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5 . 2 7 . 0 4 Just woke up from a very strange dream. First I was in a locker room of sorts where I was the team mascot for a Basketball game with the Indiana Pacers. Reggie Miller had just scored a three-pointer and the crowd was going apeshit. I was supposed to go out on the court wearing a golden gopher (Minnesota) outfit and cheer the crowd on, but for some reason I could not find a jersey that said Minnesota. All I could find was a sweatshirt that said Washington. Somehow I decide that this isn't for me, and I walk out of the locker room and I find myself back in Madison walking barefoot with my parents and some of my extended family. K is with us and we are walking around town looking for a place to eat. It starts to rain, and then sleet but my feet are not cold. My first thought is to run up between my parents to make sure that they dont' slip in the ice on the ground. I walk between them holding their hands. For some reason we go to a bar that was called the Echo Tap that was pretty nasty. It is definitely one of those dive bars that I have become fond of in Madison, but not one that you would bring your parents and family to around bar time. As we are walking in, a lady comes out and makes last call. The people inside are a mix of young and old, some bums and others passed out on the ground. When I go to the lua this lady comes rushing in and sits on the toilet that I'm going shishi in. Later on my family looks a little lost in the place which looks more like an after party than a bar. Pop served himself a plate of fried rice and ordered a beer which cost 3 bucks total. He gives the guy a big tip. As we are leaving the place, we notice that there was a local looking man standing on the side of the bar that looked out of place, wearing a white tuxedo with tails on it and holding a counter in his hand. He said "this way sir" pointing straight at a door that standing next to. When I almost go in the wrong door, he says "this way sir" again pointing to the other door. this time I got the right one. The door leads downstairs to another place that is like night and day compared to the first. It is very clean and elegant, almost like a hotel. The entrance there are two girls dresssed in red and black evening wear laying down on a sofa/couch/bed who check ID's, even mom and pop's. In the distance I can see a huge fish tank with giant reef fish, and couches with people lounging around on them. Everyone in this bar is dressed very nice, walking around and talking. I try to call K but at first my phone didn't get a signal. I walk upstairs out of the new place on the side and eventually I am outside the place which looks almost exactly like outside the cafeteria at Punahou looking over middle field by the rock wall. When I finally get a hold of her she tells me to wait for her at the entrance. When I turn around I realize that there was a mad rush for people trying to get in. I glance at my watch and note that it is about about 4 am. I wake up at about 3:57AM Hawaiian Standard Time. And on side note it always baffles me how religion breeds ignorance. 5 . 2 3 . 0 4 Been about a week and it has been busy as hell moving out of the rock and getting ready for DC. Khamphian is in town, checking out the sights and the beach. The joke is that by spending some time in my hometowne, she's finding out why I'm so fucked up. That is of course after living in Wisconsin for about 6 years I already know why she's the way she is as well. Went out to the turtle beach on the side of Kam Hwy, got a little burnt but got to see a huge honu almost 5 feet long. It was pretty unreal. The water was clear with some debris, but pretty calm in general. Made for good swimming. The place has been discovered by the tour buses and there was a lot of people there, too many that I think the turtles didn't want to crawl on the beach. Went to the Willow's yesterday morning for brunch, had some good Hawaiian food and got to hear some live music requests, Hi'ilawe and Waikaloa by a trio of very good musicians. Later on I messed around with the interesting water sculpture set up in the courtyard that was shooting water in globs up in the air. 5 . 1 9 . 0 4 Home now. Been a crazy crazy last week in the Madtowne, running around from the post office and back, Inn on the Park, Capitol, Great Dane, Magnus, Tornado, Corral room, Opus, State Street, all over. The commencement ceremony was great. Smaller, in closed quarters at the State assembly room, gave it a much more intimate feel to the whole thing. The pageantry and what not of ceremonies was better handled in more private settings. I recall walking in the Kohl center about 3 years ago, joking around with Aki not even paying attention to what the keynote speaker was saying. This time it was more meaningful. Interesting speeches from Nichols, Wallace, Anna and Rochelle, Julio, and the Chief Justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court. We had a small trinket to attach to our tassels with the beaded letters WWBD? All this to go with the weird Teal coloured hood. Doris and Alice drove down for the ceremony too, my folks got to meet a bunch of people from my time up here in Madison. Tristan seemed very amused Dad and his stories. Amazing as to how much to reflect on my father's adventures over the years. Many of which I have been a part of. Mom got to go down state street and check out the hippie stores, and we ate a lot of good good food. Magnus is unreal. Ended up mailing just about a trunkload of stuff from my dorm to DC. While it always amazes me how much crap you can accumulate over the course of 2 years living in a little box, it equally amazes me even more how cathargic and maybe nostalgic it can be cleaning through it and throwing stuff out. We'll see how much crap I accumulate in DC this next upcoming year now. Khamphian is coming to visit tomorrow, we'll see how she likes my island home. hehe. Driving around the island today I've noticed how much things have changed. Makes me wonder what another year or 2 or 4 might bring. Everytime I come home I never want to leave. Meanwhile my classmate Hiro had a baby. 5 . 1 3 . 0 4 Pau with school, now its some hard core packing to do from here on out. I just realized that I have to be out of the Merit House by Sunday at noon, since they're locking the doors. Kind of abrupt really, get in get out, get on with your life. Its really good, have to throw a tonne of crap that I've accumulated over the past two years. It really is amazing on the sheer volumes. Mom and pop are coming into town tomorrow, should be fun. Got my hood today, with the cap and gown. La Follette has a Teal trim on it, to signify "Public Affairs". I wonder how they pick the colors, since teal doesn't go very well with cardinal red. 5 . 1 0 . 0 4 About a week left in the Madtowne. I get a kick out of the fact that I was saying the same thing about 3 years ago. Well officially it was more like 2 years and 9 months ago, since I left in August 2001 from my undergrad experience. In more ways than one it really is the same, seems like things happen for a reason. I was thinking about how I ended up coming back to Madison after really leaving it for good. This ride was shorter, but just as fun. It's raining, May showers instead of april showers this time around. Puts a kink in my plans to go to a coffee shoppe and jam out these two last papers. Maybe it'll let up so I can dash out to state street, maybe it won't and I'll have to brave it in the umbrella and jacket. Either way it'll all be pau in about 48 hours I suppose. So graduation will be in the capitol, kind of an exclusive set up, if you ask me. I guess it is fitting somewhat. I think it'll have a closer feel to it as opposed to the kohl center, a better sense of place. Wonder what Aki is up to about now? 5 . 7 . 0 4 Federal Budget & Finance (PA 890) Final today, I think it went okay, given the amount of preparation time I had for it. Kind of squeaked by on this one, I think. At the very least I can still fail one of my 3 classes and still graduate. Although I'm sure that it won't come to that. So now I'm almost almost there, one more take home final, and a paper and its smooth sailing. Watching C-SPAN this morning on the testimony given by Rummy and Co. given the recent torture in Iraqi prisons by US soldiers. I find it disheartening that people are surprised and shocked, thinking that US soldiers are incapable of being so cruel. Something about being American is inherantly good, morale, without flaws? Almost as if the general public thinks that US soldiers are inhuman - no pun intended. It all sounds crazy and naive at the very least. I agree with the notion that war is hell, but not in the fatalistic sense alone. War brings disorder, destroys reason and justice, it brings out the worst in people, delineates human beings to the lowest common denominator where those with the means of physical intimidation and brute force are kings. It is crazy to say that we can bring order by creating more disorder. No country begs for war, no country begs for liberation in the form of cluster bombs and depleted Uranium. Unless of course it is the country that has never had to deal with the prosepect of bombing raids, military curfews, and occupational forces roaming the streets. It baffles me how there are people in world who are actually pro-war. I hate to say that I think these people honestly have not suffered enough. Maybe there is more truth to the saying that life is supposed to be suffering, and that through overcoming human sorry you reach enlightenment. Or at the very least you become more in touch with humanity, something bigger and grander than yourself. I view this self-righteousness as an empty answer to coping with the cold realities of life. Lashing out at annonymous strangers thousands of miles away and wishing them hell on earth is an artifical way of seeking redemption through the suffering of others. It just doesn't seem to fit right, as it is not an effective solution that will match the problem. Kind of searching for the meaning of life from an angry sermon behind a pulpit instead of the soulful wail of the a blues singer on a street corner, or the sound of the ocean rolling onto the shore. It is turning out even more evident day by day that this has been one of the worst kinds of war - a war of choice, waged by a selected few ideologues who have grand schemes for how the world should be run, regardless of what the majority of people think and with a callous disregard for the mountains of human suffering that they have caused. It makes me a little bitter about the mess created in the world today that my generation and my children's will have to deal with. Some of which may come a lot sooner than later. 5 . 3 . 0 4 Monday and its the last week of classes at Madison. Chances are that I won't be able to attend more than 50% of them. Sadly I'll probably be busy busting my ass for the remainder of this week getting my shit together and done. And its the finish stretch, in about a week I'll be joining the ranks of people with a graduate degree. Funny how I don't feel all that much different or wiser. Maybe just more of a wise-ass. I've definitely developed a dark sense of humor over the past 3 years. I always used to hate spring semesters since around finals time it gets so hectic and stressed. On top of it you have to make plans to move out of your place, pack things for storage, find storage, book a flight, etc. And when its your last semester in the Mad Towne you really don't have a chance to enjoy the city before saying good bye. Although it was great the second time around. Who knows, maybe I'll end up back here for something. Again. Apparently it snowed this morning, I was too busy trying to get a few hours of sleep before cracking open the books again after a hard core night of reading and studying. Big flakes too, according to Khamphian. I'll just have to take her word for it. Funny, I wouldn't mind seeing one more snowfall before I leave. Actually it would be really something if my folks got snowed on when they come up in a couple weeks. That would be a sight. 5 . 1 . 0 4 Mifflin street block party today. Once again I have a tonne of work to do and I won't be hitting it. Wonder if there'll be riots this year, as Madison has been prone for in the past couple years. I remember getting a sample Badger Herald sent to me back when I was a Senior in HS, and reading about the mifflin street riots. Thought to myself that it couldn't have been very good PR for the university. Lucky me I didn't read into it much. There are a few things that I still haven't done yet in Madison. Catching a squirrel, to name one. |