Frontier travelogue

I have arrived in a another country, far away from home. There are orange stone houses lined with arcades and dotted with courtyards, which serve as offices and classrooms. Judging from the architecture, the Spanish must have come here long ago, but they are mostly gone now. All that remains of them are young students from that country, almost indistinguishable from the small groups of French or Germans, except, naturally, by their speech.

In the place of the Spanish, this place is overrun by California Liberals, and their work is seen in the numerous warning labels placed prominently on campus. One such label, taking a cue, no doubt, from the success of the anti-tobacco campaign, warns bus passengers that their vehicle of choice may cause cancer. Another one, a road sign, warns of the danger of playing chicken on bikes at an intersection, especially if a car is approaching from the side. The work of the Liberals is also seen in the fact that rather than placing trash receptacles in dormitory rooms, they place recycling bins.

The dormitories themselves deserve special mention, for many grad students stay there, as they are the only reasonably-priced residences close to campus. My apartment is tiny, but I suspect that a New Yorker from Manhattan would feel feel he could really stretch his legs here. When I first walked into my bedroom, there was just enough room for all the furniture. The only question was, where to fit the people.

But if the space is all the way from East Coast, the view is strictly local. My bedroom is equipped with a huge floor-to-ceiling window that looks out mainly upon a pair of trees with sparse leaves, where one can watch the squirrels running about their business.

I call it a window, but it opens completely, and I'm sure it was once meant to be a balcony door. The building's architect, however, must have had the balcony shrunk and shrunk again in his plans, until all that was left was a foot-wide ledge, enclosed by a rail. Still, this platform of sorts outside my bedroom window makes for very pleasant viewing.

I must say, however, that I do not believe that all dormitory apartments are similar to mine in size. A German student I ran into had quite the opposite problem, I believe, in that he was looking for another couch to fill some big empty space in his living room.

I have hinted at this already, but the sheer internationality of this place deserves mention. On the shuttle bus to the grocery, I was just as likely to find a group of people from Europe, India, or East Asia as I was to find a group from some part of this Continent. Chicago, in its quiet, Midwestern ways, was not like this. There were international students, of course, but I never saw them traveling in packs. This is a very interesting phenomenon, which is probably responsible for the wonderful selection of International food available nearby, and for the Japanese household goods store, which is also close at hand.

But now, it grows late. It is 9 o'clock in the morning, and I'm quite ready for lunch. So, I leave you now, readers, with these imperfect reflections on this strange land, until such time as I may meet with more adventures to relate.

*Ok, now I can apologize for the style here. I've been reading a Victorian novel, and wanted to play a little bit. So this is, um, the Neo-Victorian writing style . . . *