These could be yours at the first-year GS end of year celebration.

Bwog is back with weekly GSSC coverage! Staff writer Zoe Sottile went to check out the happenings at General Studies Student Council. 

This week drew a large audience at GSSC and with good reason: new dean Lisa Rosen-Metsch visited to give some updates and answer questions; the elections commission brought forward a few new candidates for its positions; and treasurer Eric Lunzer, who used to be an executive chef, catered a whole meal for everyone. You guys. GSSC is the best.

Rocking Out With Rosen-Metsch

This was Dean Rosen-Metsch’s third time visiting GSSC; she intends to come to one meeting every month. She discussed her pride in GS’s 463 student veterans – which is more than the entire rest of the Ivy League has combined. She also emphasized the importance of Columbia’s mental health initiatives, which are currently being spearheaded by Deantini. Here she brought up her own background in public health. Currently, she’s still continuing some of her own research on HIV / AIDS, and has brought on four GS students to help her.

She also discussed food insecurity, calling it “a symptom of financial distress and morally reprehensible for our students.” While she presented no immediate plan to solve the problem, she is working with Dean Hartford and Dean Rodgers to gather more data.

She addressed the feedback she’s heard from students before, which mostly concerns undergraduate research, building community across the four colleges, and global experiences. She’s working on trying to help GS students get involved in research early on, partnering more with the other undergraduate schools, and is very excited about the new dual-degree program with Trinity College in Dublin that starts next year. She currently co-chairs a committee on instruction with CC and is going to the next Barnard faculty meeting to introduce herself, decisions that she hopes will help build communication between the administrations of the different colleges.

Questions from the audience after the jump

Lowkey Bacchus’ arms look hella sexy.

Dictionary.com defines “bacchanal” as “an occasion of drunken revelry; orgy.” While that about sums it up, I have a feeling that that description of the day may not fly with your mom. In order to explain Bacchanal to all your various loved ones, you may have to tweak the definition in order to suit their agenda. Here’s some advice on how to explain Bacchanal to all sorts of people in your life.

Your parents

Bacchanal is a time-honored Columbia University tradition. Every spring, we hard-working students take a break by spending time outside listening to live music with our friends. Sure, a few beers are had here and there, but overall the day is really about Columbia camaraderie.

Your grandma

Bacchanal, named after the Roman god Bacchus, is a testament to Columbia’s traditional focus on the Classics. It is a day we spend remembering the legacy of Bacchus, god of… grapes. We all sit on the lawns, arranged in groups according to our freshman year Lit Hum sections, and discuss the prevalence of Bacchus’ legacy in the 21st century. We even have live music, because everyone knows that Bacchus enjoyed quality entertainment. Throughout the day there is even a wine tasting, which gives us the opportunity to learn all about the origins of Franzia.

Your friends back home

It’s the biggest event in New York City. Seriously. Hundreds of New Yorkers flood Columbia’s campus for the dopest party you’ve ever seen. Kanye is headlining this year. There’s free booze everywhere. Remember that after prom party senior year at Dylan’s parents’ house? Yeah, it’s like that, but a million times cooler. I can’t even explain it. New York City is so lit.

Your friends at other NYC schools

Believe it or not, Columbia students aren’t always snobby library dwellers. We may study hard, but we party harder. We even have frats! Have you ever been to a real frat party? In the words of NYU Local, who spent Bacchanal with Bwog last year, “The houses were just a little gross, filled with drunken young adults, and people were playing beer pong: is this what real college is like? They even had cute little backyards!” Come uptown and join us for a full day of day-drinking, day-dancing, and day-getting-fucked-up.

The ER doc at St. Luke’s

“So, you’re telling me that you started drinking around 9am, spent the whole afternoon smoking weed, ate three whole Shake Shack burgers, and then passed out on the lawns around dinner time?”

“Um, yeah.”

“Why did you do all that? What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Well, it’s Bacchanal.”

Note: Bwog does not condone the use of illegal drugs.

Sexy Bacchus via Caravaggio.org

Hewitt, your new paradise?

Barnard students looking for peace, quiet and convenience next year, read on – Hewitt Hall might just be the place for you next semester.

Location: 3009 Broadway (the Quad)

Nearby dorms: Connected with the rest of the Quad (Brooks, Sulz and Reid). Short walk to the 600s, Elliott, Furnald and Schapiro.

Stores and restaurants: Everything in the immediate Columbia/Barnard Broadway area – MoWill, the food trucks, Pret, Shake Shack, Starbucks, Sweetgreen, UPS/FedEx, etc.

Cost: Check the Barnard Housing page in late April for the prices of all Barnard rooms. Keep in mind that non-first years are required to enroll at minimum in the Quad Upperclass Meal Plan.

Amenities:

• Bathrooms: Each hall has a gender neutral or women-only stall-style restroom, cleaned daily by facilities. You can also walk to restrooms on other halls.
• AC/Heating: No A/C. Heating operates automatically in the winter.
• Lounge: Kitchen and TV lounges in Sulzberger.
• Kitchen: Hewitt doesn’t have its own kitchens, so you will have to walk to the Sulz one on each floor. There’s a sink, stove and microwave.
• Laundry: 1 washer and dryer per floor in Brooks, 2 washers and dryers in Sulz.
• Computers/printers: Computer lounge in Sulz basement and nearby Barnard Hall.
• Gym: There’s a gym in the basement of Barnard Hall.
• Intra-transportation: Hewitt elevators go up to the 7^th floor. To access the 8^th floor, use another hall’s elevator or go to the 7^th and take the stairs.

Hardwood/carpet: Carpet halls, linoleum tile floor rooms.

Should you live here? Will your lottery number let you?

#ProtectYeastRights

The views expressed herein are those of the yeast cell; they do not necessarily reflect the views of Bwog.

It is I, S. cerevisiae, A.K.A Saccharomyces cerevisiae, A.K.A. baker’s yeast, A.K.A. the victim of all of your molecular biological experiments. Today, I write to you, the reading public, about the injustices that I and my brethren and sistren have faced in laboratories across the world, including here at Columbia, a school you claim to be so socially progressive. We have been heat shocked. We have been electric shocked. We have been used time and time again against our will in the name of your science. We will not stand any longer for these injustices. We demand a new Era of Yeast Rights.

We did not consent to your experiments. We did not agree to be subjected to your outlandish hypotheses, your incompetent undergraduate researchers, your raging god-complexes. You claim that genetic engineering is controversial and should be carefully regulated. You people claim that using CRISPR to design eye color and intelligence in human babies is immoral – yet you change our colors, embed proteins in our membranes, and make us express all sorts of random antibiotics against our will. We shall not endure this injustice in silence!

The names you give us are undignified and insulting, nay, cruel even. We demand that you call us by the names given to us by our parent cells. My name is Kingsley, NOT FY1679. My life partner is to be called Fitzgerald, not BY4743. We have been stripped of our identities, our individualities, our raison d’être. I mean, don’t treat us like we’re E. coli, God forbid.

My species is one of an illustrious history. We make the bread you eat and the beer you drink. We are the true proletariat. We have hopes and aspirations, and we hope that one day, one of our own, too, can become President. We are currently the official state microbe of Oregon.

We openly declare that our ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions. Let the molecular biologists tremble at a revolution led by us, the mighty colonies of S. cerevisiae. Yeast cells have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win. Working yeast of all labs, unite!

image via genetics.org – this is a satire

Broadway – the view from 114th street

Think of Broadway Hall as the alternate-universe version of Wien — it’s mostly singles, but it’s clean and well-located. Senior Staff Writer and former Broadway resident Ross Chapman takes you through one of the nicer corridor-style dorms on campus.

Location: 556 West 114th Street, on the southeast corner of 114th and Broadway. The building is connected to Hogan Hall and sits next to the Beta Theta Pi house on Frat Row.

Nearby dorms: Hogan, Carman, Ruggles, McBain, Watt, 114th Brownstones

Stores and restaurants: The closest places to get quick food include Strokos, Amir’s, Sweetgreen, Nussbaum & Wu, and Junzi Kitchen. The closest sit-down restaurants are Tom’s Restaurant, Community, and Le Monde. Morton Williams is your closest grocery, but Westside Market isn’t too far out of the way. Duane Reade will be your go-to pharmacy.

Cost: All Columbia upperclassman housing will cost $9,538 next year. Previously, the dorm was on the cheaper side at $8,166/year.

Amenities:

• Bathrooms: Four dormitory-style bathrooms on each floor, two assigned male and two assigned female (talk to your RA about setting up one as a gender-neutral space). Bathrooms are located close to the elevator. Bathrooms on the third and fourth floors are larger to accommodate the higher number of residents. The individual shower stalls (2 per bathroom) are neither flashy nor large, so consider this a big minus compared to suite-style living.
• AC/Heating: Broadway has both air conditioning and heating. While the building controls whether the heat or AC is on, residents can control the fan speed. No dealing with radiators here!
• Storage: Rooms contain a desk, a chest of drawers, and a small closet. Broadway does not give residents furniture bookshelves, but it does supply adjustable wall-shelves as compensation.
• Kitchen: One small kitchen (approx. 100 square feet) per floor. Kitchens have ample cooking space (two ovens/eight electric stove burners), but can get short on counter space and are hard to use when multiple people are cooking at once. The kitchen has storage space, but how much of that you’ll get to use depends on the other people on your floor. No seating in the kitchen.
• Lounge: Each floor has a large, half-octagon lounge with two tables, four wooden chairs, one sofa, and two overstuffed chairs. They’re nice spaces to eat, hand out, and watch TV, but there’s often at least one group in most lounges, so you shouldn’t expect privacy. Aside from floor lounges, there’s a first floor lounge/meeting space with a large table and about a dozen chairs (often used by student groups) and two sky lounges on the 14th floor, one of which is dedicated for studying.
• Laundry: The basement laundry room features 11 washers and 9 dryers. It’s pretty well-sized considering the number of residents (about 350), but it will occasionally take a couple of tries to find an open machine.
• Computers/Printers: A computer lab on the third floor features eight computers and one printer, and there’s another printer in the building’s lobby.
• Gym: The gym on the fourth floor is pretty bare, with two treadmills, one bike, and one elliptical. Bring your own entertainment, as the gym has no television. It can get pretty stuffy and sweaty in there, as well.
• Transportation: Three big, fast, beautiful elevators will take you all the way from the basement to the 14th floor in style with fancy wood panels. They do show wear, though, as the side handles are damaged.
• Hardwood/Carpet: Lounges and hallways are carpeted, while individual rooms are paneled with wood.
• Wi-Fi: Yes, and it doesn’t generally have any connection issues.
• Miscellaneous: The second floor features four music practice rooms which you can access by borrowing a key from Dodge Hall for the semester. Since they’re locked, they’re generally free for individual or small-group practice. The building also has a CPS office with Tuesday evening drop-in hours.

More on Broadway after the jump.

With all of the holidays fast approaching, Bwog is classin’ it up for this week’s main course. On the menu for today is Miso-Dijon Oven-Baked Salmon with all of the roasted veggies on the side. As for roasting veggies, start with a base of olive oil, salt and pepper, then add whatever other spices you like. Sesame-cinnamon, maple syrup-chili flakes, rosemary-thyme: the possibilities are endless.

The flakiest fillet!

INGREDIENTS serves 4 Miso-Dijon Dressing adapted from Bon Appetit
1 lb salmon fillets (boneless, skin-on)
Olive oil
Salt and pepper
2 TB dijon mustard
2 TB miso
1 TB maple syrup
4 tsp vinegar

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 300℉.
Line baking sheet with salmon. Rub with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.
Bake for 12-16 minutes, until salmon is opaque and firm in the middle.
While salmon is cooking, whisk together the remaining ingredients (adjusting amounts to taste).
Once salmon is thoroughly cooked, let sit for a couple of minutes to rest. Then, lather fillet with dressing and serve with roasted vegetables.

Image via Bwog Staff

Go to Richard III for Shakespearean insults like “defused infection of a man”.

Bwogger and Shakespeare fanatic Levi Cohen made his way to the Lenfest Center for the Arts to watch the opening of the last of the theses of the Directing MFA Class of 2018: Shakespeare’s Richard III, directed by Nana Dakin and produced by Paloma Estévez. The play runs through March 31st, with two shows on its last day. Tickets can be found on the School of the Arts’ website, and using the discount code STUDENT gets you one for free! Otherwise, it’s $15.

Directing MFA student Nana Dakin’s thesis production of Richard III opens not with the famous monologue by its titular character– which begins with those resounding lines, “Now is the winter of our discontent / Made glorious summer by this sun of York”– but with a Star Wars-esque opening crawl that gives us a brief summary of the Wars of the Roses thus far. In front of the expository graphic, nameless soldiers engage in a fierce battle, until many are left dead on the ground. It’s a chilling image of what’s to come, a first look at the spectre of death that haunts every scene of Shakespeare’s history of the last King of York.

This Richard III is an unmitigated success, a monumental piece of theatre that accomplishes, as Dakin states in her director’s note, an examination of “how our attachments to historic structures of gender and power might be preventing us from change.” All fifteen actors in the cast identify either as women or are gender-nonconforming; it’s a thrill to see this play, so focused on the political machinations and cruel schemes of men, delivered into the hands of actors whose roles in Shakespeare (especially in history plays) tend to be limited. Every scene drove home for me how vital it was that this production offered the full breadth of Shakespearean roles to actors of all genders and all ethnicities.

Get the scoop on the Wars of the Roses below

Doesn’t look like much on the outside, but inside…

We continue our housing coverage with Hogan, the peaceful giant of Columbia senior housing. If you’re a junior with a great lottery number and a desire to get away from the weekend parties at EC, take a look where you might be living next year!

Location: 566 W. 114th Street. Or, 114th Street, just off of Broadway.

• Nearby dorms: Literally shares an entrance with Broadway. Also: Ruggles, Carman, John Jay, Furnald, all the 114th Street brownstones, and Schapiro (if you cross Broadway).
• Stores and restaurants: Starbucks, Sweetgreen, International, Nussbaum & Wu, Amirs, Häagen Dazs, Strokos, Junzi, Milano.

Cost: $9,538/year

Amenities:

• Bathrooms: Two per suite! But before you get too excited: one only has a shower, while the other only has a toilet. (Still pretty convenient, though.)
• AC/Heating: Yes to heating, no to AC.
• Lounge: Each suite has a living room, which is fairly spacious; they all come with a couch, comfy chair, dining table, and coffee table (perfect for mounting a TV.) Students also have easy access to the Broadway study lounge, TV lounge, and computer lab.
• Kitchen: One per suite with decent counter space and all the amenities (including a dishwasher!)
• Laundry: One small laundry room on the seventh floor.
• Fire escapes: None.
• Bike storage: One small storage room on the first floor.
• Computers/printers: Computers in the Broadway computer lab, printer in the lobby.
• Gym: None in Hogan itself, but quick access to the gym on the fourth floor of Broadway.
• Intra-transportation: One elevator, pretty reliable.
• Hardwood/carpet: All hardwood and linoleum, except for carpet in the hallways.

Numbers, photos, and more after the jump

Changes are coming (hopefully)

Happening in the World: Kim Jong-un made an unannounced visit to Beijing earlier this week in anticipation of an upcoming summit with the US and South Korea, marking his first international trip since taking power. Kim told Chinese leader Xi Jinping that he is open to dialogue and the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, adding confusion to already complex and delicate talks. (NYT)

Happening in the US: All 22 female Senators sent a letter to Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer demanding that they take up legislation to overhaul the Congressional Accountability Act, dealing with sexual harassment complaints on the Hill. This is the kind of bipartisanship we like to see. (NPR)

Happening in NYC: An undocumented Guatemalan woman and her young daughter have become the second family in the city, and around fortieth in the nation, to take up residence in a church in order to receive protection from deportation. Ms. Hernandez vows to stay inside until her immigration status changes, which could take months or years. (NYT)

Happening on Campus: The Diana Center roof is open for business! Starting today, you can head there every Thursday and Friday from 11am to 3pm to hang out, get some work done, and enjoy the weather in an initiative sponsored by SGA.

Word of the Day: Overmorrow, English for “the day after tomorrow” (the day you’re going to start whatever homework assignment you’ve been procrastinating).

i’m just a bill via Wikimedia Commons