance was memorable in a bad way—we had to play in a rain site hotel that was in the middle of important business negotiations.  Apparently we made too much noise while setting up before dinner because they then locked us out until five minutes before the concert was supposed to begin.  We hadn’t rehearsed.  That was bad. 

Happily, all of our following concerts were very positive.  We had plenty of time to rehearse at the next site and it was gorgeous to boot.  This courtyard at Alcala de Henares was…beautiful.  It was a joy to play there.  We experienced rhythmic tri-clapping in Puerto de Santa Maria for an encore.  Our final concert was bittersweet and beautiful as everyone prepared to say good-bye—to seniors, to friends, to orchestra.  I hope the audience caught on that we aren’t normally that emotional on stage.  

It was fascinating to play for the Spanish audiences.  They really appreciated the artistry of an orchestral master like Samuel Barber.  “La Virgen de la Macarena,” which featured our tour soloist Marty Hodel was a hit every single night.  Normally when we play on tour, I feel like we’re bringing “high music” to the “masses.”  But being in Spain made me realize that making music is a collective experience between the orchestra and audience.  The audience enjoys and appreciates; the orchestra plays for its members and its listeners.  It’s a continual movement of focus that includes everyone.  In Ubeda, I thought that having audience members on the sides of the orchestra would be distracting.  Rather, it made the concert more enjoyable as I saw the reactions of the audience and knew that they were really watching us. 

F) The summary

I didn’t really know what to expect when I boarded a plane in Minneapolis on May 26^th.  Through the country of Spain, the family of orchestra, and my own self, I formed a unique, creative, exhausting, liberating, confusing, astonishing, fulfilling experience.  No matter what I was or wasn’t looking for when I arrived—I found something that’ll be worth remembering in years to come. 

The first Sunday in May was spent going to the math department picnic and the Chapel Choir Oratorio concert.  The math picnic was fun.  It was a grill-out in a nearby park.  Normally there is a traditional softball game; however, there weren’t quite enough people for two teams so the crowd fell back on croquet, ultimate frisbee and the tetrahedron-like climbing structure in the park.  

I biked back from the math picnic and headed straight for the oratorio concert.  Ole Orchestra normally plays at Oratorio, but we were exempt this year because we had just played for the Andrew Carter festival a week earlier.  It was nice just to sit in the audience and listen to the music without worrying about performing the music. 

This first week of May was the calm before the storm.  Not much was going on.  I had ongoing work to do, but nothing major.  The highlight of the week was probably having international dance class outside.  We ran through several of our favorite dances and learned a new Russian mixer out on the grass.  There is something wonderful and festive about dancing outside…maybe someone needs to bring an outdoor folk dance movement to the States.  

I capped this somewhat relaxing week with evenings full of entertainment.  First was the Senior Soloists concert on Friday, May 9.
I love Senior Soloists.  It may be my favorite concert of the school year, mostly because the soloists are always fabulous, the pieces interesting and varied, *and* the orchestra plays two showy pieces on its own.  This year was no exception.  I loved the breadth and quality of the programming.  Kenny played a bombastic and positively window-shattering Widor organ concerto;  James illumined a piano concerto by Saint-Saens, which is exquisitely virtuosic.  There were two double-reed solos—Luke played a bassoon concerto and our two principal oboists played a duet for oboes and orchestra.  And then there were the three vocalists—all sopranos, all singing songs in foreign languages, all stunning.  The fantastic thing about the singers was that each piece was unique to the singer’s voice and personality—Laura sang a lush romantic aria, Maranda a light French song and Lauren a humorous Rossini classic.  And our orchestra alone pieces were both dramatic—an arrangement of music from Barber’s Medea ballet music, and a piece composed for our Spain tour, Dervish. 

After this incredible concert, I headed over to a dorm lounge where a student jazz combo, The Shamen, were having a release party for their new (as in, recorded that week) album, available for free!  (You can download it here if you want.)  I know Ben, the pianist, quite well (he was in Great Con with me) and Jacob (trumpet) and Christy (bass) are both in orchestra.  So I feel close to the group simply for that reason.  AND they turn out some fabulous tunes.  All the members are ridiculously talented and when they get together to jam, it is an absolute delight.  That was a great way to cap off my Friday night. 
My Saturday night entertainment consisted of seeing the spring lyric theatre production Company by Stephen Sondheim.  It was quite long and the songs were about half-and-half winners, but because it’s Olaf, the show was very well done and it was a lot of fun.  The only other Sondeheim show I’ve seen is Into the Woods, but a trend I see in both musicals is a focus less on a conventional coherent plot and more of an emphasis on ideas—trying to get you to think about a certain issue or the inside of a particular character.  Company is about marriage—what it means to be alone or with someone, married, daily life, with kids, etc.  An interesting show. 

Of course Saturday also marked the beginning of the intensifying end of semester busy-ness.  I got rid of some stuff at the Ytterboe yard sale.  I also aquired some things.  It was quite a deal though—Emily and I got a hand mixer, a chair for our room and assorted goodies for about 10 bucks.  My favorite purchases were some horrifically cheesy plastic goblets and a pair of awesome sandals. 
Oh, and we also bought a refrigerator.  And received a carpet for free.  Which was both blessing and curse, because the next day was the one day of large furniture / carpet / fridge storage.  Our carpet might have been free, but I still had to spend about three hours helping the owners roll it up and get it out of their room, trek it down to storage, wait for storage to open, and get it into storage.  Emily’s futon had to go into storage too, so I spent a good portion of my Sunday afternoon schlepping stuff.  After it was all over, my friends and I went to the Pause (student run fast food place on campus) and celebrated with soft serve.  It was hard to get up the gumption to move after we were done. 

So without much of a break in the weekend (between music and moving stuff), the last week of classes began.  I had my “final” for voice class on Monday—a recital of all voice class students.  Altogether, one of the most enjoyable finals I have ever taken.  :)  It was fun to hear the other classes and then to cheer on the representatives of our class.  I sang well, so I was pretty pleased with that. 
I also had my audition for re-entry into band on Monday.  (Part of the reason my weekend was shot—I did a lot of practicing.)  It wasn’t the best I’ve ever played, but Dr. Mahr accepted me back into the St. Olaf Band for next year and I am thrilled about that. 

Speed forward to the last day of class (Wednesday).  Our final animation project for Computer Science was due.  My group had spent a ton of time on Monday and Tuesday working on it (I know I put in a good 12 hours or so in two days).  It was finished, kind of, and then completed late in the afternoon.  A good thing to have off my plate.  Here’s a link to the finished product. 
The last day of class was also the last day of daily chapel.  It was one of those end-of-year bittersweet moments.  For the seniors, it’s the last daily chapel and for everyone else it’s the last chapel until next year.  Some tears were shed during the singing of hymns.  But the message (given jointly by Pastor Benson, Pastor Keonig, and Andy, the pastoral intern), was timely, humorous and loving towards the community.  So I left with a feeling of warmth—especially after three regular attenders of chapel chose to dance for the entire postlude, which was one of my favorite organ pieces.  

Now begins the painful part of my narrative.  By Friday afternoon, I had to complete an 8-10 page philosophy paper on the self-appointed topic of “facticity and freedom in the philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre.”  On Wednesday afternoon, I had essentially nothing except some scrawled quotes, vague half-formed ideas and a rudimentary understanding of the 200ish pages I had skimmed from his first major work, Being and Nothingness.  I did not enjoy those two days of the semester.  Luckily, the paper got done and turned out decently, but it definitely could have used a few more revisions and been written with considerably less anxiety.    

However, once the paper was done, I was essentially done.  I still had four finals to go, but after writing a paper, most exams feel trivial (to me at least).  So I didn’t stress too much about my history final, which I took Saturday morning.  And it went just fine. 
Having gotten the major events of the week out of the way, I spent Saturday afternoon attending another final (the advanced poetry class had a poetry reading for their final and I went to hear my friend Laura), and finishing the day with a girl’s night.  Eight of us went into downtown Northfield to have waffles at the waffle bar and then a smaller group of us watched “Enchanted.” 

 

Okay, thus far we’ve had a couple of concerts, a paper, a project, a final, and an audition.  All good?  Next up is…the triathalon!  St. Olaf always has a triathalon on the Sunday of finals and this year I participated for the second time.  All the parts separately are not so bad, but the transition from biking to running is the absolute worst.  Ugh. 
I went straight from the triathalon to the last church service, which is always an outdoor service.  We walk around to the various buildings on campus and recognize the different parts of college life.  Our “theme hymn” was a Spanish sounding praise tune and we were accompanied by a volunteer crew of trumpets and violinists, creating a very festive mariachi-like feel to the service. 
Sunday was also instrument pack day for Spain—all the percussion was being shipped over there on Monday, so we spent the hour after rehearsal crating the nearly thousand pounds of equipment that we’re going to need. 

This week has been more relaxed.  I took my CS final on Monday and also had my final pottery critique.  I took my philosophy final yesterday.  It’s nice to be done with everything academic. 
Orchestra definitely isn’t over though—we’ve had rehearsal every day in preparation for both celebration weekend and our tour to Spain. 
Packing is the other ongoing project.  I put the last of my stuff into storage yesterday too, so that was a good feeling.  Storage is always an adventure.  Emily and I made a box for our refrigerator and carried it from one dorm to another to put into storage.  Yesterday night was the final night of storage and I helped two people carry boxes down.  Tuesday night was the night I carried my bookshelf down four flights of stairs.  Basically, I’ve carried a great many heavy box-like objects in the past few days and my arms have been perpetually sore. 

But the semester is finally over!  Hard to believe…yesterday was full of people using up their Cage money by buying ice cream cones, the white masking tape X’s appearing on doors as people move out, the general mess of boxes and tubs and furniture lying about…

Whenever one can spend time on campus without the pressure of classwork, it’s a gift.  I plan to spend the next few days relaxing and relishing my time on campus.  This entails:  Reading books.  Hanging out with people.  Watching movies.  Getting ready for Spain.  Going for walks.  Enjoying the gorgeous spring weather and green leaves that have finally arrived on campus!  

I’m going to be one of the bloggers for the “official” St. Olaf Orchestra in Spain blog, so check it out in the next week or so!  

Computer Science

 

[Introductions on the second day of class]
Leif: “David missed the first day of class because he was at a sweet frisbee tournament.”
Prof. Olaf: “Was it a sweet one?”
David: “It was a sweet one.” 

[when evaluating what code ‘means’]
Prof. Olaf: “The meaning of 2 is…2.”  

[learning to write cond clauses]
Prof. Olaf: “If the temperature is greater than fifty, we’re going to wear short sleeves because we’re Minnesotan and we can.”

[the truth of programming]
Prof. Olaf: “There’s a fine line sometimes between randomness and being creative…” 

[Fibonnaci]
Prof. Olaf: “This is an insightful italian with an interest in indestructible rabbits” 

[More programming genius]
Prof. McKelvey: “This is a statement which is true, which is always nice.”  

[When discussing highlights of spring break]
“I wrote an article about slime mold.” 
“Well, we all have to do something over break.” 

[The title of a final animation project]
“It’s probably not going to be called “Pinata.”  It’ll be ‘how my drunk mother ruined my birthday’ or something.” 

 

Kierkegaard 

[Class discussion, in a nutshell]
Prof. Marino: “You guys have been smoking grass or something…there’s good stuff here!” 

[An exhortation to not procrastinate]
Prof. Marino: “Don’t think of this as a paper topic, think of it as an exercise in the self…”  

[Ah, ye existentialists…]
Prof. Marino: “Me, I hate optimism.” 

Prof. Marino: “Good old existentialists.  Just can’t wait to die.”  

[Re: Sartre]
Prof. Marino: “He was doing hallugengins long before they were popular.”  

[Re: the narrator in Dostoevsky’s “Notes from Underground”]
Prof. Marino: “He should try some meditation baby.  Some chamomile tea might be good.”  

[Paper requirements]
Prof. Marino: “Actually, yes, I'm going to require that you use both a footnote and a semicolon at least once in your essay.”

[While discussing Sartre]
Barry: “Maybe I’m just too stupid to understand it, but…”
Prof. Marino: “Bad faith!  You’re treating yourself as an object!  Barry!  Come on now!”
 

[During the midterm review session]
“Teleological suspension of the ethical for ten points.”
“Ooh, me!  For Gryffindor!"

[Midterm review, again]
Mitch: “Is anybody in this room sober?”  

[Existentialist people are rockstars]
“Baptiste is such a rockstar!”
“Hegel was like a rockstar.”
“Wagner was a rockstar back then.” 

[Pleasure and pain as viewed by Schopenhauer]
Barry: An animal can’t forsee pleasure.  So when it comes it’s like…holy crap!” 

[Re: Kierkegaard]
“He’s a brilliant man but he frustrates the hell out of me.”

[A slow day in class, while discussing despair and depression]
Prof. Marino: You guys are a little subdued today.
Me: It's the weather. 
Jay: It's a chemical imbalance.
David: It's external factors. 

Modern Scandinavia

[On history:]
Prof: Nichol: “Here’s the definition of history: if it happened five minutes ago—it’s mine!"

[The view of certain political philosophers]
Prof: Nichol: “…the natural state of humans is naked, happy and peaceable.”  

[after humming the 1812 overture]
Prof: Nichol: “And we will *all* do the cannons, thank you very much!” 

[independence of thought…]
Prof: Nichol: “…except on our better, stronger, more creative individual days, we think what we’re told to think.” 

[Describing the Corsair]
Prof: Nichol: “Somewhere between ‘People’ and ‘The New Yorker.’” 

[Re: calling the high middle ages dark]
Prof: Nichol: “good grief for a study in presumption!” 

Prof: Nichol: “Sin is an equal opportunity avocation.” 

[Re: Grundtvig’s excessive writing]
Prof: Nichol: “He’s just as much a criminal in that respect as Luther.” 

[Re: exams] 
Prof: Nichol: “First is preparation.  Second to show what you know.  Third, to provide data for my miserable task of assigning grades, which is right up there with committees in my book regarding things of academic life that I could do without.” 

[Re: WWI] 
Prof: Nichol: “…may be the stupidist war on record, and that’s quite an accomplishment, given the history of human warefare.”  

[Quoting a grandmother and granddaughter, the latter which cannot understand why the former left Norway] 
“Why did you leave beautiful Norway for the flat midwest?”
“You can’t eat fjords.” 

[Noise is heard outside]
Prof: Nichol: What’s going on out there?
Teddy: That would be a group of girls walking.
[a few minutes later, more noise is heard]
Prof: Nichol: Okay Teddy, give us a report. 
Teddy: This time it’s men *and* women.  

Voice

[The secret to good singing]
Prof. Wilkerson: “You want me to ‘opera-ify’ that?”

[How to pronounce vowels]
Prof. Wilkerson: “That’s ‘ay.’  Like from Canada, ‘eh?’” 

[On nervousness]
Prof. Wilkerson: “The nerves attack your singing areas.  What is that?  Why can’t we get nervous on the balls of our feet?”  

[On perceived improvement]
Prof. Wilkerson: “I was going to be really impressed.  Now I’m just really sorta impressed.”  

[Re: Rise Up Ye Men of God]
Pierce: “It’s sexist but it sounds better.”  

[On singing]
Pierce: “I don’t sing, I just come to this class and try.”  

[Rachel has a beautiful voice]
Prof. Wilkerson: “Unfortunately for you perhaps, you have ability.” 
Rachel: “Crap.” 

[Freedom?]
Prof. Wilkerson: “You have the freedom to play around with this.” 
Danny: “Dang.” 
Prof. Wilkerson: “I know, give me specifics.”  

[Re: Making our voice journals look used]
Prof. Wilkerson: “Write in different color pen…spill coffee on it…”
Pierce: “Tears…”

Pottery 

[During final critiques]
Kirsten: “I don’t really know what you could use this for…”
Ron: “It’s an object of visual appreciation.”

 

Again, not the *best* paper I've ever written...could have used another draft or two. 
But for what it's worth--this is the final paper for my philosophy class (entitled Kierkegaard, but really more like Existentialism 101). 

Condemned To Be Free – But How Free? 

Existentialist writing resounds with the theme of freedom.  Attitudes toward freedom—anguish, activity, potential, despair—encapsulate existentialist thought and its ambivalences toward the project of human life.  French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre put it best when he said “Man is condemned to be free” (“Existentialism” 350)  On one hand man is free to define himself and realize any potential he chooses; on the other hand the full weight of responsibility for these choices falls on man’s shoulders.  This balance causes the existentialist some difficulty. 

I find another source of ambivalence in the definition of freedom itself.  To Sartre, freedom is anguished because there is no set of rules to guide it.  However, for me the more pressing question is not how I exercise my freedom, but how much I can exercise my freedom.  When I examine my personal experience I can cite many instances where I did not feel free.  There is the example of sheer physical impossibility—if I jump off a building with no external aid I will never be able to fly—but also the problem of contradiction between what I want to do and what I actually do.  I may feel that my primary desire is to stay healthy, but I find that desire contradicted by my actions as I skip a run or eat the extra cookie.  These inconsistencies bother me.  Freedom of choice is an integral part of human existence, yet it so often seems compromised.  What would an existentialist say about this apparent lack of freedom?  I will continue to call Sartre, one of existentialism’s flagship authors, to explore an existentialist perspective on where and how the necessary quality of freedom can be limited or compromised. 

Sartre immediately recognizes the practical objections placed upon freedom.  He acknowledges that “the decisive argument which is employed by common sense against freedom consists in reminding us of our own impotence.  Far from being able to modify our situation at our whim, we seem to be unable to change ourselves” (Sartre “Being” 619).  Sartre wants to answer the objections of people who experience life as I do—as an often constricted, not liberating series of actions.  He is also speaking to the philosophical description of this experience—determinism.  Sartre will refute determinists who argue that human actions are pre-determined and that people have no control over what they do.  He finds the logic of those who denounce freedom to be superficial, incomplete or simply irrelevant.  

To answer the skeptics, Sartre begins by exploring the relation between freedom and its perceived limits.  For Sartre the existence of some obstacle—perhaps unable to be overcome—is not a reason to claim people are not free.  He claims that the obstacles (what he calls the “coefficient of adversity”) that seem to limit our freedom are actually created by freedom itself—“for it is by us—i.e., by the preliminary positing of an end—that this coefficient of adversity arises” (Sartre “Being” 620).  Paradoxically, it is only by setting a coal that obstacles materialize as obstacles to obstruct it.[1]  Sartre gives an example, describing a mountain that is impossible to climb.  In itself, the mountain simply exists as an objective thing.  It becomes a problem only when  I make a mountain climbing goal.  Then my “freedom” is limited because I have made mountain-climbing my goal and thus created a path that can be blocked by an obstacle, in this case the mountain.  If I choose not to climb the mountain, that limit to my freedom is irrelevant.  Furthermore, if mountain-climbing is my goal, while I may not be able to achieve the action, I can still choose to attempt the climb.  While the ends of actions may be impossible, people still have the freedom to make them into goals.  Sartre believes that it is this determining of goals that constitutes our true freedom.  In summary, “it is therefore our freedom which constitutes the limits which it will subsequently encounter” (Sartre “Being” 620). 

This last quote highlights the real issue at hand.  The question of freedom is a problem of definition.  Two different kinds of freedom are present in the discussion.  First there is what I would call “acting freedom”—the ability to do something.  I am free to act in ways that are physically or situationally possible.  I am free to climb the mountain if I have the physical strength and the mountain is climbable.  Thus, acting freedom is subject to the limits of situation.  However, the limitations of acting freedom do not invalidate human freedom as a totality, because freedom, as Sartre sees it, runs deeper than the ability to take action.  The essential freedom at hand is “autonomy of choice” (Sartre “Being” 622).  It is a freedom to choose rather than do.  Sartre’s freedom consists of being free to choose or set goals for oneself, not necessarily being able to complete the tasks.[2]  Sartre provides a clear example by describing a prisoner in jail.  The prisoner’s acting freedom is clearly limited by his position in the prison.  He is not physically free.  However, his freedom of choice is not compromised; “he is always free to try to escape” (Sartre “Being” 622).  The prisoner is still free because he can make choices about how to respond to his situation.  He has the options of remaining quietly in prison or trying to escape and he retains the ability to make that choice.  The prisoner’s faculty of choice is not constrained by the prison walls. 

From this distinction of freedom, human intuition is partially confirmed—people are creatures of limitation.  The external freedom to act is subject to the specifics of a situation.  As such, I would like to seek out a better understanding of what constitutes an actual limitation of acting freedom.  For example, if a runner loses a race, was he “not free” to win because the other runners were all better than him, or was he free (in this case synonymous with able) to win and simply didn’t try hard enough?  My question is this: when does an obstacle become insurmountable, and therefore limiting of a person’s acting freedom? 

One might think that Sartre is not really concerned with this type of limitation because he is more interested in establishing the importance of a person’s freedom to choose rather than act.  It could be tossed aside as an irrelevant question—as long as we are free to choose an action, even if we have no guarantees of completing it, then that is what matters.  However, Sartre is willing to address the dilemma of action’s boundaries. Accepting the conventional “acting” definition of freedom, Sartre says, “A choice is said to be free if it is such that it could have been other than what it is” (“Being” 582).  In other words, a free choice must allow for the possible fulfillment of at least two, if not more potential outcomes.  Sartre presents the scenario of taking a hike with some friends.  At some point, Sartre postulates that he (as a hiker) will become tired and give up.  He assumes that one of his friends will reprimand him for being weak, “meaning thereby that I was free—that is, not only was my act not determined by any thing or person, but also I could have succeeded in resisting my fatigue longer” (Sartre “Being” 583).  Here is the question of true limits.  Could Sartre have kept hiking?  If so, his action was a free choice.  However, if he couldn’t go on, it was not free.  Was there the option of going on?  The short answer is yes, Sartre says, “I could have done otherwise….But at what price?” (“Being” 585). 

Here Sartre enters upon a convoluted explanation of his action via layers of choice.  He says, “If….I wish to understand under what conditions I can suffer a fatigue as unbearable, it will not help to address oneself to so-called factual givens, which are revealed as being only a choice; it is necessary to examine this choice itself and to see whether it is not explained within the perspective of a larger choice” (Sartre “Being” 586).  What made the fatigue “too much?”  Sartre asks us to look beyond immediate cause and examine the possibility of global choice.  Sartre’s choice to stop hiking is not a mere physical response.  Instead, the limitation comes from a kind of “meta-choice” that Sartre made earlier, when he chose to view fatigue as a sign that he should stop acting.  He contrasts his own attitude with that of his friend: “my companion’s fatigue is lived in a vaster project, of a trusting abandon to nature, of a passion consented to in order that it may exist at full strength, and at the same time the project of sweet mastery and appropriation (Sartre “Being” 587).  Sartre and his friend made different global choices about the kinds of people they wished to be and this choice shaped their daily actions.  An earlier free choice limited their freedom to act in certain ways later.  Therefore, Sartre acknowledges that he was free to go on hiking, but only if he was willing to exercise his freedom of choice and overthrow his previous perspective of physical pain in favor of something different.  Within the context of his earlier choice he is not free, but globally, he is.  There has been a return to the concept of freedom limiting freedom (as in the creation of obstacles).  A person can exercise his essential freedom by making a choice; the choice can in turn affect his acting freedom. 

So much for the superficial boundaries to freedom.  The problems of situation and choosing a life plan will emerge again later, after Sartre has shown that the two are not only linked to acting freedom but essential freedom as well.  To reach that point, it is necessary to examine Sartre’s claim that human are free despite any limits on their action because they still possess the essential autonomy of choice that defines human existence. 

Sartre’s conception of freedom as a core element of human existence grows straight out.  So I will place the notion of freedom into the context of existential thought with the help of Sartre’s essay entitled, appropriately enough, “Existentialism.”  In “Existentialism” Sartre presents the basic underlying tenet of existentialism—common across all religious and moral differences—that ultimately man’s existence precedes his essence.  He gives the counter-example of a simple man-made object: a paper—cutter.  Sartre says “for the paper-cutter, essence—that is, the ensemble of both the production routines and the properties which enable it to be both produced and defined—precedes existence.  Thus the presence of the paper-cutter or book in front of me is determined” (Sartre “Existentialism” 344).  The creation of a useful object and the characteristics of that object establish what it is as it comes into existence.  The purpose of an object defines it.  Not so with humans.  There is no object-maker, creating humans for a predefined purpose or role.  No spirit or ultimate design represents a person before he physically exists or defines him as he comes into existence.  Sartre puts it quite clearly when he says, “Man exists, turns up, appears on the scene, and only afterwards, defines himself” and “Man is nothing else but what he makes of himself” (“Existentialism” 345).  Man comes to existence as a vacuum.  First there is mere existence and a series of choices and actions fill this existence until a person is defined.  Freedom arrives on the scene through this process of self-definition.  Sartre says, “If existence really does precede essence, there is no explaining things away by reference to a fixed and given human nature.  In other words, there is no determinism, man is free, man is freedom” (“Existentialism” 349).  The choices that a person makes in order to define himself are not determined.  To claim so would be to introduce a contradiction with the existentialist foundation; determinism implies that man has an unchangeable essence that precedes existence.  If man has no fixed essence he cannot be determined and therefore he must be free.  Furthermore, as a free agent, he is fully responsible for all of his choices and actions.  Sartre claims that “existentialism’s first move is to make every man aware of what he is and to make the full responsibility of his existence rest on him” (“Existentialism” 346).  The foundational ideas of existentialism serve as the main argument for the essential freedom of human beings.  If one accepts the concept of existence before essence, freedom is a necessary corollary. 

Sartre claims that this freedom—the essential freedom to make choices that define oneself—is what really matters.  He believes all people possess it.  Freedom is not a state or quality of existence, it is existence.  But I pose the question again.  Is this valid?  Is it really true that all people possess the ability to choice or can even this most essential freedom be compromised? 

Sartre acknowledges one undeniable limitation of the essential human ability to choose.  He calls it the facticity of freedom because it is a necessary, unchanging rule that dictates the way freedom operates.  This facticity is “the fact of not being able not to be free” (Sartre “Being” 625).  Freedom cannot negate itself.  It cannot be chosen as a way—to make the choice of freedom or non-freedom implies an already existing freedom of choice.  As Sartre says, “we should be referred to infinity” (“Being” 623).  Freedom is necessarily an all or nothing.  If freedom exists, it must be exercised.  Even the refusal to make a choice is a choice because it is the choice not to exercise freedom of choice.  We may choose to be unfree but only in the context of an already existing freedom.  Sartre succinctly states “We are a freedom which chooses but we do not choose to be free” (“Being” 623).  This one choice we cannot make si the one limiting factor of the freedom to choose—its facticity. 

One the surface, this may seem like an abstract philosophical point.  However this one limitation of essential freedom links back to the previously discussed limits of a person’s acting freedom.  If the freedom to choose must exist, it must be used in the world.  As free beings, humans must make (or not make) choices that are manifested in the world around them.  The making of these choices creates obstacles and Sartre has stumbled unto “the paradox of freedom: there is freedom only in a situation, and there is a situation only through freedom” (Sartre “Being” 629).  Freedom cannot be acted out in the abstract—it must take place in a space and time, or a situation.  However, the situation is only created because the person has made a choice about what he wants to do.  He goes on to discuss the situational factors of place, past, body and relation to others, but in all cases, he returns to the theme of things that we cannot change being transformed into relative obstacles. 

I’m not entirely sure what this means if one tries to draw broad conclusions about Sartre’s limitations of freedom.  I have a lingering question.  Sartre has been discussing facts that exist (a mountain, a past, a feeling).  But can the non-existence of something limit a person’s freedom to choose?  I am thinking of the particular example of an inner city neighborhood.  Some residents may make the choice to try to leave, others will make the choice to stay.  All of these decisions are free, even if they are not actualized, because the deciders made their own choice.  But what of those people who are ignorant of a second option?  If there is a person who does not know that a better life exists, she cannot choose it and therefore cannot be free to choose in any real sense. 

I think Sartre would say that this ignorance is irrelevant.  It only arises as an obstacle if the woman wants to make the choice for a better life and because she can’t (due to her ignorance), it is a simple fact.  The lack of that single choice does not invalidate all freedom.  The person can still make choices within the sphere of what they do know. 

Could there ever be a situation where all of a person’s choices become non-existent and they are unfree?  Sartre does not speak to such an extreme case, but based on his opinions and arguments, I would guess that he would hold out for freedom.  There always seems to be some small sphere for each person where he has the ability to make choices and act on them.  A person always has some measure of control.  And even a completely unfree person existed, I think Sartre would say that they had been free at some point. 

To Sartre, beginning with the existential premise of existence preceding essence, all people posses the freedom of choice.  Human freedom may seem limited, but to Sartre these limitations arise from the decisions made by human freedom.  Ultimately, in some form or another, all people must and can make choices from a deep essential freedom that in turn constructs the potential of their freedom to act in the world. 

Not the best paper I've ever written, but the subject was interesting and I did my best.  This is just for fun, really...

Fairy Tales Both Light and Dark

Denmark’s Golden Age In the Work of Hans Christian Andersen

 

No story exists in a vacuum.  Danish author Hans Christian Andersen is no exception, despite the apparent triviality of his most famous work—fairy tales.  However, even these stories, often meant for children, are distinct reflections of Andersen’s world.  In his tales, Andersen wrestles with Denmark’s Golden Age society: its highly stratified and inflexible social order, the harsh realities of daily life, and intellectual and religious movements. 

Social structures and their accompanying suffocation feature most prominently in Andersen’s works, as Sven Rossel notes that one of Andersen’s primary themes is “an unmistakable, almost nihilistic, attack on bourgeois cultural ideals” (229).  Denmark has a long history of rigid class structures.  Bredsdorff claims that, “In Danish society of the early nineteenth century it was almost impossible to break through class barriers.  Almost the only exceptions were