Natasha B. '16
May 10 2013
Sal Khan, Gabriel Abrantes, and the Man in the Shiny Red Satan Suit
Posted in: Miscellaneous, Life & Culture
2:50 PM, Wednesday, May 8
I am in a café on Mass Ave, waiting for a roast chicken-mashed avocado-jicama sandwich and talking to my sister on the phone. A tall, tattooed man walks in wearing a skintight red devil suit and horns. He stands around for a few seconds, looking like he might order something, then walks up to the man working the register, throws his arms in the air, and yells:
"I'm SATAN!"
The man at the register looks up, smiles, and says "Satan! I've been waiting for you!"
"I've been looking all over for you, kid!" booms Satan. "Let's get you back to hell!"
"Hell?!" says the man. "But, Satan! I thought I was already in hell. I thought I'd been there all along, working at this godforsaken JOB!"
The manager has sidled up to the counter and is standing behind his employee, smiling very uncomfortably and waiting for the scene to play out.
The man from behind the register climbs onto Satan's shoulders, shouts "I QUIT!" , and piggybacks out at a sprint.
"Order... read the post »
May 2 2013
Right NOW
Posted in: Miscellaneous
Yesterday I met with Ta-Nehisi Coates to talk about writing. I'm taking Advanced Essay Workshop with him, and I've never cared about a class this much. This week, to my academic detriment, I'm proof that energy spent caring isn't always energy spent constructing.
Ta-Nehisi said something along the lines of this: "When you're young, people are sorted out. Everybody has different levels of talent. Later on, though, the only thing that will differentiate you is how hard you work." I left feeling inspired and jubilant, saying something along the lines of this: "I'm going to go be a writer! I'm going to write my essay right NOW!"
So I went and lay in the grass between the chapel and the student center and watched a man with headphones sleep while I thought about what I was going to write, and eventually I realized that I was close to falling asleep myself, or (at the minimum) seeming like a creep watching someone else sleep while I spaced out. I picked up my backpacked and trekked to... read the post »
Mar 19 2013
Fancy Feast & Happy People
Posted in: Miscellaneous
Chapter 1: A Formal Account of a Fancy Feast in February. Location: pika.
Across the train tracks, just a few blocks into Cambridge, a big green house on Chestnut Street has a porch light on. This is pika, one of MIT's independent living groups. It's a "mixed house," home to an eclectic assortment of MIT undergrad, two cats, and a brood of hens. Every Friday night is Fancy Feast.
The pikans eat together every night. There are always visitors: alumni, locals, students from Harvard, BU and Wellesley. Friday nights, anybody's welcome, and for the food and the company, it's well worth the walk. Last night's Fancy Feast was elaborate. There was hot, rich spanakopita, Greek salad, eggplant. There were Dan's hand-wrapped dolmas, golden puffs of fried and honey-soaked dough, and a hundred servings of baklava. "Just try a little bit of everything," someone warned me, but I was heedlessly hungry, and by the time I'd taken something from each dish, I had enough on my plate to feed all the... read the post »
Dec 27 2012
For Applicants
Posted in: Miscellaneous
I know it's late in the college application season--the deadline is near and the pressure is on--but for all of you who are still typing away at your application essays, fretting over phrasing and wondering what to say, take a look at admitsphere.org.
Admitsphere was devised by a floormate of mine, Jacob Cole '14, along with Prabhav Jain '14 and Merry Mou '16, to sustain high school students through the application process. Here, successful college admits post their college application essays and offer advice/tutorials for younger students. Their ambition is "to become a central, open-source, online hub that high school students look to in order to learn how to win at high school, college applications, and life.” In other words, to help you!
From Jacob:
“We believe that you shouldn't need to buy an expensive book or pay an independent college counselor to get real college essays and relevant advice. Through collaboration, we can give everyone access to the inside knowledge... read the post »
Dec 10 2012
Don’t Waste Daylight; Don’t Lose Sleep
Posted in: Miscellaneous
I love the weather today. I rode my bike home through puddles and gulped down the wetness in the air like I imagine a fish would if it, and not I, were in that spot on the sidewalk of dorm row. I shuffled into my suite on the fourth floor of Burton Conner shedding a trail of water from my backpack and raincoat, looked out the window, and exclaimed joyfully to my roommate, "It's so... gray!"
She's from the northwest corner of Washington, and I'm from the valley in Oregon, so we feel the same way on days like this. When it's wet, warm, and kind of dark, when the forecast is downright dreary, we feel right at home.
In eleven days, we will be home. I guess I'm surprised I'm still alive. I've survived. Coming here was so overwhelming in the beginning that I didn't think beyond first semester. I don't know what I thought would happen to me: that I'd freeze? That I'd get lost in the tunnels between Stata and some far-off building and live underground forever? That I'd step into traffic... read the post »