Yet another semester gone and done.
Not to label my first two semesters as irrelevant in any way (because they weren’t at all), this semester is going to remain in my mind as probably the most pivotal of the 8 that I have as a Harvard student.
If I had to sum up the course of this semester using single words, they would go as follows:
Because I never really plan these kinds of blog entries in advance and kind of just write whatever comes into my mind and edit as I go, I will now proceed to elaborate on each of these words and after that write separately about a couple of this semester's highlights.
Certainty
After taking a long break from the craziness that was freshman year, I had a renewed sense of resolution. I had the idea in my head that there was nothing more noble than being a doctor, and though the road would be hard (as many people would tell me throughout the years), I knew I had the will to pursue it. I had a schedule for the rest of my time at Harvard planned out that included all the pre-med requirements, my concentration requirements, my secondary requirements, and a semester of studying abroad. It felt good to have it figured out. I couldn’t wait to actually get started!
Slump
People speak of the “sophomore slump” that second year students experience their first semester. Maybe it is especially pronounced at Harvard, when after the exciting first year where all freshmen live in the same area and there’s lots of opportunities to get to know fellow members of your graduating class, sophomores are placed into the “real” Harvard, in twelve different upperclassman houses, with no unifying class wide activities or special treatment. You aren’t necessarily left to your own devices, but it’s different from being a freshman, and it was an adjustment. I feel like people around me were feeling it too, so even though I consider myself someone who adapts to a new environment very rapidly, I accepted that I was feeling it. The shiny image of Harvard and being surrounded by my incredible friends (the image I held in high esteem in my head towards the end of my summer) dimmed to the flurry of problem sets and readings I suddenly had to contend with. I figured I would get used to it, and the slump would pass.
Doubt
The slump didn’t really pass. It only gave way to doubt.
I began doubting my desire to be a doctor when I realized how much science I would need to be taking and using. I began doubting the love for science I so vehemently exhibited throughout my schooling prior to college. I began doubting my purpose in life when I struggled through math problem sets (NOT EVEN KIDDING). I saw my friends taking organic chemistry struggle even more intensely than I did, and looking at the work they were doing, I had absolutely no desire to learn it. Thus, I doubted my will to actually proceed with pre-med classes that people seem to constantly be suffering through.
Disillusionment
But wait. I had never thought of any other career besides some kind of surgeon who regularly volunteers with Doctors Without Borders. Was this all temporary? Or was I really just not meant to be a doctor because doing science homework felt like a chore and I didn’t really feel fulfilled from it? There were so many questions that coursed through my head. It’s not as if I deeply regretted picking the pre-med classes for this semester, because they really were quite interesting. I was just going through some kind of internal crisis because I realized that I might not have been the same girl I was even a year and a half before then, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. I didn’t know how to deal with doubting if I actually wanted to fulfill my childhood dreams. I had made it this far! What was going on now??
Epiphany
Eventually, I went through a dearth of realizations that led up to a golden epiphany about my character in general.
Some of these realizations include:
• I could make whatever I wanted of my time at Harvard, and didn’t have to prescribe at all to preconceived ideas. If I heard of something somebody did that would make me say “wow, I wish I could do that too, that sounds so fun,” nothing was actually going to stop me from doing it besides me.
• So yeah, my time at Harvard is for me to use wisely.
• I didn’t care at all about going beyond the material covered in the math and science classes I took this semester, and taking more higher level classes to deepen my understanding and knowledge of it didn’t interest me at all.
• I preferred reading about cool things (in the social sciences…) and writing essays, because as you might have been able to tell, I adore writing. I love using my brain in that way.
• I didn’t like the thought of having my future heavily planned out and structured for the next 10+ years anymore.
• Maybe it’s because I’m in Harvard and I saw so people who cared so much more than I did, who put in so much more effort than I was willing to put into those classes that led me to question myself.
Which led up to the realization that I am a very all-or-nothing kind of person.
Let me explain.
In high school, I was willing to work hard in everything and do whatever the system expected me to so I could earn high marks and hopefully get into a good school. Which is cool. But life as a college student didn’t necessarily work that way for me.
Harvard takes everything to such an extreme level that you find out what you think is the shit and what you think is shit very fast, and you find out what exactly it is you want to struggle through, and what you think is worth it.
In high school, I was able to push through whatever I needed to do in order to succeed, even if it didn’t necessarily please me. I knew I had the brains to work things out, anyway. But at Harvard, it was completely different. I actually found classes difficult. I was actually intimidated by my peers rather than regarding myself as somewhat above them intellectually. That being said, I realized that if my heart wasn’t fully into something, if I didn’t feel a certain intense passion towards it, then it wasn’t worth my time and attention at all. I can’t feel lukewarm about something, because that’s just a waste of my time. That’s how I’ve come to perceive my academic pursuits. If I wasn’t absolutely in love with the idea of doing something and then the act of going off and realizing it, then why should I even bother?
This is both good and bad, though I consider it more good. That way I feel like I have purpose. That way I actually feel fulfilled. Harvard has more than enough things for me to feel this way towards.
Excitement
Once I had resolved all the confusion, new sentiments, and wholeheartedly assumed my identity as an all-or-nothing go-getter kind of person, I looked excitedly ahead at how I would meaningfully make use of the rest of my time at Harvard. As a main example, I figured it’d be a great idea to invest in the languages I speak. Spending next summer immersed in German and getting it to a C1 level? Totally doable! I talked to my last German professor, the German department, and the Office of Career Services to help me plan. What about Spanish, that language I’m ashamed I used to resent that I’m now unashamedly in love with? I found a really cool class where you get to spend four hours using it volunteering every week (beats four hours in a lab any day LOL) as well as class time deepening knowledge of the language and learning of the very real lived experiences of Spanish-speaking communities. You have to speak at a pretty high level, so ballsy audacious me emailed the professor asking if I could take it. We met for a conversation (that also served as an interview, which obviously took place in Spanish), and I’m in! I’m so stoked. What’s more, it counts for my secondary/minor in Ethnicity, Migration, and Rights. Also I’ll finally actually be able to do something with my French instead of letting it stagnate and appear on rare occasions in the metro, so I’m going to take a French literature class as well. Oh yeah, I’m not letting the Polish I learned over the summer go to waste either, as I’ve also spoken with the first year Polish professor and I’m going to take second semester Polish.
Those are just a few of the goals that suddenly came into my head that I didn’t hesitate to get working on. I’m happy to say that things all feel right, now.
Determination
That being said, I’m satisfied with the semester. I don’t regret anything that happened, since I believe that everything that happened has a reason for happening, and it has led me to this. I can say with absolute certainty (that is not going to devolve into doubt) that I’m happier with myself the way I came out than the way I came in. To me, that’s what really matters.
Rodrigo
Is this it? Has woeful loveless lacking-a-man Amanda finally found romance?
LOL no.
Something even better.
I can’t believe I haven’t yet written about Rodrigo in this blog when he has been such an interesting character in my life plot, so I will take the time to honor him and write about him now, knowing full well that he probably won’t be able to understand a lot of this entry because his English is limited.
Let’s start with how we met. We actually met in Cochabamba, Bolivia, through my friend Ignacio (who I will freely admit here I totally had the hots for), this Bolivian I met in France that has actually been written about in this blog. Ignacio and Rodrigo became friends around a year after Ignacio and I had last seen each other, soon after Ignacio returned from his year in France. One fine day in Bolivia, he called me saying, “I have a friend who’s going to study English in Boston! You have to meet him!”
Oh?
(And I will say now that Rodrigo is not to be confused with Ernesto, another of my male Bolivian friends who spent time in Boston studying English. My poor parents are so confused.)
Intrigued, I told Ignacio we should plan something. So he invited Rodrigo to the evening we were to spend making crêpes because we miss France.
I’m never going to forget when I first saw Rodrigo walk into the kitchen, wearing a trim black peacoat and looking sophisticated as hell.
I suddenly got very giddy in the company of two tall, attractive Latinossexily skillfully making crêpes, a delicacy I really enjoy. Rodrigo was even able to suavely flip the crepes using a flick of his wrist. I was awestruck. Both would speak to me in Spanish, though Ignacio would also speak to me in French, which are both romance languages, which made the entire situation so much more enjoyable. Not to mention, Rodrigo asked me to sing something with my ukulele, so Ignacio and I sang this song called Volví A Nacer by Carlos Vives, whose chorus has the lyrics quiero casarme contigo (I want to marry you), which made me rather kilig. (Filipino word with no English equivalent, deal with it.) I didn’t know who to pay my attention to, in all honesty. Not that it was that big of a problem.
I found out after having met him that Rodrigo is probably the most overachieving boy in Bolivia. Apparently, he was #1 in Model United Nations for the entire country or something like that, and what’s more, he was also a legit newscaster for Boliviana TV, a national news station. (Watch this video. I’m in love with 2:34.) Ignacio told me that Rodrigo would write his goals and whatnot in a journal, and was the kind of kid in high school who didn’t really party with people a lot because he was too busy with his own ambitions, which made me very kilig because it sounds just like yours truly.
ANYWAY. Fast forward to when I got to spend more time with him and get to know him better, a continent away from where our paths first crossed.
I got extremely excited at this unexpected turn of events. Here was this good-looking boy, one I met while traveling, who would actually not be too far away from me for a period of time longer than two weeks. He was accomplished, motivated, funny, charming. Right away, we got along extremely well.
We never explicitly talked about it, but I’m fairly certain he’s in the same romantically inexperienced boat as I am, which made me like him even more. He seemed like the type of kid who was too busy with his own personal goals to want to focus on anyone else, which was yet another thing we had in common. (Whether he laments about it as much as me, I don’t know, because like I said, it was never discussed.) It turned out that he was doing so much more in the United States than just studying English; to name a few things, he was also doing some kind of program his friends at CNN en Español connected him to at the Harvard Extension School, he attended a UN General Assembly in New York with the Bolivian delegates and chilled with the president of his country, and he helped to spearhead this organization called Clubes de Ciencias Bolivia. He would never cease to impress me, and at every conversation I had with him there always seemed to be something new he was working on, something he was clearly genuinely passionate about. Even better, this admiration wasn’t unrequited, since he was always eager to hear about what I’ve done and am doing, as proud of me as I was of him.
All those things given, I couldn’t help but wonder if the sincere friendship could be anything more.
As I said earlier, it didn’t, but I’m not disappointed it all.
Rodrigo was living one of the most exciting lives of anyone I knew, and a lot of it was thanks to his own personal drive and ambition. He didn’t have time for frivolities with a girl, an involvement that would take him away from his making his own dreams come true. He was impressive because he made his own life interesting and continues to make it so. And the fact that he didn’t care about getting with anyone, but instead cared about his own personal advancement and what he could do for greater society, was something that I really loved about him because it was something I also saw in myself.
I mentioned being an all or nothing kind of person, and I could tell Rodrigo was too.
He left Boston after less than four months, and though I was sad he was only here for a semester, I’m left feeling more inspired. I’m really, really grateful to have met him, and I know he and I have become lifelong friends. He's somebody I value in my life very much, that's for sure.
Rodrigo now works at the Ministry of Justice in La Paz despite only being 19 years old. I can’t wait to see him again when I return, and what we’ll both have accomplished in our lives until then.
P.S. Ironically enough, Rodrigo’s main shortcoming was that his English was bad. Even at the end of his stay here, he refused to speak to me in English (embarrassed of it) and we would continue to converse in Spanish. I feel especially proud because he is the first friend I’ve made speaking exclusively in Spanish, one that I’ve been able to relate to on a profound level.
Me and Annie’s concert
Annie is probably the only one of my friends who gets a regular mention on my blog because she’s probably the only one who cares to read it whenever I tell her to.
Anyway, I knew from when I first met Annie that she played the flute, and I hoped to eventually perform with her in some kind of flute piano duet. Over the summer, I suggested we put on a concert during reading period in December, and she was all for the idea. We found some pieces we liked, and were happy to have a good excuse to motivate us to practice.
So we practiced on our own throughout the summer, then a few times during the semester, practiced together. It was so enjoyable for us to feel the thrill of performing and just making music in general, and we were excited for our concert. We had a pretty fancy common room reserved in Cabot, with a Steinway piano and everything. Some of our friends came to see us play, and afterwards there was a reception with food catered by the dining services.
Just so I can brag about how awesome we sound, here are the pieces we played!
https://youtu.be/hsUn8ATKPV0
https://youtu.be/sIVuhC7rLKA
https://youtu.be/_li-AVDInx8
We’re probably going to do it again sometime because of how much fun it was to prepare and how proud we felt after performing. I loved having the project to work on throughout the semester and seeing it become a reality in the end; it was definitely super rewarding.
While this eventful semester has been full of excitement, I’ve made sure to take the time to appreciate the mundane, everyday details of the life I’ve been living as well. Now that I live in an upperclassman house, life feels different from when I was a freshman living in Harvard Yard. I live in the quad, somewhat isolated from the rest of campus, but it was a great excuse to get a bike. And oh do I love my yellow cruiser bike. I love pedaling it down Mass Ave on my commute. In the fall, biking down Shepard St to get back home, I adored seeing the trees that lined to streets in their autumn colors, a chill barely seeping through my coat, the entire scene and sensations that were rather idyllic. Besides the commute, there’s also the quad in general. It’s so picturesque. I love walking out of my building and being greeted with the comforting sight of the quad buildings surrounding the lawn. It feels like home, and I couldn’t be happier it’s where I get to live for the rest of the time I have at Harvard.
These are some of the mundane details of daily life that occasionally fill me with wonder, and I hope I never lose that enjoyment of the little things.
In the meantime, happy holidays to everyone, and it’s good to be on break!
Not to label my first two semesters as irrelevant in any way (because they weren’t at all), this semester is going to remain in my mind as probably the most pivotal of the 8 that I have as a Harvard student.
If I had to sum up the course of this semester using single words, they would go as follows:
Certainty - Slump - Doubt - Disillusionment - Epiphany - Excitement - Determination
Because I never really plan these kinds of blog entries in advance and kind of just write whatever comes into my mind and edit as I go, I will now proceed to elaborate on each of these words and after that write separately about a couple of this semester's highlights.
Certainty
After taking a long break from the craziness that was freshman year, I had a renewed sense of resolution. I had the idea in my head that there was nothing more noble than being a doctor, and though the road would be hard (as many people would tell me throughout the years), I knew I had the will to pursue it. I had a schedule for the rest of my time at Harvard planned out that included all the pre-med requirements, my concentration requirements, my secondary requirements, and a semester of studying abroad. It felt good to have it figured out. I couldn’t wait to actually get started!
Slump
People speak of the “sophomore slump” that second year students experience their first semester. Maybe it is especially pronounced at Harvard, when after the exciting first year where all freshmen live in the same area and there’s lots of opportunities to get to know fellow members of your graduating class, sophomores are placed into the “real” Harvard, in twelve different upperclassman houses, with no unifying class wide activities or special treatment. You aren’t necessarily left to your own devices, but it’s different from being a freshman, and it was an adjustment. I feel like people around me were feeling it too, so even though I consider myself someone who adapts to a new environment very rapidly, I accepted that I was feeling it. The shiny image of Harvard and being surrounded by my incredible friends (the image I held in high esteem in my head towards the end of my summer) dimmed to the flurry of problem sets and readings I suddenly had to contend with. I figured I would get used to it, and the slump would pass.
Doubt
The slump didn’t really pass. It only gave way to doubt.
I began doubting my desire to be a doctor when I realized how much science I would need to be taking and using. I began doubting the love for science I so vehemently exhibited throughout my schooling prior to college. I began doubting my purpose in life when I struggled through math problem sets (NOT EVEN KIDDING). I saw my friends taking organic chemistry struggle even more intensely than I did, and looking at the work they were doing, I had absolutely no desire to learn it. Thus, I doubted my will to actually proceed with pre-med classes that people seem to constantly be suffering through.
Disillusionment
But wait. I had never thought of any other career besides some kind of surgeon who regularly volunteers with Doctors Without Borders. Was this all temporary? Or was I really just not meant to be a doctor because doing science homework felt like a chore and I didn’t really feel fulfilled from it? There were so many questions that coursed through my head. It’s not as if I deeply regretted picking the pre-med classes for this semester, because they really were quite interesting. I was just going through some kind of internal crisis because I realized that I might not have been the same girl I was even a year and a half before then, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. I didn’t know how to deal with doubting if I actually wanted to fulfill my childhood dreams. I had made it this far! What was going on now??
Epiphany
Eventually, I went through a dearth of realizations that led up to a golden epiphany about my character in general.
Some of these realizations include:
• I could make whatever I wanted of my time at Harvard, and didn’t have to prescribe at all to preconceived ideas. If I heard of something somebody did that would make me say “wow, I wish I could do that too, that sounds so fun,” nothing was actually going to stop me from doing it besides me.
• So yeah, my time at Harvard is for me to use wisely.
• I didn’t care at all about going beyond the material covered in the math and science classes I took this semester, and taking more higher level classes to deepen my understanding and knowledge of it didn’t interest me at all.
• I preferred reading about cool things (in the social sciences…) and writing essays, because as you might have been able to tell, I adore writing. I love using my brain in that way.
• I didn’t like the thought of having my future heavily planned out and structured for the next 10+ years anymore.
• Maybe it’s because I’m in Harvard and I saw so people who cared so much more than I did, who put in so much more effort than I was willing to put into those classes that led me to question myself.
Which led up to the realization that I am a very all-or-nothing kind of person.
Let me explain.
In high school, I was willing to work hard in everything and do whatever the system expected me to so I could earn high marks and hopefully get into a good school. Which is cool. But life as a college student didn’t necessarily work that way for me.
Harvard takes everything to such an extreme level that you find out what you think is the shit and what you think is shit very fast, and you find out what exactly it is you want to struggle through, and what you think is worth it.
In high school, I was able to push through whatever I needed to do in order to succeed, even if it didn’t necessarily please me. I knew I had the brains to work things out, anyway. But at Harvard, it was completely different. I actually found classes difficult. I was actually intimidated by my peers rather than regarding myself as somewhat above them intellectually. That being said, I realized that if my heart wasn’t fully into something, if I didn’t feel a certain intense passion towards it, then it wasn’t worth my time and attention at all. I can’t feel lukewarm about something, because that’s just a waste of my time. That’s how I’ve come to perceive my academic pursuits. If I wasn’t absolutely in love with the idea of doing something and then the act of going off and realizing it, then why should I even bother?
This is both good and bad, though I consider it more good. That way I feel like I have purpose. That way I actually feel fulfilled. Harvard has more than enough things for me to feel this way towards.
Excitement
Once I had resolved all the confusion, new sentiments, and wholeheartedly assumed my identity as an all-or-nothing go-getter kind of person, I looked excitedly ahead at how I would meaningfully make use of the rest of my time at Harvard. As a main example, I figured it’d be a great idea to invest in the languages I speak. Spending next summer immersed in German and getting it to a C1 level? Totally doable! I talked to my last German professor, the German department, and the Office of Career Services to help me plan. What about Spanish, that language I’m ashamed I used to resent that I’m now unashamedly in love with? I found a really cool class where you get to spend four hours using it volunteering every week (beats four hours in a lab any day LOL) as well as class time deepening knowledge of the language and learning of the very real lived experiences of Spanish-speaking communities. You have to speak at a pretty high level, so ballsy audacious me emailed the professor asking if I could take it. We met for a conversation (that also served as an interview, which obviously took place in Spanish), and I’m in! I’m so stoked. What’s more, it counts for my secondary/minor in Ethnicity, Migration, and Rights. Also I’ll finally actually be able to do something with my French instead of letting it stagnate and appear on rare occasions in the metro, so I’m going to take a French literature class as well. Oh yeah, I’m not letting the Polish I learned over the summer go to waste either, as I’ve also spoken with the first year Polish professor and I’m going to take second semester Polish.
Those are just a few of the goals that suddenly came into my head that I didn’t hesitate to get working on. I’m happy to say that things all feel right, now.
Determination
That being said, I’m satisfied with the semester. I don’t regret anything that happened, since I believe that everything that happened has a reason for happening, and it has led me to this. I can say with absolute certainty (that is not going to devolve into doubt) that I’m happier with myself the way I came out than the way I came in. To me, that’s what really matters.
The highlights of sophomore fall!
Rodrigo
Is this it? Has woeful loveless lacking-a-man Amanda finally found romance?
LOL no.
Something even better.
I can’t believe I haven’t yet written about Rodrigo in this blog when he has been such an interesting character in my life plot, so I will take the time to honor him and write about him now, knowing full well that he probably won’t be able to understand a lot of this entry because his English is limited.
Let’s start with how we met. We actually met in Cochabamba, Bolivia, through my friend Ignacio (who I will freely admit here I totally had the hots for), this Bolivian I met in France that has actually been written about in this blog. Ignacio and Rodrigo became friends around a year after Ignacio and I had last seen each other, soon after Ignacio returned from his year in France. One fine day in Bolivia, he called me saying, “I have a friend who’s going to study English in Boston! You have to meet him!”
Oh?
(And I will say now that Rodrigo is not to be confused with Ernesto, another of my male Bolivian friends who spent time in Boston studying English. My poor parents are so confused.)
Intrigued, I told Ignacio we should plan something. So he invited Rodrigo to the evening we were to spend making crêpes because we miss France.
I’m never going to forget when I first saw Rodrigo walk into the kitchen, wearing a trim black peacoat and looking sophisticated as hell.
I suddenly got very giddy in the company of two tall, attractive Latinos
I found out after having met him that Rodrigo is probably the most overachieving boy in Bolivia. Apparently, he was #1 in Model United Nations for the entire country or something like that, and what’s more, he was also a legit newscaster for Boliviana TV, a national news station. (Watch this video. I’m in love with 2:34.) Ignacio told me that Rodrigo would write his goals and whatnot in a journal, and was the kind of kid in high school who didn’t really party with people a lot because he was too busy with his own ambitions, which made me very kilig because it sounds just like yours truly.
ANYWAY. Fast forward to when I got to spend more time with him and get to know him better, a continent away from where our paths first crossed.
I got extremely excited at this unexpected turn of events. Here was this good-looking boy, one I met while traveling, who would actually not be too far away from me for a period of time longer than two weeks. He was accomplished, motivated, funny, charming. Right away, we got along extremely well.
We never explicitly talked about it, but I’m fairly certain he’s in the same romantically inexperienced boat as I am, which made me like him even more. He seemed like the type of kid who was too busy with his own personal goals to want to focus on anyone else, which was yet another thing we had in common. (Whether he laments about it as much as me, I don’t know, because like I said, it was never discussed.) It turned out that he was doing so much more in the United States than just studying English; to name a few things, he was also doing some kind of program his friends at CNN en Español connected him to at the Harvard Extension School, he attended a UN General Assembly in New York with the Bolivian delegates and chilled with the president of his country, and he helped to spearhead this organization called Clubes de Ciencias Bolivia. He would never cease to impress me, and at every conversation I had with him there always seemed to be something new he was working on, something he was clearly genuinely passionate about. Even better, this admiration wasn’t unrequited, since he was always eager to hear about what I’ve done and am doing, as proud of me as I was of him.
All those things given, I couldn’t help but wonder if the sincere friendship could be anything more.
As I said earlier, it didn’t, but I’m not disappointed it all.
Rodrigo was living one of the most exciting lives of anyone I knew, and a lot of it was thanks to his own personal drive and ambition. He didn’t have time for frivolities with a girl, an involvement that would take him away from his making his own dreams come true. He was impressive because he made his own life interesting and continues to make it so. And the fact that he didn’t care about getting with anyone, but instead cared about his own personal advancement and what he could do for greater society, was something that I really loved about him because it was something I also saw in myself.
I mentioned being an all or nothing kind of person, and I could tell Rodrigo was too.
He left Boston after less than four months, and though I was sad he was only here for a semester, I’m left feeling more inspired. I’m really, really grateful to have met him, and I know he and I have become lifelong friends. He's somebody I value in my life very much, that's for sure.
Rodrigo now works at the Ministry of Justice in La Paz despite only being 19 years old. I can’t wait to see him again when I return, and what we’ll both have accomplished in our lives until then.
P.S. Ironically enough, Rodrigo’s main shortcoming was that his English was bad. Even at the end of his stay here, he refused to speak to me in English (embarrassed of it) and we would continue to converse in Spanish. I feel especially proud because he is the first friend I’ve made speaking exclusively in Spanish, one that I’ve been able to relate to on a profound level.
Me and Annie’s concert
Annie is probably the only one of my friends who gets a regular mention on my blog because she’s probably the only one who cares to read it whenever I tell her to.
Anyway, I knew from when I first met Annie that she played the flute, and I hoped to eventually perform with her in some kind of flute piano duet. Over the summer, I suggested we put on a concert during reading period in December, and she was all for the idea. We found some pieces we liked, and were happy to have a good excuse to motivate us to practice.
So we practiced on our own throughout the summer, then a few times during the semester, practiced together. It was so enjoyable for us to feel the thrill of performing and just making music in general, and we were excited for our concert. We had a pretty fancy common room reserved in Cabot, with a Steinway piano and everything. Some of our friends came to see us play, and afterwards there was a reception with food catered by the dining services.
Just so I can brag about how awesome we sound, here are the pieces we played!
https://youtu.be/hsUn8ATKPV0
https://youtu.be/sIVuhC7rLKA
https://youtu.be/_li-AVDInx8
We’re probably going to do it again sometime because of how much fun it was to prepare and how proud we felt after performing. I loved having the project to work on throughout the semester and seeing it become a reality in the end; it was definitely super rewarding.
One more thing
While this eventful semester has been full of excitement, I’ve made sure to take the time to appreciate the mundane, everyday details of the life I’ve been living as well. Now that I live in an upperclassman house, life feels different from when I was a freshman living in Harvard Yard. I live in the quad, somewhat isolated from the rest of campus, but it was a great excuse to get a bike. And oh do I love my yellow cruiser bike. I love pedaling it down Mass Ave on my commute. In the fall, biking down Shepard St to get back home, I adored seeing the trees that lined to streets in their autumn colors, a chill barely seeping through my coat, the entire scene and sensations that were rather idyllic. Besides the commute, there’s also the quad in general. It’s so picturesque. I love walking out of my building and being greeted with the comforting sight of the quad buildings surrounding the lawn. It feels like home, and I couldn’t be happier it’s where I get to live for the rest of the time I have at Harvard.
These are some of the mundane details of daily life that occasionally fill me with wonder, and I hope I never lose that enjoyment of the little things.
In the meantime, happy holidays to everyone, and it’s good to be on break!
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