Of the Busy Town

It's quite an odd time in Lawrence right now. There are no more home basketball games and while that gives me more time to study, it's kind of odd and disturbing to not be camping. I promised I would explain how camping so here's what I tell people when I give tours:

1. Lottery- this is the worst part about camping. The morning after a home game you have to be at Allen Field House BEFORE 6 a.m. Someone from your group signs your group up on a list. Then at 6 a.m., this jerk who is never going to graduate starts calling of the group names from the list. Once your group is called all of the people in your group line up and for every 5 people, 1 person gets to pull a poker chip out of a box with a number on it. That number dictates where you are in line to camp and to enter Allen Field House on game day.
2. Camping- I may complain about the Athletics Dept., but they do let us actually camp inside unlike other schools. On the weekdays, we camp from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. unless there is another event at the Field House (then we are kicked out) or if there is an away game that everyone wants to watch (then we suspend it). On the weekends camping is from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. One person from your team must be camping at all times.
   
3. To ensure that each group always has a person there, people will sporadically call "roll." Everyone there goes and huddles by a sheet that has the list of groups on it, and the jerk that called roll yells of each name on the list. If your team gets called and there is no one there to answer "here" then your crossed off the list. It's pretty much every person's goal in life the knock off a team in front of them to get a better seat.

That said, I waited through the longest lottery of my entire life for the K-State Game- over 100 teams were there. It wasn't until 7 a.m. (remember it starts at 6 a.m.) that our group at 50 was called. My team lined up and they counted us off. I should mention, I hate being the person that pulls the chip. I always pull the worst number! Well, a girl holding the box of poker chips is counting us off and she points at me and tells me to pull. I wanted to turn around and let the next guy do it, but there wasn't enough time. I grabbed two and dropped one back in the box, hand it to the guy in charge and walk off. I hear him drop it and say "one hundred... no wait, eight." What??? Did I just draw eight????? We went over and asked and the guy said "Yeah, your number 8 in line!" Out of 100 teams we were going to be the eighth group inside Allen Field House for the K-State game. Emphasis on were. Three days later I get a text message saying that we were bumped at 6 a.m. because someone missed roll call and are now 114. I was not happy. I still made it into the game, and had a lot of fun, but still, that would have been a fun game to have good seats!

The Distant Humming

It's 5:14 in the morning and my phone is ringing. At first I thought it was my alarm waking me up to go lottery for seats at Allen Field House (I'll explain that process in a later blog). I answered. It was my friend who lives upstairs. Half awake, I couldn't really understand her and all I could make out was "...we're wigging out....can you come up?" I made sure she was in her room and stumbled out of bed, up the stairs, and into her room. "Frances, is that you?" I responded and opened the sliding door to the bedroom. She and her two roommates were wide awake. One was sitting up and staring at the window- I would have been scared if I was actually awake. "What's wrong?" I asked. "We thought someone was in the room, either that or the window is making noise." It was most definitely the window. The three of them were absolutely terrified that someone was lurking on the other side of the sliding door and instead of opening it, they were absolutely frozen in fear. I ended up talking to them for 45 minutes until they had truly calmed down. It wasn't until after I woke up the next morning that I realized how truly ridiculous the whole event was. First off, with how many people live in this house, someone is always awake. If someone was in their room, it would probably have been a girl borrowing something. Secondly, why would someone wait to open the sliding door? Thirdly and finally, why would you call your smallest friend to protect you??? I know I am kind of crabby before I've had some cereal and coffee, but really?

It reminded me of the absolutely insane night I had in France when we were living in dorms with other Americans. The weekend before we left I was spending the night in my friend's room. We ate at a French Tex-Mex restaurant (we were curious) and I had some tuna salad that was NOT sitting well so I was already having problems sleeping. Then at 2:30 a.m. a very loud argument woke the both of us up. "Give me my #@$#@$ keys!! Come on Lauren give me my keys!!" "No Lindsey! They're mine!" After 15 minutes I went out into the hallway and asked them to quite down. Lindsey was the only one in the hall and responded with a blank stare. I went back inside and heard her stomp away. About 20 minutes later, it happened again. Lindsey left (I only know their names because they were yelling so loudly). She came back again up the stairs. This time crying saying how stupid the whole thing was. Lauren didn't let her in. Twenty minutes later I woke up to what I could only assume was a brick being thrown against the wall next to us. (We figured out the next morning it was Lindsey kicking the elevator.) This went on until we had to wake up at 6:15 to catch a train! Stupid Americans!!

The moral: There is no reason to wake me up no matter what country I am living in.

Far Above

There is never a dull moment on KU's campus! Last week my roommate decided she wanted to start going to the Rec to work-out at 6 AM like we used to do Sophomore year. She never was able to get up so I decided I would wake up and make her go with me this morning. I was successful! But obviously that is not the fun part of the story. I ran on the treadmill and then decided to do some weights while she stretched and did crunches. We were about to go when we ran into another girl we know. She asked if we had been running on the track. "No. Why?" She just raises her eyebrows and says we should stretch over next to the track by the aerobic classroom. There is a spot on the track where you can look down into the room where aerobic group classes take place (the main reason why I don't take them- like I need more people to see how I have no rhythm). Anyways, we wandered over there a little confused to stretch. We sat down, peaked into the room, and started cracking up! It's 7:15 in the morning and still dark out. This is Campus. Most people in the surrounding area are asleep and those who are awake are only kind of awake (including those at the Rec). What do we see? Two people dressed in all black with masks and helmets on doing what I only can assume is Japanese sword-fighting screeching like Jackie Chan on stimulants. KU is always full of surprises!!

KU!

One of my very good friends is on the same study abroad program this semester as I was. She set up a blog too. I tried to read it today but it made me so jealous that I just couldn't. Another girl in my house was accepted to the program (which had so many applicants for this semester that they had to cut people) but she DECLINED. When she told me that, I wanted to yell at her, "You're an idiot!" but that would have only made her feel bad. And that's why I want to tell you Kelly, it's scary as Hell getting ready to go, but you're already braver than her, and I PROMISE that it will be far more fun and far more life-changing than being on Mass Street after the National Championship.

As for myself, I realized on Thursday when I was going to my first class that I was so sad about not being in Europe anymore that I forgot how much I LOVE Lawrence! It is going to be a great semester!

One last thing. I'm having a bowl of cereal and chatting with one of my friends on Friday morning and she asked me if I had gone anywhere over break. "Yes, I went to..." I stopped. Had I gone anywhere? I'm so used to traveling that I didn't realize I hadn't really left Kansas City over break. I had gone to Lawrence. Morgan came from Denver. But I had done so many things! I went shopping, to museums, to restaurants, but I really never left the metro area. "Ha ha! I guess I didn't. It may have been more relaxing if I did!"

Jayhawk

Well, I have been home for a week now and conquered my jet lag and reverse culture shock of coming home. Now the annoying part for all those around me has set in: the stories. When I first came home people kept asking me "what was your favorite part about Italy or France? What was your favorite place? What did you do?" I didn't really know how to answer them. I still don't. But now stories from different places come out in conversations. Unfortunately, most people won't hear these but those of you reading this blog will hear them thousands of times and become horribly annoyed with them! Lucky you!

So whenever one of these stories pops into my mind, I'll post them so you can read them. This way I'll know which stories I've told!

Here's my story for today:

Mom and I went to Price Chopper and bought Cherry Coke Zero (my favorite). I decided I wanted one when we were home, but Mom said that it wasn't a good idea because it wouldn't be cold. That reminded me of my plane ride home.
We finally took off from Paris heading to Chicago, and my heart started aching. I had been so excited about going home earlier, but now I was sad that I was leaving Paris. Then the flight attendant came by with drinks. "Would you like something to drink?" She asked with what looked like a genuine smile. That was one thing that pretty much NO ONE in Europe did: smile. I have truly missed people being truly kind to each other and that saying "the customer is always right." While it is annoying to always be nice to people when you are working, it is soooooooo nice that we do. I've really missed it.
Then, the MOST exciting thing happened. The flight attendant gave me a REAL Diet Coke NOT a Coca-Cola Light (while they are good, the Lights just are not Diet Coke). That was when I decided I was okay with going home.

Rock Chalk

The major reason that I do not want to go home: I'm afraid that I'll wake up and it will all be a dream. Someone will just say, "You hit  your head on the steering wheel when that idiot rear-ended you and you had a concussion." I'll be in Kansas and they'll tell me it was all a dream.  At least my reality will be in color.

There is a GREAT youtube video that makes all my friends and I here laugh until we cry.  It's called David after the dentist.  This poor 9-year-old boy had to get his teeth pullled and put on pain medicine.  He's a little loopy.  Our favorite line by far is when he says, "Is this real life?" We've had several moments while we were here when we've busted out that quote.  That's what I feel like these last three months have been: me questioning reality.

I'm know that I have learned so much since I was over here and I'm sure some of it won't even hit me until later. But don't care. I'm just glad I was brave enough to come.

I can't wait to see you all and hope that I don't sit next to another crazy person on this flight!!

If I am Dorothy, can I just tap my heels three times and be home?

Hail to Old KU

A few random stories for you:

Le Musee de l'Orangerie is a museum right near the Louvre that houses the massive Water Lilies by Monet (2 rooms where the walls are covered by them!). We had a site visit there with my art history class. While my teacher went into the Museum to buy our tickets, everyone else was forced to wait outside.  We were all just standing by the door, when the security guard told us that we needed to go further away from the door. We ended up being forced about 20 yards away by a wall.  My Western Civilization professor, Nan, has "never been so offended." Because there was a good view of Place de Concorde from where we were standing, I whipped out my camera and snapped a quick picture.  Our teacher came out and said she had the tickets so we could go inside. On the way in, the security guard (the same one that forced to stand by a wall which I haven't been told to do since 1st grade) asked if he could see my camera. 'Darn it,' I thought 'is he actually going to take my camera away? I won't take any pictures in the museum!! I know how to turn the flash off too!' I reluctantly handed him my baby (AKA my camera).

"May I give you some advice?" He said, "hold your camera like this when you take vertical shots. It makes it easier to adjust the camera." Then he handed my camera back to me. "Merci," I replied completely taken aback. I went through security and found out that you can even use your flash! Jerry (my professor) told me he was standing behind me and that he had never seen anything more odd in all of his travels. A security guard giving photography advice.

I was reluctant to listen to the advice at first because he took my camera! No one does that, but in all honesty, the security guard was completely right. If I remember nothing else that I've learned while over here, I can say that I received a free photography lesson!

P.S. Nan and Jerry invited me and three other students to dinner last night.  Nan is a retired professor of education philosophy: Jerry is an attorney. If our massive family dinners and just our every night dinners has taught me, it is how to properly have a conversation/argument with an attorney. For that I would like to thank everyone in my family! You're the best!