THE HOUSING GUIDE Seaside Residence Halls, Pg. 11
Spring 2018
Your guide to living on and off campus, courtesy of Pepperdine Graphic Media 0 Cover 1
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OFF-CAMPUS HOUSING JUST PENNIES ON THE DOLLAR
VANESSA PELLEGRINI
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IN THIS ISSUE:
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MA RKETS OF L OS A NGEL E S
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P EP P ERDI NE GOES SMOKE F R E E
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B EST EA TS OF L OS A NGE L E S
11 SEA SI DE RESI DENCE HA L L 13 NA TU RE I N THE B I G CI TY
STAFF LIST G RADUATE AS S IS TANT o f Advertis ing Falon Opsah l Barton L ead De s igne r Melissa Loc ke C reative d irector Nate Barton advertis ing Manage r Jonathan Opsah l
contri b u tors l i z a b l ak e e l l a g o n z al e z M ary cat e l o n g gat h e n j i n j o ro g e k e l ly ro d ri g u e z M ari a Val e n t e B RI AN N A W I L L I S A DVI SERS E l i z ab e t h S m i t h Co u rt e n ay S tal l i n g s
FRONT COVER DETAILS: D E S IG N E R : M E L I SSA L O C K E P H OT OG R A P H E R : SH E R RY YA N G
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Why Have You Chosen to Live at Pepperdine?
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To live with friends, be close to Payson Library and for quick trips to the beach!
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Why Have You Chosen to Live at Pepperdine?
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I don’t have to worry about leasing, subleasing, furnishing an apartment, or paying utilities. In the end, it’s a money saver!
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EXPLORING THE MARKETS OF LOS ANGELES Ma ri a va l e n t e Life & Arts Editor
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Spring 2018
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First Fridays in Venice Southern Californians and Pepperdine students alike made their way to Venice to enjoy the monthly First Fridays event on Abbot Kinney Boulevard. While there were countless food trucks and shops in the area on the first Friday of each month, from 5 to 11 p.m., here were a few recommendations that shouldn’t be passed up next month. TOMS is a footwear store famous for their buy one pair, give one pair policy. This practice is only further realized at their flagship shop on Abbot Kinney, which is not only a shoe and accessory store but also a cafe. Employee Nick Harkins said one of the more unique things about this store has to do simply with the locations’ arrangement. “The cafe is inside while the shoes are outside,” said Harkins. “It’s kind of this unique retail experience that you don’t
see every day.” Charity doesn’t end at shoes here; buy one coffee and fund one day of water for someone in need. The NoMad food truck came around L.A. to promote their NoMad Hotel opening on the West Coast in September. The NoMad Hotel (with an accompanying restaurant) opened in New York City in 2012. The company is using this single food truck to let everyone in town know that they’re going coast to coast. Their most popular food truck item was “The NoMad,” a chicken burger with truffle mayo, a NoMad employee explained. Not only is this burger popular, but Elisa James, head Event coordinator for First Fridays, raved about the Milk & Honey soft serve ice cream, “That’s where I was planning on getting dessert!”
LA Markets At barely six months old, The Fix On Wheels food truck caught the attention of aforementioned coordinator James and earned a coveted spot at First Fridays. James said the garlic fries were delicious and said the burgers were better. James said the process in which the food trucks were chosen each week was detail-oriented. Her enthusiasm for The Fix made it clear that all of the effort was worth it. Their most popular food product was their Silver Lake burger with a side of fries. “We hand out free samples of our fries to get people to come back,” said The Fix owner, John Ou. “They’re like crack.” Whether in need of retail therapy or a hunger to satisfy, First Fridays offered a unique set of vendors and shops in the artsy area of Venice. C
Malibu Farmers Market The Malibu Farmers Market is known by locals for having artisan crafted products and fresh, ethically sourced food. Every Sunday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., the Malibu Farmers Market takes place right behind the Malibu Country Mart. Locals can purchase groceries, home goods and ready-to-eat meals. Sharon’s Heavenly Cobblers started with just one recipe for peach cobbler, and the rest is history. While this vendor has only been coming to the Malibu Farmers Market for a little less than a year, they’ve been selling their products at food festivals like the Taste of Soul Family Fes-
tival for years. Sharon’s Heavenly Cobblers also provides vegan and gluten-free options to attract more of the Malibu community. Vita Juice has sold their products for almost four months at the Malibu Farmers Market. The company specializes in cold, pressed juice, but they also produce milks and lemonades. “Our juices include centrifugal,” said Alexia Lopez, founder of Vita Juice. “This helps the nutrients in the juice stay alive for five to seven days longer than without.” While Lopez said that the chocolate organic almond milk
and the black lemonade with probiotics are among the favorite items, a less obvious product is the most popular. “The green juices,” she said. “Everyone loves all the green juices.” Vita Juice also sells chia pudding and overnight oats at the farmers market. Each week, artisan vendors are selling their products right next to campus. Students can purchase these things within a two-minute drive. The Malibu Farmers Market is an opportunity for students to buy local and support the community they live in. C Pepperdine Graphic Media
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Pepperdine Goes SMOKE FREE GAT HENJI NJOROGE Staff WRite r Pepperdine will become smokefree starting Fall 2018, according to an email from Pepperdine’s Public Relations office. This change will apply both to Pepperdine’s domestic and international campuses, though graduate campuses will retain designated outdoor smoking areas per their lease agreements, according to the email. Director of Human Resources Sean Michael Phillips said the primary motivators for Pepperdine becoming smoke-free are concerns for the health and well-being of students, faculty, and staff and mitigating the risk of fire. Phillips said the transition is, in part, a response to requests from community members received over a number of years: “In 2014, the University Management Committee (UMC) adopted the current smoke-free campus’ policy which says that Pepperdine is smokefree, apart from designated smoking areas on campus, with the intent of becoming 100 percent smoke-free in the future.” Vice President for Student Affairs Connie Horton said the process of becoming smoke-free was intended to be a gradual evolution to give community members time to adjust to the changes. A number of representatives were involved in the process of creating Pepperdine’s smoke-free policy, Phillips said. The University Management Committee was
the group that voted the smokefree initiative into effect and initiated the transition from the 2014 policy to the new policy, Phillips said. Student representatives were also included in the planning of the new smoke-fee policy, Horton said. Members of the Student Government Association provided feedback such as encouraging the University Management Committee and the implementation committee to inform international students and other incoming students about the new policy. During the process of planning the transition, those involved consulted statistics about smoking, health risks, the number of smoke-free campuses across the nation, as well as the number of wildfires resulting from cigarettes and smoking, Phillips said. The planning committee also talked to peer universities to learn how they underwent transitions to being smoke-free, Phillips said. Horton said free counseling and medical support will be provided to those who need to quit smoking. “Some may find that more difficult than others depending on their habits, and we want to be sensitive and supportive in that regard,” Horton said. SGA President Austin Welch said SGA wanted to ensure that students were given enough time to prepare for Pepperdine’s smokefree policy. “There were suggestions to have [the transition] done earlier or later and the biggest thing that we wanted to make sure of was that when the decision was
made that there was ample time for students to be made aware of that,” Welch said. Horton said she wants Pepperdine community members to know that Pepperdine cares about their well-being. “Pepperdine overall cares about students, faculty, and staff holistically,” Horton said. “We say that a lot in different literature, in different presentations. This [smoke-free policy] would be an example.” Student reactions to the smokefree policy are mixed. Senior Madison Findley said he agrees with the adoption of the smoke-free policy, although he said he sees the potential for enforcement of the rule to be difficult. Senior Jacob Zimbelman said he thinks the change could infringe on freedom. “The people who smoke are not going to be in the Pepperdine mainstream so to me this has the effect of marginalizing them further,” Zimbelman said. Senior Ryan Opton said he thinks banning smoking on Pepperdine’s campuses will not keep students from smoking and will lead to unsafe smoking behaviors. “I don’t agree with us making Pepperdine’s campus smoke free for the same reason I don’t think we should be controlling the use of alcohol either,” Opton said. “I think it fosters an environment in which the use of those is overrestricted and so people use them almost too much or unsafely.” C Pepperdine Graphic Media
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Best Eats of LA Some of the best places to grab a bite or satisfy your sweet tooth
MTN Venice
e l l a Go n z a l e z S ta ff W r ite r
1305 Abbot Kinney Blvd., Venice, CA 90291 It might be said that there is something rather pretentious about the Los Angeles food scene. Perhaps it is the need to embellish dishes with unnecessary ingredients (gold, truffles, kale), deconstructed fare flaunting itself on Instagram, and restaurant trilogies that arise amid the welter of a sticky summer heat. It doesn’t hurt if the restaurant has a name that causes one to question his or her ability to pronounce. MTN is pronounced “mountain,” and it is Venice’s latest addition from the folks who brought Venice Gjusta and Gjelina. While it lacks the guttural sound of its predecessors, it more than makes up for it in izakaya
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cuisine (a Japanese gastropub where it’s every bit as much about the food as it is about the drinks). Elevated in price (ramen worth over one hour of minimum-wage work), style and ingredient, MTN is a culinary force shrouded in a dose of ambiguity and mystery. Their website lacks a menu, their Instagram a disparate paring of unrelated images. Any semblance to a restaurant is gleaned from restaurant reviews that bespeckle the internet and the most trusted “foodie” sources. One Yelp review reads, “I got the ramen; it is beautiful. Especially in my mouth.” Wonderful. It shouldn’t be any other way … or in any other orifice. Three dollar signs for MTN because it’s $18 to $20 bowls of ramen. C
Spring 2018
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Tuesdays to Sundays, 5 to 10 p.m. — 514-516 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90405 Food critic Jonathan Gold recently compiled his 101 Best Restaurants list for The Los Angeles Times. Rounding out at number 71 on the list is Erven, a restaurant that Gold describes as starting out “as the most ambitious vegan restaurant in town.” The “starting out” part of the sentence might suggest a failure on behalf of Erven, but it is in fact, the diversification of the
Erven
LA Eats
menu and the coalescence of animal and vegan foods that make it so alluring. At Erven there’s no ersatz animal products but substantial snacks, shareables, mains, and sweets — to borrow from the parlance of the menu. Food ranges from chickpea fritters with black garlic and yuzu to the decidedly un-vegan fried chicken sandwich with sauce gribiche, fennel slaw, herbed fries, and achiote ketchup. C
Food Truck Bazaar (at CA Heritage Museum) Tuesdays, 5:30 to 9:30 p.m. — 2612 Main Street, Santa Monica, CA 90405 It is not a bazaar in the conventional sense. There are no colorful arrays of spices, gem-like treasures nestled in small circular baskets and no rolled up carpets. Nor is this bazaar a life changing and slightly sad bazaar experience as in James Joyce’s “Araby.” Every Tuesday, from 5:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m., the California Heritage Museum in Santa Monica hosts a motley of gourmet food trucks. Gourmet, however, should not be conflated with expensive. The Food Truck Bazaar includes affordable options that rival the prix-fix menu of the school cafeteria. Become part of the intelligentsia by flaunting recently acquired prowess of Sondheim-inspired musicals, redefined bazaars, outdoor cinema and canon-redefining art. C
I Scream for Ice Cream | Ice Cream Turck at Annual Abbot Kinney Festival in Venice, CA. The festival takes place annually on the last Sunday of September. This year it will be on Sept. 30 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. The event is free and welcoming to all ages with a variety of entertainment, food, drinks, and vendors. C 9-10 Best Eats.indd 2
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Photo by Sherry Yang
Seaside Residence Halls On Track For Fall Opening Brianna Willis Sta ff WRite r Seaside Residence Hall is set to open for the fall semester. Robin Gore, director of Housing Operations, said the completion of Seaside will open up more space for students living off campus. After construction was delayed during the 20162017 school year, builders have started working at 4 a.m. to ensure the dorms will open this fall. “[In August] the building had been delayed because of the spring rains last year,” Gore said. “But so far this year there have been no major setbacks and construction is on track.” One of President Andrew K. Benton’s goals was to “provide a space for our sophomore students who are abroad to have [on-campus housing] when they come back their junior year,” Gore said. Benton wants to make sure that the students returning from abroad can be easily re-acclimated to the Malibu campus, Gore said. Every year it is more difficult for students who want to live on the Malibu campus as classes get larger, Gore said. This year in particular has been “very complicated with having 100 beds offline to build Seaside, and yet we have a record high firstyear class,” Gore said. But Gore said she looks forward to being able to give more students housing: “With Seaside, it’s really exciting to provide spaces to accommodate our students that want to live on campus, [whether] they are graduate students, or sophomores or juniors,” Gore said. Danecia Kearney, a sophomore living in Towers, 11
said she is excited about the idea of living in Seaside because she would be the first person to live in the dorm. She said the new Seaside Residence Halls would be her first choice for housing this coming school year. Gore said that while Seaside has eight people to a suite, it is unlike freshman dorms because there aren’t different suites on different floors. Instead, “Each suite is their own unit with four-double bedrooms, eight residents and they share a bathroom and an open common living area,” Gore said. Julia Held, a sophomore studying abroad in Shanghai, China, said she wants to live in Seaside next year because it’s the “[ideal] option for upperclassmen,” adding that she thinks “it would be cool to be the first group to live there.” Held also said she loves communal living, so Seaside is the ideal living space for her. Unlike Kearney and Held, not everyone is excited about the new housing project. Carlie Ott, another sophomore who lives in Lovernich, said she doesn’t want to live in Seaside because she has already lived in apartment style housing. “Converting to freshmen style dorms is not ideal, especially with the dietary restrictions of [me and my] roommate,” Ott said. With Seaside comes parking concerns Gore said, and the university has been discussing parking on many different levels, like where to put more parking and who would park where. Although Gore said the university has parking plans in progress, she thinks “the university is not ready to necessarily launch those specific dates.” C
Spring 2018
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A list of
Important Housing Deadlines Housing Portal Walk Through Feb. 21 Sophomore Housing Selection Day March 21 Junior and Senior Housing Selection Day March 28 Visit community.pepperdine.edu/housing/seaver for more
Courtesy of HRL Pepperdine Graphic Media
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N I E R U T A N E TH Escondido Falls Liza BLake Guest Contributor For those who want to be surrounded by nature and not the stress of homework, the hike to Escondido Falls just may do the trick. Escondido Falls is a four mile hike just off Winding Way road off PCH, just a few miles north of Pepperdine. While it may seem like a longer hike than usual, the falls near the end of the trail are what makes it worth it. The hike is comprised of three different falls, two being relatively easy to access and one to proceed with caution. The main water fall is about 150 feet high with bountiful amounts of plant life that make it a gem of nature. 13
Escondido in Spanish could be interpreted as “to hide” or “hidden,” and the falls stick to their name. The trail is tucked behind a neighborhood of mansions, and it is not until about two miles in that visitors reach the Escondido recreational canyon region. From there, the hike begins. Pepperdine junior Kaley Morgan has always been one to find herself at the falls for the thrill of adventure. “Escondido Falls has always been a little fun secret getaway for me whenever I’m the need to get out and do something,” Morgan said. Morgan also said she had a tip for those looking to get the best views of the waterfalls. “I always like going after a rainstorm because then the
falls are full of water, and it makes it that much better,” she said. Fellow hiker and USC student Stephanie Keener is also one who chooses to hike at the falls, regardless if there is abundant water or not. “The hike alone is physically challenging that I use it as my workout plan when I’m not in the gym,” Keener said. She also said this hike is in no way made for a solo trip — the buddy system is the way to go. Whether visitors are looking to workout, relax or even check out some locally made waterfalls, the hike to Escondido Falls is a hidden nature gem in the Malibu area. C
Spring 2018
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LA Nature
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Malibu Creek Mary Cate Long Assistant News editor Malibu Creek State Park offers a variety of outdoor activities and opportunities to enjoy nature. Nestled just past Pepperdine’s campus, north on Malibu Canyon Road, Malibu Creek State Park has seemingly endless opportunities for the outdoors enthusiast, from hiking to kayaking to rock climbing. The park grounds stretch more than 8,000 acres and include “dramatic, jagged peaks, stunning canyon vistas, oak woodlands, rolling hills of tall grass, a large volcanic swimming hole, world class hiking, biking and rock climbing and more,” according to the Malibu Creek State Park website. Junior Audrey Riedel first visited the park last January. “It is definently a hidden gem because the mountains and rocks are unlike anything you usually see near campus,”
Riedel said. “It’s just so unique and makes you feel like you’re worlds away from the cliche Malibu feel.” A unique aspect of the park is the opportunity to rock climb and boulder. Bouldering is the activity of rock climbing without ropes or harnesses. Junior McKenna Olson first visited the state park two years ago during her freshman year and said it is one of her favorite spots to frequent, especially for climbing. “It’s the best place to boulder because of the natural holds in the rocks from years of erosion from smaller pebbles and rain,” Olson said. In addition to its recreational value, the park has a rich history. The Chumash Indians were the first known occupants of the area, according to the park website. “The very designation of the area comes from the name of a Chumash village pronounced ‘Umalibu’ by the Spanish.”
In more recent history, several films have featured the park landscape. Park-goers shouldn’t be surprised to recognize scenery from Hollywood productions such as “Dr. Dolittle” and “Planet of the Apes.” “It’s just so fun to get off campus and be in a space that is so different from the scenery that we are used to at Pepperdine,” Olson said. “There is something about being surrounded by mountains that makes you feel so small and really puts the stressors of school into perspective.” Guests are able to visit the park every day from dawn until dusk at this address: 1925 Las Virgenes Road (at Mulholland Hwy), Calabasas, CA 91302. Dogs are allowed only in the parking lot and on the campgrounds, but not in any of the backcountry trails. All-day parking is available for $12. C
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