The Best of Both Worlds

There are two purely non-academic reasons that I consider legitimate to take a certain class that you have already taken three times. Number one: you are madly in love with the teacher. Number two: you get to go to West Point. My Advanced IR Theory class falls into the latter category. I probably had IR theory in some disguised form every single year in the last four years but I was dying to get into this one. The waiting list was long, the costs of the books totaled at $350, and the extra-curricular but hyper-compulsory Bard-West Point joint seminars were scheduled at 8 am (which, for a decent Bardian is about four hours before standard weak-up time). It was eventually a Swiss girl’s first week drop out and my international status (ironically the same that barred me from staying in NYC) that proved to be my lucky constellation.
When the first Monday morning came with the 6 am alarm clock obnoxiously waking me up from my 4 hour sleep I was little less enthusiastic about the lawful or unlawful status of detainees in Guantanamo Bay and all that jazz…

But duty is duty. Outperforming myself with a record breaking speedy dress n’ go I was out in the chilly, snowy realities of a 6:30 dawn before I even realized. That’s when I paid my first deep respect for all military students around the world who do this seven days a week without the faintest grumble.
The bus ride to the US Army campus on the other side of the Hudson River was probably picturesque but I respectfully slept it over. I woke up just in time to be able to dutifully present my visa to the officer at the gate and try not to behave suspiciously and more civilized than what my Eastern European passport implies.
West Point being the oldest military base in the long history of the US has a sort of eerie atmosphere, its fortress-like grey stone buildings projecting rigid authority. With all our civilian humbleness and Bardian coolness we penetrated into the Social Science Department which happened to be housed under the same roof with the Combating Terrorism Center. Welcome, make yourself at home. Gulp.
Since last week we have spent an entire hour of the class wondering what time they get up, go to bed, brush their teeth, date (is it permitted?), if they ever leave campus other than to Iraq or Afghanistan? And questions like are women allowed, are they all tomboys? Do they use names or only numbers? Are they graded? Are they allowed to get married? Are they allowed to vote? Are they allowed o breathe? Etc, etc.
Having a friend from West Point and having visited his perfectly normal family I found ourselves truly entertaining. But I have to admit, I was nevertheless extremely curious. Surprisingly enough, the future brave man and women looked remarkably human (minus the uniform): the girls were girl-like and the guys were guy-like, some were brawny, some were scrawny. They were from all over the States, and majored in shockingly strange things like English, Engineering, Political Science or History. But the unconventional circumstances and kind of mythical status of the players added a massive dose of stimulation to the by nature controversial US foreign policy topic we had to discuss. They talked like students, had good points and weak points, said smart things and less smart things. By the end of our very short 75 minute seminar session we realized we have at least one thing in common: we’re all completely clueless about the current chaos.

“A gathering would be cool”

If you reside long enough in New York slowly but surely you get used to the incessant and characteristic background music of Manhattan streets presented by the local taxi driver community. It is probably one of the very few city orchestras in the US that perform every day of the year (national holidays included), 24/7 and they're not even paid for it.
Walking across town on 42^nd Street this Sunday, the volume of non-stop honking got to the point of ultimate irritation as I got close to Times Square. I was on the verge of going to the nearest post office and sending a letter to Hillary Clinton to immediately include free daily doses of hardcore tranquilizers in her MediCare reform program for Manhattan taxi drivers; I know it’s a stressful job but not everyone is deaf and dumb in this city, please!
Fortunately, before the next UPS office came my way I literally bumped into one of the cars that gave the obnoxious sound. When I noticed that the trunk of the sedan was wrapped in Albanian flag, the penny dropped…I turned around and realized that the van I just had intimate physical contact with was followed by an endless line of Mercedes’, BMWs, Toyota Jeeps, black SUVs of various brands but all neatly decorated with the somewhat scary scarlet-and-black Albanian emblems. Teenagers hanging from skylight windows, waving and singing along with the radio playing Albanian songs, their parents at the wheels probably grasping more of what a historical moment it was.
The unsuspecting British shopping tourists less so. They knew Times Square is a vibrant and crowded place but few expected an extra two hundred Albanians shouting and dancing around the US ARMY recruiting booth and flooding the sidewalks along Broadway. The most helplessly uninformed opted for “phone-a-friend” to try to understand what exactly is going on: “I have a real quick question for you, man: is Kosovo’s Independence Day today, or what?” Well, sort of. It happened to be the first one for them, very good guess though. But the puzzled majority just stared at celebrating crowd or took six dozen memorable pictures of … when-we-get-back-to-the-hotel-we’ll-find-out-what exactly.(Kosovo's declaration of independence being breaking news on CNN and front page story of the NYTimes it was clearly the mission impossible of the day.)
What gave the distinctive US edge to this local Balkan Independence celebration was the almost equal number of American and Albanian flags. For every two ecstatic Kosovar dressed in the double-headed eagle there was one dressed in Union Jack. “We finally have a State….Thank You, USA” - read hundreds of ruby red T-Shirts featuring the map of Kosovo. Enlightened passers-by clapped and showed V-signs sharing the blissful euphoric moments.
Today, in the seventh post-Yugoslavian state that has probably been the sickest part of the Sick Man of Europe the same Union Jacks were burnt by Serbians denouncing Kosovo’s independence.
But stone-throwing and flag-burning of incensed ethnic Serbs over the Pond is less of the émigrés’ problem. American-Albanians of Albanian.com can lay back and “chill out for the day” or maybe “go to one of those NY parties.”

Climate Change for Real

When the holy board of international program directors decided that being an exchange student I am absolutely required to have at least one semester of “campus experience”, I knew that moving up from the middle of Manhattan into the middle of nowhere will be a more than drastic climate change. I am usually very good at getting used to new living environments, but I have to admit, acclimating myself to the Moon would probably be a slightly easier project than my current situation.
Imagine a green bubble in the heart of the Catskills, on the Hudson River, completely cut off from any form of civilization. The first habitation of human beings is found in a 20 minute picturesque drive from our college grounds in the form of two villages with a population slightly above that of the North Pole.
On site, however you’ll find a plethora of rare plant vegetations (with varying levels of hallucinogen content) and a whole range of unidentifiable forest mammals and birds - indubitable proofs of our extreme remoteness and seclusion. What ultimately completes the particularly rich local flora and fauna of the campus site is of course Bard’s uniquely diverse student population of 1,500 undergraduates whose physical appearance is so distinctive that you can easily single them out in even the most crowded Amtrak trains.
Bard, this 540-acre incubator of hyper liberal, alternative minded, post-Woodstock “nerds” (which is what the freshmen were collectively and officially called during the introduction week) reminds me most of the famed hippie enclave, Christiania, in the heart of Denmark’s capital. Much like Copenhagen’s flower power community, Bard is a sort of social experiment; the land of the freest of free and (second) home of the bravest of brave.
At Bard it is difficult to feel like an outcast since everyone is an outcast. Unless you happen to be “normal.” I.e. you happen not to be a pseudo-hippie, a forgotten punk rock star, an anti-everything-that-has-to-do-with-physical-exercise, a staunch atheist, a faithful Marxist, an unappreciated artiste, or haven’t recently changed your sexual orientation.
Since I don’t (yet) belong to any of the above listed castes, it looks like the spring semester will be my most intensive anthropology class ever. Franz Boas and Bourdieu would surely envy me.