MIR ROR SEPTEMBER 27, 2013
THIS TOWN // 2
SOCIALLY SAVVY // 4
FILLED TO CAPACITY // 3 A FAIRLEE PERFECT TRADITION // 8 TTLG: DO YOUR HOMEWORK AND DON’T SAY SORRY// 6 MARGARET ROWLAND// THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF
2// MIRROR
EDITOR’S NOTE Individuals like to find solid ground. We’re all students at an acclaimed academic institution, but, for most of us, that’s not the first way we would identify ourselves. After the immediate thrill of Dartmouth has subsided, many students are left looking for a place on campus where they feel they really belong. Dartmouth provides a strong base from which its members can find groups or places to help form their identity. Some organizations are tight-knit, while others may seem somewhat artificial or random. But it’s these structures that give us a space to explore our identities. In this week’s issue, we investigate course enrollment, the locations where students seek employment and our college’s presence on social media. We explore an Upper Valley gem and reflect on maintaining relationships on campus when one doesn’t have organizations or Greek houses to keep interactions constant. It’s a hectic time, and any upperclassmen will tell you that being this over whelmed during the second week of term isn’t normal, but as we shift around in search of a place of belonging, it’s useful to take a moment to reflect. With all the individual talent around us, we’re sure to find something truly valuable in the communities of Dartmouth. Happy Friday!
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MIR ROR MIRROR EDITORS AMELIA ACOSTA TYLER BRADFORD EDITOR-IN-CHIEF JENNY CHE PUBLISHER GARDINER KREGLOW EXECUTIVE EDITORS DIANA MING FELICIA SCHWARTZ
OVER HEARDS
THIS TOWN
Courtesy of Sheya Jabouin
By MARIAN LURIO New York and Boston have long been internship meccas for students during the summer and off-terms. The appeal of working and living in New York is understandable, and the number of people going there certainly doesn’t seem to be decreasing. But the abundance of Dartmouth opportunities through the Rockefeller Center and on Capitol Hill have recently made Washington, D.C., an attractive option for off-terms, especially for those interested in public policy. So is D.C. becoming the new Boston? D.C. has always been a popular choice for Dartmouth students looking for internships, said Monica Wilson, associate director of Career Ser vices. “Some [of our advisors] have said there may be a slight increase and some say they haven’t seen a difference,” Wilson said. Because many students utilize the Rockefeller Center or find internships on their own, Career Ser vices does not have comprehensive data on the shift from Boston to D.C. Interest in D.C. internships through the Rockefeller Center has been ver y consistent from year to year, program coordinator Thanh Nguyen said. About two-thirds of the ones funded through the Rockefeller Center are in D.C. “It seems like [there is] more legal opportunity in Boston, more policy in D.C.,” Nguyen said. The Rockefeller Center runs the FirstYear Fellows program, supporting a group
’15 Girl: I’d rather have a baby through pregnancy than a baby through rush.
Blitz overheards to mirror@thedartmouth.com
of 20 freshmen with policy internships. While the number of applicants for the program has not increased dramatically, the caliber of students applying for the program has increased in recent years, program coordinator Robin Fr ye said. Arden Arnold ’16, who spent the summer interning at the Project on Government Oversight through First Year Fellows, said many other students had Rockefeller-funded internships or other opportunities they found on their own. “The wealth of programs in D.C. offered at Dartmouth makes the District a really attractive and accessible place to spend a term,” he said. “It’s hard not to run into Dartmouth students during the summer in D.C.” Sheya Jabouin ’15, who is currently interning at the National Organization for Women in D.C., said she is surprised more Dartmouth students aren’t interested in spending a term in D.C. “I went to boarding school in Massachusetts, so I’ve seen Boston. Therefore I had no strong desire to do an internship there,” said Jabouin. While some find the D.C. heat to be a little too sweltering, the weather was a welcome relief after spending nine months in Hanover, Arnold added. The number of D.C. alumni turning out for events for First-Year Fellows and Civic Skills Training has also been increasing each year.
’14 Girl: The rush process reminds me of the Sims when you make characters and have to make the shmooze with each other.
“I think that as you build momentum, there’s an increasing interest in a particular city,” Wilson said. “It seems like a safer place to look at.” However, the increase in interest in D.C. is probably higher for internships than for jobs, Wilson said. Many students like to experience D.C. but do not necessarily want to live there after they graduate. “Over the years I’ve had a few employers who were disappointed, because they made offers to students who decided to take jobs in Boston over D.C.,” she said. A shift toward D.C. internships may be due to both the political climate in Washington and a broadly changing economy and job market. “The new Obama healthcare initiatives, the impending election and a bit of a downturn in the private sector economy may have contributed to an increase,” Wilson said. This phenomenon is not exclusive to Dartmouth students. The 2010 Census found that D.C.’s population is growing faster than that of any state. It seems, then, that D.C. hasn’t become quite as popular as Boston for employment after graduation. The significant resources Dartmouth provides for students to intern, however, make it appealing to many students, and this appeal doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. After all, who doesn’t want to rub shoulders with the people running the nation?
’17 at off campus house: Do you take Da$h?
’14 Guy: I think I would have made a great Rho Chi.
’15 Guy: Apple picking? That’s even better than shopping...shopping in nature.
’16 Guy: Did they put up those trees just for inauguration?
MIRROR //3
TRENDING @ Dartmouth
By MICHELLE LI THE FLU SHORTS
Is it really not summer anymore?
FILLED TO CAPACITY
MARGARET ROWLAND //THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF
At a college that emphasizes small class size, students may face waiting lists for popular courses. By TROY PALMER The last weeks of each term mark the familiar ritual of course election. Majors are reconsidered, minors are abandoned and existential crises abound. But when the dust settles and the verdict is ready to be delivered, the Registrar releases its highly anticipated class schedule for the term ahead. Legions of students are left furiously refreshing their browsers as they attempt to access Banner Student, ascertaining the fate of their next term. The lucky ones proudly and insensitively proclaim, “I got into all of my classes!” The rest of us, harboring undue animosity toward enrollment limits and our classmates, anguish over the necessary restructuring of our dreams and aspirations. Though intermittently frustrating, course enrollment limits are an integral part of the academic system. Registrar Meredith Braz said the responsibility for determining enrollment limits on courses falls to the department or program offering the course, who decide the caps on the courses offered. Tuck School of Business professor Yaniv Dover, who teaches business courses to undergraduates, said that aiming to accommodate as many students as possible is not always the best route. “Larger class sizes lower the quality for everyone, because they dilute the one-to-one relationship with students that I appreciate having in a course,” he said. “I want to be as personal as I can when I teach.” Many students also share Dover’s perspective on the drawbacks of popular courses, as the value of discussion-based courses may wane as enrollment grows. “There’s much less incentive to actively participate in larger classes,” Nick Shallow ’16 said. “Any debates held in large lecture courses change in character because the decrease in student contributions leads to a decrease in intellectual diversity.” Even after the term begins and add-drop period ends, enrollment limits are not set in stone. Following initial course registration, the Registrar sends reports to every department detailing the number of students selecting courses. “This way they are aware of the demand for each course each term,” Braz said. By notifying individual departments of the shifts in course enrollments, each department and program can adjust their caps accordingly. Often, as in the case of Dover’s undergraduate course, small modifications are made. “I started with a class size of 60 and realized I could do more in the next term while maintaining the quality of service, so I moved the cap to 65,”
Dover said. In the event that caps are exceeded, wait lists often begin to form. Dartmouth has no formal, ranked system for waitlists, but instead relies upon a decentralized system managed by departments and programs. To facilitate waitlists by various academic departments, departments and programs have “bounce lists” with names of students who requested but did not gain entry to their courses. However, the manner in which waitlists and bounce lists are utilized is subject to each department. Like most, Dover chooses to manage his on a first-come, first-serve basis as students choose to drop the class. “The earlier you apply, the earlier you get in,” he said. Though rare, there are situations in which students with high priority designations from the Registrar may fail to gain access to a necessary course. Professors grant more students overrides to enroll at their own discretion. “My primary consideration is how many remaining opportunities a student has to take a course,” Dover said. In the case of his “Principles of Marketing,” class
ANTHONY CHICAIZA //THE DARTMOUTH
this fall, a waitlist of 60 people formed in addition to the two enrolled sections of 65 each. Pale as the administrative intricacies of course election might be in comparison to the importance of KAF’s new menu and College President Phil Hanlon’s tie selection, it necessarily plays a vital role in preserving the quality of undergraduate education at Dartmouth. That’s what we can remind ourselves of the next time we don’t get into any of our classes. It’s for the greater good.
In the event that caps are exceeded, waitlists begin to form. Dartmouth has no formal, ranked system for keeping such lists of students, but instead relies upon a decentralized system managed by departments and programs. Though rare, there are situations in which students with high priority designations from the Registrar may fail to gain access to a necessary course.
RUSH
Because everyone just had too much free time. Watch out for nervous packs of girls in a “cute top and jeans” and ’16 boys having awkward but earnest lunches with upperclassmen on Collis porch .
APPLICATIONS
Seniors facing the real world don business casual to schmooze with titans of consulting, while freshmen realize that the selective admissions process that got them into Dartmouth didn’t end there. Dance, sing, write and volunteer your hearts out, hopefuls.
MOZZARELLA STICKS ’17s are learning that Late Night Collis is your friend. What better way to spend the extra 500 meal swipes?
STRIPPERS We’ve all heard the rumors of especially wild antics in the alternative social space known as club Russell Sage.
TIMEFLIES
4// MIRROR
SOCIALLY SAVVY Sure, you follow your friends, celebrities, animals or Angelina Jolie’s right leg across many forms of social media. But how about following your college? Dartmouth’s presence has increased dramatically in recent years and now includes official pages on Google+, Flickr and Youtube and the big three: Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Reaching out to alumni, current and prospective
students and anyone else who might be interested, these forms of social media are updated daily. A team of three, headed by digital content director Martin Grant in the Office of Public Affairs, is behind the informative posts, photos and videos. For a college generation like ours with short attention spans, Twitter enables students to remain informed about school events
By LINDSAY KEARE and MADDIE BROWN
without getting bored. “Twitter is a nice way to get news in short snippets,” Carolyn Parrish ’16 said. Dartmouth’s account, launched in 2009, is arguably the most wellused of the College’s social media sites, with over 13,000 followers and over 11,000 tweets. Anyone who goes onto Dartmouth’s Twitter will likely discover cool events they never even knew existed.
Grant and his team live-tweeted inauguration and often congratulate recently admitted students or wish someone a happy birthday. While some students clearly love to receive personal responses from the College, others prefer to steer away from these interactions. Elena Alicea ’16 says she does not follow Dartmouth on Twitter, because she does not want them following her back. However, oth-
MIRROR //5
ers are grateful for the knowledge that Dartmouth social media sites give them. The Instagram account, created last summer, includes architectural photos to “Throwback Thursdays” to snaps of daily student life. It’s not uncommon to spot a friend in a photo, sitting under a blossoming tree, getting on the Dartmouth Coach or listening to a lecture. And tagging someone you know in these pictures makes the experience even more interactive. Anne Strong ’16 has been in the right place at the right time to be in multiple photos on Instagram. “People would always be like, ‘Oh my God, I saw you on the Instagram!’ and usually they would see me before I saw myself,” Strong said. Interactions like these will presumably drive even more students to follow @dartmouthcollege. Strong said she appreciates the Instagram even more when she is not on campus. “I thought it was best this summer when I was not in school because I could see what was still going on at Dartmouth,” Strong said. Indeed, Grant and his team make sure to keep up the content of their social media platforms during sophomore summer, despite the fact that only a quarter of the student body is on campus. These efforts have paid off. Be it through word of mouth, curiosity or simply a desire to be more informed about happenings here at Dartmouth, the College’s social media sites have been steadily increasing in followers, though Grant stresses that sheer number of followers is not the only thing that matters. “The quality of content is most important. We want to engage, inform, learn from and delight our audience,” Grant said. He added that the time of year and current events on campus strongly impact the target audience. During Homecoming, the site’s content is geared toward alumni. When admissions decisions are released, content is angled toward prospective students, and on the first day of classes, it is directed at current students. “We watch the calendar very closely and make sure our content is in sync,” he said. Grant and his team make sure to respond promptly to the many messages and comments from these sites and feature students’ own Instagrams. So if your repeated tweets at Lady Gaga to wish you a happy birthday have failed, maybe give the College a try. Or go sit under the prettiest tree you can find and hope you end up on its Insta.
ALI DALTON // THE DARTMOUTH
6// MIRROR
Through the Looking Glass
DO YOUR HOMEWORK AND DON’T SAY SORRY
B y VIRGINIA RATLIFF
Earlier this week, I was sitting on the Green with a very intelligent and pretty friend (such people are rather easy to find on this campus), and we started talking about making mistakes and figuring out how you’re supposed to feel and how you can most effectively redeem yourself after royally screwing up. She said something about the crippling depression that results from guilt, and I said something about being afraid to make the same mistakes. We both brought up the value of discretion in new relationships and not wearing your flaws on your sleeve. Our conversation didn’t really mean to become about anything serious or deep. In fact, I have found that “life talks” make me tired and that I usually have a better day when I stick to lighter topics, like the new black dress that I just bought for no reason or the good music at dance parties or how awesome the halibut is at Pine. Alas, there are a lot of smart 20-somethings running into each other on this campus. Conversations turning unintentionally toward truly meaningful things, like coping with feelings and the fates of our future post-Dartmouth selves, should be coveted and expected. I can remember receiving my first D on my college transcript, but the story about receiving my second D (with a citation, go figure) is much more interesting. It was spring break, and I was traveling around Europe on my way to the art history foreign study program, pretending to be totally independent enough to ride trains between foreign countries alone (thanks for the firstclass Eurail Pass, Mom). I had just arrived in Berlin when I got the news about my grades on Blackboard. Getting blind-sided is a bad feeling, but looking back and realizing that you were deluding yourself the whole time, that you believed your creative writing professor would forgive the fact that you didn’t even turn in the final project, has worse implications. In retrospect, I can say that this double mistake, of not doing my homework and of truly believing that I could fly trans-Atlantically away from consequences, could have been avoided, or at least been made into a single-mistake. I could have admitted to myself, before jet-setting, that I wouldn’t get a decent grade on something I didn’t turn in. Or I could have sucked it up, pulled an all-nighter and finished the project. I initially traveled to Europe with a friend from Dartmouth, another smart and good-looking one, and while we were waiting in Boston Logan International Airport, we started talking about finals week. I discussed my unsubmitted project, unaware at this point of the grade, and laced my comments with enough humorous self-deprecation to make myself seem rightfully apologetic and semi-self-aware. My travel buddy listened, like a good friend, and nodded pretty indifferently but with earnest understanding. Then, like a better friend, he said something that made me check myself: “It’s not cool to not do your homework.” It wasn’t a particularly show-stopping observation on my friend’s part, or a particularly kind one, but it was a moment that made me truly alter my attitude toward my performance, as a student and as a person, at Dartmouth. I have never forgotten it. The last three years have not been a series of uninterrupted mistakes and unnecessarily not following through, despite what I may be making it sound like. But the moments when I didn’t do my best were important and impacted my life here. It was something where most of my close friends pledged Greek houses and stayed with their extracurricular groups, and I didn’t. I quit the one group I belonged to — the Decibelles, who, by the way, are a super talented and special group of girls on this campus — and I dropped rush. And while having these kinds of associations are by no means critical to having a good college experience, I know that they can be incredibly valuable. So it was up to me to maintain those friendships outside of these groups and create a life for myself a Dartmouth that was, by definition, unlike the traditional Dartmouth experience. I exercised, I reached out to people when they were too busy to make plans and it worked. I focused more on my homework, and I discovered the things that I like to do when I am truly bored — a common state, like it or not, for us all. I did the D’s to myself, among other stupid things. While I am sorry for not giving my all even to certain nonacademic opportunities, like the a cappella group or the sorority thing, I am not sorry for all of the other opportunities I did take or how I go about my days on campus now. I go to class and truly enjoy myself. I watch good TV shows. I spend copious numbers of my mornings at Dirt Cowboy. Occasionally, I forego class readings for the sake of a long jog. I have learned how to take naps. I go to office hours with my
Courtesy of Singer Horse Capture
MARGARET ROWLAND // THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF
College is hard work, both in terms of academics and social interactions. Being honest with yourself about your capabilities can increase your happiness in challenging situations. English and art history professors just to check in and hang out. And, sometimes, I still don’t meet deadlines. But I am more honest with myself now about my capabilities, my potential and my self-expectations. And I am increasingly coming to find that doing what you want just isn’t that difficult, and that going about the day doing things that don’t warrant apologies — to professors, to peers or to yourself — is far better than the alternative. Back to the beginning, the conversation with my friend under the sun. It rolled on for the better part of an hour. Our tete-a-tete had shifted from being about how good it feels being the oldest ones on campus and the boys we had most recently kissed to wondering how we were going to compartmentalize the last three years of college and making mistakes, in time to apply for jobs and figure out what to do with the rest of our lives. On second thought, figuring out the next six months or so should be sufficient. In any case, the ability to acknowledge your mistakes
and accept them, we decided, is the way to be. And “accepting” here neither means that you block out the things that you do wrong, nor that you sit in your room and think too much about anything that you’ve ever done wrong. Accepting mistakes, it seems, is contingent on accepting yourself and only the best version of yourself. As someone important named Maya Angelou reportedly once said, “Do the best you can do until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” So whatever you want out of college and however long your current life plan is, I wish you grace when you fall from grace, and I wish you the fortitude, when you screw up, to acknowledge what you did wrong and then get over it, if for no other reason than that the high is in the 70s every day next week. Welcome back to school.
MIRROR //7
COLUMN
WHAT HAVE WE DONE? IN CASE By SEANIE CIVALE and AMANDA SMITH YOU WERE WONDERING
COLUMN
By
KATIE SINCLAIR We met playing Pterodactyl at the Moosilauke Ravine Lodge during our first-year trips. This is how we remember each other: Amanda wore a white wool beanie with a pouf on top that doubled the size of her head. Seanie did not speak. It wasn’t until later, during orientation, that the spark of friendship flew. We were sitting silently again, waiting for the a capella showcase to begin, when Seanie held up her Verizon enV3 and said something she would repeat often throughout the course of our friendship: “Look at this picture my mom just sent me!” The pictures are always irrelevant, but Amanda has never once failed to look. Upon seeing the pixilated photo of two nugget-sized dogs with sad eyes, we said “aww” in unison and shared dog photos for several minutes. The friendship set sail. In similarly simple ways, we were lucky enough to fall into friendships during our first term at Dartmouth. Our best friends were our trippees, floormates and Dimensions pals, as well as each other’s trippees, floormates and Dimensions pals. In other words, the College orchestrated our every relationship. We did no work. When we reported back to our parents, they were thrilled. If we’re going to continue with this ship metaphor, we could say that high school wasn’t exactly what you would call smooth sailing. One of us spent the entirety of ninth grade lunch alone in a library cubicle, while the other ate with her “friends” (read: they were not her friends). So our parents loved hearing stories about our newest, real amigos: the cool girl from Kaua’i with the nose piercing, the pageant queen from Oklahoma whose two great loves were salt and meat and the German boy down the hall with the radically expensive foreign liquor and soda maker. Our newfound stability was comforting to them and to us. Our friendless pasts were swept under the rug, the assumption made that high school was a random fluke. We were great at making friends! This term, the disillusionment struck. Amanda: It’s the first Friday of term, and I find myself in a room circled by people I do not know. My first thought is: Hey, I’ve got this. I’ll just introduce myself, ask for names, we’ll chat for a second and then we’ll be friends. And it might have actually panned out like that had I chatted like a normal person, which I did not. Instead, what I said was this: “Let’s go around in a circle and say our names and our favorite candy bar!” If I could accurately explain the looks of contempt I was given for interrupting a round of shots with my incredibly obscure question more fit for a summer camp ice-breaker, I would try. But I would also fail just like I did then.
After enduring those glares for a few more moments, I did what anyone in my position would do: clinked my shot glass with theirs, threw one back and crept away silently, repeating “abort mission, abort mission” in my head. And so it goes that I have no new friends to write about today. Seanie: During interim day three as a squatter living off the charity of my friends, I lay alone on the Ledyard dock doing Sudoku like the grandmother I have become. About an hour into this, a pod of ’17s came onto the dock. I was pumped. They seemed so happy, kind and interested in each other in that way that’s exclusive to orientation. This was a perfect time for me to make the new friends that Amanda and I had discussed. The leader of the pod asked me my year, and I told her I’m a ’14. That is when they began to treat me like a rare and ancient specimen. “You’re a senior?!” the lead girl asked. I said yes. “You’re graduating?!” Suddenly I was seized by an overwhelming feeling of shyness. I didn’t come down to the docks until my freshman spring. These kids are so freaking savvy, and I am a weird Sudokuplaying dinosaur. The wind was knocked out of my sails, and I sat in silence (some things never change), thinking that I should be better than this by my fourth year here. The interaction was generally over then, one of the girls had sat on the corner of my towel, and I spent a good 90 seconds working up the courage to pull it out from under her before leaving. To the ’17s I met on the dock that day: you guys are awesome. Keep doing what you are doing. To me: stop doing everything that you are doing. We owe this week’s “What Have We Done” to the sense of impending doom and consequent urgency that has come with senior year. We feel like we must do everything and do it now. We attach sentimental value to extremely dull and often unpleasant things. Several days ago, we mourned the loss of our very last second Monday of a fall term ever. Just earlier, we experienced nostalgia for the final discovery of mold upon a comforter after taking it out of storage. But maybe the most urgent and sentimental of all has been the compulsion to make friends while we still have the chance. The sheer luck of our freshman fall made us confident that if we wanted new friends, we just had to put ourselves in the right situations and the rest would work itself out. Nope. We have no solution to this problem. Also, Amanda would like it to be known that there was not in fact a pouf on her beanie when we met on trips. Whatever. Yours from the Bermuda Triangle, Lucy & Ethel
In case you were wondering, Helicoprion is a genus of shark-like fish that went extinct 250 million years ago. Helicoprion was very odd-looking: its teeth were arranged in a whorl resembling a circular saw. People were puzzled about the exact purpose of the tooth whorl, and early illustrations posited that the whorl was placed on the tail as a defensive mechanism, or curled up over the rostrum, a bit like a flamboyant unicorn. It was recently discovered that the tooth whorl was actually just teeth and that it did sit in the lower jaw, positioned almost exactly like a circular saw. Scientists were baffled as they tried to explain how on earth this creature managed to eat with such bizarre dentition, but eat it did. You can tell a lot about a creature from its teeth. For instance, one of the defining distinctions between groups of mammals is the alignment of their teeth. Tracking the evolution of reptiles to mammals involves looking at jaws and teeth. Most importantly, teeth tell you what something eats, and thus its place in the food web. Which leads me to the Dartmouth food web: if Dartmouth students had specially evolved teeth, what would they look like? I, for one, would probably have teeth adapted to the extraction and chewing of fried cheese. My fondness for mozzarella sticks probably accounts for why I cannot fit into my jeans from high school anymore, but I would much rather eat mozz sticks than wear pants, so no harm done. One of the greatest disappointments of my Dartmouth career is the increased difficulty in obtaining these delicious morsels. In Collis, mozz sticks are now placed behind glass, regulated like cough medicine at a pharmacy. It is no longer possible to drunkenly munch on them in line, eating six and only purchasing three. I ordered EBAs my first night back, and to my surprise they didn’t have mozz sticks, only “cheese fritters,” which are a poor substitute. But that’s just me. Other students would have teeth suited to more nutritional things such as kale, quinoa or egg-white wraps from the Hop. Wide molars to chomp down on vegan granola. Front teeth modified into a straw for the smoothie-sippers. Frat pledges would be equipped with only a dentine and funnel, perfect for ingesting copious amounts of beer. Since the freshmen are still new, clogging up the lines everywhere and easy to spot (lanyards and ’17 jerseys make it almost too easy, but if you’re looking for incognito freshmen, their tell-tale aura of confusion and feigned sophistication is a surefire way to tell). I feel inspired to advise
on choosing a diet. Freshmen, I know 20 meals a week are ridiculous. Back in my day, everything was a la carte, you could duck into FoCo for a drink or fro-yo without having to swipe for a meal, and the Hop was open for breakfast. The closing of KAF at 8 p.m. and removal of the sandwiches is an injustice so recent that it pains me to think about. Basically, things were better in my youth. But even though the meal plan is annoying, and sometimes there’s nothing edible at FoCo except for lettuce and chicken nuggets, I must note that it is important to eat real food once in a while. It must also be noted that lukewarm, soggy breadsticks in a frat at midnight are inexplicably one of the most delicious things in the world. Be sure to make a few vegetarian friends, because when you run out of DBA at the end of term, vegetarians tend to have some left. If you happen to be a vegetarian and have DBA left, don’t be a jerk: go find some hungry friends and buy them food. On the same note, EBAs is meant for sharing, so always order more than you think you’ll eat. And that’s it for any sage advice, because I want to go back to talking about Helicoprion. Though cartilaginous fish, Helicoprion are actually something like second cousins twice removed from sharks and rays. Their closest relatives are the subclass Holocephali, whose only living representations are chimaeras, rare fishes that populate the cold, dark waters of the deep ocean. If you’ve never heard of Holocephali, don’t worry, because I hadn’t either until I took vertebrate zoology sophomore fall. Chimaeras, despite their beastly name, are actually quite cute, though I may not be the best judge, because I tend to find a lot of weird things cute. They’ve got wide eyes, big, wing-like fins and festive, erect dorsal fins. I believe they’re called chimaeras because they look like a bunch of different animal parts all stuck together. They’re also known as ratfishes, rabbitfishes and ghost sharks, but I’m partial to “chimaera” because if you’re going to be a funny-looking, poorlyunderstood deepwater cartilaginous fish you might as well have a sick name. One lesson to take away from Helicoprion and their chimaera cousins is that it’s okay to be odd-looking, eat odd things, not fit into your jeans from high school and live in cold, isolated habitats, like 8,000 feet underwater or New Hampshire. If that’s how you evolved, roll with it. At least you didn’t go extinct 250 million years ago, nor are you the only remaining species of your clade. Weird people may even find you interesting and write a column about you.
8 // MIRROR
PROFILE
Photo Courtesy of Turner Nichols Graphics by ANTHONY CHICAIZA // THE DARTMOUTH
The drive-in movie theater in Fairlee offers one of the Upper Valley’s quaintest traditions By MARY LIZA HARTONG There’s nothing quite like spending a Friday night cooped up in a pint-sized dorm room watching a movie on your computer. The picture quality’s shady, the screen size is shrimp-like, but still it’s a dream come true. Sure, you can hear your neighbors pre-gaming, smell your roommate’s perfume as she leaves for a date and feel your spinster future bearing down on you like a big cardboard box full of cats but, hey, cinematic gold is right at your finger tips. Who needs fresh theater popcorn when you’ve got a bountiful stash of Pop-tarts and ramen just an arm’s length away? Pull on those footie pajamas, snuggle up on your futon and experience what college is all about: solitude. But somehow this doesn’t seem right. You came to Dartmouth to make friends, after all. You told people you’d be hiking trails to get to class. You vowed to see the stars! Tonight, tuck your laptop into its case and hop in a car because you, friend, are going to see a movie the right way. A mere 20 minutes from campus in the quaint town of Fairlee lies a hidden treasure, the Fairlee DriveIn. This diamond in the rough was founded in 1950, originally called the Highway 5 Drive-In. Before I-91 and iPhones, Highway 5 and the drive-in served as the most
popular roads to entertainment. From the road, the Fairlee Drive-In and Motel is nothing special. If anything, it looks like a setting from an Alfred Hitchcock movie, just mundane enough for something terrible to happen. Drive a little further, though, and you begin to see the field, the projector, the snack shop and all the things that make this little hideaway a magic kingdom. It’s as though someone stuck a screen inside the BEMA, plopped it down among the trees and said, “You’re welcome.” There is no need for 3D movies here because, enclosed by the forest, you are already inside some sort of movie: Jurassic Park, Harry Potter or, most likely, a movie of your own making. Owners Peter and Erika Trapp and their three teenage sons are the magicians that make it all happen. With Erika Trapp whipping up goodies for the snack shop, Peter Trapp on the projector and the boys doing the rest, they are as efficient and cheery as their cinematic counterparts, the Von Trapps. “The kids have a lot of fun doing it. It’s a great summer vacation for them,” Peter Trapp said. The Fairlee, after all, is primarily a family attraction. Pictures range from classics to new releases and
run from the end of the school year to Labor Day. Your night there is not complete until you have taste one of Erika Trapp’s Thunderburgers, made with beef from the family’s own farm in Plainfield. Top it off with some popcorn made with Cabot butter and you’re good to go. Its nostalgic appeal isn’t limited to families or locals. Katherine Cima ’14 saw “Monsters University” at the Fairlee this fall. “It’s so cute,” Cima said. “They had a little snack bar in the back and cars lined up in rows to watch the movie on the big screen. It felt like I was in ‘Grease.’” As beloved as drive-ins like the Fairlee are, changes in technology are threatening many such institutions with extinction. “A lot of people just wait for a movie to come on TV,” Peter Trapp lamented. “I don’t know how much people really even care about having a drive-in up here. Last weekend we had 11 cars on Friday and 11 cars on Saturday. Our field can hold 400 cars.” In addition to the availability of movies on the Internet and other new means, the films themselves are changing. “We play 35mm films,” Peter Trapp said. “Studios are starting to say there won’t be any more
35mm prints. It’s all going digital. It’s a dollar thing for them.” The new digital format necessitates a new projector that costs upwards of $70,000. “There’s no way we can afford it alone. We just finished paying off the projector we bought in 2003,” Peter Trapp said. While the family is able to survive off revenue from the drive-in, motel and its farm, it needs support from the surrounding community to keep the business alive. “It’s not worth it for us to get jobs at McDonald’s just to buy this projector. If people in the Upper Valley want a drive-in they need to contribute,” he said. Through website donations and t-shirt sales, the Fairlee has already raised over $19,000, but waning interest due to rain and the weak local economy combined with the need for a new projector places the theater in real danger. Some students expressed a deep connection to the theater. Matt Garczynski ’14 has been visiting long before even matriculating. “I think I first went the summer of 2000, when my family drove up to visit Camp Moosilauke in Orford,” Garczynski said. “We saw ‘X-Men,’ and I laughed when Wolverine gave Cyclops the middle finger with his claw. I ended up attending Camp
Moosilauke, where they would reward the cleanest cabin each week with a trip to the drive-in.” Though it’s been years since Garczynski has visited the theater, its impression on him has remained. “Now that I do the math, the first night I spent at the Fairlee Drive-in was among my first nights in the Upper Valley,” he said. “And I’ve spent a large chunk of my life here since that night. I didn’t know it yet, but seeing “X-Men” from the back of a Honda Odyssey was my own little homecoming ceremony. Not in the college homecoming way, just in the way that I was coming home.” Perhaps someone still cares. “Maybe I’m over-romanticizing it,” Garczynski said, “but I like to imagine it’s perfect.” So maybe tonight, as you slip on your footie pajamas and gear up for a “Lord of the Rings” and Ben and Jerry’s eating marathon, you will take a moment to go to the Fairlee Drive-In website. Perhaps you will donate 10 dollars or buy a t-shirt. Perhaps you will help preserve something, one of very few somethings, that is truly perfect. And maybe after that you’ll gather up some friends, look up at the stars and be grateful to be home.