First day of school. Again.

Monday was the first day I sat down for classes although technically, school had yet to start. I signed up for a short workshop on the basics of using GIS software. GIS (don't make the same mistake I did and pronouce it "jiss" which has gotten me into trouble more than once, spell it out G-I-S) stands for something like global information system. It's a way of looking at data as it relates to a geographic basis. Basically, tying various geographic pieces of information together. So you could load, say, a street map of St.Louis, add in block populations, and land use, and then selectively look at the relationship between housing density and grocery store locations. It's pretty powerful stuff.

Anyway, that was monday. Monday night, I went down to a friend's house in the historic and gentrified Tower Grove area and enjoyed some drinks out on the patio while her friends played an incredibly lengthy and convoluted game of croquet on her tiny, uneven plot of grass below.

Tuesday was our first day of classes. Bright and early 8:30 AM Advanced Building Systems, which is supposed to bring together all the systems we've studied so far, incuding lighting, acoustics, site, HVAC, and structural systems. Taught by a professor with a very very strong Massachusets accent (and a licenced "Ahhhkitect"). Actually, I'm finding myself liking him. He's coming from a very Corbusian background and he's totally negating any kind of architecture that is not an enclosed space, but I think it should still be interesting.

Then in the afternoon, I had Urban Books. Urban books is a class mostly made of architecture students and taught by an urban planner and an artist. They teach us bookmaking, and the subject of our books is going to be St.Louis. I'm excited for this class as I love stuff done with my hands, the crafty side of things, and there's a lot of potential for the subject matter. It's pretty wide open. And Dew is in the class, which makes things more fun too. Our final books will go into the special collections library at the Olin library (our campus library). The idea is that the books document the city in some way. Sketches, photographs, maps, etc. Making books is actually a a really good way to get into curating my own work, or at least saving it and presenting it and disseminating it.

That night, I went over to another friend's house to play some cards. (Cahds). I've been craving a game of dihinmen, which is the japanese version of asshole a.k.a. president a.k.a. scum a.k.a. big 2 a.k.a too many other names and variations. The way my east coast/ midwest friends play it is much more like egyptian rat screw. There's no Jokers, for one thing, people can slap down cards whenever they feel like it, and you can go out with 2s and 8s still in your hand which you give away to other people who fight over them. No revolutions, any number of 2s will take a set. It's more frenetic, less graceful, and probably less strategic than dihimen. I'll have to teach them sometime. I suppose its not too surprising that the Japanese version is more reserved and polite with everyone playing in turns.

Summer is still here. It gets hotter and cooler. Today is beautiful and sunny and hot. The campus is verdantly green. Filled with students lounging on the grass under trees, strolling with their bicycles, and enthusiastically walking to get thier coffee drinks. Everywhere you look, its like a shot from the Wash U recruitment magazine.

Anyway, I'm off to pick studios this semester. More on that later. I'll find out tonight (9:30PM, what a stupid time to pick desks).

Orientation Day 1

Today was the first day of orientation.

We had been given no indication as to what to expect or how long the day would last, other than that we were to show up at 9am at the main auditorium. As Saori and I walked the 2.2 miles to school, we joked that we'd go in and they'd point out the cardinal directions and that would be it. If only that were the case.

It was a beautiful walk to campus- at 8 AM, the air was cool and crisp, the heat and humidity were way down from the last week, and it was really the most pleasant weather we've had since we got to town. It's also a long walk to campus- it ended up taking us about 50 minutes each way, but I think that may not be a bad thing considering how we don't really get any other exercise.

When we got to the building, we were about five minutes late (but not the last ones in!) and (surprise surprise) they handed us:

• The Student Orientation Handbook, which includes an incredibly helpful section on where to live IF IT HAD BEEN DISTRIBUTED WHEN PEOPLE WERE ACTUALLY LOOKING FOR PLACES TO LIVE, not that I'm annoyed about it or anything. It also includes helpful hints concerning student insurance such as "if you cut yourself, do not walk to the student center" and warning that if you go to any other facility within 50 miles of the campus, your medical expenses will not be reimbursed.
• The orientation and pre-semester calender of events which pretty much indicated that our summer is over, ha ha.
• A few pages of notes on getting metro passes, ID cards, etc. and a map of the campus.
• An overdesigned social calender made by the architecture graduate social committee including dinners, bike rides, jazz nights, and picnics.

In the seminar room, we listened for about three hours as major faculty and professors introduced themselves and the college. The associate director of the college, Peter, took the lead as MC and after all the introductions were made gave a very awkward and euphemistic speech about "academic integrity" as well as "unpleasant situations" including the school's policy of intolerance for any form of racism, sexism, discrimination based on religion, nationality, or ethnicity, as well as any form of physical or sexual violence or intimidation. And then we got the same speech again from the head of the student judiciary, who was more comfortable talking about it.

Then a representative from the writing center came in and spent about an hour emphasizing that going to the writing center doesn't mean that we have writing disabilities or incurable social disease. "Lots of fantastic writers come to the writing center," she pointed out brightly, "you know why they are fantastic? Because they know that their work can be improved with revisions." 

The unspoken running joke of the morning was that because all of this stuff was taking place a week earlier than previous semesters, many of the faculty and students on the student council committee were not back in time to be a part of the orientation.

Anyway, the rest of the day was lunch, wandering around campus, tours of the library and printing rooms. (3 laser cutters, 8 main plotters, milling machines, etc etc.) and we all got our student ID's made.

It was interesting to see the makeup of the incoming students. Apparently the school received around 600 applications of which they selected around 116 incoming students to fill in three different sections of the graduate program track. I was amazed at how many Chinese students there were. I'd say there were at least a dozen Chinese, and from the ones I spoke to, most of them had just arrived from China and had never set foot in the US before. For all that, their English was phenomenal. They comprehended my regular speed speech and responded fluently in conversational English with few mistakes in pronunciation. It hints at incredibly intense English education over there, complete with language immersion.

I can't believe it was only seven years ago that I was an eager-beaver freshman, enthusiastically chomping at the bit as I got ready for classes. I've felt a lot of things in the move and in the preparation for school and studio, but enthusiastic isn't one of them. At first I thought it was related to the stress of moving, or settling in, but now, with orientation, there's just not that level of excitement. It makes me a little concerned if I'll still have that level of enthusiasm once studio gets underway. That collegiate rush is missing, replaced by a kind of resignation mixed with determination to work hard. Post-professional graduate apathy? We'll see.

Open house day

I was understandbly bleary-eyed and hungover, and as I got ready to go, I was regretting the last round at the bar, fortunately, I was feeling much better after an hour or two. Outside the lobby, we were met by the student driven SUVs which shuttled us over to the campus. WashU is not a large campus, and occupies a rough rectangle perhaps half a mile long by a quarter mile wide. The architecture campus sticks out of the rectangle, towards the river.

Looking at maps of the area, I was surprised by the scale of St.Louis. The city itself is quite small, perhaps five miles wide and six to seven miles deep, but it is ringed by about 90 smaller municipalies and suburbs, which give it the sprawl. It is interesting in comparison to Phoenix, which basically annexed every small community that grew into it. WashU sits on the boundary of the city, technically in a part of town called University City. I think the term city is being used fairly liberally here, as University City looks like it would be dwarfed by even Ponca City.

Anyway, the university is fairly surrounded by parkland and residential neighborhoods. The main campus looks very prestigious, with castleated battlements, and a general tudor/gothic style, despite being constructed at the turn of the last century. The architecture campus mostly comprises of two buildings mated together, a 1960s modern with a folded plate roof, and a modernized beaux arts style, which is an older building. It's a quirky combination. There's a small library and a warren of computer labs, 3 laser cutters, and various 3D printers and CNC machines. Definately capable of handling digital fabriction.

A continental breakfast had been laid out for us and we ate and mingled with the other arriving students. A very large contingent of University of Florida students showed up. Actually, of the students who would be entering the 2+ program, literally HALF are Gators. This is a little disconcerting to me, especially after overhearing a conversation about what a great convenience laser cutters are and how relieved they are that WashU has three of them. The whole thing conveyed such dislike of craft it made me wonder how they would be as studio mates. I should not judge the entire group though, and I have to admit that as admitted students, they must have been held to the same rigid academic and design standards, so we'll see. Most of the visiting students I talked to at the open house seemed pretty sure that Wash U was going to be their top choice of schools.

Breakfast was followed by a day of short rotating lectures across several rooms. There were a series of half hour sessions that students rotated around to check out sessions that most interested them. Sessions dealt with various aspects such as study abroad, digital media, representation, introduction to professors, thesis projects, etc. etc. A lot of information, but clearly presented.

Wash U has a very large program- about 300 architecture graduates. There is essentially one program, roughly a three year cirriculum, and students enter at one of three points based on their undergraduate degree and transcripts. Saori and I would enter the 2+ program, which is five semesters in length. The first semester 'core studio' is required, and then the next four semesters have option studios, where we pick out of a dozen studios which we want to take. It's an interesting vertical studio where 2nd year students will mix and work with 3rd year students. The last semester is the studio project/thesis.

Lunch was sandwiches, laid out in the main lobby, followed by more sessions. Saori and I had signed up to talk to a financial aid advisor and we ditched a few classes to walk around the campus a bit beforehand. It looks like a prestigious private school, with its Tudor architecture and castled battlements, although not as old as it looks (only early 1900s). The financial aid advisor talked us through our questions, didn't hurry us along, and was genuinely intent on making sure all of our questions were answered. Saori and I both were awarded scholarships to the school, and the rest of the financial aid comes in the form of different loans, which we go completely through the school.

Afterwards, we ditched more sessions to walk around the studios and see what students were working on. I liked the studio space- although individual stations are smaller than ASU's, the rooms had high ceilings and lots of natural light. The studio looked a lot like ASU's, with paper, drawings, cardboard, and foamcore everywhere, and students working on laptops. We talked to a few students at work and they were happy to explain what they were working on. We showed up just as a student led tour was ending, and then the student gave us a personal quick tour, hitting the major places of the rest of the architecture buildings.

The two major buildings are directly connected, but they are also connected underground to other buildings which house the library, art museum, computer labs, and fabrication shops. I've always liked expansive labyrinthine buildings, and it looked like there was a lot to explore.

After a final few sessions, we were released to a happy hour in the courtyard. A collection had been taken up to get clean glassware/cups for visiting students for beer. Apparently, they hold the $1 happy hour every friday afternoon. We talked more with the local students, waited in the terrifically long beer/re-beer line, and generally enjoyed the late afternoon.

At six we were shuffled into the main auditorium to listen to a lecture by Wiel Arets, a famous European architect (although I confess I'd never heard of him). The lecture was surprisingly fun. Arets is a lucky architect who gets to work with people who own castles and 7 aston-martins. The introduction by one of the faculty members was thorough and contextual, but damned near as long as the lecture and put some of the already tired and beer-befuddled audience members to sleep.

After the lecture, we were shepherded over to the main campus building, where we went into one of the grand halls with paintings and chandeliers, a la Hogwarts. We were served dinner, more wine, and more speeches and toasts with dessert and coffee.

Apparently Revit is not widely used on the campus- Rhino is standard for 3d modeling, a step up from FormZ. I sincerely hope that I'll be able to use Revit (and learn Rhino meanwhile) in studio.

When dinner was over, we were shooed out the door into waiting yellow school busses, which took us to Blueberry Hill, a massive bar with many rooms dedicated to Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley, where surprise, there was more free beer. We hung out there for one drink, chatted with some former ASU students, and called it a night, catching a bus back to the hotel at 11:30.