Good Night and Good Luck.

Well loyal readers this is the last that you will be hearing from me for the next 4 months or perhaps even the next 14 months. If all goes well I will spending the next semester in China and the semester after that in Istanbul so keep your fingers crossed!

After working my butt off for the last 4 weeks on final papers, projects and presentations it is all almost and a week from now I will be half way done with my undergraduate career. Though I still have to take my Chinese final and turn in my take home(thank you Marion!) exam for Biology I really feel like I am done. This may be at least in part because neither of these are for a couple more days. It is hard now to figure out what to do with free time now that I am so used to working and going to classes all day that it is hard to get used to relaxing and not always looking at the clock, but it is a transition that I am also looking forward to very much.

It has been great blogging this semester and seeing that so many people are actually looking (however briefly) at my writing and what it is like to be at Beloit College.
Thanks to you all and have a great summer.

The Last Weekend of the Year

Its over! I can not believe it but we just had the last weekend of the year especially now because my time at Beloit is half over(Over half because will be abroad for at least one semester next year)! The real world is close and terrifying.

But it is not here yet! So we are still having a good time here!

Saturday night there was the bizzaro Beloit party where you dress as someone else and go party. It was really fun cause I got to wear a dress and legging which is a little different than my normal grab. It was crazy to because one of my friends dressed as my roommate and looked almost exactly like him which for a very interesting night.

Vusi Mahlasela at Beloit

This last Tuesday our fine establishment had the luck(well not really luck cause we paid him a ton of money) of having the African pop sensation Vusi Mahlasela come and preform at our campus.

Going into it I did not really know what to expect cause I had never heard of him before or heard any of his music but I was quite impressed. It was kinda of a mix of 50% reggae and 50% African folk music that was 100% enjoyable! Most all the songs were about some kind of struggle in Africa, be it aparthide or tribes getting kicked of their land. He and all the members of his band were quite talented and had a good stage presence. Another nice feature of the concert was all of my hippie got up and started dancing to the music to the side of the stage. It was great to see people getting into the music in different ways.

Afterwards he was handing out signed stickers and selling CD's so everyone who wanted to had a chance to meet him.

The TKE Formal

Last weekend my fraternity had its annual formal and they really went all out for it this year. Most of the other Greek organizations on campus will go to one of the campus buildings or one of the 4 restaurants around Beloit for their formals but not us we went to Chicago's Shed Aquarium.

It was quite the get from what I here. Apparently we beat out Toyota for that Saturday night. We left the campus around 5pm after a little pre-party at the house and our bus got down to the aquarium by about 7pm. First they herded us into the big amphitheater with the dolphins and beluga whales. It was soooooo cool, it was only us in there and we could walk right up to the sides of the tanks! After that we went into the main area of the museum where they had set up tables around the Caribbean reef exhibit. We had an amazing meal and got to listen to some very interesting senior's speeches. The rest of the time there we were allowed to walk around the aquarium and see the fish at our own pace.

It was an amazing night and I have certainly never been to such a classy place and event.

Spring Day!!

We at Beloit College believe that on the first warm day of the new year that students should be outside not in the classroom. In fact they administration believes this so much that they have created a special called spring day so students can be out there and enjoy the weather. All the frats and sorority have games and events outside in a carnival like atmosphere.

Some years they do not get it quite right. Like last year when it was 40 degrees and raining all day(though still very fun). But other year, like this one they get it right on.

We had beautiful sunny 70 degree weather and everyone was out enjoying it if only for a little while for some. I was one of the some who allowed myself an hour or two to hang out outside before going into the library to finish the 2 ten page paper and other odds and ends that are due in on Friday. As if this task was not hard enough at the peak of health the fates decided to strike he down the night before with a high fever, pounding head ache and joint pain. However, your hero was able to triumph over adversity and get some solid work done.

Weissberg Chair

Well we have just finished the coolest week of the year here at Beloit, Weissberg Week! It is where the college brings on some amazing person in the field of international relations and they come to classes and give lectures for a week. This time we had Jan Egeland who until last year was the undersecretary general of humanitarian relief for the UN which means he was in charge of all of the UN's relief missions as well as being the head of amnesty international at the age of 21. He was one of the most amazing people I have ever met.

He gave a talk on Thursday about the state of the worlds refugees and about what is being done and what needs to be done to help them out. It was quite inspiring and I am very impressed that we were able to get him here. Also, since I work for the Poli Sci department in my other job, I helped coordinate part of his visit and arranged for him to have three lunches with small groups of students. I got to go to one of these and it was amazing to sit at the same table and have a conversation with a man who has been to 11o countries and saved more lives then almost anyone out there.

An International Party!

This weekend was fairly average here at Beloit, lots of fun parties lots of studying. However, I thought that some of you readers might be interested to hear about what a room party at Beloit is like.

One of my good friends Davis had his birthday over the weekend so he had a party in Brians room. Now I did not really think about it until after the fact but I have to say that outside of the study abroad programs I have done this was about the most diverse party I have ever been to. Brian, the host, is from Zimbabwe, Davis grew up in Thailand, his girl friend Delna is from India, the friend she brought Eva is from Hungary, my girl friend, Val, is from Malaysia and another guy there A.J is from Palenstine. Now of course there were about an equal number of American students there but I thought that it as pretty cool that there were so many international students there too. Especially since that is not considered strange and I did not think of it until I was trying to figure out what to write.