Name, school: Nick Serpe, CC

Claim to fame: I’ve thrown my hat in a fair number of campus rings, in about this order: Amnesty International, COOP, Responsible Endowments Coalition, the Current.

Where are you going? I’m moving to Brooklyn’s fairer shores, but I’ll be working back Manhattan-side at Dissent magazine.

Three things you learned at Columbia:

1. Yes, the wonders of the City lie just beyond our gates. It’s true, that some come to Columbia for the metropolis. But for what it’s worth, there are also great friendships and communities to be found on our campus, in our dorms. I’m excited that I’ll be staying in New York after graduation–but I don’t regret making Columbia my home while I was here.
2. I once heard a wise person say, in more or less these words, “Most of you get into a school like this because you’re well-rounded, but the aim is to get some dents.” I came to school wanting to be everything and to do everything, but I’m glad to have found passions worth having.
3. Beware of the fruit punch in the orange Gatorade cooler.

Justify your existence in 30 words or fewer: I’m an old-fashioned humanist. I think each and every one of us matters, and under those conditions I suppose I’m justified, too.

Any war stories from the War on Fun? Don’t let them (the “Man”) tell you what you can or can’t be. Everyone who’s trying to keep your party down, they can’t touch you. You have the power, you have the party, you are a partisan for the cause of Fun! Attica! Attica! Attica!

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? I was a vegan during my high-school years, and I still had a great time.

Any advice for the Class of 2014? Don’t listen to anyone’s advice. And do your homework.

Any regrets? A great number.

Name, school: Dan Miranda, SEAS

Claim to fame? Hosting crazy parties in the Band Suite, and contributing some of the most controversial jokes to Orgo Night scripts.

Where are you going? Maybe getting this job as a research assistant uptown at CUMC… maybe flying to Puerto Rico to fix up an inherited condo…

Three things you learned at Columbia?

1. A summer in NYC is a summer well spent. especially if you’re 21+
2. How to “gun” a beer
3. The true meaning of G(tb)^2

Justify your existence in 30 words or fewer?
I’m an engineer
I built a V-show set once
and sometimes I try
to figure out how
to write what I want to say
in haiku format
congratulations
irresponsibility
undeniable

Any war stories from the War on Fun? We throw a “Liquidation Party” right after the last possible exam in May. It’s where people come to dispose of any leftover “party supplies” that they can’t/don’t want to take home with them. Last year we got busted for noise at 11pm. Really? Also, give Barnard women swipe access to Columbia dorms already.

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? Depends… is the cheese toothy?

Any advice for the Class of 2014? Follow your bliss. Make lots of mistakes. Make lots of friends. Pick the right major. Explore the city. Walk down Riverside park all the way to South Ferry. Call your parents on the weekend. H&M exists. Free beer always draws a crowd. Keep it classy. Join the Marching Band.

Any regrets? “Forget regret, or life is yours to miss” – Jonathan Larson (from RENT)

You know the old addage: you gotta sanitize before you can litigate! We’re upset we missed Raskolnikov’s speech, but we did catch some recent Law School grads dancing to “Love Shack” after the ceremony.

Update: Then everyone threw their robes into a pile at the Butler security desk.

Name, school: Joy Resmovits, BC

Claim to fame: I’ve probably interviewed you and your dean at some point for Spec (former news editor).

Where are you going? In the short run, the Wall Street Journal. After that, who knows? (Will cover education policy/city politics for food.)

Three things you learned at Columbia:
1. It’s never too late to change your mind, to switch majors, to meet new people. This is trite, but there’s nothing wrong with following your dreams.
2. The Columbia University undergraduate community exists, and it’s made up of students from all four schools. This truth is hard to ignore when you see them toil together to put out a daily newspaper.
3. Free fountain soda refills at Brad’s!

Justify your existence in 30 words or fewer: I laugh at everything. I can read Middle English. Little fascinates me more than wonkish chats about Columbia University’s organizational structure.

Any war stories from the War on Fun? I’m kind of boring, actually. But it was sure fun to explain this concept to oft-confused administrators in interviews.

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? Hi Mom!

Any advice for the Class of 2014?
1. Spend as much time as possible on the steps.
2. Spec and Bwog are better when read together.
3. Surround yourself with people who know when you need to be challenged or supported.

Any regrets? Not taking classes with Eric Foner or Margaret Vandenburg. Not learning more languages. Missing incredible campus events because I was too busy editing articles about them. Not meeting all of you.

Name, school: Ross Ramone, CC

Claim to fame: Captain of the Men’s Swimming and Diving Team, that blonde guy in Notes and Keys, known to portray Jews in various CMTS productions, the bronze Alexander Hamilton statue in Vshow 113, responsible for your black out at the White Party (Sigma Nu ’08 edition), great in the SAAC, self-proclaimed “Mayor of The Heights”… Oh, and “the hair flip.”

Where are you going? I’ll actually be staying here in the city, diving head first into the whole audition scene. It’s scary, but since I was nine years old it’s all I’ve ever been able to imagine myself doing. I figure I owe it to myself to give it a shot. So that’s where I’ll be – just pursuing the dream. I never looked good behind a desk, anyway.

Three things you learned at Columbia:

1. Deadlines are just suggestions.
2. You learn a hell of a lot more from rejection than from success.
3. Hair grows back.

Justify your existence in 30 words or fewer: I like to believe that people can surprise you, if you let them.

Any war stories from the War on Fun? Let’s just say it involved Central Park, speedos, “Haterade,” and an unfortunate run-in with a certain beloved Columbia Athletics administrator…

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? Cheese. Yup.

Any advice for the Class of 2014? Don’t stress. It’s a waste of energy. At the end of the day, it all gets done. A smile and a healthy dose of perspective will take you a long way. If not, there’s nothing that a couple good friends and a Heights Happy Hour can’t fix.

Any regrets? I think after four years here, it’s hard not to wonder if you did it right. Do I have any regrets? Of course. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t. But you live and you learn, you know? You learn to live better, to love better… Maybe it all sounds cliche, but that’s one of the most valuable things this crazy place called Columbia has taught me. I could probably use this section as one giant “I’m Sorry,” but I just don’t think there’s enough space… Also, I probably didn’t call my mom enough.

Look what we found! It looks like our beloved 116th stop is going to get subway indicators like its little brother Cathedral Parkway. Now, if you wait for the 1 for 35 minutes on a Saturday night, at least you’ll know you’re in it for the long haul. We’ll let you know when it’s up and running- if you catch it before we do, send a picture using our tips form.

Now that we have your attention, two PSAs: as you move out today, don’t forget to donate what you don’t want to bring home to Give + Go Green. The EcoReps are at the Wien Gate today from 12-5 and there are other more local drop-off stations, too.

Also, attention seniors: if you have a calculator you don’t want anymore, please donate it to the Double Discovery Center. They’ll be given to kids who can’t afford calculators to use on the SATs, putting them at a big disadvantage. Look for drop-off locations in Lerner 306 and for drop-off boxes along the Lerner ramps today from 12-5.

Name, school: Armin Rosen, JTS/GS

Claim to fame: Current senior editor, tunnel explorer, dilettante music journalist, dilettante intramural official, defender of hopeless causes, hack. Also Bwogged for a spell.

Where are you going? Any suggestions? It’s a brutal job market for middlingly-talented hacks, and for the middlingly-talented in general…

Three things you learned at Columbia:
1. Whatever it is, it’s all gonna get done eventually
2. If you absolutely must hitchhike in a 3rd world country, do yourself a favor and don’t tell your parents about it.
3. It’s really important just to like, remind yourself to stop freaking out every once in awhile.

Justify your existence in 30 words or fewer: I’m the Typhoid Mary of the Spicy Special

Any war stories from the War on Fun? I know this isn’t a competition or anything, but I think mine is probably among the saddest WoF-related stories out there. The Zeta Psi brownstone on 113th was pretty much a second home for me, until the brownshirts up at Low decided that my deadbeat fraternity’s house could be put to better use. Now we Zetes didn’t really contribute much to campus life–beyond of our baller annual Mardi Gras party, which I’m sure only about 5 of you actually remember–and in retrospect the brownshirts were probably right. But the heart doesn’t care about such things. Our house was taken way the summer before my sophomore year, and I’m bitter about it to this day.

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? Oral sex. Not ashamed to admit that there’s a lot more cheese than oral sex in my daily life.

Any advice for the Class of 2014? When I was a freshman, I asked two of the school’s outgoing journalistic luminaries a similar sort of question. Bari Weiss, now with the Wall Street Journal, said you should “never hedge, and stick up for what you believe in.” Avi Zenilman, formerly of the New Yorker, said “Screw that. Always hedge, you’re just a college student anyway.” In addition to never hedging, always sticking up for what you believe in and forgetting at every possible moment that you’re “just a college student,” I recommend you get a bicycle and explore this town with the urgency of someone who’ll be permanently exiled from it any day now. Also, never agree to do an unpaid internship for more than like, 3 hours a week.

Any regrets? Agreeing to do any number of unpaid internships for more than like, 3 hours a week, thus devaluing my labor and, by extension, the labor of every other aspiring journalist in New York. And not reading for pleasure as much as possible, and not paying enough or in some cases any attention to Ross Posnock’s lectures, and not quitting Spec a semester earlier than I did, and not really cultivating as many new talents or skills as I could have, and not actually studying for or, God forbid, learning Hebrew and never eating at Massawa or Kitchenette and never setting foot on the dome of Low Library. And not sucking it up and throwing down the $70 to see Jeff Mangum last week. And not sucking it up and throwing down the $10 to buy a good pair of earplugs (if you’re gonna go to a lot of shows, children, do your potentially half-deaf, 50-year-old self a favor and BUY A GOOD PAIR OF EARPLUGS). The memory of having my fake confiscated at frickin’ O’Connels during the 2007 NFC Championship game still produces pangs of regret. And I guess I should have spent some time stalking Thomas Pynchon, who lives somewhere in the 80s I hear…

Name, school: Monica Quaintance, CC

Claim to fame: University Senate, Alpha Chi Omega, Ski Team!, Capoeira, Bach Society, Rock Climbing, Ballroom Dance, and, lately, that girl that is always on the steps skipping class and getting sunburnt.

Where are you going? 60 blocks south!

Three things you learned at Columbia: The best things I learned here weren’t from the faculty (not even the fabulous Caterina Pizzingoni), as amazing as they are. All the best stuff comes from other students:

1. How to convince a bouncer you are an Armenian exchange student that doesn’t speak English
2. How to fake just about anything: a scary face; a fencing stance; a terrible Russian accent; or a scary face, in a fencing stance, while speaking in a terrible Russian accent, like Cliff Massey taught me freshman year
3. How to not take things too seriously, because in the long run no one remembers that stuff anyway.

Justify your existence in 30 words or fewer: Sometimes, to bring them together, people just need a smile. Or they need a firecracker. Or a firestorm. If I could do that even once, it was all worth it.

Any war stories from the War on Fun? I think the worst part of the “war on fun” is the administration’s general attitude towards students. They treat us like a liability, not like a potential wellspring of creativity and school spirit, and that makes the whole campus hostile to new and exciting things. For example, I was there when facilities commandeered the giant snowball this winter, and that was really tragic.

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? I think I would actually not be able to survive without cheese, because on a no-carb, low-meat diet I am basically a cheeseatarian, if such a thing exists. Cheese is my primary food group, so I can’t really give it up, even though the alternative is incredibly devastating.

Any advice for the Class of 2014? Push yourself! I am, at heart, totally lame, and given the choice between a) going out and b) watching Battlestar Galactica in my pajamas I am always inclined to the latter. But one of my best memories is romping downtown with fellow then first-years, that at the time I didn’t even know, and getting cut in line at Misfits by Jessica Simpson (she is really short, by the way, and not that hot). It’s the things outside your comfort zone that make you grow. So go for it, what have you got to lose?

Any regrets? Never. It has become such a cliché, there is even an amazing Jimmy Eat World song about it, but I refuse to ever regret anything. Every choice you make turns you into who you are, even the crappy ones, and you learn so much more from screwing up than you do from accidentally getting anything right. So no, no regrets! But I am going to try and meet as many fellow seniors as I can before I graduate, because you are all amazing and it would be a shame to go without meeting you all.

Name, school: Megan McNally, BC

Claim to fame: Barnard EcoRep, and apparently I bought a house? (Clearly not in NY since no one can even afford to own a windowless, rat/cockroach infested basement studio let alone a house)

Where are you going? Fulfilling my childhood fascination with NASA and being an astronaut. I’m off to New Mexico to build earthships! Like spaceships, only built out of tires and glass, and 100% off the grid. After that? Vermont for the ski/board season.

Three things you learned at Columbia:

1. No matter what, go outside if it snows in NYC. That’s probably the first AND the last snow you’ll see all season, so might as well enjoy building forts and whipping snowballs and unsuspecting passersby.
2. Barnard recycles #1-7 plastics. Weird.
3. As much as I love learning, I am not an academic.

Justify your existence in 30 words or fewer:
My name is Megan,
I make things from trash to art,
Take it or leave it?
…How’s that for haiku-style.

Any war stories from the War on Fun? The security guy in Butler will not stop you if you walk into the library in a blow-up leprechaun suit.

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? …for a second I thought the choice was between oral sex and chess, so my first thought was chess because I don’t know how to play that game. But oral sex or cheese? Smoked gouda is outta this world good! I could never give it up.

Any advice for the Class of 2014?

1. Get involved in the community beyond the ivory tower.
2. Apply for study grants and travel grants because surprisingly few people apply for them.
3. Butler = death. I think I spent .2 minutes there once looking for a book…now I send my friends in for me. Avery is much better.
4. Barnard and Columbia both have composting (somewhere), but if the bins are full…bring it to Union Sq at the lower east side ecology center van.

Any regrets? Not getting a pink scooter from Book Culture on Broadway. Though I hear they’re back in stock?

The Blue and White’s Gavin McGown ventures up to 126th Street to find art and innovation.

“This space used to be a machine shop,” says Darryl Hell, technical director and co-founder of New York-based artists’ initiative Chashama, as he walks the halls of its Morningside studio space at 461 West 126th Street. “Before that it was a brewery.” The stained bricks of 19th century industrycould easily hide the studios and exhibition spaces within, but the front entrance has been painted over in vibrant colors that catch the eye. While construction crews restore the exterior, over a dozen artists fill the building with what Chashama considers some of the most innovative art now being created in the city.

Chashama (Farsi for “foresight”) has garnered bothsuccess and recognition for its innovative mission: the organization takes over temporarily unused or abandoned buildings and transforms them into studio and performance spaces, leased to artists for highly subsidized rents. Founded 13 years ago by New York artist Anita Durst in memory of deceased director and playwright Reza Abdoh, “Chashama was one of the original people before the pop-up gallery and the pop-up art space came in vogue due to the real estate crash,” says Hell. “That was always our model.”

The organization now runs 12 facilities in Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens, a success story Hell attributes to their willingness to renovate dormant spaces themselves. “We’re an economic solution for landowners to be able to rent their space for more money than they would otherwise get.” Now, Hell says, some landowners go out of their way to approach the organization with space offers. “Before, we were limited to a space that was beat up from the feet up.” He says of 461, before Chashama moved in, “it looked like hell.”

Read more…

Name, school: Dick Bullitt Brown, University of Havana – North

Claim to fame: Butt-ass naked CC presentation on ontological anarchy. The author, Hakim Bey, is a Columbia grad, like me.

Where are you going? Into the world/into the wild. Gotta find out whether openness is really my anti-drug.

Three things you learned at Columbia:

1. Beware of any lesson taught in words
2. Every molecule of water breaks and reforms its bonds a trillion times a minute
3. You never know what you don’t know

Justify your existence in 30 words or fewer: I think, therefore I am thankful.

Any war stories from the War on Fun? Ooh boy… One time, an older PS officer walked into our Ruggles suite and said, “That’s one of the top five weirdest things I’ve ever seen.” By the way, let’s all streak the quad.

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? There are soy substitutes for cheese, but no soy substitutes for lips and tongues. Yet.

Any advice for the Class of 2014? My favorite freedom comes from remembering that life has proved me dead wrong far too many times for me to predict the future. — Be open to things and they’ll be open to you. — Never abuse your drugs…treat them well and they’ll treat you well. Also, The flow is there to be gone with. -J. Swanson And, It’s only a problem if it’s a problem. -D.S.

Any regrets? All the jealousies and insecurities… sometimes I forget that it’s a mistake to be jealous of anyone because everyone’s got their own crazy, crazy shit goin on. If I can deal with mine I’m ahead of the game.

These Professor Gchat statuses are fake, but The Blue and White wishes they were real.

Peter Awn: worshipping the albino marsupial that lives in the basement of Low Library

Jenny Davidson: a sabbatical combining the acoustical elegance of the aphorism with the force and utility of the load-bearing, tractional sentence of a more or less traditional vacation: http://jennydavidson.blogspot.com/

Kenneth Jackson: bring me a bagel, you can do my index!

Joseph Massad: considering the Palestinian question

Dorthy Denburg: <3 Hewitt Fro-Yo!!

Sudhir Venkatesh: underground for the week, contact Barksdale to find me

Dan O’Flaherty: http://icanhascheezburger.com/

Jeffrey Sachs: in Kenya developing millennial goals, spotty connection

Robert Thurman: Communicating

Gayatri Spivak: By reading stories intended to be fictive or mytho-historic, I train my imagination. A trained imagination can see the outlines and layers of what we are given to know; rather than be at the mercy of rational choice minimally defined by what sells. A trained imagination can judge, a faculty intrinsic to democracy. Why do we need to minimize the role of the imagination in everything we consume & use the word “reality” to endorse fiction (“reality”-tv, virtual “reality?”). These matters will not be discussed. I will read, and describe what I do when I read, learning rhetorical terminology as I do so.

Learned Foote reports from Butler 209:

Another photo after the jump.

Read more…

Name, school: Michael Snyder, CC

Claim to fame: Amongst friends, amateur gastronome; general enthusiasm for wine, gin, bitters, and pork products; general antipathy toward vegans. Secondarily, campus theater.

Where are you going? Staying in the city for the summer, then moving to Santiago, Chile in August for six months to write for The Santiago Times. After that, the future is unclear, but ideally I plan to live nomadically for a couple of years before returning to the States to do graduate work in English literature.

Three things you learned at Columbia:

1. People who live in Butler and make a point of telling you just how much work they have to do are miserable and boring and not any smarter than you are.
2. In every class there is someone really irritating, and someone who speaks rarely but profoundly—often many of the former, rarely more than one of the latter. No exceptions.
3. 5 o’clock is cocktail hour, no matter where you are or what else you have to do.

Justify your existence in 30 words or fewer: I’d rather not.

Any war stories from the War on Fun? I had a beer confiscated on the Steps once by a public safety officer. Then again, at least once a semester I’ve had someone ask if the beverage in my brown bag is alcoholic and take my word for it when I’ve said ‘nope,’ not to mention the number of times my suspiciously hand-rolled smoking implements have been quietly overlooked in public. All in all I’ve come out relatively unscathed.

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? Imagine oral sex at 90. Valdeón and Stilton last a lifetime.

Any advice for the Class of 2014?

1. Go to office hours; most professors want to interact with students and are incredibly personable.
2. Go abroad.
3. Stay in the city every summer if you possibly can (unless following my above advise and going abroad).
4. Have a sense of classroom decorum—silence in seminars is a waste; speaking too much in lectures is presumptuous.
5. Invest in good liquor.
6. Never use the word ‘problematize.’

Any regrets? I didn’t stick with my foreign language after high school, and I absolutely should have. Otherwise, there are some classes I wish I’d taken, a few I wish I hadn’t, but no—when push comes to shove I don’t think I’d do anything differently.

Law school professor Alex Raskolnikov is, miraculously, the third Raskolnikov on Google

Excellent news for those who like delicious tacos and don’t like Georgette Fleischer: La Esquina will be permanently re-opening tonight. A few of you chatted with Page Six about your contempt for Lady Fleischer, calling her a “narc” but adding that “she loved cats.” It all goes to show that you win some, you lose some in this big, wacky world of ours. At least we have La Esquina back.

Another update from the World of Morningside Villains, this one a bit more literal. At this year’s Law School graduation, Attorney General Eric Holder, former managing editor and publisher of the Blue and White Jessica Isokawa, and a Law school professor named Alex Raskolnikov will address the Class of 2010. (The first link will show that Raskolnikov’s office is on West 1126th Street). That’s quite the surname- hey 2013, remember him?

Columbia scientists built robots that may one day become evil and take over the world.