Subconcious contamination

It's been a pretty intense ramping up into the final semester. Stress levels really going up, especially trying to figure out summer and trying to get into final production mode for school. It's been coming through in my sleep- all of a sudden, I'm having incredibly intense, realistic, bizzare dreams; like every night. One night I dreamt I was on the super huge train to Shanghai. Anyway, its felt very much like a world spinning out of control, but I'm worried I'm feeling too relaxed about it- I'm really not doing much about saving my own summer. 

I'm actually not too worried about my final project- we had a review with Sung Ho about a week and a half ago and he said he really liked the project (I want to see a quarter scale model on monday) and Derek really likes the project. I guess I like the project, although I feel like I'm not really pushing all the implications. We'll see.

Still have some minor misc. stuff for my Mid-century class, I need to re-write my paper for AA for monday, and finish the strucutres homework- and then I'm pretty much done for the semester other than studio. Our review is a week from tuesday, so I'm going to get a better layout for my boards this weekend. Board graphics were always one of my weakest skills I think. 

I've got a pretty sectional model out of wood. It's been a wood and rockite semester. The final model should be pretty nice. Revit and photoshopped renderings, yeah.

Took the structures final this morning- so happy it was not cumulative. It was multiple choice- which has ups and downs. On the one hand, I don't have to do much work like working out problems and I'm actually better at concepts rather than problem solving with numbers and formulas. There's also the advantage of knowing how to make multiple choice questions work for you. The downside is that there's no partial credit. So we'll see. I got a 89 the first test, a 94 or 96 the second test, and I'm hoping to at least make a 90 on this test. It'd be nice to get an A in structures. 

The approaching storm...

May is nearly upon us, and there is so much work to get done, it's frankly terrifying.

So I took a deep breath, sat down, and calmly made a list of things to do.

Terror gives way to stark panic. This is because my to do list includes items such as "Move to Shanghai," to say nothing of my final exam for structures, final theoretical paper, and final presentation on post-modernity falling on the same day next week.

Night out

Friday night, after the architecture happy hour, Chuck drove us to Seki, a Japanese restaurant on the Loop. He was treating me to dinner in gratitude for helping get his driver's licence in the US. As a Chinese student who may only be here for a few years, even if he doesn't end up buying a car, there are huge advantages to having a driver's licence. On the one hand, he can now go to bars without having to worry about losing his passport, since he can just show his driver's license. Also, now he can drive other people's cars, or rent a car, which will give him a lot more mobility. It's actually to my advantage as well, as he's living pretty close by and I need to go to a doctor or a hospital or something, that he could drive me.

When I got licenced in Arizona, I literally drove around the block, making only right-hand turns, and then had to make a three-point turn marked by traffic cones. The guy giving me the test was a ADOT employee with a name badge. I passed handily. Arizona is pretty easy on that kind of stuff.

Not so much here in Missouri, apparently. Chuck failed his first two driving tests. The first one, he didn't physically turn around to back up, and the second one he was driving too slowly. All systems: go on the third, however. Apparently, this test is a lot more stringent. They ask you how to turn on the defoggers, the parking brakes, etc. even before you leave the lot. They were making several left hand turns in the middle of the lane in confusing traffic situations. I'm really glad I don't have to retest here, frankly.

Anyway, that was friday night, and after dinner I just watched Mel Brooks' Blazing Saddles which has a few good moments, but was probably best experienced in the early 70's, when farting on screen and using phrases like "up yours, nigger," was revolutionary and boundary-breaking.

Saturday, back in studio, was a miserable day out, so a great day to stay inside and work. I worked on studio stuff from about 9-8, before a Freda, a friend of mine from studio, reminded me about the schoolwide end of year graduate student event. I never really pay attention to the emails that were sent out, but free beer and BBQ is a deal, especially for someone still on campus. Apparently Wash U is about half graduate students, which I hadn't realized, of course, only a tiny fraction showed up for the event. So I got there just as it opened, and it was like high school prom all over again. People standing around awkwardly. Name tags. Streamers and balloons and a few token decorations. (This year's theme was "Hip Hop Hoedown". Think bling and haybales.) Just what I get for being exactly on time. We got three drink tickets, good for cheap wine or bud light. I grabbed a beer and moseyed on over to the BBQ room. After eating, I was going to walk to the metrolink to catch a ride to Anita's birthday drinks at the speakeasy, but I was waylaid by a group of friends who convinced me to stay and chat and drink some more.

I eventually caught a ride with them to the Speakeasy in downtown. It's kind of a fun concept- An old office building lobby, renovated in art deco style, but you don't enter that way. You have to go around to the back alley, and ring the doorbell for admittance. There's a password (this weekend's was "Daddy") (it was on their website, plus the suggestion that you "whisper the password to the doorman"), which gives you reduced cover. $3 instead of $5. The bar is downstairs, below the elegant and empty lobby. Really cool bar actually. Much older crowd, and not nearly enough dancing for our nightlife chaperones. I drained the gin and tonic I'd ordered (toyed with the idea of ordering a gin fizz, given the surroundings), and hit the road again, this time heading for the more trendy neighborhood of central west end.

The Mandarin was a dance club and it was hopping. It exuded trendiness. Red walls, minimalist accentuated with Asian decor, dramatic lighting, throbbing beats, and roped off areas. I paid the $5 cover and passed on a drink at this place. It's kind of funny, actually. When 4e opened in Scottsdale, Chase and I both had to drop a $20 just to get in the door. I guess its another way of saying that St.Louis is not Scottsdale.

Anyway, the floor was packed, everyone was getting down, and I had a lot of fun dancing. Met up with some other familiar faces from my studio who hit the club circuit pretty hard, so that was fun too. The only crappy part was the fact that Mandarin closes at 1:15, and they don't segue you out. They flipped on all the lights, and made repeated announcements to basically pay your tab and get the hell out. By the time we'd all regrouped outside the club, it was nearly two and a group of us, including the heavily inebriated birthday girl, were showing signs of club fatigue, so we decided to call it a night.

Makes me want to get out more.

Three-hour nights and three great meals

So, after saying "screw it, I'm going to see Farnsworth House" all day saturday, it was inevitable that something else had to give. Sleep was the obvious candidate. In a day of 24 hours, any element that takes up more than six of them is going to be the elephant in the room. So, sunday night, monday night, and tuesday night, I averaged three hours of sleep each night.

The first day was terrible, the second not so bad, the third was simply surreal. One feels slightly loopy and a little drunk. There is a history of sleep deprivation- the Russians discovered its use as a means to break the will and mind in torturing political prisoners- the US government has picked up where the Russians left off. It's convenient that it can't be photographed and leaves no physical marks. I've read that certain artists use it as a means of working, the hallucinogenic properties in particular.

Anyway, the reason for all this was that we had a pin-up review wednesday with Francis Kere, the architect from Burkina Faso. This pin up (perhaps because I was stoned from lack of sleep) felt like the most productive day we've spent in studio, at least in terms of advancing and understanding our ideas. Kere loved all the projects, he wasn't really critical of any of them. However, the discussions we got into over each project raised questions of community focus, financing, etc. that many of us had simply never considered. However, given the length of the discussions, he was only able to review five student's work before leaving to prepare for his lecture that night.

The rest of the review session was essentially a student critique. DH gave us some criticism and then the floor was opened up to the rest of the studio. It's really the first time we've had a chance to see each others work where it is now, and to comment on it. Anyway. The comment's I received were a mixed bag, but overall very positive. The gist was essentially, "this project is too good for you to be allowed to screw it up."

Anyway, I slept really well wednesday night. I don't even remember anything about how I got home or what I did that night. Thursday night, Chuck, Allison and I went to get some Mexican food at the taqueria in the old taco bell northwest of campus, out off of Page road. Tinga chimichangas and jamaica. Good, sleepy Mexican food.

Friday night, after happy hour, I got roped into taking a second, smaller group of prospective students to dinner at Bar Italia. There were about eight students who couldn't make the main open house, so a condensed version was being offered, which included a dinner (and the requisite toasts) from the president of the architecture school as well as another distinguished faculty member (who has a tendency to name-drop, although he might be forgiven for actually delivering these people to the school).

Dinner was excellent. We got a private room, appetizers of cheese plates, olives, etc. Small salads with more olives, and our choice of entree. I went with the grilled salmon with polenta. Actually, what really got me into this gig was the chance to dine at the rather pricy Bar Italia. Quite good. I was disappointed to get chocolate mousse instead of tiramisu for dessert, but considering I paid nothing, I couldn't complain. I sat between a young and eager Florida student who I will probably see in the fall, and a young woman from Saudi Arabia and we talked about the differences between the architecture school culture of Saudi and the US. While they skate by on 45 cents a gallon gas, the students also face astronomical plotting costs at school, at least five times what we're paying over here. So, it was a sacrafice of a friday night, but it wasn't like I had a party to go to.

Today was sunny and muggy. I was totally unprepared. I still have my snow boots ready by the door. Yesterday was beautiful. Today was muggy and warm. Warm is nice. Sun is nice, muggy not so much. Don't we get a spring? Or is spring what you call the violent shifts between summer and winter in the midwest? Either way, after a productive morning of work, I succumbed to the beautiful lazy spring day and went for a walk in forest park to photograph the flowering landscape. Tons of people out and about, capitalizing on the warm weather and beautiful scenery. All the couples walking around holding hands, or laying side by side on the grass together really made me miss Saori. We're missing each others' spring.

My Vietnamese friend Hiep, who is, incidentally, one of the funniest people I know, had invited Chuck and I out for dinner for some Thai, but we joined our group with a group of other friends, including Dew, two other Chinese students and a Korean guy I don't really know, and we went out for all you can eat Korean BBQ. We went to place Seoul Garden out by the airport (why is the good ethnic food by the airport?). We pushed together a few tables and they basically filled with several hundred small dishes of traditional Korean fare, mostly pickled vegitables, kimchee, dried fish, beans, tofu, etc. and also never-ending bowls of rice. Then came the grills and the plates of thin-sliced meat. Our two tables must have gone through at least a dozen plates. Bulgogi, pork, marinated chicken, thin sliced beef. Really good. We got ourselves totally stuffed.

It was kind of amusing to find myself, once again, in a very international community. We had a large percentage of asia present: Japan, Vietnam, northern Chinese, southern Chinese, and Korea. Hiep asked me if I was oriented towards Asians and I was kind of stuck on an answer. I've never considered myself remotely Asian- I appreicate a lot of aspects of Asian culture, and a lot of my friends are asian, but I don't mimic Asian fashion, I don't do cosplay. I do drink a lot of tea, however. And really, most of my friends are more international in comparison with what would be considered straight-up American. I don't really know how to explain it.

On the one hand, seeing a culture and context with different eyes is incredibly liberating creatively and intellectually. I experience the world more fully when I'm traveling. There's also something vulnerable about international students that makes them very easy to befriend. They're also very open to new experiences and new ways of thinking (it's starting to sound like I'm starting a cult, actually) but there's also so much help I can do for them with so little effort on my part. I was and still am so touched by the kindness of strangers while traveling, both here and abroad, that I feel like I am in debt to the rest of the world.

Dancing directions

Peculiar travel directions are like dancing lessons from God.

So sayeth a character from Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle, which is a philosophy I have attempted to take to heart. Which is why, when a friend asked me if I wanted to go to beer school, I immediately replied "yes" and why today, when another friend came up and asked if I wanted to drive to Farnsworth House, an architectural icon and 4 hours from St.Louis, again I replied with the affirmative. 

So I'm going to be driving to Plano, IL, with three Chinese students and one Spanish architect, Alfredo Paya Benedito to see the deeply contested work of Mies van der Rohe.

Should be an interesting day.

This comes on the heels of another interesting day. This morning started with a structures exam, which I actually felt pretty good about considering I only did about a third of the homework. Right afterwards, I got got chewed out by my studio instructor for not having enough work done. I lost a lot of time working for the GAC yesterday, taking prospective students to the hotel from the airport. After getting yelled at for a few minutes, I left studio and went to buy some model supplies. I bought around $40 of concrete and $20 of wood, and hauled it back to studio. Actually, I barely was able to squeeze the 10' board into my Prius, but I did it by wedging the board in diagonally all the way up to the dashboard. Got back to studio, quickly sliced the board into 2' sections in the wood shop, and then took one of the prospective students back to the airport for his early flight out of town.

It's been kind of fun shuttling kids around. They have this nervous/eager look to them, they look so young. The way the whole thing worked is the school rented minivans and SUVs for us to drive, and we would send in a greeter to the terminal to collect the students while the driver hung out at the cell phone lot or circled. My greeter was one of the most stoic and taciturn students I've seen in the school. In the car ride, I was making all the conversation with the student. At least he hung in for a long time.

Anyway, after I got back to campus, it was time for happy hour (free beer for this time/mixer with the prospective students) (also where I was approached and asked about Farnsworth house), then there was a lecture by Juhani Pallasmaa on comparative phenomenology/existentialism in literature vs architecture, followed by a very nice dinner in Holmes Lounge, the very nice beaux arts former reading room of the library. Everyone calls it Hogwarts. Good dinner, mediocre wine, (but after a few beers at happy hour, who really cares?) and good desert. Our table was dominated by the presence of one of our senior professors who has a tendency to name-drop and to monopolize conversation. It was an interesting study in the subtle art of putting down other schools while appearing to be balanced, especially in the context of quietly selling the school to the three prospective students at the table. Actually, most of what he said made sense to me, and I frequently agreed with his assessment of the school and its comparison to other campuses.

After dinner, more free Blue Moon beer at the Blueberry Hill bar.