Hey there. So it's 1 am and I've just opened the e-mail containing the person I am supposed to assassinate. Well, not really. But really.

I decided to join in on this game that goes on between my dorm and one other. It's called Assassins and basically you get the name of a person also playing the game and from that time you have three days to "assassinate" them. To assassinate the person you have to... grab the persons butt. Like a serious, 2-handed grab. Haha it's going to be so weird. There are of course rules, like no assassinating in the bathroom, your room, etc. Once you assassinate the person they give you the name of their person they were supposed to assassinate. If you don't do it in the three days, the "death squad" comes after you to assassinate you. Which actually reallly freaks me out. They have no rules. If i know they're coming for me I'm dropping out. Anyway, the girl i must kill lives in the basement of my building so I'm plotting. Haha just a weird Swarthmore thing.

Life's been pretty nuts lately. Iz and I decided to go up to NYC for the day Saturday which was super nice. To get away from campus and... it's just New York. Iz knows NY really well so we just sauntered up and down Broadway and Amsterdam, popping into cafes, we went to Rockafeller Center. That was originally the whole reason I wanted to go to NY but just watching the ice skaters was good enough for me. I walked away with fourteen dollars, smugly awaiting some delicious baked good.

Friday I finally broke in the new video camera, shooting some random scenes with my friends. It was a lot of fun, but really some pretty bizarre footage. I don't even know if I get it.

My workload is starting to scare me... I had an interesting first Spanish test and possibly my first oral quiz tomorrow? No one really knows for sure. I had to write a paper for Spanish tonight containing some themes of a story we read in class. I twisted the story to fit into an episode of The Office. It amused me but I'm not sure what Señora will think.

Miss y'all.

Happy birthday moma :]

Hola.

I'm mumbling spanish vocabulary in a deserted coffee bar with Iz doing work next to me, when I thought, whooops haven't written in awhile. The weekend flew by and so have the first couple days of the week. On Saturday I took a field trip to Chester, the town about 5 miles (?) or so down the road. The bus pulled past the familiar banner of green lawns and beautiful old architecture until the road bled into a different sight. Trash led the way up the broken stoops of the subsidized houses of Chester. It might as well have been worlds apart from my charming college life. We spoke a lot to a panel of older community leaders, ate soul food in one of the 200 churches in the town and went on a modest tour of the town via school bus. Given the time it was a brief introduction but we were sent home with a folder of information. The town really has quite the story.

Anyway, I will be volunteering there for a class that requires us to do so (community based learning) either tutoring kids after school or working at the co-op. The town does not have one grocery store, meaning they do not have access to fresh fruit and vegetables. It's really unbelievable. I can't wait to start.

Other than that, I've been doing homework and spending late nights with my video camera. I've also been checking out various clubs on campus. Yesterday I went to an Earthlust meeting, the environmental group, and tonight was the Sudan Radio Project and Tango lessons. There are millions of clubs and I don't know what I'll end up doing. The radio show seems pretty unbeatable, though. Ayyy yi yi still trying to get back into the swing of things.

Miss vuu.

Heey.

In anticipation of the remarkably long nights I will be pulling very soon, I've decided not to wait. I stay up so late doing pretty much nothing. So this will serve as the blogging time slot. Perfect.

I surprised myself with a little school spirit tonight. After dinner I hopped on the fan bus as it was pulling away from the school to go to the men's basketball game against Haverford. Basically everyone in our conference we have a rivalry with, but for some reason this one is particularly serious. My, how I've missed cheering at sporting events. Telling #21 he looks like Colonel Sanders. Doing my part on D ("D-FENCE"). The game did get pretty heated between the two student sections. We were directly across from each other so that didn't help the situation. Of course, we lost, our team is something like 2-17, but not without chanting the apparently classic "Safety School" to the Haverford fans in response to "Na na na naaaa."

I reallllly like my classes. Like, really. But instead of Globalization which had a prerequisite I did not have, I'm taking an intro Philosophy class. It's called Truth and Desire and I think it'll be pretty interesting. The professor just looks like she was born to teach philosophy. Cute short hair. Older woman. Small frame. Sweaters. Oversized glasses. And boy does she love her some Socrates. Anyways, it's a kick. And thankfully not a lot of shallowly profound jabbering. If something of that sort leaps out of my mouth I'm going to have to give myself a knock on the head.

I think Iz and I are going to go for a bike ride tomorrow and maybe shoot some video. yay. Friday there is a meeting for a program to work with refugees in Columbia over the summer. I hope it's encouraging because I really want to do some cool things this summer. alksjf. We'll see. Miss you guys.

I'm baaaack. Yes it's true. Back by popular demand, The Swat Life has rebooted to serve as your eye into my experiences in Pennsylvania at the charming institution of Swarthmore College. Alllright enough with the cheeseballs and excessive prepositional phrases. Makin me sick.

Nat dropped me off at the airport yesterday after a month back in Nebraska. I can't even believe it was yesterday just as much as I can't believe it's been a month. Travel was murkey. Murkey seems like the perfect word, but I have no idea what it would exactly entail. But finally I arrived, ditched my suitcases in my dorm room, and ran in the rain to join friends in another dorm. Amidst general questions and the even more general responses that come from long separations, it was so good to see the people I've met. It makes me realize the relationships I have already begun to form. Mmcheesy. We proceeded to go to dinner together, bounce from dorm to dorm, and after a few games of Shanghai called it a night.

My class schedule was in interesting shape, but long story short the lineup for the semester is:

Intensive Intermediate Spanish

Political Science: Globalization

Religion and Ecology

The Arts as Social Change

I'm pretty dang excited. Syllabi are as far as most teachers get these first couple days so I'm living it up while I can. After class today I took my sweet time over some peanut noodles, milled around the Bookstore, picked up my new video camera from the mail (soo excited), and went on a run with two of my soccer buddies through town in beautiful 50-or-so degree weather. Glorioussss.

In the evening my good friend Iz and I caught up a little more in depthly, and decided to commemorate the holiday by watching a few of MLK's speeches on youtube. We figured it was the least we could do after the ludicrosity (ludacrisity? ludacrosisity?) of beginning classes today. The nerve. A few of us then decided to check out the meditation club that meets three times a week on campus. The senior that leads it is hilarious and has been practicing meditation for a heck of a long time. Bony Chinese dude with dreadlocks, also head of the Buddhist Club, unaffiliated with the meditation club. They usually sit in a circle on meditation pillows for thirty minutes straight (in meditation, of course) and then closes by eating chocolate or something of the sort. No, but they're actually pretty legit. They didn't have enough pillows so I sat on a chair which turns out to be quite brutal when you have to sit on the edge, maintaining good posture. Because there were quite a few noobs joining today's session, we did two separate intervals of fifteen and ten minutes each. In the opening few seconds I thought I was going to burst out laughing, but I composed myself and really enjoyed the challenge of quieting the mind. All in all, I think I will be frequenting the meditation club.

I'm sorry that when I do post, they're ridiculously long. It just turns out that way. For the remainder of the night I'll be tinkering with my new camera while on the lookout for stinkbugs that have set up shop in our room. It's really not as bad as it sounds. They're friendly fellers that I let go out the window. An exchange that some could say parallel my past boyfriends. Haha wow. Too much?. Yes. Gooodnight.

Love.