Bombs Away

We had a crsis commitee in Model UN about a week ago. We had to pretend we were NATO during the Kosovo genocide in 1999. So yeah, depressing topic, but we still managed to have absolutely hilarious moments. Some highlights:

One kid's mom called during debate, and wouldn't stop talking. Eventually he just said "Mom, people are dying!" and hung up.

The "KLA" kidnapped the delegate from Greece. As in, busting in with a paper bag and dragging him out. He ended up dying.

One of my friends, Rebecca (not the one that posts on this lovely blog), was the US. And she basically screwed over the rest of us by going behind our backs and bombing the Chinese embassy. In a totally badass way.

There were plenty of country insults. Like, "Canada is not afraid of France's army!"

We had a 20 min. break during one four hour session. And we spent the 20 min. clustered around a single laptop, looking up primary results. This is what happens when you get a bunch of MUNers together in a small room on a Saturday.

The French delegate requested 90,000 from his home bureau to invade Kosovo. When he reduced the number to 5,000, they made him a national hero. With a parade and everything.

Italy's parliament dissolved, again.

And our very last news article, the one with the results of our last attack, was from Teen People. Seriously. And it told people to recycle to help the refugee. And one of the reader letters in it said, I quote, "NATO is like, so hot! I totally want to be a diplo-whatever!"

<3 Helen

Tastes Like Chicken

My family is all kinds of strange, but perhaps one of the strangest things about us is our propensity to attract chicken feet. Yes, chicken feet. As in, the Chinese dish. Every time we go out to dim sum we manage to, despite having not ordered it, end up with chicken feet on the table. We have even been seated next to a giant picture of a chicken's feet. Now this would be strange enough on its own, but being the strange people we are, we are also on a quest to break this curse.

So today when we went out to dim sum, with two of our New York friends in tow, was destined to be the day that happened. We sat around the table, having just finished an assortment of who-knows-what watching the carts go by. One of them stops and my mother asks, do you have any chicken? The waiter looks at her, then takes the lid off one of the circular wooden boxes. Chicken, she says. Pause. Feet, she finishes. Of course. What were we expecting anyway? We shake our heads no, and she moves on to peddle her wares to other tables. But would that be the end of the saga? Had we gotten away—albeit much too easily? Alas, we had not. But it was our fault this time.

My brother looks over at the federal judge (one of our New York friends) and says, "I'll try it if you try it." She considers. "I'll do it if you do." It was settled. I sat there shaking my head, but they were sure this was the way to once and for all end the curse of the chicken feet. As they ordered the chicken feet I almost thought that the world would explode or that something catastrophic would happen, like all of New York City would spontaneously cease to have ever existed, just to prevent something as paradoxical as us willingly inviting chicken feet onto our table. I waited, but nothing happened. The two of them picked up their chopsticks and took a foot each, tentatively tasting bites. I could hardly watch. "It tastes like fat." My brother says. "It's mostly skin and fat." The federal judge comments. There were choruses of "it's not that bad" and "you all should try" (as the saying among those of us who take tap goes, hahaha...you're funny, i.e. no thanks).

Eventually, (though not soon enough), the tasting is over, and we dispose of the chicken feet we have ordered, minus a few bites. Just as we are leaving another cart passes by: chicken feet. But not just any: pickled chicken feet.

Sachi

stupidity is....

my latin teacher is crazy, but awesome. we learn about bio, french, german, english, neuroscience, philosophy and psychology in his class. oh and mice, we sometimes talk about mice too. it is so interesting...heh

well...anyways, stupidity is....

going on to wikipedia and reading about random films that have come out recently.

fussing over how your nails look awful (don't ask, years of violin did this to me XD).

going on to wikipedia and trying to search schools that you have been in before and what has happened to them now.

going to the guitar center website and looking at "cut capos" and "string winders" and wishing you could afford a cut capo when it is clearly over budget.

not studying for your midterm...which basically sums about everything above...but w/e

~Lucy

Maybe All Teachers Are a Little Bit Crazy #1

My Spanish teacher was talking about how she used to study Spanish, and she said (in English), "It's a lot of work, but that's what I did, when I was studying. I grew up on a farm. Winter nights are long on a farm. I did a lot of school work because I was so bored. There aren't animals so much in the winter as there are in the summer, you know what I mean?" I looked at the person sitting next to me, and we sort of almost laughed. No I don't know what you mean, I was thinking.

My English teacher assigned us to criticize something "phony" in the voice of the main character of The Catcher in the Rye. The person sitting next to me asked, "what if there isn't anything I consider phony?" and the teacher said, "Nothing you consider phony? There are lots of things I can think of that I would call phony."
"Like what?" the student asked.
"Well, I think faculty meetings are sometimes phony. They talk to us like we're children, sort of dumbing down what they're saying. I sometimes just want to stand up and say 'This is so phony!' And rice cakes are phony,"
"How?" We asked.
"Well, they're all processed, and compacted, they seem like plastic..."

Now, the same day that these two things happend, in my physics class, the teacher was picking names out of a hat to choose people to go up and draw position vs. time graphs on her SmartBoard. She picked a person who had just left to the bathroom, and she said, "Saved by the toilet!"

Parts of these quotes are approximated, but I guarantee, they actually happened. If your teachers do anything funny, feel free to write All Teachers are a Little Bit Crazy #2, or #3, and so on for infinity (or until we get out of school).

-Rebecca

For Just Six Low Payments of 10 minutes!

It is now six o'clock.  Please proceed to your next conference.  A voice announced over the loudspeaker.  Tonight was parent teacher conference night- but also a Model UN night, for me.  

It is now six ten.   Please proceed to your next conference.  Model UN begins, a bit late.  We're in a lecture hall with huge seat-less tiers, my friends and I have claimed the couch at the top.  "Decorum!"  The head delegate reprimands.  We quiet down.  A cell phone goes off.  I brace myself, expecting to hear your usual hip hop ring tone.  But what's that-opera?!  We all silence to hear the song.  "I didn't know you could buy opera ring tones."  Someone comments.  "Decorum, delegates!"  Thailand is called to speak.  Or is it Finland?  "Finland, Thailand, all the same country," the head delegate dismisses.  Right.  Finland introduces an extremely vague resolution.  A girl raises her hand.  "Would the delegate from Finland be amenable to amendments?"  She asks, tripping over all the amens.    One of the delegates with a history of changing his country steps up to speak.  Last week he was the Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, the week before he was People's Republic of China.  "Go back to Japan!" someone hollers.

 It is now six twenty.  Please proceed to your next conference.  Japan yields to Japan #2, who despite only having ten seconds, manages to get in about thirty seconds worth of material with a small fight against the gavel, speaking over the loud bangs and glares of the head delegate.  He raises the point that the resolution is very vague.  United Arab Emrites is up to speak.  "Vagueness is good!  In true UN spirit!"  He argues.  At this point I am rather bored, and I reach over to peruse Marena's notebook.  One of the pages has a long list of names, first and last.  I head it with the words 'People to Kill'.  Helen looks over.  "Whaat?!" She exclaims.  "Marena?"  I giggle.  I love fostering confusion.  She eventually is told that I wrote the heading.  (Edit: Well, apparently not.  Over IM she informed me, "Wait?  You wrote that heading?  I was not eventually told!")  Finland is up to propose an amendment.  He reads it aloud.  "...semicolon and with the aid of the UN office of blah de blah semicolon."

 It is now six thirty.  Please proceed to your next conference.  I wasn't really paying attention but some absurd statements caught my ears.  "This isn't a golden ticket!"  One person exclaims.  "No one found it in a chocolate bar."  Another kid gets up and asks if he can propose amendments to amendments.  Hey-I'm all for it.  Anything to add more semicolons.  There is a random email in Marena's notebook and I can't resist adding in a caption-my boyfriend.

 It is now six forty.  Please proceed to your next conference.  Oh god.  Would they just shut up already?  I'm not sure what's worse, the ten minute interruptions or the fact that we are now voting on whether to vote.  There is so much parliamentary procedure in Model UN that I have at times voted on whether to vote to see if we should vote.  The motion passes.  "Clapping is in order."  The head delegate tells us.  No one claps.  "Please clap."  He translates.  Oh.  Right.  Us.  We start to talk about new topics to debate.

 It is now six fifty.  Please proceed to the last conference of the evening.  "I don't want to solve poverty."  Someone complains.  "We've done it too much."  The head delegate tells us to get cracking on curing AIDS.  I ponder what we could do.  Maybe we'll write a resolution suggesting countries to look into implementing programs that may lead to the cure for AIDS.  We are the UN after all.  Darfur is suggested.  "Yeah there's a lot of shit going on in Africa."  The head delegate says.  "Well I mean there's always shit going on in Africa."  The room erupts into chaos, every delegate shouting out a country in Africa and its problems.  But then we move on to discussing fashion, specifically shirts for club members.  "I don't want any purple shit."  The head delegate tells us.  Ideas included monogrammed scarfs, pictures of gavels with the caption 'banging' and dedications professing our undying love for the club sponsors.

 Parent teacher conferences are over.  Have a good night.  Model UN is over.  I jump down the large tiers, and head home.

Sachi

The Case of the Missing Cubicuboctahedron

It all started with a simple idea: to make an interesting geometric shape. 2 of my friends and I spent an afternoon constructing an appropriately complex one out of construction paper: the cubicuboctahedron. (Here's a picture of one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Great_cubicuboctahedron.png )

We brought it to school the next day, and when it was my turn to carry it around, I put it under my desk in English. Then I forgot about it. Two periods later, I rushed up to my English classroom and burst through the door, and the sight before me was heart-stopping. It was gone!

I had no choice but to leave school empty-handed, after confessing to my friends that I had lost it. As we started walking home, one of my friends mentioned to another, "You didn't get to see our cubicuboctahedron!" I added, "And now you can't, because I lost it!"

He responded, "What did its faces look like?"
"Well, it was a sort of cube with star shaped faces," we described.
"Was it green?" he asked.
"Yes!" we answered.
"I found it under a desk in my English classroom," he said. "I gave it to the teacher for safe-keeping."

The next day, I had the slightly awkward task of asking my English teacher about it.
"Did you find-- I left a 3-D shape in here yesterday," I asked.
(Momentary pause)
"Yes!" she exclaimed in her enthusiastic English-teacher manner. "We were admiring it in G-block! Its very pretty," she responded as she reached into a cabinet and returned it to me.
"Thank you," I said, and sat down at my desk, victorious.
Case closed.

-Rebecca

Choking on Air

Do you ever have those times when you just choke randomly? No, I don't mean on words, I mean actual, coughing choking, on nothing but air. Like, you just take a breath, and suddenly, you can't breathe and you're coughing and people are staring? No?

Well it happens to me. All the time.

Today, for instance, I was just sitting there innocently in French class, feeling slightly nauseated because the floor kept vibrating where I was sitting (long story), wondering how many minutes were left in class and generally spacing out, when I choked. Not over the many impossible syllables of French. I choked on absolutely nothing. So I'm coughing these big, hacking coughs, sounding like a dying... something, I don't even know how to describe it, and after a few seconds, my classmates start noticing. Now, I'm sitting in the corner, in the very last row, so it was pretty awkward when half the class started looking over at me. It was worse when the teacher stopped in the middle of the lesson and asked what the hell was wrong with me. Only, like, you know, in politer words and with a French accent. So I kind of cough out that I'm fine, I'm just sitting there choking, and the class smirks a bit before going back to the lesson, while I'm despereately trying to stop coughing. And to stop blushing.

So, really, people have to be warned about this. Most people go through their entire lives without realizing how dangerous, and embarrassing, air can be. This if wrong, and I firmly believe education is the key to overcoming such a serious hazard to our learning, and though that, our futures!

<3 Helen

Raindrops keep falling on my head

It was raining on Friday. Like, the type of really heavy rain that you see in old movies during those super dramatic parts. So of course, a few friends and I have to run out in the middle of lunch to go jump in puddles.

We ran towards these doors in the cafeteria, but then we realize that the doors would lock behind us once we went out. Still, nothing would stop us from puddle jumping! We ran out anyways, after extracting a promise from some random person to hold the door for us.

We got wet. Really wet. And, it turns out, my shoes were made with these holes in the side of them, so you can imagine what happened after I jumped in a few puddles... After a few minutes, we decided to head back in for our next class. Except, the random door guy had disappeared and the door was closed! So we went up to the large windows next to the door and banged on them for a few seconds, until one of our friends let us back in.

By this time, half the cafeteria was staring at us, and the person who had let us in was all "what the hell are you doing?" And later my other friend told me she saw us from all the way across the cafeteria.

So, to recap, a few hundred people saw me run out in the rain to jump in puddles during lunch. Funny thing was, these other random people decided to run out after we came back in. So we're trendsetters. ;)

<3 Helen

Shocking New Game

Believe it or not, I don't actually get paid for just being me.  (I know, I know, you're all thinking, what do you mean your friends don't pay you to grace them with your presence?  You're so amazing!)  To make up for this, I have a job.  You see, if my friends won't pay me to be around them, parents of small impressionable children will.  Mondays and Fridays I work at the local elementary school as a teacher for the third grade group at the after school program.  The kids are adorable.  I am one of the only high schoolers in a staff of adults, but the staff are great, too.  

On this particular Friday, I walked in the teachers lounge to find a three of the staff playing some sort of game.  I watch as they stare intently at a flashing light, an eerie song that builds up anticipation playing, and then, when the light changes color, the players press buttons on their metal controls.  One of them screams and drops the control, waving the hand that was once holding it.  "It gives a shock if you press it before the light changes or if you're slowest to press it once it does change." Carly, the head of the third grade group tells me, over the screams of another teacher receiving a shock.  "Matt thought the kids would love it."  I blinked.  The kids?  I watched as more teachers lined up to play.  "I'm more worried about the parents," I reply.

We laugh as we watch more masochists step up to play and I think back to my first few days working there, and kids that I had to admonish at for hitting each other, not doing what was asked of them, or trying to trick me into letting them do something the other teachers wouldn't.  Of course there are times when you just want to give the kids a shock, so they'll behave.  But hearing the screams of another teacher, and the clatter of the metal control as it is dropped to the floor, I can't imagine it's worth the lawsuit.

Sachi

It is a truth universally known...

...that I'm a klutz. Seriously, walking in a straight line is a real challenge for me. But my klutziest moments always, always happen on the bus. Something about the whole big, moving metal thing... not good for me. I've dropped my (10 pound) backpack on people's feet, gotten stuck in that little area between two seats (where your legs are supposed to go, but I've managed to fall down there... several times), and cause a few injuries when I try to open the window (it's not easy!)

But my klutziest bus attack? Yeah, that would be the one a few months ago. So I get on a bus, and just as I'm about to sit down, the bus starts to move. Which, really, wouldn't be a problem for anyone but me... Anyhow I go flying back, and land on some upperclassman. I kinda sat there, dazed and listening to the other people on the bus laughing, for a few seconds before I realized that I was ON someone. So I scramble off and into my seat, mumbling apologies. Definitely awkward...

The moral of the story? Don't take the bus.

<3 Helen

Somehow I Feel We're Not Traveling on the Same Wave Lengths....

Oh....so...um, I remember doing this charity walk once and like, a bunch of us got together and formed a group.  Problem was one of my friends (who's younger than me and I've known him since...pre-k) is really lazy and I had to set up his account for him.  And then for some reason he couldn't join our group. So, being the nice person that I am (how can you doubt it?) I sent an email to the hq and asked for one of the tech dudes to help. And the tech dude sent me an email back and I sent him an email explaining, then on the next email he was like: oh I can solve the problem for you and your boyfriend and I was all: wtheck????? All I said was that we were friends....um.....so I have no idea how he thought that so I sent an email back and I was all: oh we're just friends....and then he was all: oh sorry.  

And then the problem got solved so that was it...I am so glad that I have no idea who the heck the tech dude was and it's a good thing we'll probably never meet....

Ok I really suck at this....but whatever since Sachi wanted me to post....thought I might as well XP

~Lucy

Spooked Out and Kicking

My house is haunted.

So I was just sitting in my basement, innocently doing my math homework, when the TV turns on. By itself. I was five feet away from the remote control, and nobody else was in the room.

Even scarier? The program was talking about ghosts the moment it turned on. Specifically, ghosts haunting this one house and how somebody felt a "presence" there. I'm dead serious. Oooh, probably not the best choice of words there, but seriously, it was creepy.

I'm taking this as a sign that supernatural beings don't like it when I do my math homework.

<3 Helen

Just Smile and Say Thank You....

Well...being who I am and who my parents are I got to a lot of dinners/lunches with people....people who are usually adults. And most of the time, their kids are either college-age, toddler-age or in their thirties so I'm like this odd wheel out. So...we had a special speaker today (at church, yes I am Christian but whatever) and like a lot of the elders/pastors/ministers/spouses went out to eat and I ended up going with them. And let me tell you, the closest people there to my age were two infants so I ended up sitting through the whole meal in awkwardness, listening to the adults talk and being polite when they spoke to me. I actually do this quite a lot so it's not like totally out there but it was still pretty awkward because we were squished together at two round tables so there wasn't a lot of room to eat. Um....yeah....

~Lucy

Photo Minor Crisis Averted

If there's one thing you should know about me, it's that I'm pretty disorganized, and I never have what I need when it's due. This causes some inconveniences, conflicts and occasionally a minor crisis. And as I walked into my photo minor class and heard the teacher announce our projects were due, I knew this would be one of those crises. Rule number one in dealing with times when you don't have what you need: there's nothing you can do at this point. It's not that I like not having things, but once you already don't have it, there's no sense worrying more. So I approach the teacher and calmly explain the situation. Just my luck, he's the kind of teacher who's going to fail me unless I have the project that day. In any other class, that would have been that, and I would have failed the project. But no, this was not any other class, this was photo. This was not any other teacher, it was my crazy old photo teacher who always smelled like smoke. Well, he told me, you'll just have to go run home and get them.  

Of course, it's not so easy as, walk out of school, grab project, hand it in. Because we can't exactly trust high schoolers to walk home without getting themselves killed. But, what can I do? I went down to the house office (each grade has a different 'house') and spoke with the secretary. No, no, we can't let you do that, Sachi. You're fourteen. Clearly you need to be at least sixteen to be trusted in a city this dangerous (that was sarcasm, for those of you who don't know my city is one of the safest in the country.) But we'll ask the housemaster, just to see what she says.

The housemaster is talking to another adult. I wait, awkwardly trying not to look like I'm eavesdropping. The man she is talking to looks at me strangely and I edge back to the doorway. When they're done, the house secretary comes out looking around for me, finally spotting me, halfway out the door. She beckons me, and I follow her into the housemaster's office, as she explains the problem.  The housemaster is a skinny young-ish woman with blonde hair who tries to bond with students through her enthusiasm for cafeteria food. Picking up a slice of orange she tells me, "I got this from the cafeteria. It's delicious." I nod along, never sure what to say (we've had a few other awkward conversations concerning cafeteria food, but that's a story for another post). We talk and she tells me she'll never let me do it again, but if I call my mom and get verbal permission, I can go get my project.  

That's how I found myself, five minutes later, hurrying home to grab my photo project.   I was able to get it in on time, and even received an A on the project.  I had a grand time, over all, but apparently other people thought it was pretty stressing. Upon my return, my photo teacher, who, if you'll remember, is an old smoke smelling man, asked me if he could give me a hug. A few kids turned around to look at me. Awkward. What do you do? Sure, I said, as he put an arm around me and gave me a quick hug.  Then I quickly scurried out and headed to work. Whew.  Minor crisis averted.

Sachi

I seem to get stuck in doorways frequently.

So today I did some work for the Newtonite. It was awkward. Just a slight bump in the road to being a high-ranking Newtonite person-the road to perfection!
So first, I walked into the Newtonite office to find out what the heck I was actually supposed to do. So I walk in, and Mrs. Smith greets me. "Eric??" she yells. "Are you feeling charitable?"
Eric walks in. He's a senior, and also advertising manager. "This is Marena," Mrs. Smith says. "She's nice. But hates interviewing. Absolutely hates it." I'm always introduced like this to Newtonite people. How does one respond? I smiled sheepishly and awkwardly chuckled to Eric.
She then told Eric to take me to see Mr. Siciliano, who I had to interview. We walked around the basement a lot, until we came to a room we thought was right.
Now, whenever I have to talk to people, I can't seem to go in through the doorway. I kind of teeter awkwardly on the threshold, pondering whether or not to take that plunge into the door. Eric, being a talking expert, boldly went in as I meekly stood in the doorway.
It was the wrong room, and we went to several other wrong rooms, and I meekly stood in the doorway. One of his friends came up to us as we wandered. "Look, I have with me a real live freshman!" he told the friend. How did I respond? Sheepishly smiled and awkwardly chuckled. So very awkward. "No, you're not a freshman!" the friend exclaimed. "Erm...I'm an exceptionally large one...but a freshman nonetheless," I awkwardly responded. He continued to deny this, until my friend Brendan walked by and was like, "Yup. She's a freshman. She's in my Chinese class." Then there was an awkward silence.
Finally, we came to the right room. There he was: Mr. Siciliano, the cause for all of the searching. And where was I? Stuck in a doorway. "Go!" Eric prodded. But I was stuck. I couldn't do it. There were kids in there. I came back in 5 minutes and got it over with. We went into his office, and I asked him questions. But I messed up. Awkward.
Somehow, Eric showed up behind me as I walked out of the office, and then we went back to the Journalism room. Mrs. Smith was teaching a class, but she talked to me in front of everybody anyway.
"Did you get it?" *nod* Everyone turns around to look at me. A room full of seniors. "Did you die?" *shakes head* Mrs. Smith turned to the class.
"She's a freshman and she didn't die!" A few people chuckled. I stood there outside the doorway....awkwardly.
"So you're going to have it in by this afternoon?" *nod* "Great!"
I got out of the doorway as fast as possible.

Marena

Bra Shopping and Planned Parenthood

I called Planned Parenthood today at lunch. The conversation went something like this:

Me: Hi, I need to know about contraceptives.
Receptionist: Ok, I'm transferring you to someone else.
*pretty music*

So I talked to the other nice lady for a few minutes about birth control and pregnancy and HIV testing and all that good stuff.

Another awkwardish moment:
Over vacation, Annie and I took Jared bra shopping. At Victoria's Secert. He didn't seem to understand why we actually had to try on the bras before buying them, so I was trying to explain, which got me a lot of weird looks from the other shoppers. See, I was trying to explain it in a way that he could understand, so I was like "Well, you wouldn't want metal sticks poking into your balls would you? Or pants that gave you an awkwardly shaped penis???"

He also seemed to think that girls try on bras in front of each other, in the same stall. The things in that boy's mind...

Awkwardness is the story of my life.

<3 Helen

Dial A for Awkward

"You are made of awkward!" One of my friends exclaimed to me as I tried to subtly ask her crush over IM if he had a girlfriend by pretending to have a girlfriend myself.  "I'm impervious to awkward!"  I contested and told her about the conversation.  "Ohmigod.  that is painfully awkward."  she winced as I continued talking about my made up girlfriend.  The conversation ended in me scaring him away with my love of board games.  

Alright, I'll admit.  I can be pretty awkward.  The upside: it's pretty funny.  Even if you're hiding your head in your hands because it's so awkward, you can't help but laugh.  I'll tell you another story.  In seventh grade our class went on an overnight field trip to New Hampshire.  My friend had her period and needed to go to the nurse and get pads.  To go to the nurse, however, we had to ask our teachers, two of whom were female, one male.  Unfortunately, they traveled in a pack, always together.  And since time was of the essence we approached the three of them and asked to go to the nurse.  "What for?"  They asked.  "Ummm..."  We stumbled.  "Do you need to get meds?"   We shook our heads.  "Are you bleeding?"  They tried again.  "Uh, well...umm.'  Our faces were pretty red.  We were staring at the younger female teacher, hoping she would catch on.  "Oh!" Our male teacher said.  The others still hadn't caught on.  "Go take care of your, um, needs."  He told us.  We scurried out.  Oh god.  Awkward.  I mean, how did he get it before them?  

Whether it's going up and hugging the wrong person, or a conversation in which a well meaning but misguided friend is trying to set you up with someone, awkwardness happens to everyone.  So from all of us to you, welcome to dial-a-for-awkward.  Embrace your inner (or outer) awkward.

Sachi