Ben, ‘11

September 22, 2007

Hey everyone! I’m back and have had yet another busy week. Here are the main highlights from this week. I have been trying to put in a lot of pictures since I think that they do a better job of telling the story of my life here at UR:

- The major event of this week is my decision to run for Student Government. I attended the candidate meeting and decided that it was something that I wanted to do. Even though my parents told me to not get over-involved, I regretted not doing it in high school, so I’m giving it a try here. I have formed a coalition with some other people who I believe are quality candidates and I’m excited about our possibilities. I think that we have some really good ideas. I am running for Chair of the Freshmen class and I don’t know how many others are running, but twenty-eight other freshmen are eligible to run for Senator or Chair. I won’t spend any more time on this right now because campaigning won’t start for a few more days. More to come soon.

- Last Friday night, I attended the men’s soccer game against the Binghamton Bearcats. It was one of the top games I’ve seen in my life, even though it was raining and pretty miserable. It was scoreless and went into overtime. However, with ten seconds left in OT, we kicked it into play. With three seconds left, we shot it and bounced it off of the top crossbar. With one second left in OT, we shot the ball and we scored. It was such a thrill. Only my friend, Sarah, and me stayed the whole game, but we proved that we are superfans. The fan base at Richmond is not very good and there were only a few die-hard fans at the game. Just as a word of advice: do not come to Richmond if you are solely looking for a top-notch sports school that has a ton of school spirit.

Cheering the men’s soccer team on to victory with Alex

- I attended Fall Festival out on one of the greens this afternoon. It was a nice day and the Student Government provided barbecue and bands. It listened to groups that I had not been able to hear yet, such as our acappella group and UMOJA (our gospel choir). After attending the festival, I played some beach volleyball with my friends instead of studying. I’m finally settling into this college student mode of having fun now and doing homework late Sunday night.

UMOJA (our gospel choir) at Fall Festivus

- On Saturday night, I attended “Diavolo”. Diavolo is a group of dancers/acrobats who put on a very good show. The University provides lots of free events for students, which are $32 for other people. This one was $8 for me, but totally worth it. It was a really cool performance to see. It’s hard to explain what they did, so here is a link to a video of them:

Download Diavolo

Me, Tim, and Katie at Diavolo

- I was able to run into town on Monday and get lots of supplies that I needed. Actually, that’s a lie. I hardly got anything that I needed, but I got lots of food. $100 later, I was set for a while. I spent the rest of the night watching the Eagles play the Redskins on Monday Night Football, since those two teams are very well represented here. Football is definitely dominant on the weekends and I have unfortunately fallen into the trend of watching many games during the weekends.

The results of my shopping spree

- I met with my advisor on Wednesday and ran down my classes and what I had been up to. I have already begun planning for next semester’s classes.

- Just in general, the nights here are pretty exciting. Obviously, sleep is of little priority to college students, but each night goes until 3 AM. The other night, we had an altercation in our hallway, which spiced up the night. It was a simple disagreement between someone from our hall and an entire other hall, but it was resolved peacefully (thanks in part to a Resident Assistant threatening to call 911). Also, pizza is a must for most people late at night. It is perfect for that 2AM hunger craving.

- Friday night was Man Night for InterVarsity. This meant that all of the guys got together and grilled out and played Wii and then played volleyball. We had planned to watch the 3 disk set of Gladiator, but that fell through. I had bought a hair trimmer on my town run and the rest of Friday night was spent buzzing my head and my friends’ heads. I have lived with a buzzed head for my entire life and had no desire to spend $15 on a haircut. We did a pretty good job for having never done it before. The next morning, a lot of my InterVarsity friends got up at 3:30 AM to go to Virginia Beach to watch the sunrise over the ocean with InterVarsity. However, I could not go because I had a 2-hour class on Saturday teaching me all about the bad effects of alcohol. Unfortunately, I knew everything they tried to teach us.

It was finally time for a haircut

-Tonight (Saturday), I attended New Faces, which is a bunch of skits and songs performed by freshman and other new students. I went with twelve of my friends and we had a great time. The actors had a ton of talent and the plays were incredibly funny. I plan to keep going to a lot of events at the Modlin Center since almost all of them are free and they are bringing in some really good shows.

Me and my friends went to see Kelly (center) perform in New Faces

- The last thing I will comment on is a wager between my roommate (John) and one of my friends (Alex). The short version of the contract (which I signed as witness) is that if Alex dyes his hair purple and keeps it for one month, then John must grow his facial hair for two months and then shave it into handlebars. The first step is complete and Alex is now walking around with pinkish hair. I’m pretty sure he’s the only person on campus with dyed hair, other than blonde.

The “Hair Contract”

Alex getting his hair dyed purple (which actually looks pink)

I will briefly touch on each of my classes now:

Economics: This class is pretty easy and I’m enjoying the class and the teacher.

CORE: I have finished “Phaedo” by Plato and am now working on “On Evolution” by Darwin. We had an interesting discussion about religion since my teacher is from Turkey and is Muslim. We discussed the similarities between religions such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. It’s a fairly easy class and I have had nothing due yet, but I do have an essay due in a week.

Spanish: I had my first test and I feel fairly good about it. I also had a composition due about an important event in my life. Other than this, I’m enjoying the class and haven’t been overwhelmed by this six credit course.

Public Policy: This class has been a lot more fun lately. We have been discussing Social Security and tax codes and the class discussions have been interesting. The teacher is very accessible and I actually stayed after class and talked with her for twenty minutes about tax laws. It may sound very uninteresting, but I thought that it was pretty cool in class. Currently, we have started our first book and it’s about the death/estate tax. I never knew anything about the death tax, but I’ve found the book to actually be a good read and it has piqued my interest.

That is all for tonight. I’m sorry for the long entry again, but I’ve come to the sad realization that my life is just too busy and complex to sum up briefly.

I spent an hour trying to help him get a good Facebook picture

Thought to Ponder: Why do we say “heads up” when we actually mean “duck”?

Quote of the Week: “Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn’t.” – Erica Jong