April 2011
40 posts
I was told I’m taking a tour to of prospective students of chines to a Chinese class here, so I tried to remember what I know of the language. Wo yao cher nee means “I want to eat you”, wo ei nee means “I love you”. I was advised not to say this as I greeted my tour, and I agreed. Then we looked up the phonology of chinese, regarding the 5 tones.
I have twelve costumes going into the Senior Dance Concert this coming Friday.
ADD THAT TO THE FACT THAT
I’m a procrastinator
AND YOU GET
Many long nights, and all nighters, in the Costume Shop. Friends have been keeping me company when they can. I think a few are stopping by tonight.
We go into Tech at 7:00 on Monday. That is about 48 hours from when I began this post. Wish me luck. I’ll update with pictures in a bit, but for reference, this is me at the beginning of the night, awake and kinda happy:
Let’s see how this goes.
It’s true that almost all of us work for Admissions and that we are geared towards an audience of prospective students — i.e. we try to blog about things that would be of interest to people thinking about coming here who want to know what sorts of events are happening, things we do on the weekend, what coffee hour is like, etc. That said, most of us work in Admissions because we love the school and know some things about it that other students might not know. We also communicate with prospective students via email a lot so we have ideas about what kinds of things might interest them. This blog is intended to show a sampling of different voices from a variety of different students who go here, not just one anonymous student with only one perspective. Our mission is to give people a sense of what it is like here using a more organized platform and from a variety of vantage points. I hope that answers your question!
-Riley
Hi Sophie!
It’s not quite the season for camping up here, so if you decide to do tent camping, be prepared with sleeping bags that can endure temperatures as low as 30 degrees! (It probably won’t get that cold, but you’ll want to be prepared.) And lots of blankets of course. The Woodford State Park is just east of Bennington, but it’s not open for the season until May. You’ll have the best luck if you check out the Green Mountain National Forest, which has a couple of campgrounds that are open all year (and are free!) that may or may not be terribly close to Bennington. Be careful to look up which ones are in the mountains, higher up you go, the more likely cold and snow are!
Just click the little tent symbol here:
http://www.fs.fed.us/r9/forests/greenmountain/htm/greenmountain/g_rec.htm
Happy camping, and stay warm! I mean it, bring lots and lots of layers!
-Allie P
I don’t usually frequent the science building, Dickinson. Partially due to high school trauma, but mostly because I just spend so much darn time in Jennings (music) and VAPA (Visual and Performing Arts). BUT this afternoon I was working on some writing and music listening in the Dickinson computer center. And just 5 minutes ago, a faculty member came through with a cart full of snacks and I asked if I wanted some. I said “Sure!” as any reasonable person would and asked “Why, may I ask, are you delivering snacks?” And guess what? Apparently this happens every Friday in Dickinson! (and they told me I wasn’t part of some sort of psychology experiment, so I believe it!) This place is apparently filled with more magic than I’ve ever known! No one has ever delivered me snacks in VAPA or Jennings to this date!
And with that I’m off to eat my SmartFood popcorn, and my tasty, ripe Clementine! :)
Hey folks! It’s been quite busy and I haven’t gotten around to talking about the past two arts forum experiences, which have both been very interesting. Music faculty member Nick Brooke and Drama/APA (Advancement of Public Action, click here for more info) faculty member Danny Michaelson both brought in really inspiring ideas and work for us to grapple with.
Two weeks ago, music faculty member Nick Brooke came and spoke about Wayang Kulit AKA Indonesian Shadow Puppet Theatre. Nick is my advisor, and also taught me a class called “Musics of Asia” a little while back. But I still learned a lot of new information about Wayang Kulit in his presentation. It’s definitely something worth checking out on YouTube!
Nick went to Indonesia at some point, and even has his own shadow puppets that were given to him. They are absolutely beautiful, very intricate little pieces of art.
—————————————————-
This past week, another faculty member, Danny Michaelson came in to speak with us. Danny is Bennington’s costume design teacher, and this is his last term at Bennington College! He got very involved in mediation after spending some time as Dean of the College with dance faculty member Susan Sgorbati (who was also interested in mediation and conflict resolution). The two of them started the mediation and conflict resolution program here at Bennington.
Danny explained how, for him, there are many similarities between the process of mediation and of theatre collaboration. He talked about a project he’d been involved in called Benedictus, which brought together creators from Iran, Israel and the USA to create a piece dealing with the Iranian and Israeli enmity, and their relationship with the USA. It was first presented at Sienna College, then brought to San Francisco and LA, and it has undergone a lot of changes along the way.
It sounded like a really fantastic collaboration that broke a lot of boundaries, and Danny challenged all of us to think of how we might create a piece of art that might be able to help in the reconciliation in the aftermath of violent conflict. I’m looking forward to writing that paper! The lecture left me brimming with ideas.
You can read more here.
