Name, Hometown, School: Leah Greenbaum, Newport Beach, CA. A global citizen of Columbia College

Claim to Fame: Spec’s campus news editor; that girl who always begged professors for extensions; that girl who interviewed you once about SGB; that girl who transfered from UC Berkeley and still wears flared levis sometimes/a lot.

Where are you going? Morocco, Cambodia, Belize, New Zealand, New Mexico, everywhere, hopefully someday. But first, I suppose I’ll try to make some money in that gold mine of an industry we call journalism.

Three things you learned at Columbia:

  • From Robert, the public safety officer at East Campus on Tuesdays: Don’t start letting people make you feel sad, unless you want to be sad forever. Choose happiness and dignity. Also, it’s okay to hug and be hugged by strangers sometimes. Especially when you are weeping.
  • From the cashier lady at Absolute Bagels: Be quick and know what you want.
  • From interviews with PrezBo: No touching!

“Back in my day…” .. it was okay to say you hated Twitter and believed that print journalism would never die. Sorry kids, we were wrong about that one.

Justify your existence in 30 words or less: I have housed two kittens in Columbia dormitories. #suckitreslife #kittenrebel4lyfe

Is the War on Fun over? Who won? Any war stories?  I have a story for you. I once brought my hammock up to the roof of Spectator, a Columbia-owned building. For four glorious days we lounged, we beered, we lemonaded, we sunned, and we laughed. We once sat three people to that one hammock. It was like a Hannukah miracle.

Then one day I went up to the roof and Spec’s beloved hammock had disappeared. I’m not saying that Robert Kasdin and John Coatsworth are sharing a pina colada and listening to Jimmy Buffett atop that striped hammock in some dark corner of Low at this very moment, but I’m not, not saying it.

Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese? You should ask my boyfriend. He lives in Madison, WI and he knows there’s a reason I visit the cheddar capital of the US as often as I do.

Advice for the class of 2016:

Proudly may your freak flag fly.

In all seriousness though, I’d encourage students to seek out support at CPS, if you ever feel like you need to talk and don’t know who, how, or what about. Getting help will change your life and it doesn’t make you a freak. And even if it does, fuck it, let that freak flag fly. Own it and don’t be ashamed.

Any regrets?

I know I should say “no! party hard and die young bitchezz” here, but there are a lot of things I wish I’d done differently. I wish I’d found more classes to love, gone to more friends’ events, called my parents more, done bigger and bolder things with my time at Spec and Columbia, etc…

But then again, I’m graduating from Columbia University this month with an incredible set of friends and a life-changing education AND I get to do a bwog senior wisdom!? Soo many things went right in my life to bring me to this point.