I sent the following in an email on 9/15/04
I had meant to send this earlier but for reasons to be explained, i could only write now. This took me several hours to write and it hasn't been edited and grammar has often been ignored for the sake of brevity (and whatever the opposite of that is), so I apologize in advance. Some of you had no warning that this was coming, but you'll continue to receive mail from me even if you don't care for it (hitting the delete key takes little effort). Hopefully future emails will be more frequent and less long
9/8
We left for Hanover around 6:20am, which was later than we had hoped but wasn't terribly bad. The ride was mostly uneventful (with the exception of some heavy rain) until we reached I-287 which has become our default route around NY. There was heavy traffic near when we got on, and later once we joined with I-87. A sign advised travelers to New England to take 87 north to 84, but that looked substantially longer. Anyhow, traffic was bad until we reached 684. For those of you who know roads around NY: I was wondering if it would have been wise to take the saw mill parkway from 287 to 684 (it looked like a shortcut but we didn't know). Pretty soon after we entered connecticut we were convinced that we wouldn't make Hanover in time so we made several frantic calls to alert them to our impending delay. However, we made good time, 84 was slow in spots but not as bad as 287 and 91 was nearly empty so we just sailed along. We reached Dartmouth around 4, got my ID and room key, hastily unloaded the car (my poor mother didn't have tine to make my bed), and reached Robinson hall before the 5pm deadline.
I was signed in, and repeated a madlib like pledge where I agreed to forfeit my hair and big toe if I did so much as leave food on the pristine white mountain ground. Somewhere in this I said goodbye to mom and she disappeared; when I was done with the pledge I was sent to the next building over and I saw mom heading back to the car. Anyhow, before I really dive into my DOC trip a little background is necessary. The Dartmouth outing club was founded in 1909 and has about 2400 members (half of whom are current students) making it the largest and oldest collegiate outdoor club. The club itself is an umbrella organization for a host of other clubs which do everything from rock climbing to cycling. The club also runs these pre-orientation trips which close to 90% of incoming freshmen take. Furthermore, everyone who takes them seems to love them and everyone claims to have made life long friends there.
The Hanover end of the trips are orchestrated by "H crew", a group so gung hoe that they shave their died hair in weird patterns and wear outlandish clothes. Their man purpose is to teach everyone the "salty dog" which is a rather interesting dance. In fact, nearly the entirety of the non outdoor portions of the trip was dedicated to dancing. As you probably know, I'm somewhat clumbsy so complex movements like the salty dog are not easy to me. Moreover I dislike dancing in general so I felt very out of place. I ended up trying to talk to some people who also weren't dancing but the lound music was a real conversation stopper. Anyhow, we eventually met our trip leaders and proceded to the gym for out swim test. The two leaders were Dan, a squash playing jew from the bronx and 07, and Laura a particularly outdoorsy 05 from Lexington Mass. The swim test was easy (2 25 yard laps of any stroke) so I completed my first graduation requirement. Individual trips then separated to eat and we then ate a home cooked meal at "the rock" a house owned by the Cabin and Trail (CNT) branch of the outing club (which Laura was an officer in).
CNT is the branch of the DOC that does hiking and maintains a 70 mile stretch of the Appalachian Trail, many spur trails, and cabins and campsites along them. This was appropriate because my trip would be doing trail repair. This was my third choice after moderate hiking and road biking, and, truth be told, I was somewhat disappointed with my draw. The trip was composed of an odd group of kids, none of whom would have made trail repair their first choice. There were two black girls, one from Chicago and one from Baltimore (who had spent her senior year in North Western Germany). There was also one Indian (the asian type) from Wisconsin and a white girl from Los Angeles who had just moved to Iowa (which is quite differnt from LA). There were two white guys, both also from PA. One was from State College and one from Easton and had just moved to LA. Lastly there was a Chinese guy from NY. Following introductions the trips met back up under the guise of a safety talk, which turned out to be a very funny show by H crew where they presented information on subjects as diverse as preventing blisters and pooping in the woods through parodys of songs. This was, of course, followed by more dancing.
All 10 people in our group slept in a dorm room and that about rounded out a long day.
9/9
H crew was supposed to wake us up at 5am to get an early start but some prankster woke us up at 2. It took us several minutes to realize the 3 hour discrepancy, but we were soon back asleep. H crew then woke us up at 5 as promised (some combination of pot banging and singing). After packing, breakfast, and more dancing (including everyone's favorites "Blame it on the boogie", "Sex box", and "salty dog rag") we were finally loaded on busses and sent off to our trailheads. We had a 2 mile hike in to our campsite on Wachipauka pond near our work area. We ate lunch, set up our tent (2 giant tarps), and headed out to the work area. The trail went through a flat area which had been turned into a swamp by above average rainfall. We were to build bog bridges and dig drainage ditches to make the trail less of a mud pit. Laura was certified to use a chainsaw on federal lands (we were in the white mountain national forrest) so she worked on the bridges and most other people helped dig ditches. The ground was either mud or so saturated with water that stepping in the same place twice would transmute it. What did this mean? Lots of fun! I hadn't played in mud in the longest time and it was quite enjoyable. My tool of choice became the polaski (or axe mattock) which is essentially an axe with a hoe on the other end. Digging and chopping through the root filled mud covered me in dirt. Another task was to place stepping stones in convenient places. These stones, more often than not, were 150-200 pound boulders that were moved with heavy iron "rock bars" and lots of pushing and grunting. Since these "stepping stones" were needed in areas of mud, sometimes higher than my boots, my shoes got soaked. Before I had left I had meant to waterproof them but I couldn't find the bottle of nikwax that we used to have. In short, my boots and socks were soaked (along with the rest of what I was wearing). We worked for 3 hours then returned for dinner.
After some talking, games, and dancing practice (where I finally got the movements to half of the salty dog down) we finally went to sleep. However, we were awakened by the two hikers who asked for a place to sleep. There was little room in the tent but we agreed to make room. Then they dropped their bags and disappeared because they had to pee. Not long there after a official sounding voice announced the presence of FBI agents Walker and Smith who were looking for illegal drugs. Apparently the AT is a corridor for drug traffic because it was so unregulated. They proceeded to start searching our packs and produced a bag of white powder from one of them. Then they found brownies in a bag from one of the hikers. Around this time the two hikers ran in, took their bags and ran off. Then Walker pulled out a gun and shot them, with a stream of water. Apparently there is a long history of raiding DOC trips and this was a common variety of raid (the pot brownie raid). We then partook of the food. It turned out the raiders were fellow members of CNT and friends of Laura. Eventually, we got back to sleep.
9/10
The day was fairly uneventful: more games, dance practice and trail work. I managed to not get quite as dirty as last time. The day's greatest accomplishment was a large drainage ditch which rerouted a medium sized stream which has turned a good 50' section of trail into a stream. I dubbed this work "the Panama ditch" because it required a deep cut and the movement of several large rocks. However, draining such a long section of trail was quite satisfying. We also heard more stories of raids. Apparently last year there was a rather complex raid where an upperclassman masqueraded as a trippie (with the help of the trip leaders). The first night the leaders told a ghost like story where a trippie had been kidnapped by some through hikers because of some minor altercation. The next night they slept in a cabin along the AT and two more upperclassmen, dressed as through hikers, claimed to want to stay at the cabin but got into a argument with the embedded upperclassmen and they huffed off. That night when everyone was asleep, he snuck off. The next morning the trip awoke to find him missing. This caused quite a stir and the leaders had everyone put on the packs and hurry down the trail. A little bit down they found the upperclassman trippie tied to a tree, apparently dead. When they got close he yelled, "Look out! It's a trap!" whereupon the two other upperclassmen came charging and screaming from behind some cover. The trippies scattered like neutrons from a split uranium nucleus and apparently it took over an hour to find them. One of the trippies parent's didn't find it so funny and complained to the DOC, and this almost got raids banned. Some of the more scary raids such as the chainsaw raid (where a chainsaw sans chain is used to terrorize trippies) were.
Anyhow, dinner for that night was couscous, which I wasn't looking forward to. We started dinner surprising late, and all of a sudden a man came charging through the woods into out campsite with a humongous backpack. This was a self admitted redneck from central PA (who will remain nameless) and he was bearing 13 lbs. of chicken, rice, a dutch oven, and other cooking stuff. We had previously heard of this man when I joking suggested that we "break out the emergency diatomite supply" to do away with a particularly large annoying rock. Laura and Dan looked at each other and agreed that it was a good thing that this person wasn't present, because he a) probably did have explosives on him and b) would probably use it. It turned out that he had ran in 25 minutes what we had done in 1:50. I had thought that our pace was slow, but I was impressed. Anyhow, the chicken and rice sure beat couscous. He had some interesting stories about raiding other college's outing trips (which was new, raiding used to be confined to Dartmouth's own trips). He made extensive use of pyrotechnics, rebel yelling, and live animals such as porcupines (which he tossed into a cabin filled with panicked students from a school in Cambridge that will remain nameless).
But what comes around goes around. I later learned that he was raided as he was returning back to his car. Details are sketchy but it apparently involved sharpened sticks and a black cat. Later that night we were chainsaw raided (the college tried to prevent this by not letting students borrow their chainsaws, but this person owned his own). However, we hardly batted an eye but we received some snickers bars from people in scream style glowing ghosts masks.
9/11
We woke early and started a hard 9 mile hike to Moosilauke lodge. The lodge and the mountain of the same name (at 4802' it's the southernmost of the 4000 footers). Our hike included crossing a large, cold, and fast slowing stream, and a rather steep and long ascent up Hurricane Mountain (which is really just the side of Mt. Moosilauke). When we neared the top Laura uncharacteristically started complaining that her pack was too heavy. So we stopped and she took out a large watermelon. In another apparently common prank played on trippies, the leaders partially buries a pineapple in the ground along the trail before the trip starts. When the trip starts they pretend to be amateur botanists and start identifying plants along the trail to the trippies (even if they have to make up the name). When they reach the buried pineapple the say, "Oh my god! It's a Canadian ground fruit! I've never seen them this far south before". Then they dig up the pineapple and serve it. This happened on Laura's DOC trip and she recalls a fellow trippe exclaiming, "It tastes like pineapple! Only Better!"
We reached the lodge around 5. Everyone else was already there because most people had only hiked a few miles then been bussed in. The lodge was run by lodge crew, who were comparable to h crew. They served dinner with song and dance. Then more dancing, a 1935 movie that parodied hiking safety films (the main character is Dr. Schlitz who is a rich german on vacation on early spring and attempts to climb mt washington with little more than a suit and bottle of wine), and a deliberately long and boring ghost story which put people to sleep only to be awakened and startled by orchestrated screams by lodge crew. Eventually, we went to sleep.
9/12
We woke up. More dancing. It ended eventually and I finally got bussed back. I was glad to be away from all that dancing (which i mostly didn't participate in because it wasn't working for me) I showered and unpacked some before meeting back up with my trip for dinner (pizza) followed by dessert (Ben and Jerries has a store in town). Many people on my hall had already moved in. This next part discussed some of my internal functions; if you dislike such subjects please skip to the next paragraph. Before coming to Dartmouth, I was nervous. I'm not opposed to new things, but when things are good enough I am resistant to change. One day while biking, all of a sudden I was realized how to condense all my anxiety into one question: Where would my home be? Would Dartmouth be my home or just a temporary exile from my real realm? I didn't know how I would figure this out. However, back to my original story. After ingesting 4 large slices of pizza and a small cup of coffee coffee buzbuzbuz I really had to poop. Now, some of you may know then when I'm traveling, I have trouble doing this. It's not a conscious thing, but when traveling I usually get slightly constipated (or sometimes the opposite happens). This was the case with the trip. I had tried pooping severl times but not much came out. But then I sat down on the toilet in my dorm and what hadn't moved after days of grunting now slid out smoothly. Such things only happen at home. My intestines had identified what my mind had not. Now it just needs to be tests if I can have 2 homes (thanksgiving dinner will tell).
I started unpack soon and managed to make my bed all one my own! However, when I tried to unpack my computer, I ran into trouble: my mouse and keyboard were nowhere to be found. Several frantic calls home later it was established that my keyboards were approximately 300 miles south south west of Hanover. Thankfully dartmouth has old iMacs littered all over the place for the purpose of checking email, so I survived.
9/13
This was the first day of orientation. After showering, I didn't know what was required of me, and neither did other people. However, I had a nagging feeling that I had to do something. So I wandered across the green and noticed a tent full of people. I found that if I waited in line long enough then stated my name people would hand me a pile of papers. Presently, I sat down and looked through them. Several of them were from local banks, and I figured that a bank account would be useful. After some reading it seamed that fleet had the best offer (a student deal for 5 years worth of fee free basic checking and savings). The bank was mobbed with irritated parents and children. I, for one, am glad that I was without parents because none of them seemed to be behaving themselves. There were signs up for a student account with only 1 year of fee freeness, but one parent, despite asking a officer several times, couldn't get it through his head that his son was getting the 5 year deal. Another kept asking about money market accounts, as if the .25% interest on the basic savings account wasn't good enough for him (as if his student would have enough money to have non-negligible interest). Anyhow, after waiting for the flustered parents to be calmed down and shuffled through I finally met with a bank officer. They really had the process streamlined (if you weren't a whining parent that is) and I was set in no time, and I'm finally getting checks without my parent's name on them (they're green, 150 of em, and free).
After that, I wandered around hanover, and soon found the bike shop (http://www.omerandbobs.com/) which is very well stocked. I talked for a while with one of the workers (Seth) and learned about good bike routes, that there were organized rides starting at the bike shop sundays at 3pm, and that dartmouth cycling club members get a 15% discount. Sweet. With this knowledge, I set out for my first ride. The standard route is to head up the Connecticut river along NH 10, which is sort of hilly because it stays back from the river. One then crosses the river at Lyme or Orford, and heads south along US 5 which does stick right next to the river and is dead flat. The scenery is wonderful (I can't wait untill the leaves start to change) but it smells like cows for most of the route (for obvious reasons). Anyhow, I took the shorter route crossing at Lyme, which made a 22.5 mile course. However, it felt too flat (I deliberately integrated all the good hills in the area into my home route) so I'm looking to modify it.
This is a good place to talk about my neighbors since they had all moved in by now. My floor is all freshman except for 3 07s (only one of whom is already here). The floor bellow is similarly arranged, as is the second floor of Ripley (the opposing but attached dorm). I seem to be relatively computer savvy compared to the other people so I've been called in several times to help people. Here are several people who I seem to interact with the most:
Cena: The first person I met on the floor. She has established herself as floor mom and has already cleaned cut someone's hair and cleaned another person's windows.
Karl: has similiar interests to mine (physics, math, history) but is also planning on taking humanities 1, 2.
Nick/Allex: These two share the double at the far end of the hall. They seem to have similar interest (liberal arts) and have a nice big room to visit.
Somewhere in the day I was told that my advisor is Carl Pomerance who dad knows.
9/14
Some genius decided to have the first official meeting of the class at 8 in the morning. We heard speeches by a number of people. Moderately interesting but too early. I then went with Karl to a meeting about calculus placement. They had a packed auditorium for an obvious reason: the calculus system is overcomplicated. The standard calculus sequence goes 3->8->13. However, there are honors versions of 8 and 13 (9 and 14). Then, there is a slower paced 2 term replacement for math 3 ( and 2) which requires you to be invited. They didn't say it but the implication has to be that they put you in 1 2 if they somehow don't think that you're good at math. Then for the premeds then have math 4, which is a dead end after math 3. Then, if you're taking the 2 intro physics classes they have 15.1 and 15.2 which replace 3 and 8 and go in a a different order to better accommodate the physic's class's pace. So, after sitting through 45 minutes of this (and many repetitive questions, all from premeds no doubt), I finally learned of the course that i was placed into, math 11. Because Dartmouth has quarters, their classes don't quite line up with other people's course. 3 is more or less AB calc but 8 not only finishes up BC calc but spends half the time doing multivariable. So, even though I was given credit for 3 and 8, I don't know half of math 8 so there is a special course for me, which does all of their multivariable stuff (aka of half of math 8 and math 13). However, it does no single variable stuff review, and since I did BC as a junior that might hurt. But oh well, math 11 it is.
Starting the day before I started to have a soar throat and by this day it had spread to a general cold. So I then headed off to CVS to get some pills. I was amazed at the variety of pills they had. Usually I just pop whatever we have in the cabinet above the drier, but now I had to make a choice of my own. I eventually went with a CVS brand multi symptom cold remedy with different day and night formulas. It seem to help some, but I was still feeling pretty crappy.
But I had to do something important: pick up my laptop. This device has wasted much of my time since then. It is very well designed. The screen seems as big as my 17" monitor. I was also lucky in that I have no dead pixels. The internal speakers sound good (it's supposed to have a small sub in there somewhere). The lack of a "right mouse button" is annoying, but I can survive by hitting control and clicking to get the same effect. The tracked has also grown on me (I used to hate them), but I'd still prefer another pointing device. Battery life seems to be decent. However, if you run it at full capacity for a while the bottom gets hot enough to cook an egg on, and it's still nice and warm when it's being used to type this.
Any how, the president hosted a dinner held on his lawn and I shook his hand (along with 500 other freshmen). His house is on frat row, which must make it an interesting place to live. After dinner I returned to my dorm and did laundry. There are 6 washers and driers for my dorm complex (~120 people i think) but I had no trouble. In the meantime I started writing this. I turned in around 10 because I was sick and beat, but my neighbors were having a loud room party. However the CVS stuff must have had something potent because I was out cold.
9/15
The day started bright an early for an 8 am german placement test. I meat Vineea (sp???), the girl from my outing trip who had gone to germany. She was nervous and she had been in germany for a frigging year, I didn't feel so good (but perhaps just because I was still sick). The test started off easy, then got gradually harder, and then shot up at the end. Most of it was fill in blank/ rewrite a sentence by doing something (my favorite one required us to make all possible things plural and then negate the statement). However, by the end it was using genitive prepositions (or some such) and requiring me to rewrite a paragraph in subjunctive. Bah. I came away feeling that I had certainly justified my place in german 2, and possible got into german 3, but that I certainly didn't place out. This was affirmed by an email a few hours later saying that I had placed into german 2.
My keyboard and mouse arrived from swarthmore and I soon had my desktop up and running and I started transferring important files to my laptop. I must say that I really like a laptop because I hardly moved from my bed all afternoon. I'm now feeling somewhat better. Now you are all up to date. Later.
-Leon
