I'm trying to brainstorm for my seminar paper, but instead, I blog. I've found a new musical love! "Spring Awakening!" Tis a musical which won eight Tony's in 2006, and Elsa told me about it sometime last year but I didn't really listen. Then, a couple weeks ago, Greg was telling me about when he went to Broadway and saw this show called "Spring Awakening" and he told me all about it. Then, this week, in my seminar on Berlin, I open my packet of reading and THERE IT IS. The original play was a late 19th century German one, so it applies. Then Greg brings me the CD today! And now I'm listening and loving! It's all about repressed sexual tension and is pretty explicit, so it was pretty interesting discussing sadomasochism, sex, masturbation, and suicide in class today...

But what I love about Amherst (and am kind of scared by) is how everything just comes together, like everything is reaffirming that we're making the right choices. Shannon and I went to the library to go watch this 1927 German silent film, "Metropolis," today for our history class. It's a dystopian science fiction movie about the tension between workers and owners, which ties in with our study of the Russian Revolution in history. It's also a German silent film made in the time period I'm studying in my seminar on Berlin. I've been doing nothing but watching old German films lately... And then, Shannon's seminar is on prostitution around the world (it's the dullest class in the world.. we don't understand how it's possible), and just yesterday she had to read a book called "Yoshiwara" about Japanese prostitutes. Then, today in the GERMAN FILM, the nightclub was named "YOSHIWARA." We paused it and started screaming (in library voices), "IT'S EVERYWHERE!!!! AHHH!!!!" And what was even crazier, for religion, we were reading from the Book of Revelations, and the movie quoted the exact passage we had to read the night before!!! It was SCARY!!!! We were so freaked out by the movie!!! We spent the whole time making a running commentary of it so we could stay awake. It was hilarious... the bad acting and the random clutching of the breast by the damsel whenever she is frequently in distress.

Last night, we had dinner with Greg and Tim, who are just absolutely HILARIOUS!! They're awesome and hilarious by themselves, but together (they're roommates), they're just like a dynamic duo of comedy. It was SO much fun. Greg texted me at around 5 and asked, "How do you guys feel about dinner tonight?" We told him that we were going to the gym and would be back by 6:30, but if he wanted to wait, we would be most happy to go to dinner with him. However, if he got too hungry (since he and Tim usually eat early), he should feel free to feast without us.

We were assured that they would wait, and at 6:30, headed off to Val together with Camille. Meals there usually take.. 30 minutes.. an hour tops.. We stayed till 8:10, just sitting there, talking and laughing about the most ridiculous things. We discovered Tim's ARDENT love for apple sauce, and how Greg eats apple sauce and cottage cheese together for dessert, something I've never even heard of. I wish I had a video camera or even a tape recorder to just capture the two of them in action because there's just no way to even describe it and my memory doesn't do me justice.
Tim: I used to have apple sauce every day for lunch until... I came to Amherst, actually.
Greg: Really? They have it here, you know.
T: I know, but I can never find it!! Where do they hide it?!?! Where is it??

After trying to reassure Tim that apple sauce indeed does exist in Valentine Dining Hall, we begin a discussion on apple sauce, which I've never really had.
T: I don't know if their apple sauce is any good though. My favorite was the cinnamon kind, but apple sauce is good for anything. When you're sick, it's like something light that goes down easy, and it can take the place of your fruit.. if your parents let you...
G: Oh Tim. You WILL have your apple sauce.
Elaine: Yeah. Greg will make it for you. Forget writing his paper. We're just going to see Greg out in the quad at 2 AM churning this huge barrel of apples and be like, "Greg.. what the heck are you doing?"
G: Making Tim's apple sauce!!!! It shall be done!

At this point, we're all completely done with eating. Greg then commences, quite absentmindedly, with cutting these two apples left on his plate. As the night wore on, those apples became smaller and smaller, until really, apple sauce was being made.

Apparently, Greg is one of those unlucky few that talk rampantly in their sleep. Tim thinks it's the funniest thing in the universe, but could never remember what Greg was saying the morning after. So, one night, after Greg went to bed, Tim got out his notepad and pen, and basically sat there WAITING for Greg to start yelling in his sleep.
Soon enough, Greg starts muttering and shouting. Tim dives for his pen and paper, and starts scribbling.
"NO! NO WAY! ABSOLUTELY NOT!!!!"
And Greg never remembers what he was dreaming about that would merit that amount of negation. Tim was gesticulating wildly doing impressions of Greg.. it was pretty hilarious.. GRAH I NEED A VIDEO CAMERA TO CAPTURE THIS!!!

Then Greg told us the story about how, ever since he was little, he was everybody's favorite person to have at a sleepover. And everybody's favorite game to play was make Greg go to bed before everyone else and then just watch him. In the sixth grade, he went over to this friend's house and he fell asleep before them all, and had this dream where it was his pressing duty to explain what a television was. This resulted in:
"No guys! No! It's like.. a giant, plastic fish tank!!!"

Since Greg lives in Newton, which is in Boston, it's pretty easy for him to get home. He's taking Tim back home with him for the whole weekend, and they're going to a Red Sox--Yankee game (Greg loves the Red Sox; Tim loves the Yankees). Somehow, this evolved into Elaine and Shannon making homosexual innuendos about them. I think it was because they were talking to each other and finishing each other's sentences so that none of us had any idea what they were talking about (they're like the male version of me and Shannon) and so we were like, "Aww.. they're like us!!!!"
And that somehow devolved into a "Greg + Tim = love" situation. Yes. We are mature.
Shannon and I started muttering together too to imitate them. Then Greg said something about, "This is getting serious!!!"
And I responded, "I know!! He's meeting the parents!! This IS getting serious!!!" before Shannon and I dissolved into fits of giggling.
They looked at us and Greg said, completely stone-faced but not quite managing to keep the note of laughter out of his voice, "Tim. Tim. I think they're making fun of us."
Shannon then said, "They live together! Greg makes Tim apple sauce while Tim writes Greg's paper! He's meeting the parents and coming home for the weekend!"
Pouting, Greg mutters, "You guys live together too!!!!! No fair!!"
We're so mature.. This is AFTER the whole, "Let's imagine our phones as people and how Tim's phone is cheating on Elaine's phone with Greg's phone.
AHH One story just leads to another!! Tim, Greg, Michelle, and I were sitting in North hanging out. Greg's phone has dead pixels on the screen, and we were like, "OMG. What do you DO to your phone??" and he throws it on the floor.
I tell him that he's too mean to his phone, and he apologizes by "making out" with his phone.
me: WHAT are you doing Greg?
G: You said my phone was feeling lonely!!
me: Yeah.. but what are you doing?!?!?
T: Man. I wonder if my phone's lonely.
Michelle: WHOA! You and Elaine both have red phones! Your phones are meant to be!
T: Whoa, whoa whoa! Are we being racist here??? Just because they're red doesn't mean they have to be together. We can have diversity!
me: Oh come on Tim. Now you're being like... reverse racist. It's like BECAUSE they're red, you're fighting Fate and not letting them be together.
MIchelle: I think those phones belong together.
So Tim and I put our phones together. Greg has this habit of spinning his (black) phone on the table, and on one of these spins, it nudges Tim's phone.
me: WHOA WHOA WHOA! What is this!!! Tim! Is your phone cheating on my phone?
T: I don't know! I mean! I keep it with me all day, but at night, once I go to bed, I don't know what they get up to!!

Then later that night, I was talking to Tim on AIM and we were saying good night and he said, "My phone's charging right now, so it's kind of on a tether. Stay away from Greg's phone, phone!!"

Then today at dinner, we bumped into Greg again, and sat with him and a bunch of other guys from North... who are decidedly less funny. We listened to "Spring Awakening" on his iPod and as we were walking back, he mused aloud, "I wonder if Amherst will still be this pretty in winter."
Shannon: Yeah. I think so.
Greg: Well, when it snows, yeah, but what about the days in between?
S: Oh yeah. When it's pure cold.
G: Yeah and everything is brown and grey. haha pure cold. Yeah...
I kind of whimpered a little bit, and Greg responded, "Aww Elaine.. I'm sorry.. I wish I could make my home more hospitable for you! It's okay. We have good company, so it'll be fun no matter what."

I have so much work to do today!! :(
But that's okay, because it was worth it to go to Boston yesterday! I went with the College Democrats to the "Students for Change" Obama rally. A Boston Congressman and the governor of Massachusetts both spoke, which was awesome, and the only sad thing was that Barack Obama himself wasn't there. Sigh. I sometimes hate living in all-blue states, but only because that means Barack never comes to neither California nor Massachusetts. Oh well. I might kill myself if I lived in a swing, or Heaven forbid, a red state.
We were driven in an Amherst van by a really nice sophomore named David, whose niceness apparently did not entail an ability to navigate. We were separated from the group and ended up taking the long way around, by first going west and THEN turning around to go east to Boston.
We eventually got there, but the rally was shorter than expected, and after pooling our money, we donated a whopping $12 to the Obama campaign. Then we wandered around Boston, finally ending up at Fenway Park, where I took many pictures for Shannon. I was so glad to have Trevor and Camille with me. They're so nice and fun. :)
After David's suggestion and my insistence (woot Chinese people!), we went to a Chinese supermarket, 99 Ranch style. However, as we were driving to get there, the other van was parked in an extremely precarious situation. It was in between a corner and this huge dumpster. Someone had parked extremely closely behind him though, and so it was virtually impossible to get out. Right as I asked from our van, "How are they going to get out?" we hear this CRUNCHING sound as the back of their van rams into the bumper of the little Civic behind them. We all look at each other, panicking, but after the leaders decided that there was no visible damage on the car, they spent 10 minutes of extreme skill befitting only New York cab drivers and finally got the van out. Yes, Amherst students. Hit and run.
After that saga, I introduced everyone to Chinese food. It smelled SO much like HOME in that store.. it was beautiful!! After spending too much money and having boba, we headed back towards Amherst.
Now, heading back and actually getting there are two completely different notions. We paid the toll and somehow ended up OFF the Masspike (freeway), stranded somewhere in Newton. If only Greg were there... (he's from Newton).
We finally figured our way out, after many illegal and risky turns, near death experiences, including taking the wrong turn and ending up at the prettiest lake ever, that the boys in the car (Trevor, David, and Ethan) didn't seem to appreciate.
"WHERE ARE WE ELAINE?" Trevor demanded, since I was sitting in the passenger seat and was therefore by default navigator.
"It's SO PRETTY!!!!" I protested in reply, "We're taking the scenic route!"
A collective grunt from throughout the van, from the backseat to the driver's seat, echoed in the car.

That and I became the official radio DJ, and since I had no idea what people liked, I usually just turned the dial until someone started singing along, usually Trevor. At one point though, I found this station that played "Hey There Delilah," "The Remedy" and "Love Song" in quick succession, which obviously means that it was an awesome station. The others however, didn't seem to quite appreciate it, and dubbed it "GIRL MUSIC." WHATEVER. Camille and I liked it!!

Wow I really need to update!! So much has happened around here that I can't even begin to describe them all. I feel like I should introduce all the characters first, but don't know if I have the stamina for it.
First and foremost, let me say that I am very happy here. I love my classes (well, three out of the four), love my roommate, and like my developing group of friends. And Amherst is beautiful. :) It's been easy to get into the rhythm of things, going to class, eating at Val (Valentine Dining Hall = Val), and reading the 800 pages a night for all my classes.

First let me talk more about Shannon, my roommate. It's almost eerie how well we get along. People call us the poster board roommates, and one person even said that they should bring the college tours into our room and say, "This is the example of perfect roommates." We have the exact same schedule and we do basically everything together. On the rare occasion that we're not together (when she has XC), people ask me, "Where's your other half?" Every night, we lie in the darkness of our respective beds and discuss the day and all the people who go through it so that we always end up sleeping a lot later than we think.

Despite the fact that we're sub-free (substance free: no drugs or alcohol on the floor), we're also the first floor, which means that all the drunk people pass by or hang out in the common room. A lot of people, mostly sober actually, also decide that our room is THEIR common room, and they invade. At one point, we had about 15 people come in at once and go basically crazy, with one guy, Dede, swing off my bed, and others turning on the TV and sprawling all over the floor. Grr. We kicked them out.

My classes are basically amazing. I absolutely love my seminar on Berlin. Germany is the one European nation I never really got obsessed with, and it's fascinating learning about it in all its aspects and reading German literature. I love how classes here are so interdisciplinary. I've written literary essays without taking an English class. Happiness!!! If you're in need of a great realist novella, try "Delusions, Confusions" by Theodor Fontane. My professor is from East Germany and she's the sweetest lady who just loves her subject. Always so nice to talk to, and she's taking us to New York!
My Spanish class is decent. Too easy thus far, but I love my professor's accent. He's from Northern Spain and I just like sitting there and listening to him. Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, are the best because after Spanish, I have Europe in the 20th Century, which is an awesome class that really weaves literature and history. I always look forward to going to those classes.
The one class I don't look forward to is Intro to Religion. The class is really long and early in the morning, and every day we really have a RIDICULOUS amount of reading. Seriously. Even compared to all my other classes. I think I have more reading for that one class than my other three put together.. like half the Bible in one day. And then the lecture style is so unstructured. She's basically spraying out stream of consciousness about Judaism. If you space out for about two seconds, you're completely lost.

Hahah Shannon's listening to "Bet On It." Camille, another friend who is absolutely adorable with her big eyes and her cute dresses, and I introduced her to High School Musical songs... Shannon's slightly obsessed with "Bet on It" currently.. I've heard it about eight times a day. I think this will be the first cause for roommate strife haha.

Friday night, I was dragged to "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" at the campus center.. Yeah.. okay... not a good idea... THERE DOES NOT NEED TO BE THAT MUCH SEX IN ANY ONE MOVIE. EVER. OR NUDITY. EW. I blame Tim, who heard from his very critical friends that it was the best movie ever made. He's not trusting them ever again. Then afterwards, a group of us, Robert, Tim, me, Shannon, Camille, Ethan, and Trevor just hung out in the room talking for a couple of hours. With a lot of them not really knowing each other, it was sometimes difficult to keep up a stream of conversation, and so we went around the circle and talked about our days. Trevor, who is EXTREMELY into math, decided that since there were seven of us there, and obviously seven is a prime number, that thus we could pick any number less than seven and still manage to go all around the circle. So we went every other person. My very exciting day included going to my callback for an a capella group, which I didn't make, but the callback was fun. They taught me the soprano part for two of their songs, "Lean On Me" and "Hide and Seek" and then I had to sing it with all of them singing their different parts. That all went pretty well, until I had to sing the solo for "Come On Over" by Christina Aguilera. Elaine doesn't really have a sense of rhythm, so she messed up twice during that... eww.

Last night was far more interesting. We spent almost four hours of the afternoon in the library with Tim and Camille. Tim takes religion with Shannon and me, and thus we all had about 800 pages to read. Thus, on Thursday, he proposed that we have a mass religion reading session, AKA mass execution at 1 PM on Saturday. However, when that time rolled around, Shannon was not yet back from her morning run (she's a psycho), and thus I texted him to tell him that we just MIGHT have to live for yet another hour, to which he responded, "Oh man! I was hoping to fulfill my martyrous destiny as soon as possible!"
We did eventually meet our fates, after we found the sound-proof glass room in the library that I had seen earlier that was AMAZING. We sat there for four hours straight... I think I lapsed into a coma at some point.
To shake ourselves out of our religiously-induced stupor, we went to eat dinner, which was actually good because they had Mexican food (I never thought I'd like it so much) and then we came back to the room, having picked up the rather unwelcome Andrew, and played Apples to Apples. It was pretty funny how you could tell each person's personality from the way they chose the cards. Andrew always chose the most bizarre, nonsensical, and even disgusting cards. Camille always picked the opposite of what everyone else thought it would be. For example, for "masculine," people put down "Clint Eastwood" and something else rather manly, and she picked "Hummingbirds." I'm not complaining. I put that one down. :) Tim always chose the most sensible or the most romantic, such as "A loving hug," "sunrise," "sunset," and "the ocean." I always picked the one that had anything to do with Europe, and Shannon also went with common sense. They were all really mad at me in the last round when the word was "dangerous" and everyone put down "electric chair," "thunderstorm," and something else that was actually dangerous, and I picked Andrew's "Renaissance" because it was dangerous and damaging to the ecclesiastical structure of Europe. :D
Another round, I was the judge for "fabulous," and when I pulled it out I said, "Fabulous. Obviously Elaine." Camille pulled out a "create your own card" and said, "Elaine!" Obviously, she won. :D

After that, Tim took off for his room and we tried all sorts of maneuvers to get rid of Andrew, who was bombarding us with strange Youtube videos. Finally, we left him with the boys playing Settlers of Catan, and took a walk throughout campus at night. It was really pretty, even with the loud music and screaming emanating from various dorms. Basically, Pratt is the sex dorm. Stearns and James are the drunken dorms. Appleton and Williston are the ghetto dorms, and North and South are the soberly social dorms. We went to Schwemms, the cafe that's open really late, and sat around and talked for a little bit. Then we came back, each doing our respective things... Shannon studying French while sort of watching Youtube, Camille watching SNL, and me watching "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" on my computer. All of a sudden, Trevor and Jesse come up to our window and scare the living daylights out of me. They were COMPLETELY drunk, and then came in through the door. Harbouring drunken Trevor is our Saturday-night thing, apparently, since he did it last week too, though I really hope he doesn't fall into this pattern. He starts drinking when he's depressed, and his ex-girlfriend had come to visit for the whole day and he'd realized that he still had a lot of feelings for her but she didn't reciprocate, and thus, he drank himself into a stupor. He comes in and tells us how Jesse and him were at the social dorms. They wandered into the bathroom, and with encouragement from Trevor that "We need to make our mark!" Jesse took someone's shower brush and snapped it in half on his knee. We shall call the shower brush Y. They then wandered into the kitchenette, thinking it was an exit, and found this unopened bottle of really expensive vodka, which Jesse stuffed into his shirt and sprinted back to South to put it in his fridge. The vodka will be known as X. Then, Jesse looked for Michelle, who shall be known as Z, because he wanted to have sex with her. He kept asking Trevor her number, and Trevor kept responding, "1-800-Michelle-Escobar," which Jesse was not yet drunken enough to believe. Remember that Trevor is extremely into math, always wearing T-shirts with mathematicians' faces on them, but by the end of the night, he couldn't keep it straight that "Jesse stole X, broke Y, and wanted to do Z."
Trevor then started moping that he was meant to be miserable in life and that he should never again pursue any girls because it would just turn out badly. If he wants to be a great mathematician, he must be miserable, and then we argued about different mathematicians and their varying degrees of loneliness as I attempted to make him feel better. We eventually walked him back to his room and made him get into bed, even tucking him in, since last Saturday when we told him to go bed, we mistakenly left him in Jesse's hands. Instead of going to bed, they ended up riding the elevator up and down the four floors for an hour eating a whole box of 18 chewy bars.
Right when we thought things were calming down, Cam and Jeremy show up at our window, thoroughly drunk. Cam is the guy that gets drunk on Tuesday nights and is perpetually drunk. Apparently he drinks so much that he had crystals in his pee, which made him realize that he might have had a problem. He had 10 shots of vodka and a crapload of beer, got written up by the police, but the policeman didn't even think that he was very drunk. Eek. We introduce Cam, who is Shannon and my favourite person just because we love laughing about him, to Camille. Cam's real name is Camilo, and when we introduced him to Camille, he said, "CAMILLE? Wow! My name's Camilo!! You're like the girl version of me!"
We finally walked Camille back to her room, only to meet the creepy Alex who used to follow me around. He was found out stone cold last weekend in the shower. He was also completely wasted this weekend, and he said to us, "Hey! Camille, if you and I ever go out together, you can be my spit checker."
The three of us stare incredulously, uncomprehending the meaning of this enigmatic statement.
Thankfully, he continued, "Well, sometimes when I go out, I need someone to tell me when my spit is gathering at the corners of my mouth so it's not all frothy. You know what I hate? I hate it when my eyes are different sizes."
What made it even funnier was that his speech was completely slurred, and also that at the moment he was describing these phenomena, they were occurring before our eyes.

Oh drunken people... I promise I'll update more!!

Hi people!
First off, NO, I have NOT yet gone to a college party.
Secondly, NO, I have NOT gotten drunk or even sipped alcohol here.
Thirdy, NO, I am not on the brink of an emotional breakdown.

Just thought I'd get that out of the way. Geez. That's all anyone wants to know. Well, the third one is mostly my mother. She seems to think that I miss her or something... *rolls eyes*
There ARE a lot of mosquitos here though... sadness.

I shall catch you up on the epic events of the past few days. I can't really keep the days straight, so I will just mainly guess.
Wednesday night, Shannon and I met up with Greg and Tim from North (we live in South). Greg had come to South because the night before his roommate, Tim, had been in our common room and had noticed that on the map/list of where we all come from, there was another person from Newton, MA, which, incidentally, is the hometown of Greg, John Krasinski, and BJ Novak (YAY OFFICE!). Tim had thus told Greg, and Greg had come to check it out, but was too afraid of basically stalking that person to find out who it was. Shannon and I, however, had no such inhibitions, and we walked through the floors looking, and within seconds found the culprit: our RC!!! She wasn't in though, so Greg just left her a message on her white board, which he was afraid might sound stalker-ish: "Hi! I'm Greg from North! I'm one of the two other people from Newton and I just wanted to meet you!! Bye!!"

After that, we headed over to North to play a very intense game of Risk. Now, Shannon and I had never played before, and Greg was basically a lifetime expert. He taught us how to play, and we got underway at about 8:30 PM.
Eight and a half hours later, at 5 am, we were finally conquered, and we have become legendary.
Jaclyn and Dash were playing together, but not really.. they were switching on and off, and they didn't consult with each other at all. They were using the black pieces and they had basically swept across and conquered all of Europe like a thick Iron Curtain. Dash proudly proclaimed them the FOURTH REICH. And they were acting like it too!! No, no. They weren't massacring anyone, but I think that had Jaclyn been given the chance to, she might have. She was scary, laughing demonically and screaming, "I JUST WANT TO WIN!!!!"
Shannon and I were using the blue pieces and before every single move, we would discuss and consult with each other and analyze the pros and the cons of each move. We were also the firmly established power of North and South America (particularly the latter) and the battling owners of Africa. Thus, we were THE REPUBLIC. We stand for all good in this world.
Greg and Tim, but basically just Greg because Tim was the only one with enough sense to go to bed at a godly hour, were basically holed up in Australia and parts of Asia with their pink pieces. However, like the smart, sensible being that he is, Greg realized that if he sat idly and watched The Fourth Reich and the Republic hack at each other over Africa for long enough, quietly building up his Pink Army of Doom, he would soon be the most powerful of all. And thus, when the time came, Greg, the Dragon Emperor with his Pink Army of Doom, UNLEASHED his forces and swept across and killed everyone.
IT WAS SO UNCOOL. And then, the Fourth Reich realized that Greg was going to win, and basically OFFERED US UP AS MARTYRS. Apparently, they think "casualties are acceptable" but "THE FOURTH REICH HAS NO MARTYRS!!" Except when they're other teams... named Shannon and Elaine. So basically, they decided that they were getting out of this fight, and retreated ALL of their units back to MADAGASCAR, the impenetrable fortress that Shannon and I had tried to take ten times but only succeeded once, and left the Republic fighting the forces of the East. Needless to say, Greg soon unleashed his wrath upon us all, but we put up a great fight, I must say. We finally holed up in South America, our one perpetual home, and defended to the death! Greg eventually ran out of pink pieces, and then ran out of red pieces, and had to end up with this bright amalgam of pink, red, yellow, and green pieces all over the board, so he was like a little preschooler colouring the board. Dash kept yelling, "MADAGASCAR WILL NOT DIE!!!!" but sadly, they fell too... after like an hour.
Whatever. GREG IS GOING DOWN. And we're very proud of ourselves. The two newbies took on the seasoned veteran for a whole eight hours. I got so hungry halfway through the game so Greg brought down all the cereal he had stolen from Val (cafeteria) and we feasted. Other highlights included the fact that Greenland, a largely ignored country in everyday life was the central battlefield for so long, and that Alberta (in Canada), which is completely inexistent in daily conversation was named so many times that night!

So yes. Board games are amazing. Especially when you're sub-free and don't want to be part of the drunken contingent that roamed through our halls last night at 2 am and woke Shannon up. I was completely out apparently, because I never hear anything. It kinda sucks when you meet people and you like them and you think you should hang out with them, but then all they ever want to do is party and get drunk. Grr. So annoying. Yay for sub-free!!

Like last night, we went to North, the sub-free dorm and just sat and talked to everyone for a couple hours.
We're going to go explore now!