U Chicago
Monday, August 21, 2006
Day 2 in Chicago
I woke up at six to my alarm, went back to sleep, woke back up at 6:30. Dad kept complaining about everything as usual- today, he happened to pick the fact that it’d be too hard to get to the 10:30 info tour. And then he did his whole melodramatic ‘I’m gonna go on a diiiieeeet’ routine and told us to go eat breakfast downstairs. So we go downstairs, and oh I forgot to mention- he decided that we would try to attempt the 10:30 anyway. And so we had about 6 minutes for breakfast and towards the end I was getting the check and dad comes out, making a fool of himself as usual, screeching about how we’d miss the damned shuttle. As usual, he was dumb enough not to anticipate the fact that we’d need to pay for the food “hey, you have six minutes to eat.” NOT what he should have said, which was “you have six minutes before the shuttle arrives”. Two different things- anyway, I could feel the waiters’ glances of commiseration as we scrammed out of the shuttle. And dad does this huge gesture of apology ‘ohh I’m sooo soooorrryy, sir- I know you have to be on schedule.’ My bet is, he didn’t even go to the driver and ask if he could wait for a minute or two, but instead danced around screaming his head off as usual and then started apologizing as if we did something wrong. Anyway, we finally got to the subway and got to Hyde Park… which was lovely. Lots of greenery, very pretty place. And we started walking towards U Chicago, and dad, of course, kept screaming at me whether we had reached it yet or not. On the way, a few cute things happened. In front of the International House, there’s a map of campus, so I stood there looking at that for a second, and I could see from the corner of my eye, a charming guy w/ a pleasant face and a suit on came over and asked if I was looking for something and I said I was on my way to an information tour, applying as a freshman… and he said, ‘oh, so you’ll be our new president then?’ and I replied, ‘of course!’ and then, he starts BOWING to me! Hahaha! And he says stuff like ‘we’re not wooorrrthyyy’ and it was starting to get embarrassing at a certain point but it was soooooooooo funny. What a hilarious guy. And then he stood up and told me a little about the International House, how diff ppl from abroad come to visit and give speeches, etc… and it sounded pretty neat… ppl from 2nd year and on go and live there, apparently. So anyhow, he told us a ‘scenic route’ to get to Rosenwald, which is the admissions building, but dad wouldn’t have any of it, so we kept walking along the street, and we finally got to the area.
Ohhh the ivy! The stone buildings! The gargoyles!!! *melts* Oh, those heart-warming gargoyles. I adore them. And let’s not forget the ivy. And there’s this cute swing in the middle of the quad- I took a nice pic of it. kinda blurry, but who cares. Aghh, getting off on tangents. Which reminds me of my tour guide, who is an incredibly ‘lets go off on tangents’ kinda guy. OK, back to rosenwald. So we’re in the building, and finally I get a break from the folks and we separate, and I’m sitting on the couch wondering how I’d find this amazin’ tour guide I was supposed to find… and I thought about ways to approach and ask him ‘uh hi. Do you like economics and sports? No? oh. Ok. Thanks…’ bleghhh. It turned out alright, though. So I’m sitting there on the couch with this Asian tour guide speaking to some folks to the right of me… I listened to them for a little but felt out of the loop (her back was to me and it just felt awkward) and so I got up, and noticed that this guy who I thought could be the right tour guide wasn’t talking to anyone. He fit the description my friend gave me. Ooh, totally detective-like. Congrats, Rev. haha. And so I approached him and asked him very non-sneakily, ‘HI! DOES YOUR NAME START WITH A J?’
You know, I can’t remember him if I asked him that first or whether I asked whether he was a tour guide first. Anyhow, he looked at me a little strangely (but kindly, so I didn’t run away shrieking! Wouldn’t that be a sight.) and he replied that his middle name started with a J. Forgetting that my friend was unsure about the name part, I decided that this wasn’t the guy I was looking for, and I told him I was looking for a tour guide whose name starts with J, and who loves economics and sports. Right after having said that, I realized how generic that statement was. Hm, what’s the likelihood of a guy liking sports? Pretty likely. Most guys like some sort of sport. And liking economics in a school where Econ is the most popular major? HM.
BUT! Thankfully, the guy grinned and said that it was him. And then I started off with the weirdest question (about whether they get mosquitoes in Hyde park. Wtf. ) I quickly rectified the situation by explaining that I’m allergic to mosquitoes. He said he was from Texas and that he hasn’t been bitten this entire year. YAY! :D *happy dance* oh glory, glory hallelujah! And then stuff about weather, crime, etc. Oh, speaking of crime, he did this small performance of the ppl who get targeted in Hyde park- walking w/ Ipod headphones on, waving 20 dollar bills in the air, saying how drunk you are… he used that same thing on the tour later. I found that interesting- I suppose if you have a funny example that gets a good response, you’d use if frequently, even if you’re not doing a tour. Oh, though totally drama geek. And geek in the good way- though to me, there is no bad definition of geek. At all. Geeks and Nerds are happy words. Um. Anyway, being a drama geek myself, I could identify another drama geek, so it came as no surprise when he said he did IMPROV! Which is SO COOL because improv is… wowwowowowowowowowow and amazing and WOAH and sweeeeeeeeeeet and *SHAZAMMM* and everything in between and beyond! *trumpet sound* And an incredible high, let’s not forget. Unfortunately, I cannot do improv that well. (sighs… looks dejectedly at the ground…hopes it’ll swallow her up…) The upside is that I haven’t had that much exposure to improv techniques and actually doing them religiously every week, so with persistence, I could be amazing! At least that’s what I’ll tell myself.
Annnd we talked about the (crap I forgot the title…) Something’s cartoon guide to the history of the Universe… the title is something like that- but I found it really cool that he was looking forward to the release of the newest book in Jan on his birthday! (history buff too, shirlz! Great, eh?) And also he said stuff like some ppl going into econ go into it because they want to become bankers or do some sort of family legacy passed on thing… very sad- the laws of econ are amazin’ shamazin’ and people should go into it for the love of it. But maybe these guys go in and end up loving it too, who knows.
Haha this is random but I remember looking back at that famous Mustard essay question on the U of C website and applying economics, especially the law of diminishing returns and the law of marginal values (which are pretty closely related anyway) to the humongous mustard bottles…
So anyway, we talked and then the guy told us to get outside and break up into groups, and I told him ‘I’m with your group, bud’ and so I was. Which was cool, because we were broken up *randomly*. Har har har. Not so randomly that day! So!
He started off w/ a schpeel (I need to learn how to spell this word. If it even has a proper spelling. Hmph) about how he’ll walk backwards and we need to warn him please please please or else he’ll get evil and lash out and tell us evil lies. Haha. And then, he talked about the food… and how we should give points to the higher grades cuz they don’t have them… he did the crime example for everyone… well, actually, that made me feel special because it felt like we were having a shared joke or something because I had already heard it before. But that’s probably all in my head.
Annnd, he talked about what it was like coming from the suburbs of Texas to this place… how the classes are challenging and how you gotta manage your workload w/ going out and seeing what Chicago’s like… how the dorms in Pierce are ridiculously tiny and how he loves his dorm, which is in the Sheridan(?) and is nice and spacey. But it is also farther away from campus, so it’s give and take. Ummm, what else.
And he rambled a lot… gosh, it’d take forever to go on about what he rambled about. Haha, his metaphor on baseball and basketball, and thankfully he didn’t go into depth (oh man, I bet my dad would be reading my face for every reaction to anything having to do with relationships. I can’t believe the guy would think that I’d elope w/ someone in drama. WTF. Ridiculous.) BTW, he switched the metaphors of the basketball and baseball thing from what it is on his website, Shirlz. Read it w/ the two metaphors switched- baseball for life and basketball for relationships, and it’s pretty hilarious (the relationship one, esp).
Oh and he mentioned his communist looking cap… and a parent mentioned that they believed his hat after he ranted about Exon and how the guy who made U of C had video cameras around making sure ppl didn’t say anything bad or something like that and then he mentioned how he voted in the last elections for a …. Crap, I think it was a baseball player. Yeah, baseball player… who’s not American, and can barely speak English. Way2Go, man!
And he talked about the t-shirts at U of C which are GREAT. And he listed off a bunch… though the one about how the girls at U of C aren’t any prettier than squirrels was pretty sad! Though I must say, squirrels are hot lil’ things, they truly are. Shake that bushy tail, baby!
Oh dear, that reminds me of Mrs Comeau and her way of always inserting “I wanna see you back here bushy tailed and sparkly-(? Something about sparkly or bright or something)-eyed” Though bring her into a Chicago-themed entry isn’t completely random- she did grow up in Chicago. Which I didn’t know until I asked her about U Chicago and whether I could get in.
After the tour we held this information session w/ the… well, he’s not the dean… but… anyway, this blond guy with an interesting pink bowtie (very cool. Haha ;) ) And he did a great job-
BY THE WAY, SHIRLEY. THIS IS THE BEST THING EVER. THE WRITING PORTION OF THE SAT AND THE FREAKIN’ DUMB-ASSED (*^%$#%^&*$% ESSAY SECTION DON’T MATTER IN THE APPLICATION!!!!!!! HE DOESN’T EVEN SEE THEM!!!
oh and he also told us that if we’re deferred, it’s usually because they wanna see how well we do in our senior year. They accept 1/3 of their deferrals.
Oh and another thing that Daniel (tour guy) said that was pretty sweet was how the research opportunities at U of C are pretty much always greater than the number of ppl doing it, so there’s always opportunities. And the hospitals are really close… I could volunteer there, too…
And then the bombshell.
In this nice bubble I had where things were going great… U Chicago was gorgeous, I’d be so, so happy here… learning for the sake of learning (THANK GOD!!!), having great teachers and great TAs…
And then to have this.
“yeah if you take any courses in things we don’t offer, like say, engineering- of course we can’t accept them because we DON’T HAVE AN ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT”
what.
What?
WHAT?
Holy shit.
I didn’t expect this- I had no idea- I knew that there was research being done at U of C that was interesting… the whole chip in tetraplegic brain thing I was telling you about, Shirley? Yeah, anyway- AOUGEAHWGWAGOHWAEGOUEHGAOE!! *tears out her hair*
My dad made a huge deal about that on the way back. A HUMONGOUS deal.
And then my mom, who had adored U Chicago, screamed right back.
And I walked ahead, listening to them yell at each other and thinking about what great entertainment it was at first, not really getting it until it sank in.
“So what happens if you want to take an engineering course, but there’s no engineering department, HM?”
uh-oh. I think my dad actually made a point that was legitimate.
Shit. I… do want to take engineering courses. I want to take courses from a wide spectrum. I want to learn about so many things… engineering is so HUGE, how could I not take a class in engineering? What am I going to do?!!!
Ohdear. (cries)
I… really, really like this place.
I really hope there’s some way I can take engineering courses.
Awgoeiawhgoawighowiaghawoigjeawogjwoeigwagoiweaoige (muffled scream)
Ok. There has to be some way around this…
I daydreamed on the bus that I’d attend U Chicago, get a major there, and that every summer I’d come back to UW and take courses there and get a bioengineering degree. HAHA. Yeah right, that’s impossible.
Anyway.. crap my mom wants to sleep on this side of the bed and that’s the side the outlet is on. Guess I have to go.
(sigh.)
I really hope…. That there’s another college out there, if there’s no way I can take engineering, that I’ll fall in love with, too. Because this hurts and it really, really sucks. And I should have done better research into this.
*&^&%$#%^&*
and it doesn’t help how my dad keeps saying everything I do is a failure and mom keeps saying that U Chicago ‘just wouldn’t fit me’. Fuck that. I fit wherever I choose to fit. As if they really know me, anyway. Actress, remember? Comes in handy.