ktravula – a travelogue!

Browsing the archives for the adventures category.

Sisters – Heaviness and Tenderness – You Look The Same

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Wasps and bees both suck the heavy rose.

Man dies, and the hot sand cools again.

Carried off on a black stretcher, yesterday’s sun goes.

Oh, honeycombs’heaviness, nets’ tenderness,

It’s easier to lift a stone than to say your name!

I have one purpose left, a golden purpose,

how, from time’s weight, to free myself again.

I drink the turbid air like a dark water.

The rose was earth; time, ploughed from underneath.

Woven, the heavy, tender roses, in slow vortex,

the roses, heaviness and tenderness, in a double-wreath.

Poem by Osip Mandelshtam, left on my door by my secret friend.

Note: I should perhaps tell you now that s/he has now left me three poems and about five gifts. There was the photo frame, then the class notebook, candy, then some pink scented beans (which first worried me because it felt like a feminine gift 🙁 :D), and a bottle of peach scented candles. Now I’m totally confused, not necessarily in a bad way. The game ends tomorrow when I should discover who my Amigo Secreto is, and finally make myself known to my own subject. It should be fun. It is taking place at a dinner somewhere in town, organized by the department of foreign languages.

Sisters – Heaviness and Tenderness – You Look The Same was published on December 17th, 2009, with the tags , , , under the adventures, Art, Fun category. There are currently 1 comment on this article so far.

End of Term

With my final examination completed this afternoon, I am finally done with the Fall Semester, and the holiday for me officially begins. Let me tell you a little about the exam. It was a test of everything we have done in the Linguistics class, and it lasted an hour, forty minutes, even though I finished before the set time. The notable thing was that the professor allowed us to bring notes into the examination hall, as long as it was on only one side of a blank sheet, and handwritten. It was a way, I guess, to make sure that everyone has a chance to succeed.

Many other changes are taking place around the campus. It is thinning out, and in a few days, the once bubbling mini-town that is campus will become an almost ghost town. Chris, my housemate has already packed his bags and is heading home. Ben, the rugged one, will be here for a little while more, but he will also eventually leave, and I will have the whole apartment all to myself. I may have to go buy my own christmas tree… Audrey the French is leaving. Her academic exchange programme was supposed to last one semester, and is now over. We are organizing a party for her at the apartment on Friday, which should be fun. She was such a nice company, fun, adorable and lively, although I haven’t seen her for a while in the last three weeks because of the hectic nature of that time of the semester. Also leaving are other international students from France who came on the same programme as Audrey. They all added colour in some way to the semester.

My most memorable times with Audrey included a long walk around Chicago in November while we were trying to locate our hostel much without luck. Until then, I had never seen her cute Frenchie self so upset by anything. And even though we all tried to maintain a sense of balance as frustration grew on us and the maps refused to point us in the right direction, when we stood at the bridge across Michigan Avenue and thought of how to proceed, I thought I saw her really pissed off, especially since we didn’t seem to understand each other’s words and motives. Eventually, her phone came to the rescue and we found out that we had just walked past the HI Chicago building by just one block. I also remember one of the many discussions we had in Chicago about breastfeeding (she was thoroughly against it, believing that it is “disgusting” to have anything come out of her breasts for anyone to drink), religion (doesn’t believe in it, rationalizing that there is too much wickedness in the world to believe in a good and kind God), and homosexuality (doesn’t have anything against it, since humans all have the right to express whatever they are), and how opposed to Reham she was every time the conversations took place. “As soon as I have a baby,” Audrey always said, “I will spend all my nights in bed, sleeping while my husband will feed the baby whenever it cries. I carried the baby for nine months, after all, and I’m not about to lose my sleep for anybody.”

She was fun.

The semester was fun. I hope the next one is just as fantastic.

End of Term was published on December 16th, 2009, with the tags , , , , , , , under the Academic, adventures, Fun category. There are currently 1 comment on this article so far.

Howard University

IMG_3786IMG_3782IMG_3777IMG_3783IMG_3779IMG_3778This one looks like a shrineIMG_3788IMG_3801IMG_3780IMG_3797IMG_3787IMG_3789IMG_3800IMG_3790IMG_3796I spent the beginning of Sunday on a foot and drive-through sight-seeing tour of the famous Howard University in Washington DC and its major famous spots. The trip was made possible thanks to a Nigerian friend and a student of the University, who drove all the way to pick me up and give me a tour even in the freezing rain.

The buildings in these photos include the iconic Founder’s Hall, the school gate, the school yard with all the fraternity trees and signs, the Arts and Science building, the medical sciences building, the “Founder’s Walk” area and the Howard Place, a building named after the General Oliver Otis Howard who the University itself was named after. He was an American civil war hero who also became the University’s first president.

The University was founded in the year 1866 as a theological seminary for African-American clergymen, but quickly expanded into a full-fledged University. One of its notable Alumni is Edward Brooke, the first African-American to be elected into the US Senate.

Howard University was published on December 15th, 2009, with the tags , , , , , under the Academic, adventures, Art, Observations, Travelling category. There are currently 7 comments on this article so far.

G is for Goodbye

IMG_3625Oh no, not another alphabetic title, you say! Well, my time in this enchanting city is now over. In less than eight hours from this moment, I will be entering another mode of transportation out of the District of Columbia.

We have just had a wonderful session of international dancing in the ballroom of our wonderful hotel…

We have also been given certificates of participation, and the shirt pins that will mark us from now on as “Fulbright Fellows” for the rest of our lives.

We have shed our tears and said our goodbyes. For many of us going back to different parts of the country, we would not be seeing each other again until we return home. But what a great time we had.

The photo was taken at the base of the Washington Monument

G is for Goodbye was published on December 13th, 2009, with the tags , , under the adventures, Fun, Travelling category. There are currently 1 comment on this article so far.

350 At The White House

IMG_3691We went back to the White House today, this time to see the North side of the building. And it was there where we saw the 350 volunteers with placards demonstrating in front of the gate – under the watch of one police car – to petition the President of the United States to pay more attention to climate change, and to do the right thing at Copenhagen, in Denmark, where the conference on climate change would take place.

On the 350 Website, the mission states that “350.org is an international campaign dedicated to building a movement to unite the world around solutions to the climate crisis–the solutions that science and justice demand.”

It continues: “Our focus is on the number 350–as in parts per million, the level scientists have identified as the safe upper limit for CO2 in our atmosphere. But 350 is more than a number–it’s a symbol of where we need to head as a planet.

To tackle climate change we need to move quickly, and we need to act in unison—and 2009 will be an absolutely crucial year.  This December, world leaders will meet in Copenhagen, Denmark to craft a new global treaty on cutting emissions. The problem is, the treaty currently on the table doesn’t meet the severity of the climate crisis—it doesn’t pass the 350 test.”

Anyway, it was night and freezing, and they had been there in front of the White House since the day began, calling attention and taking pictures to be sent all over the world. Nothing doing, we joined them holding candles and taking pictures with the 350 sign held up high. Here’s the freedom to assemble and protest as guaranteed under the US constitution, but is not afforded to millions of citizens in many around the world. Here was the seat of power, and yet here were citizens, making their presence with simple, dignified protests and demonstrations on climate change. We shared stories with them, exchanged contacts and ideas, and then made our way back home, again on foot in the freezing weather, but feeling much, much pleased.

You may follow 350 on Twitter.

350 At The White House was published on December 12th, 2009, with the tags , , , , , under the adventures, Fun, Observations category. There are currently 2 comments on this article so far.