rt7's blog

I continue to be impressed by people whose first instinct is to help others in a time of need! Nicole Chen, an ISA (International Student Association) leader, reached out to me when my initial petition to stay on campus was denied and helped me re-appeal. I truly thank her from the bottom of my heart. There were other members of ISA, the wider student body, and even the Williams alumni network who all coordinated quickly to assure people were safe and sound. For me, that was a whirlwind of a time where I felt overwhelmed and lost so it was difficult to envision myself on the other side aiding others.

But now that I’m on firm footing, I want to help out. I didn’t really know how, but when Nicole told me that ISA was making an interim (read: temporary) board to deal with struggles that students face, I knew I wanted to join. I got placed on the Communications Committee (with my fav IOL, Maysa <3) and today we had our first online meeting. Now I know more about what my actual role is which is nice, and I’m excited for our next steps. I think the biggest problem right now for students is lack of transparency around all the changes that are being made by the college, with silence for days on end until a sudden email informs us of a drastic action. I get that they’re figuring stuff out too, but it would be nice if we were in the loop a bit more. In addition, people have their own personal concerns which they don’t know who to direct to. So our mission (it makes me feel important when I say that) is to A) Disseminate new information by the college to the student body better and B) Listen to student concerns and make sure their voices are heard by the college. Effectively, I see ourselves as the middleman between students and the college. We’ve already made some progress on carrying out these tasks, and I can’t wait to help more!

Everything was going so well 🙁

Then, COVID-19 ripped us apart.

We didn’t have much time to figure things out before she had to go back home, so we kinda left it at that. Just seeing how it goes and taking it from there.

Now that reality has sunk in and we’ve both realized we’re probably not going to see each other for the next six months, the question hangs over our heads. Now what? I’m proud that we’re both good at communicating (or attempting to communicate) our emotions to each other, and after a lengthy talk I think we’re still gonna stick with the “see how it goes” model. Unexciting, I know, but it makes the most sense as of now. At least for me, I think it’s too premature to take a break when we haven’t actively tried out LDR, and it’ll probably add another stress onto my life constantly thinking about what could’ve been. But on the other hand, we can’t go about pretending that this is the same relationship as before because it just isn’t. We’ll have to accept and adapt to quarantined relationship one way or another. For now, I’ve been calling her daily and it makes my day just seeing her smile on laggy 720p Messenger video. I’m confident (naive?) that this will somehow work out. It has to.

Today was the earliest I’ve woken up in the past week — 9:40 am. That gave me ten minutes to lounge around, five minutes to get ready for my morning run, and five minutes to knock on Abu’s door only to find him too groggy to join me. Maybe next time? Undeterred, I jogged out of frosh quad and down that straight road past Mission leading into Vermont. 30 minutes in, I realized that Vermont was actually a bit further out than I initially thought (but still manageable) and turned back to call it a day.

It was my first run in a couple weeks so I’m probably gonna be a bit sore tomorrow, but it felt amazing to run again. The scenery is beautiful and I’m kicking myself for not fully taking advantage of it earlier in the year. Now that I think about it, it was probably because there was a truckload of school work and it was also cold as brick? Anyways, I’m glad I can enjoy the outdoors now. Scott “The WOC Father” Lewis mentioned that once spring break officially ends he’ll take us on hiking trips, so I’m excited for that too!

P.S. Later on in the day, Dom texted me asking if I wanted to toss. Of course I wanted to, so toss we did on Paresky Lawn for over an hour(!) I think frisbee is one of the few sports where you can practice social distancing without sacrificing anything, because we were 30 meters apart the whole time. Looking forward to our next safe sesh.

So last night I Mountain-Day-Rouletted and packed my bag with water, granola bars, a towel, and a frisbee because my friend said he might want to go on a hike today. (I know that’s not how Roulette works but I had to put in extra effort with the packing so… sunken cost fallacy?) Luckily, it was a popping day today so it was on! I think I overprepped though, because we only went to Stone Hill. It was still beautiful despite all the cow poop. I think any patch of grass that wasn’t completely dry was cow poop. Seeing the college, in all its deserted glory, made me appreciate being able to stay here surrounded by pretty mountains and pretty people.

Later after lunch, we played another round of frolf. I think I’m getting better at it, or maybe there was less wind this time. Anyways, it was nice having my mind occupied with just throwing plastic discs around for a while, and not the worries and wonders of our new COVID-era life. I’ve re-discovered that exercise helps me feel calm yet energetic, so tomorrow I’m gonna go on a morning run with Abu! I have a feeling continuing that will help push me through the upcoming weeks and months.

I feel like over the last three days, I’ve fired maybe a total of five or so neurons in my brain. I’m afraid they’re gonna start disappearing one by one if I don’t use them, so I decided that today was going to be a Productive Day.

And it kinda worked! I (finally) confirmed my internship for the summer, which will be back in Japan. Hopefully things don’t get out of control between now and then so I can go back and do it, especially since I know some companies are cancelling internships or moving them to a remote format. But who knows? The Olympics are postponed for a year, there are no signs of reported cases slowing down, and the economy is not looking too hot right now. I know I can only worry about this because of my privilege, but it concerns me nonetheless.

I was also able to do some CS lab work that’s due the first Wednesday back, which is not that far from now(!) We really spent an entire week in campus quarantine already, even though it seemed to fly by. But now that we’re settled in for good and have started school work and such, it might start to become more of a slog. Let’s hope not.

Williams is going to implement a universal pass/fail grading system this semester! It’s low-key helpful for me because all my classes are kinda tough right now, but looking at it from a broader perspective it was the most reasonable (do I daresay the only?) choice. My friend brought it up last week, and Maud explained it in her email as well, but with students living in varying circumstances navigating their own difficulties, it’s impossible to accurately assess a student’s learning “longitudinally or cross-sectionally”. I’ve been very impressed by the college’s response to the pandemic so far, and I’m glad they made the right choice with P/F grading.

But what about the incentive to get good grades? Won’t people slack off when it’s not there? Case in point, some people I know decided to hold off finishing their lab report because it didn’t matter anymore. The thing is though, they’re not abandoning it completely. They’re just going to do it at their own pace, unconstrained by arbitrary time limits and the stress of grades impacting grad school prospects. Which is a healthy way to learn I think! Too bad society dictates the necessity of grades and quantifying/ranking people as a whole.

To celebrate this announcement (and to seek retribution for yesterday), we ordered some two objectively-mediocre but subjectively-amazing pizzas from Dominoes. Abu really wanted to watch Us, and he assured me that it was very good and not that scary so I agreed. It was indeed very good and now I have to process the meaning for a couple of days, but it was also very scary so I’ve been half-tricked. 😡I survived though, and even though I’m scared to look out the window as I type this, it was a positive experience that I would recommend to others. 8.5/10

Just yesterday it was spring break weather — sunny with no clouds along with a slight chill that dissipated in the sunlight. This morning, I woke up and it was snowing(!?!?) So in the winter clothes we had left, Abu and I trekked all the way to Driscoll for brunch. It was a snow-in day, so I lazily finished my math assignment and caught up on the 20+ emails from my professors, and it was suddenly dinner time before I knew it. By then, it had turned into a proper storm so we decided to order takeout at the Log #suppportlocalbusinesses. They didn’t pick up, so we walked over only to find it closed 🙁 And so was our backup plan, the Purple Pub :(( After confirming that Dominoes was still open, we decided to get a light dinner from Driscoll and order later. We accidentally ended up playing Minecraft for the next three hours, but it was getting close to Snar Time so we gave Dominoes a second call. “Sorry, but due to the storm, we are not open right now.” All this excitement and anticipation only to be let down. In consolidation, we Crafted some more and promised ourselves that we’ll order tomorrow. Hopefully the storm will have subsided by then!

Today was an eventful day! My friend Ruth, who lives only a couple of minutes away, brought her dog Elwood so we could go on a walk together. So along with Abu, we explored the ghost town that is Williamstown and stopped every once in a while for Elwood to make his presence felt by peeing on a sign. He might’ve pooped once or twice as well, but that’s okay because he’s such a good boy. 🥺Also, there is so much energy in that little dude! He almost punctured my one good disc but got bored of it immediately so there’s minimal damage. I missed dogs, but even more, I missed Ruth. It was so nice being able to see her even just for a little bit. I hope she comes back sometime soon.

Later at night, I jokingly made a Google Hangouts video chat for my entry’s weekly Sunday snack nights. Here are a few takeaways:

• The turnout is around the same as usual, but there’s less fluidity in joining/leaving because you can’t quietly disappear back into your room
• It’s Chaotic. I think the combination of not being able to judge the atmosphere of the room quickly and accurately, and differing audio levels and lag created a hectic environment where you couldn’t really focus on one part of a conversation or another.
• But, it’s fun! I was so happy being able to see everyone’s faces and seeing that they were doing well. Also, a pro to video chats is that we can now show off our dogs/cats/stuffed animals/anything else that is cute and cool.

I’m glad that we were able to do this impromptu call and I hope more people join next time. Maybe the memeified Zoom will work better at handling 10+ rowdy teens who are starved of social interaction?

After a long exhausting day moving yesterday, I rolled out of bed at noon. Setting up my room until late at night so it feels just right and cozy paid off, because I woke up feeling at home despite only living in this room for one night. Immediately afterwards, my friend texted me asking if I wanted to frolf (frisbee golf) since it was so nice outside. We always did it at midnight with a group of 20+ and this time it was in the middle of the day with only 6, but it felt calming just tossing a plastic disc around while practicing social distancing. Abu went to play pickup soccer for a while, and Chloe set up an ~aesthetic~ croom for us to chill in. Some people in the groupchat “Those Who Remain” were thinking of planning social (but not too social) events for our new dorms and with all of this going around, I feel like we’re finally getting settled into our new lives. It’s an unnerving time to be in, for sure, but I’m glad I’m stuck at Williams with these people to ride it out with.

I’m officially in Sage EF now! Frosh Quad kids always pointed to Mission Hill as a con to living in Mission, and I always thought that was a weak argument. But after hauling six trips worth of boxes and suitcases, I’m glad to say that will be my last time in a while walking up that hill.

There are still remnants of the previous tenant scattered throughout the room(s), but I’ve slowly started unpacking and establishing my dominance within Sage E209 and its surroundings. I use plural because we also get our individual bathrooms and crooms for Social Distancing purposes. It’s a nice setup and even though I thought I’d be lonely with only 15 students living in a building meant for >100, my friends are only a couple doors away 🙂 We were all busy with our moving, but I’m sure tomorrow and onwards we’ll get to know each other even more and I couldn’t be more excited!

P.S. Also, amidst today’s busyness, I Google Hangout-ed with the Schow librarians I work with! It was nice catching up with all of them and seeing how they’re coping well, and I’m looking forward to our next call sometime next week.