On everything but MIT: family & friends
Doing this out of order - I intend to write a big end-of-the-semester retrospective on my 4ish months in New England, but first, I'd like to write about my time since last Monday, when I left Boston.
I went directly from my Microeconomics final to Logan Airport, turning strangers into short-term friends along the way. Flight was delayed a bit, but it ain't no thang - I was in no hurry to get to Richmond anyway. My grandparents picked me up at the airport, where I proceeded to marvel at the snow that had stuck on the bushes, and my grandfather proceeded to complain about the greeting "Merry Christmas" being replaced by "Happy Holidays." That night they fed me toast and homemade orange-carrot soup (which I later realized was made with chicken broth - whoops!), and argued over whether to let me sleep in in the morning, or get me up so my grandfather could take me on a whirlwind tour of Williamsburg. We ended up compromising with my alarm set for 9:30 AM.
I've only visited Virginia a couple times, the first being when I was 8 or 9. Of course we visited all the historical sites (Jamestown, Yorktown, and Colonial Williamsburg), and of course I didn't appreciate them, because I was 8 or 9. I would obviously enjoy them now, since I majored in US History, and so my grandfather (who I will refer to from now as Bygum, because that's what everyone calls him) decided to take me to them. Unfortunately, it was 30 degrees and very windy, which made being outside very unpleasant...fortunately (I guess), it was so unpleasant that Bygum declared we should leave (I wasn't about to be the whiny, wimpy person from southern California who ruined her own vacation by being too cold and demanding we leave). Instead we ate lunch at Trellis Cafe in what must have been downtown Wlliamsburg - cute and quaint, in a few pedestrian-only blocks. I don't know why, but I find it amusing that the restaurant is located on "West Duke of Gloucester [pronounced gl-ow-ster]," and only gets three stars from internet reviewers.
The evening was spent in a house along the Atlantic coast in Hampton, VA, eating dinner with my grandparents, Aunt Sandra (my mom's step-sister); her husband, Jamie; Aunt Billy (my mom's step brother) and his wife, Renee, and Billy's daughter, Kristen. After talking briefly with Jamie about his work with a teachers' union and my interest in community organizing, I was tipped off that the rest of the family is conservative. Dinner was good, a vegetarian Caribbean chili with mangoes, and salad. I'm not sure what else to say about this night.
The next afternoon was spent at home, because I had to finish and submit a paper. My grandparents started to bicker a lot, and I started to be driven crazy by it. We were supposed to leave around 2 to make it to Deep Creek, a neighborhood in Chesapeake, VA where Billy and Renee live. Of course, we left too late, and hit a bunch of traffic, which stressed Bygum out, which pissed me off and made me realize that I seriously need to work on my tendency to stress out. Hung out with Renee's four Yorkshire Terriers, which are pretty cute, but don't deserve to be called dogs. Went to another part of Chesapeake to another step-uncle's house, David and his wife Judy. Their house was huge - actually, most of the houses in Virginia are. My perspective is that if you're willing to live in VA, you can pay less and get more space - but as I later tried to tell the guy on the airplane to Chicago, I'd rather have a tiny shack in California than live in Virginia. Besides the big houses, the rest of Virginia looked surprisingly similar to southern California strip malls. Long, homogeneous strings of chain stores with ugly signs and architecture, with rows and rows of parking in the front.
The evening was interesting, as I got to also visit with my cousin, Deirdre, who has a master's degree and a baby, and another cousin, Chelsea, and her boyfriend, both of whom seem to have had rough lives. The cultural differences were interesting: he didn't know vegetarian lasagna existed, she didn't know what my Siig water bottle was. But we got along, and that made me happy, because one of my worst fears about MIT is that it's going to turn me into this out-of-touch official smart person. As weird as Virginia is for me, part of me feels I should keep going back, at least as a sort of social/anthropological study to understand what these people care about. For instance, after dinner I was telling my uncle a bit about urban planning, community development, and how the current pattern of auto-dependent sprawling towns is unsustainable - he totes agreed with me, even though walking and biking and not driving are usually like, super liberal things that only communists want. But THEN he went on to say, in almost the same breath, I swear, that separate (but equal) schools for blacks and whites was a good thing, because we've lowered our standards to accommodate black culture, and that's bad for both parties. WAIT, WHAT!?! He either doesn't realize, or just doesn't care, that the whole "separate but equal" argument has been ruled illegal. DUH. He also mentioned some social Darwinist stuff, about how no matter what their context, some people are going to succeed and others automatically won't. It was scary, and disturbing, and vomit-inducing, hearing things I've only read about in textbooks come out of a living, breathing human being.
I wasn't in Virginia long, obviously, as I took a flight out of Norfolk on Thursday morning. Brief layover in Chicago, spent time working on another paper and reading Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. When I landed at LAX, I remembered that MIT did not create my hectic, stressful lifestyle - it had existed long before. However, it existed in a beautiful, warm, friendly environment, which I really think made it seem less awful. Anyway, I was all jazzed to be walking through LAX, so happy to be home - back in California, at last! Waited a long time for my luggage, but as soon as I lugged it off the conveyor belt, I proceeded to knock over my other bag twice. I saw a Flyaway shuttle drive up to the curb, so I immediately ran outside, dragging my suitcase upside down through traffic, and confirmed that this was the shuttle I needed, and had I been about thirty seconds later, I probably would have missed it! I was happy to see Culver City, not so happy to be on the 405, and stoked to arrive in Westwood. Not that I had time to appreciate any of it, because I had to get to my Zipcar so I could get downtown before I turned into a pumpkin. Finding my zipcar involved somehow managing to roll two suitcases up a gigantic hill, then down a smaller hill. Fortunately, I got to my car right when my reservation started, and traffic wasn't too bad, so I got downtown in a reasonable fashion.
I stopped by City Hall to check in with the people I used to work with - they wanted to hear about MIT, and I wanted to seek their advice that everything was going to be okay, that MIT wasn't going to change me, that I could take the finance-related classes not because I had to spend my life manipulating data but so I could call out people who try to BS me in the future. It was lovely telling them about my experiences, because usually my observations get caught up in my head and I focus on the negatives. Being forced to articulate my thoughts in an artful, non-crazy-person manner was good, I think.
After this I went to a gallery on Spring Street for our departmental open house. This thing was the whole reason I left Boston so quickly, and arrived in LA in such a rush - and it went really well! I was so worried that no one would show up, but there were about ten prospective students, which I thought was perfect and intimate enough, rather than overwhelming or pathetic. I helped set up and chatted with a professor I'll be taking a class with next semester, and an alum who works for the Los Angeles Housing Department. She actually offered to show me around the place and introduce me to people, which is so nice and generous, I can't even believe it. I'm not going to forget how useful it has been dealing with friendly alums; when I am one myself, I'm going to help out current students (from both MIT and UCLA) as much as I can, because I also know what it felt like as an undergrad to be ignored when I wanted to intern somewhere.
I spent the evening at Daniel and Lauren's apartment in Westwood. Ate In'n'Out with Claire, and chatted with the three of them for a bit before bed - I slept so well that when I woke up, I had no idea where I was, and thought my alarm was my Uncle David doing something with a cheese grater. The four of us drove to The Grove for lunch at the Farmers Market with Megan, Penson, Alex J., and Rob. Played 2 Truths & a Lie, then shopped with the girls in Anthro (I bought my mom a perfume and 2 tops and a dress that were on mega sale + an extra 25% off!). Met up with Charles at the A+D (Architecture+Design) Museum across from LACMA for an exhibit on Kanner (Richard?). It was excellent. It was also rainy, and we were bored but couldn't eat dinner yet, so we went to Le Pain Quotidian on Beverly for coffee and card games (Spoons and BS and a pseudo-poker game). We ended up spending hours though, though it didn't feel like it - Amy and Jeremiah showed up, and once George was ready for dinner, we drove to Lemonade, which was unfortunately closed. Back up plan was 8 Oz Burger Bar on Melrose, and though it was cold inside, my veggie burger was DELICIOUS, possibly the best I've ever had. Wrapped up the evening with more hanging out, this time downtown at Casey's Irish Pub. Shitty band, diverse crowd, good times.
I spent the night at George's, and set an alarm for early in the morning because Matt never made it downtown, and wanted to come over for breakfast. Of course he slept in and didn't make it. George had to drive home to San Diego, and I went to brunch at Elysee with Alex C., Timur, his friend Rebecca and girl-thing Flo. I ate an omelette, but tried hollandaise sauce for the first time, and it made me desperately wish I had ordered eggs florentine...
Anyway.
Megan picked me up from Alex's apartment and we drove downtown to the Supersensorial exhibit at the MOCA. I got in trouble three times for touching things and taking photos. Charles met us, and we showed him the highlights, and then we parted ways so Megan and I could make it to Santa Monica for Black Swan with Rob. I really hadn't had an interest in seeing the movie, mostly because it seemed bleak and depressing, and I wanted a break from MIT full of superficial nonsense and rainbows. I'm glad I saw it, though, because it really was very good. We were supposed to get lunch with Michelle and her family after the movie, but they canceled, so we ate crepes instead.
I spent the night at Rob's beautiful house in Pacific Palisades, but had to get up unfortunately early so he could go to a work function in Orange County. Unlike MIT people, my LA friends have no business waking up early, so I had Rob drop me off (at 9:30!) at a Coffee Bean in Santa Monica, where I ate breakfast and camped out at a table, with my luggage and a couple books. It got late, though, and I started to get bored, and almost switched my train ticket to an earlier time and hopped on a bus that would take me to Union Station, but then Megan called and said she still planned on meeting in SaMo, so I kept reading. We ended up going to H&M and Gap, and Alex L. made it up from San Diego in time for a late lunch at Le Pain. Megs then drove me to Union Station, where I got on my very first train!
The train was interesting, as I initially sat next to an extraordinarily sullen girl and behind a group of 6 kids passing around a bottle of vodka. They were the kind of kids that still wore saggy pants, and big sweatshirts with ornate patterns on them, and baseball hats. They were loud, and I started freaking out because I couldn't find my cellphone, so I ended up moving seats. Fortunately, I found my phone, peace and quiet, and a nice guy who grew up in Boston, studied Animation at UCLA, was visiting his mom in Santa Barbara, like bicycling, and intends to be a farmer. He was much better company than anything going on in my other seat. Oh, they also had to isolate a drunk, belligerent man (not the kids from before) and escort him off the train in Glendale. Exciting!
My time at home isn't done yet, so I will give a brief overview of my first few days.
Ben came by for a visit on Sunday night. I slept until noon on Monday. That night I drove him to LA for his 6 AM flight. We figured if we tried to sleep that night and go straight from SB, neither of us would get much sleep anyway, so we left that night and turned it into a thing! We killed a few hours at Swingers, knocked back some milk shakes, vegan chili cheese fries, and tofu sate. See, this is why I like LA, because they have vegetarian-friendly hipster diners. We ended up napping for a couple hours in my car. I parked along the beach, and the rain pounded hard on the roof, and it was very pleasant and refreshing. I dropped him off and drove home and got to bed at 7. Spent the afternoon downtown with my mom, finishing up my Christmas shopping. The next day I caught up on 30 Rock. Last night I baked cookies with my mom and brother. It's always weird to be home, simultaneously relaxing and stressful, because families are always stressful. Mine is less so than usual, but I do feel guilty for not spending more time with them, especially since I'm going to Portland in 7 days. So, I shall go do that (spend time with them, I mean).
Until next time!
--Rach