3.21.18

March 21, 2018 | 34st.com

p.6 Caleb Giles Interview

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Thoroughbreds Review

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Franklin's Table Food Hall

MARCH 21, 2018 Nick Joyner, Editor–in–Chief Remi Lederman, Managing Editor Angela Huang, Audience Engagement Director Annabelle Williams, Assignments Editor Autumn Powell, Media Director Haley Weiss, Word on the Street Editor Jamie Gobreski, Word on the Street Editor Emily Schwartz, Ego Editor Zoe Albano–Oritt, Music Editor Julia Bell, Senior Features Editor Sabrina Qiao, Special Features Editor Colin Lodewick, Long–Term Features Editor Dalton DeStefano, Developing Features Editor Lily Snider, Style Editor Catalina Dragoi, Film & TV Editor Sherry Tseng, Arts Editor Daniel Bulpitt, Lastpage Editor Ha Tran, Photo Editor Danny Rubin, Video Editor Lea Eisenstein, Copy Director Chris Muracca, Print Director Ego Beats: Valentina Escudero, Sami Canaan, Caroline Riise, Caroline Curran, Maryanne Koussa Music Beats: Paul Litwin, Amy Marcus, Arjun Swaminathan, Isabella Fertel, Holden Caplan, Chris Troop, Natalia Joseph Features Staff: Emily Rush, Angie Lin, Sharon Christner, Annika Iyer, Emily Cieslak, Naomi Elegant Style Beats: Liz Kim, Frankie Reitmeyer, Molly Hessel Film & TV Beats: Ana West, Avneet Randhawa, Bella Essex, Zovinar Khrimian Arts Beats: Sophie Burkholder, Lizzy Lemieux, Margaret Zhang, Xinyi Wan

3 WORD ON THE STREET South Africa Water Crisis

4 EGO

EOTW: Michelle Xu, Rachel Prokupeck

6 MUSIC

Caleb Giles

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Telenovelas, Thoroughbreds Review, Overheards

Design Editors: Lucy Ferry, Gillian Diebold, Ben Zhao, Christine Lam, Alana Shukovsky, Zack Greenstein, Morgan McKeever, Teagan Aguirre, Judy Zhang, Katie Waltman Lastpage Beat: Eliana Doft Staff Writers: Sophie Xi, Cass Phanord, Tamara Gelband, Jennifer Cullen, Isabella Simonetti, Shinyoung Noh, Emma Moore, Anna Callahan, Sammy Gordon, Sydney Gelman, Charlotte Bausch, Jacob Winick, Alix Steerman, Sara Merican Illustrators: Jessi Olarsch, Brad Hong, Anne Marie Grudem, Reese Berman, Judy Choi, Carly Ryan, Saranya Sampath, Catherine Liang, Anne Chen

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10 FEATURE

Chinese Students

Staff Photographers: Dayz Terry, Virginia Rodowsky, Christina Piasecki, Bill He, Avalon Morrell, Emma Boey, David Zhou Video Staff: Megan Kyne, Jean Chapiro, Anab Aidid, Abdul Sohu Copy Editors: Kira Horowitz, Kate Poole, Anna Waldzinska, Serena Miniter, Sarah Poss, Amber Auslander, Kimberly Batista, Riley Wagner, Morgan Potts Sofia Price, Analytics Editor Cole Bauer, Senior Marketing Associate Marketing Associates: Lauren Donato, Chae Hahn, Brittany Levy, McKay Norton, Hanniel Dizon, Carly Shoulberg, Merry Gu, Paige Fishman

13 STYLE

Food Hall, Street Style

Unless otherwise noted, all photos are by Dayz Terry, Virginia Rodowsky, Ha Tran, and Christina Piasecki.

Contacting 34th Street Magazine: If you have questions, comments, complaints or letters to the editor, email Nick Joyner, Editor–in–Chief, at joyner@dailypennsylvanian.com. You can also call us at (215) 422–4640. www.34st.com

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR I don't cry during movies anymore. I have come a long way since the winter of 2005, when my step–cousin and I had a crying contest in the movie theater bathroom after watching March of the Penguins. We were too embarrassed to cry about the dead penguin chicks in public, so we decided to do it in front of a mirror while others relieved themselves nearby.

Call Me By Your Name and Moonlight both came really close to breaking me. They both broke my mom, but only elicited a quiet whimper from me. Try again, LGBTQ cinema. The last time I remember crying was when I watched Boyhood in the summer before I began my senior year of high school. I even wrote an amateurish review of the movie, and all of its particularities that made me weep. And before that?

Toy Story 3 punched me in the gut for sure.

I wish movies did make me cry, though. I took a five hour nap this past Saint Patrick's Day and woke up delirious. I decided to see a movie with some friends. More specifically, I decided to see Love, Simon. I heard it was a queer movie and that it was good. I didn't read any reviews or commentary beforehand, and I went in cold. Watching movies that way is objectively better; your thoughts aren't colored by A.O. Scott and you're more likely to be surprised by the atmosphere of the film. Anyways, my method worked. I knew nothing at all about Love, Simon, and the stakes were all the higher. I had no preconceptions about whether I'd enjoy it or not.

I wanted the movie to make me cry. It had all the right elements: a rare happy ending, a heartwarming (yet idealistic) coming out experience, and so on. I enjoyed it, even the corny requisite teen movie moments. As is so easy with the genre, I projected my own idealizations of adolescence onto Simon, reimagining what my high school years could have been.

That is, what they would've been like with a $17 million budget and a professionally written script. I felt saddened in retrospect, even with the happy ending. Because it almost seemed unrealistic. Love, Simon had all the emotional excess associated with a good romantic dramedy, it just couldn't wrench any tears from me. I really wanted to let loose, and enjoy the post–cry clarity I've always valued so much.

I don't remember why I stopped crying in the movie theater. Or when. But I wish I could again. Needless to say, I will be rewatching March of the Penguins this weekend as practice.

16 ARTS

Double Vision, Frida Kahlo Barbie, Queer Media

"We shouldn't be afraid to be poetic" ©2018 34th Street Magazine, The Daily Pennsylvanian, Inc. No part may be reproduced in whole or in part without the express, written consent of the editors (but I bet we will give you the a–okay.) All rights reserved. 34th Street Magazine is published by The Daily Pennsylvanian, Inc., 4015 Walnut St., Philadelphia, Pa., 19104, every Wednesday.

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Pottruck By The Numbers 2

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Sophie Pelosi | Illustrator

WORD ON THE STREET

word on the

STREET

COUNTING DOWN TO DAY ZERO: STUDYING ABROAD DURING CAPE TOWN'S WATER CRISIS Confronting my privilege and what access to clean water truly means Ari Goldfine

When I arrived in Cape Town for my semester abroad in late January, I was delirious.

I had just spent 36 hours in airplanes and airports, and I was limping through the delightful cocktail of sleep deprivation and my anti–anxiety flight medication. All I could do in this state was observe, wide–eyed. And there was plenty to look at in the customs line alone. Signs everywhere told travelers: “Limit your intake to 50 Liters a Day!” “Showers MUST Remain Under 90 Seconds” “122 Days Until Day Zero” On my way to my dorm in Rondebosch, a wealthy Cape Town neighborhood, I struck up a conversation with the taxi driver. The highway from Cape Town’s airport to Rondebosch took us past some of the city’s most impoverished townships, and he identified them one by one. These townships, legacies of Apartheid’s forced resettlement of non–whites to the outskirts of the city, are underdeveloped and under–serviced. My taxi driver grew up in one in the city center, he said. It’s named Langa, and he pointed it out as we drove past.

If “Day Zero” was a reality—he wasn’t convinced of it—townships like Langa would see lines of people seeking their daily water ration in the early morning hours. The water crisis had been tough on his family, but not impossible. He and his kids had switched to bucket and sponge showers to conserve.

Oh, I thought, they aren’t fucking around. I knew, of course, about Cape Town’s historically unparalleled three–year drought and subsequent water crisis before arriving. I knew it was the first major city to likely

run out of water as a result of climate change.

My American and South African study abroad institutions reassured me of my safety. The crisis was serious, they told me, but there was no reason for foreigners to stop traveling to Cape Town. It wouldn’t really impact

it’s yellow leave it mellow. Et cetera.

Within my little compound of American, elite institution– backed privilege, there is no culture of conservation. Day Zero will not come for us. Nor will it come for the scores of tourists still flocking to this hyper–

showers with only the slightest bit of shame.

Early on in my time here, I attended a roundtable discussion by some of the student leaders of #RhodesMustFall and #FeesMustFall, two prominent South African protest movements. They aim to decolonize

Saranya Sampath | Illustrator

my experience here. I received a flurry of comforting emails from my program, which I forwarded to my paranoid family members. They promised that if the taps ran out, they would resource water privately. It would be fine. So, on the first day of my semester abroad, clutching my bags on that rickety taxi ride through the city, I wondered what reality I would be living for the next five months.

Every day after class, I hike down the hilly base of the University of Cape Town’s campus towards my dormitory, a residence of 100 or so exclusively American study abroad students. There, I know massive jugs of clean, cool water will be waiting for me. They’re refilled daily. Signs in the bathroom gently remind me that showers should be reduced to two minutes. I should try to turn off the tap while brushing my teeth. If

instagrammable city, staying in hotels or Airbnbs that openly promote their unaltered water access.

The same cannot be said of Cape Town’s permanent residents, especially those outside the wealthiest classes. Restrictions are their reality. Capetonians already face fines for exceeding their daily water ration, penalties not once mentioned to the American students in my program. Day Zero is coming for them.

For some, it’s more than a matter of restrictions. It’s even more than an impending Day Zero, be it one week or four months from now. Cape Town's most systematically disadvantaged have at no point had access to clean, reliable drinking water. Meanwhile, one hundred or so of my predominantly white American cohorts sheepishly take their 15–minute

the universities and make them more accessible to low–income students, respectively.

A well–intentioned American student inquired about the life of non–white Capetonians during the water crisis. How were the residents' townships surviving the water crisis? What about people living in informal settlements? How would they survive Day Zero?

One of the panelists laughed, and replied. It has always been Day Zero for black South Africans.

The line stuck with me. I jotted it down. His laughter was the miles disconnect and tension between his life and the life of the questioner. The miles between my life and the lives of those who live in townships like Langa, Gugulethu, and Khayelitsha.

My institutional wealth and privilege allow me to travel to

this exceptionally beautiful city and not feel one ounce of the suffering that is the norm for so many of its residents. Obviously, I am grateful for this privilege. I’d be a hypocrite to say otherwise. I haven’t abandoned the safety and hygiene that my dormitory promises.

I don’t plan to. But I also cannot stop thinking about my advantage in this moment of crisis. A few months ago, I had no conception of the extent to which living here would shake my thoughts and practices surrounding water, and by extension, life itself. When access to such a universally needed resource is in jeopardy, it amplifies the effects of any kind of systematic injustice.

At present, I am safe. I have access to water. And, thanks to significant cuts in consumption by permanent residents of the city, so is Cape Town. City officials recently pushed “Day Zero” to early July. This does not negate the fact that the city is a few mismanaged months from absolute crisis and heightened suffering for Cape Town’s least advantaged. This is especially true if the rainy season (the Southern Hemisphere’s winter) yields less than expected rainfall.

Regardless, I am so grateful to be in Cape Town, but my reverence for this experience is complicated. It is laced with the guilt that comes with increased familiarity of my advantage in this life. It is laced with increased familiarity with the suffering of others. It’s allowed me to feel truths in Cape Town that I hope to bear witness to in Philly upon my return. Living here has forced me to reflect and analyze and think in ways I never have. And for that, I am overflowing with gratitude.

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EGO

EGO EGO OF OF THE THE WEEK WEEK As president of the Undergraduate Assembly, Michelle Xu has a lot of emails to answer. This week, one of them was from Street. She told us about her experience as president and her time at Penn—which includes blue hair, bacon, and Brits.

MAJOR | Mathematical Economics ACTIVITIES | UA Student Body President, Oracle Senior Society,

Sphinx Senior Society, Student Activities Council Exec Board, Community School Student Partnerships

HOMETOWN | Pittsburgh, PA 34th Street Magazine: How has being a part of the UA shaped your experience at Penn?

Michelle Xu: It’s been such a great way to meet a ton of people all at once, like through campaigning, elections, and also, it’s the fastest way to learn how the school works. I think I found so much great exposure to work with not only the students, but also with the administration. It’s super rewarding too, to see all the projects I’ve worked on come to fruition, and really have an impact on students’ lives. Just the experiences from being in leadership this year taught me so many life skills that I’ll definitely take with me forever.

Street: What made you want to join the UA? MX: Honestly, in high school, I was really not involved in student government at all. So when I was a freshman, I guess I was like, oh, I don’t know what I’m going to do. People were campaigning already, and I was like, “You know what?

This seems kind of fun, I’ll do it.” And I did it. I think in freshman year, it’s kind of a crapshoot who wins, but I had blue hair at the time, 4

and so that might literally be the only reason why I ended up winning. But then I got onto it, and honestly, freshman year completely changed my view on how the student government works and things like that.

I had so many great mentors freshman year and after that year, I decided to keep doing it.

Street: What was your favorite thing about Penn?

MX: The people. My college best friends are going to be my lifelong best friends and the experiences that I made here are significant because of these people.

Street: Least favorite?

MX: My least favorite is definitely some aspects of the culture here, for sure. I think that’s something that the UA tries hard to talk about and work against, you know, we’re always talking about how it’s so hyper– competitive here, which is why we were really passionate about working on our club requirement project and making recruitment a lot easier and a lot less competitive this recent year. We ask students not to just pay lip service to mental health, but to actually practice it

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and actually be involved in different resolves and things like that. For sure, it’s a lot of Penn Face.

Street: Any advice for the freshmen?

MX: I’m not old enough to give advice, but just enjoy freshman year. I made so many mistakes freshman year and that’s what freshman year is there for. Like, the smoke alarm has gone off because of me—just be okay with making mistakes, just stupid things like that.

Street: Wait, how did you set off the fire alarm?

MX: I was just cooking bacon and I didn’t know you were supposed to turn on the fan, things like that you learn freshman year, and, like, it’s okay. Be willing to embrace your mistakes. Don’t dye your hair blue, that was hideous.

Street: So, what would you tell your freshman–self?

Don’t dye your hair blue?

MX: No, you know what?

Make the mistakes so you learn. I would’ve probably dyed my hair blue now if I hadn’t freshman year, you know what I mean? It’s okay to make the mistakes as long as you learn.

MICHELLE XU

Autumn Powell | Media Director

LIGHTNING ROUND Street: What’s the most underrated spot on campus?

MX: Penn Commons, previously Wynn Commons.

Street: Favorite TV show?

MX: Right now, it’s The Crown. It’s so good.

Street: Guilty pleasure?

MX: Not checking my emails for, like, a whole weekend, but I don’t actually do it that often. It’s just my guilty pleasure because I have so many emails.

Street: Role model?

MX: I think all my friends. They’re just so awesome, honestly.

Street: There are two types of people at Penn…

MX: People who walk on Locust and people who avoid Locust at all costs.

Street: And you are?

MX: People who avoid Locust at all costs.

EGO

Food For Thought: Student Chef Rachel Prokupek Talks Cooking And College She went to culinary school in France and helped develop a restaurant in Uganda. And did we mention she's only a sophomore?

Caroline Riise For most Penn students, learning how to make a home– cooked meal is an unavoidable and (if we’re being honest) somewhat unattainable rite of passage. For Rachel Prokupek (W ‘20), it’s a skill that she’s mastered on three different continents.

Cooking has always been a big part of Rachel’s life, as she grew up in a family that “appreciated good food” and has a dad that worked in the restaurant industry, as well a close family friend that did catering.

“The passion kind of developed naturally throughout high school,” she says. “I started cooking more, I started reading more about it, watching shows ... and it really just went from there.”

Rachel eventually got to experience the profession firsthand when, in order to fulfill her school’s three–week internship requirement for graduation, she worked for Denver chef Troy Guard at several of his restaurants. She continued to work for Guard over the following summer.

“It was my first time working at a kitchen ever, and it was a bunch of guys. I was the only girl in the kitchen,” she says.

“And [the restaurant] had this open kitchen where people would sit at the bar and look into the kitchen as we were cooking, so I was always interacting with customers. I learned a lot.”

Rachel admits there were

some unexpected challenges along the way. “One of the most important things about working in a restaurant,” she explains, “is that you have to be careful about food costs, because if you mess up [a dish] and can’t use it, that’s a waste of money. It’s the tightest margin, and I had to be perfect, so when I messed stuff up the chef would have to come up to me and be like, ‘Hey, this means you’re wasting X amount of dollars because you messed up this one skill.’”

her. “It was the best year of my life,” Rachel says. However, she says that the environment was understandably “very intense,” given the high caliber of talent.

“It’s not like cooking yourself breakfast before school,” she shares.

If earning a culinary degree from one of the most famous universities in the world isn’t enough for you to buy into Rachel’s expertise, it should be noted that she also helped develop a restaurant on Lake Bunyonyi in Uganda. This girl

Before coming to Penn, Rachel took a gap year to attend Le Cordon Bleu, the famed culinary school in France that boasts Julia Child and Giada de Laurentiis as alumni. The international and professional atmosphere combined to make the experience unforgettable for

knows what she’s doing.

The restaurant, named The Crested Crane, is part of an initiative to increase Ugandan tourism. After visiting the country for several weeks through a program run by the Global Livingston Institute (GLI) in Denver, Rachel kept

Photo Courtesy of Noel Zheng

in touch with the head cook at the program and worked with him to create the concept and menu for the restaurant. She went back to Uganda during her freshman year for the

Photos Courtesy of Isabel Zapata

grand opening. “One hundred people from all over the island came,” she says. “The chef and I cooked all of the food together.

It was so fun.”

At Penn, Rachel continues exploring her love of cooking through her participation in

Penn Appétit, which she has been involved with since receiving her college acceptance (she wrote an article for the club during her gap year before even arriving on campus) and she is now the club’s Executive Director.

While she can’t say she knows exactly how cooking will play into her profession after graduation, Rachel can’t wait to see where her passion takes her during the next two years at Penn. While nothing is confirmed, Rachel hinted that she may be in the running for an undergraduate special of Chopped, a cooking competition show on Food Network.

“That would be crazy,” she admits, after revealing that she did an interview with one of the show’s producers and received a follow–up email a few days ago regarding her upcoming availabilities.

Until then, however, Rachel’s just going to keep doing what makes her happy. “People all over the world can connect over food and ingredients, and it just brings people together,” she says. “I just love cooking.”

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MUSIC

Up-and-Comer Caleb Giles Deconstructs His Music Process

A conversation about spirituality, improvisation, and handling change with one of New York's best artists.

Street: You tweeted a week ago, "There Will Be Rain is winter music." What do you mean by that?

Caleb Giles: What that means is some of the songs on it really are for the colder months when you just feel in your bag. You are just in your mood and I just feel that at least, to me, it perfectly translates that feeling really well.

Some of the songs like “Wondering,” maybe “Impatient,” they really just tend to have me in my bag, ya know what I’m saying?

Street: How did you decide to mix it to create that dark mood?

CG: It really wasn't up to me, it was what came to me, it just kind of came through me. All of the music, um, and it was just what I was going through at the time. The shit I was saying and just all the changes that were happening in my life. I wasn’t necessarily in a dark or sad mood, but that is just how it came out. The tone of the record was shaped by my response to all this stimuli going on, and I had to say it as blunt as I could. No theatrics behind it, just trying to get it across.

Street: What were some of those stimuli? What inspired you 6

to get like that on those tracks?

CG: One of the bigger, not the biggest, but one of the bigger things that happened is that this girl I had been seeing for two years, we had broken up, and I was a little upset, but I was more, like, experiencing just a new place. I was in a new place, not really held back by anyone per se, so I was able to experience new things. I went back to my sister’s house in Detroit where I spent a lot of time as a kid, and I was able to connect with my family and just seeing them really put me in the zone and I recorded some of the songs out there in Detroit.

Street: Getting more into the album, what is the ‘rain’ to you?

CG: The rain ... The rain to me represents anything that you can’t control, that will of course just take you over. To me personally, the rain just represents change, and change is inevitable.

Street: Your album is super faith–based, so how does faith impact your daily life? Why do you decide to make it such a large part of your music?

CG: A short answer is one of the largest things to happen to me over the course of recording

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this record, I had a really intense spiritual experience, like an awakening, and it really just shook up my whole world. It coincided with me breaking up with this girl, too, so you know it really started when I was recording the record and I was so new to this, my faith. In my daily life, I’m fasting for about a month just for clarity. It’s a part of my life, it’s the most important part of my life, it’s just super important to me ... my mom had us in the church, I played saxophone in the church band for a while. I believed in God, but I wasn’t a MAN of God. But this past April 2017, this whole shit was just like flipped upside down. I just came into a new space spiritually and I was just overwhelmed. I made the album more or less about that because it was in my face. I had to speak on it.

Street: This album is heavy, it’s a storyline. Why was it important to you to make an album that was linear, rather than just a compilation of dope music?

CG: So when I started recording, I had just come off

Holden Caplan

Last fall, my friend showed me an album that had just come out called Red Burns by an NYC–based jazz collective called Standing On The Corner (SOTC).

I was blown away. When I heard that Caleb Giles, the saxophonist for SOTC, had released a rap album, I immediately downloaded it. I came to learn that Caleb creates thought–provoking music that feeds off of the same vision of Gio while forming his own unique take on his experience living in NYC. After listening to his most recent album There Will Be Rain, I wanted to know everything behind it.

Last Tuesday, I got the chance to chat with Caleb over FaceTime about his new album and his work with SOTC. I got to know all about his music and what he has gained from the past year making it.

Screenshot from YouTube

the Tower, the first record I dropped, and I was really ... I didn’t have an idea for a new record. I was making a bunch of music, with Mike, Donny, and other cats in the city. I didn’t have a real direction until I read The Fire Next Time and this other book, The Parable of the Sower, and I read a bunch of other books ... I was just focusing on what I was reading, what I was listening to, what I was writing. I was really central, I was in one place the entire summer, which got me in one state of mind ... I didn’t make a conscious choice to connect.

I can’t really say how, it just did.

Street: How was the making of the album a spiritual experience in itself?

CG: I was removed from myself. I allowed myself to be, as corny as it sounds, a vessel or a throughway to the people. I wasn't really thinking about what I was rapping. I wasn’t thinking about, "alright this has to connect here, X, Y, and Z" and it took not too long, like five months to record everything. It really just flowed through me so naturally. Look-

ing back, I was just listening to the album yesterday on the train and I just thought "Damn, this is what it sounds like when you are tapped in to something else," you know what I’m saying?

Street: Where do you see the importance of improvisation in music today?

CG: I think it is extremely important, period, just because art is freedom and I want to be free when I’m making something. So I think in music, especially in jazz or hip–hop, improvisation is so important to the art form. Free– styling and having a solo or some shit like that, I think these ways to communicate, to let shit come out of you uninhibited and just trying to connect as clearly as immediately as possible. I think that is a real gift, to be able to communicate in that way. Black music, period, should have that energy in it because it is just important in the genre, in the style, and in the medium.

Street: Is there anything you want to speak on about yourself, your music, or your album that you want people to know?

CG: Yeah, it’s at calebgiles. com. Go get it.

FILM & TV

Bingeable Telenovelas for Every Kind of TV Fan For proper, neverending onscreen drama, check out these Spanish-language TV series.

It can be hard to find good shows to watch in languages that aren’t English. While the movie world has robust foreign film industries to compete with Hollywood, and even the Oscars honor foreign language films, there are fewer television shows that bring stories in other languages to life with the same amount of worldwide reach.

The one major exception to this? Spanish–language TV. Throughout Latin America, Spanish language programming has been prominent for decades, but recently, it’s been experiencing a major boom. Telenovelas aren’t just campy soap operas: they are increasingly becoming a diverse and rich trove of innovative storytelling and comedy. With studios making content available on streaming services and adding subtitles for foreign audiences, anyone can watch them, regardless of whether or not they know Spanish—and everyone should.

If you’re new to the wonderful world of Spanish–language TV, here are a few must–watch pics to get started with: If you loved Breaking Bad or Narcos, watch La Reina del Sur Love a good crime thriller? Like your protagonists complicated?

La Reina del Sur, one of the most explosively popular telenovelas of the last few years, is just as addictive as any of its American drug–themed counterparts. Teresa Mendoza starts out as a poor, innocent woman who seeks pro-

Ana West

tection after her drug trafficker boyfriend is murdered—but she works her way up in the criminal underworld until she herself is a force to be reckoned with. In the male–dominated world of the drug trade, La Reina del Sur is a feminist story of a different kind, a stunning character arc for the main character, and a wild ride from start to finish.

For a dark, sexy period piece: Gran Hotel If you think all telenovelas are campy and over–the–top, think again. Gran Hotel is the story of one man, Julio Olmedo, and his quest to investigate after his sister dies under mysterious circumstances while working as a maid in one of the most renowned hotels in Spain. Far from being ridiculous or unbelievable, the show is just as tasteful and gorgeous as the hotel it takes place in. Gran Hotel offers hidden identities, affairs, murders, lies, passion, and sexy Spanish accents against an elegant early 20th century backdrop.

For a sweet and tender rom– com: Yo soy Betty, la fea This one might feel familiar to American viewers who remember the series Ugly Betty—which was actually a remake of Colombian show Yo soy Betty, la fea (literally “I am Betty, the ugly one”). The original program was so popular that the American remake actually wasn’t the only one. Yo soy Betty is the story of a girl in the fashion industry who is smart, hardworking, and talented, but

Jake Lem | Illustrator

is continually passed over professionally and personally because her looks are lacking. When she is hired by Armando Mendoza, a new boss with a new way of doing things, they work to save their company—and fall for each other in the process. Yo soy Betty is laugh out loud funny in a way that all rom–coms should be, but rarely are. It’s impossible to walk away from the show not loving Betty, whose character provides one of

the most refreshingly honest takes on a “career woman” that have ever been on screen.

If you just love drama: El Internado Hopefully, by now, it’s evident that not every Spanish–language TV show is over the top dramatic—but if that’s what you’re looking for, El Internado is one that is. El Internado takes place at a boarding school that is (for some reason) in the middle of the

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woods, as far away from civilization as possible. Every character has a crazy backstory, from mothers who stalk their babies after they’re sold by evil boyfriends, to orphans whose parents disappeared mysteriously while their parents were sailing around the world. I’m not entirely sure I understand El Internado all of the time, but coherence is not the point—it is crazy, and you’re going to love it anyway.

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FILM & TV

REVIEW: 'THOROUGHBREDS,' AKA THE ART OF BEING A SOCIOPATH Don't expect much from the new teen drama, which is just as flashy and empty as its two main characters.

I saw the trailer for Thoroughbreds at the Paris Theater in New York at some point in early December. It was the two female leads that eventually made me get out of bed on a Sunday morning just to go all the way to Old City and watch it—at least, this is what it looks like on an ever– growing list of “cool trailers” that I keep on my phone, and which comes in handy specifically in moments like that one.

I must admit, I don’t like knowing too much about movies before I watch them. Thoroughbreds kept popping up on my news feed, though, and while most headlines seemed to praise it, I resisted the urge to read any reviews. If I do that, I’ll either give up the thought of watching the movie altogether, or set my expectations too high, and then be disappointed. In the case of Thoroughbreds, even the faintest of hopes were crushed: as the movie approached its ending, both the intensity of the racket coming from two drunk, middle–aged women—the only ones in the theater who seemed to be having a good time—and the frequency of my own (somewhat) excited notes were basically free–falling.

Cory Finley’s directorial debut is advertised as the story of two high–school girls who embody the main versions of teenage angst—Amanda (Olivia Cooke, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl), who can’t feel anything, and Lily (Anya Taylor–Joy, The Witch), who can feel everything. It’s hard not to roll your eyes at how extreme this sounds, and at the prospect of another exaggerated, 8

romanticized portrayal of mental illness. And, while the two actresses do an incredibly good job capturing their characters’ personalities—if one can speak of any—there’s a sense of superficiality dimming both the script and the plot, which takes away from what would have otherwise been an insightful exploration of two troubled minds.

in Balzac’s tradition, so do the characters that inhabit it. Their actions—Lily chews on steamed peas for a bit too long after eating them one by one, with a fork— are meticulous, robotic. Even in the few moments that Lily displays her emotions—Amanda never does, because she doesn’t have any—there’s something about her cries that makes her

the assassination of her stepfather Mark, whom she despises, Lily takes off her sweet, girl– next–door mask, only to reveal a cold–heartedness that reaches its peak when she roofies Amanda and then accuses her of her dad’s murder.

Of course, a movie which is lacking in terms of relatability (at least hopefully) couldn’t do with-

Illustration | Reese Berman The setting—an affluent suburb in Connecticut—vaguely reminded me of Lars von Trier’s Melancholia: in both movies, the flamboyance of perfectly–manicured lawns, cellars brimming with vintage wine, and a team of servants waiting to cater to the characters’ needs seems overpowering. Especially in the case of Thoroughbreds, the backdrop looks almost artificial—and,

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character’s feelings equally invisible.

As it turns out, neither of the two girls should be relatable in the first place. The film opens with images of Amanda killing a horse with a knife. While, at first, it is she who seems to have more serious issues, as the action progresses it is revealed that Lily is just as troubled, if not more: as she and Amanda plan out

out less–serious moments. These are mostly provided by the late Anton Yelchin’s character Tim, a drug dealer in his twenties who seems to be the only one around who’s puzzled by, and scared of, the two girls. Granted, he’s one of their two victims, and the only surviving one: unlike Mark, Tim takes threats seriously. When hired to kill Lily’s father, Tim is taken to her house only to be

Cat Dragoi threatened, blackmailed, and eventually injured. The scene is, nevertheless, one of the most enjoyable in the film: Tim’s greedy look when exploring the gaudy mansion is accompanied by Schubert’s "Ave Maria," which is cut short, as is his reverie, by Amanda’s blank intervention.

What follows is his gradual realization that he’s dealing with two sociopaths who will stop at nothing to get what they want.

The one moment in which Thoroughbreds did seem like a thriller occurred, unfortunately, during the ending credits. The inebriated ladies behind me, whose voices I hadn’t heard in a while, were struggling to verbalize their opinions on the movie.

Though somewhat incoherently, they managed to reach a conclusion: “oh, all teenagers are the same.” This is where the director’s biggest fault lies: marketing it as the newest teen drama fails to bring attention to the fact that this is, in the end, a movie about mental illness, and that its portrayal is, to say the least, exaggerated.

I hope that future viewers walk into the theater knowing that fact.

I also hope the two loud audience members are doing alright, and that the teenagers in their lives are not as heartless to them as they made it seem. After all, their loud laughter partly made some of the movie’s less–than–fortunate script inaudible, for which I can’t help but be grateful.

Rating: 2/5 ‘Thoroughbreds’ is currently showing at the Ritz Five.

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THE 7,000 MILE DIVIDE

By Naomi Elegant 85% of Chinese international students at Penn say they don't have one American friend

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Photos by Emma Boey and Courtesy of Olly Liu and David Zhou 1

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fter flying fifteen hours from Beijing to Philadelphia, Wendy Han (W '19) was greeted in her freshman dorm in King’s Court with a uniquely American form of culture shock: football players, who made up at least half of her floor.

“They would just walk around naked,” Wendy said. “When I first arrived, I was shocked.”

She found it difficult to befriend her hallmates, saying she made “maybe two friends.” She tried to connect with “ABCs”—

American B o r n Chinese— but found cultural disconnect there, too.

“ABCs are totally different,” Wendy said.

“I feel like sometimes, you’re speaking English, but you’re not speaking the same language.”

Even so, Wendy became— and remains—best friends with her American–Chinese roommate, calling herself “lucky” to have her during freshman year.

“She helped me so much,” Wendy said.

“I was struggling a lot, depression, all those issues, but she was always there supporting me.”

Of the roughly 1,000,000 international students in the U.S., Chinese students make up around a third of them. Most pay the sticker price of the universities they attend, boosting profits significantly. In 2016, Chinese students added $11.4 billion to the American economy through tuition fees and expenses.

But many struggle with life in the U.S., due to linguistic and cultural barriers as well as professional and academic pressures.

At Penn, where around 38% of international students are Chinese, the administration has taken some steps to ease the transition, like Mandarin–speaking support groups at CAPS. But some Chinese students question whether these programs do enough. Others say they don’t feel comfortable using them at all.

Wendy attended Beijing No. 4 High School, one of the most prestigious high schools in China and a feeder to top U.S. universities, sending students to Harvard and Yale “every year.” In her sophomore year, she committed to applying to the U.S. for university—an irreversible choice. She moved from the local Chinese track to the American track, taking APs and SATs with around a fifth of her peers. “[My parents] kind of made the decision for me,” Wendy laughed. “It’s a middle–class thing. If you’re middle–class, you want to send your kids abroad, if you have the connections and resources for that.”

Wendy, who started as a political science major in the College before trans-

ferring to Wharton, joined the Polybian Society, the social branch of Penn’s Government and Politics Association, in her freshman year. She distinctly remembers at one Polybian event being asked by a student from Washington, D.C. what it was like living in her politically high–profile hometown of Beijing.

“That’s the first time I felt like someone valued my opinion and wanted to hear about my story,” Wendy said.

Despite that “valuable” encounter, Wendy lost interest in politics, in part because she feared a political science degree would not open enough doors for her professionally. She refocused her energy, transferring to Wharton and dropping out of Polybian to concentrate on recruiting.

“They were very acceptive,” Wendy said. “I think it’s on my end.”

"I feel like I need Chinese friends, otherwise I’d be left out."

Political Science and International Relations Professor and Director of the Center for the Study of Contemporary China, Avery Goldstein, said he’s seen the number of Chinese students shoot up since he started teaching at Penn in 1985.

“It’s a combination of those things, the opportunity [to go abroad] but also the ability of Chinese parents to pay for this,” Goldstein said. “There’s an increasing number of Chinese who can afford to pay to send their students to American universities where they’re gonna have to foot pretty steep tuition bills.”

As non–Americans, most Chinese students are paying full tuition at Penn, and so by nature tend to be “well– off,” which has led to “a stereotypical view” of Chinese students at Penn, according to and Shanghai native Olly Liu (C '18).

“I think part of it is because we’re single child,” Olly said. He added, laughing, “I think we’re a little bit spoiled in that sense—every resource [goes] over to you.”

First–year Graduate School of Education student Juliette Zhu,

Wendy Han

who hails from Hangzhou, China, is writing her thesis on the effect that studying abroad has on Chinese students’ psychological well– being. Through her thesis research, she learned that around 85% of international students do not have a single American friend.

She says she’s observed this in her own life, too.

“Most of my Chinese friends don’t really have American friends here, even though they study at an American institution and are surrounded by Americans,” Juliette said.

“First, there’s the language barrier—although they can handle academic stuff, daily English is quite difficult for them, and slang.”

Olly thinks that Chinese and American students have different standards of what constitutes friendship: the Chinese definition is “just more intimate than Americans’ definition," and requires much more of a time commitment.

“I think a lot of Chinese don’t feel like they have American friends,” Olly said. “The Americans do view them as friends, but in Chinese standards they’re not really close.”

Olly thinks that the perception of Chinese students as a wealthy, insular group is “potentially” a barrier between them and American students. He also thinks that Americans have a “different party culture”—a lot of Chinese students enjoy eating dinner together and then going to karaoke afterwards, rather than what Olly perceives to be the more “American” party culture of pregaming and then heading to parties.

In some cases, Olly says, the Penn Chinese community has created groups and events that are socially analogous to American ones, which can help fill the cultural element that mainstream Penn social life lacks. The Wharton China Association (WCA), for example, is the main social extracurricular group for Chinese undergraduates at Penn. Olly was president of WCA in his sophomore year, Wendy was vice president of internal affairs in her sophomore year, and even David was a member in his freshman year.

“In China, we don’t have frat culture, but this is basically like our family or frat,” Olly explained. “If you’re from China and you haven’t adjusted to American culture, you get to hang out with people from your own country where you feel most like home.”

WCA’s most popular social event is the annual “dating show,” based on a popular mainland Chinese dating game show. Olly says the WCA event usually attracts 400–500 people—most of Penn’s Chinese undergraduates, as well as graduate students, and sometimes Koreans and Chinese– Americans.

In the lead–up to the dating show’s final event, WCA releases trailers where participants introduce themselves and de-

scribe their ideal match. On the actual day, the participants—a group of female students and a group of male students—stand on stage and go through rounds of questions, choosing potential partners and eliminating others until they find their match.

The event is conducted entirely in Mandarin—a high bar for any other interested students to breach.

Olly explained that most students don’t participate to actually find a date, but just to see their friends on stage, meet new people, and get a dose of familiar Chinese pop culture.

“It connects people. It’s also a fun thing to watch. It’s the most popular thing among the Chinese community,” Olly said, adding laughingly that “it’s kind of like, I don’t know, Spring Fling for us.”

Olly thinks that adapting more to one another’s preferred social practices would be an effective way to bridge the divide between Americans and Chinese.

“Parents spend so much money for their kids to know American culture,” he said. Olly suggests that American students could try throwing a “hotpot–themed party” and Chinese students could reach out to their American peers to grab a beer.

He added that while cultural groups are important, Chinese students shouldn’t “ignore” the culture of the country they’re in.

Olly says he’s comfortable in both Chinese and American social groups. He went to boarding school in Massachusetts for high school, which helped him “get to know American culture earlier.” Even so, he remains tethered to some Chinese social practices.

“I feel like I need Chinese friends, otherwise I’d be left out,” he said. “I’d rather be left out of American society than be left out of Chinese society, if I had to choose. But obviously there shouldn’t be [a choice].”

Juliette said that while language barriers usually subside— “most students get better as they live here longer”—cultural barriers often remain.

One “very significant” cultural barrier is the “racial illiteracy” among many Chinese international students who come to the U.S. Because China is relatively racially homogenous, Juliette explained, students arrive with little knowledge about race and racism, especially in the American context.

“After getting here they have to deal with people of different racial backgrounds,” Juliette said. “They don’t know how to talk to them, and they have fears, and this kind of fear and unfamiliarity really restricts their relationships with their peers and faculty.”

When Juliette was an undergraduate at Agnes Scott College in Georgia, she and some of her Chinese friends discussed issues they were “afraid to ask” about, like why race was so

Olly Liu

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important in American discourse to whether “black” or “African– American” was a more appropriate term to use.

David Zhao (W '19) avoided a lot of these barriers, at least by the time he got to Penn. David, a naturalized American citizen who describes himself as “half international,” was born in Shanghai, where he lived before moving to New York when he was 11. “[I spoke] zero English,” David said. “Very, very poor English. Like, I could say my name, probably.”

He was immersed in an American elementary school, which forced him to pick up English and gave him a crash course in American, too. “I’m very happy I was able to come earlier so that I could learn the language—not just for exams and academic English, but also to be able to interact and kind of be more adjusted to American culture,” David said.

David returns to China at least once a year to see his parents and grandparents, with whom he converses exclusively in Mandarin. He stays in touch with his Chinese primary school friends, often meeting with them in New York and Boston as well as Shanghai.

When he came to Penn, David sampled different clubs, but never any cultural interest groups. He pushes himself to leave his cultural comfort zone, which means he’s often “the only Chinese guy, or one of the few Chinese guys” in the room.

“I think for Chinese international students, whether it’s to join Greek life or join a club, there’s no barrier, so everybody can join as long as they’re open to it,” he said.

Juliette does not share David’s view that “there’s no barrier” between Chinese and American students. She thinks universities should educate both international and domestic students to be more open to other cultures.

“International students in general have been the population with the least attention from administrators, but this population has increased dramatically over the decades, especially Chinese international students,” Juliette said. “I really think the

Juliette Zhu administrators, school, faculty, and staff should really pay attention to this population and learn how to get along with them and how to help them.”

Juliette is worried that existing programs don’t do enough to help connect Chinese students to the resources available to them at Penn, not necessarily due to lack of awareness, but because some Chinese students are too “shy” to initiate interactions.

“Lots of students, they don’t even know how to reach out to those other resources on campus, including the counseling service,” Juliette said. “So when they find life is frustrating and get really stressed out, they don’t know how to talk to a therapist.”

When Wendy was struggling in her freshman year, she thought about going to CAPS, but didn’t feel comfortable with the idea of “talking to strangers, even if they are professional.”

CAPS International Specialist Dr. Yuhong He said in an emailed statement that Chinese international students often struggle with a “lack of culturally sensitive support services from in and outside of campus.” Dr. He added that CAPS has been “actively employing different strategies to specifically reach out to Chinese international students.”

In addition to orientation workshops for all international students, CAPS has Chinese student–specific programming like publishing a Mandarin language CAPS brochure and hosting workshops with the Chinese Student and Scholar Association at Penn.

Director of International Student and

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Scholar Services (ISSS) Rodolfo Altamiro thinks that Penn has come a long way in outreach to international students since he arrived in 2006, when ISSS essentially functioned as an immigration office for Penn’s international population.

“We have to be cognizant that international students have specific needs compared to domestic students,” Altamiro, a former international student himself, said.

During his time here, Altamiro has launched initiatives such as Forerunner, a pre–freshman orientation for admitted students from China and India—Penn’s first and second largest international student populations—hosted in Beijing and New Delhi every summer, which CAPS is also a part of.

This year, Wendy dropped the few Wharton clubs she was in to focus on recruiting, citing the intense pressure on many Chinese students to secure “very high–paying jobs” that guarantee returns on their parents’ investment in their degrees.

“Some people criticize Chinese internationals because all of them are in finance and consulting,” Wendy said. “But oth-

David Zhao erwise you can’t really justify your education.”

Dr. He, the CAPS International Specialist, listed “performance pressure” and “complicated career decision making process[es]” as two of the many reasons that Chinese international students sometimes struggle to adjust to Penn and the

U.S. One of the reasons Wendy was drawn to Penn was its reputation for sending its graduates to those coveted Wall Street positions.

“To some extent I’m very appreciative,” Wendy said. “I wanted a practical professional education, rather than too ‘liberal arts.' I applied because this is what I [wanted], and then I got it, so I guess I should be satisfied.”

The problem remains, then, that she doesn’t know if she is. Sitting in Starbucks with a cup of coffee in her hands, wearing a white Penn baseball cap, half her face obscured by a surgical mask to fend off the circulating flu, Wendy could not come to a conclusion about her happiness.

She described the paradox of missing China, but then returning home and missing her friends in Philadelphia. She goes back to Beijing at least once a year, but the time at home is never long enough for her to feel fully “at home” again.

“When I was a freshman I thought of my Penn life as a bubble that would break at some point, and my true life was in Beijing,” she said. “But now whenever I’m in Beijing I’m like, ‘Yeah, my friends are in Penn and that’s where I live,' so I feel like the short break I have in Beijing is like a bubble now.”

Even though Wendy has made close friends at Penn and feels more settled than when she was a freshman in King’s Court, she questions whether it was worth leaving China in the first place.

“Now, I sort of don’t understand why I came to the States,” she admitted. “Is it for the education, is it for the experience? If I go back to China in the end, does this really matter? And if I decide to stay, then is there a future for me?”

Naomi Elegant is a junior from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia studying History. She is a Features Staff Writer for Street and a Graduate Student & Alumni Beat for the DP.

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We Ate at Every Restaurant at Franklin's Table Your go-to guide to Penn's new food hall

Unless noted all photos by Christina Piasecki

Molly Hessel & Liz Kim

Penn students are swarming to the corner of 34th and Walnut Streets in droves—and it’s not because they’re on their way to DRL. Franklin's Table Food Hall is open, and you better be prepared to run into just about everyone you know there. The excitement for the new venue is palpable, and anyone who walks by can clearly see how the modern and sleek yet approachable decor sparks people's curiosity. Through the glass walls, you can see that the space is packed at any time of day.

The dining hall features offerings from the best of Philadelphia’s restaurant scene. From omakase sushi to artisanal ice cream to fresh pressed juice, the vendors at Franklin Table are an expensive (and slightly controversial) upgrade from the food court’s former occupants like Taco Bell and Quiznos. Though very exciting, the hall can also be very overwhelming—luckily, we’ve broken it down to make it easier for you to decide what to try first.

Pitruco Pizza The throngs of people surrounding the vendor make it difficult to discern where the line begins. A short glass barrier separates the waiting customers and the chefs who make the pizzas from scratch. They toss the dough, sprinkle on toppings and slide the pies in and out of the wood–fire oven with mechanical efficiency, providing plenty of entertainment for the crowd. The 11” personal–sized pizza is served to–go style in a box. The pepperoni pizza is richly flavorful with a touch of spice and chewy, puffy crust. It’s as greasy as good pizza should be but also fairly light, so that you may even have room for dessert. Although it costs a hefty $15 approximately, the high quality pie is shareable and worth the splurge.

Pepperoni Pizza Little Baby’s Ice Cream The sole dessert–only vendor in the food hall, Little Baby’s Ice Cream offers four rotating ice cream flavors and four non– dairy flavors to satisfy any sweet tooth. Be sure to ask to try the flavors before ordering, as some of the names are either obscure or misleading and don't describe the actual tastes. ‘Birch Beer Vanilla Bean’ is reminiscent of a cold root beer float, and a bite of ‘Smoked Cinnamon’ is like a gulp of an iced chai latte. ‘Acai Bowl’ lacks the acai flavor it advertises, instead boasting a potent coconut flavor that’ll transport you back to spring break. All in all, you can’t go wrong when it comes to picking a flavor; they’re all certain to impress. A cup of two scoops goes for $6.

KQ Burger

Acai Bowl & Thai Iced Tea

It’s a meat lover’s paradise, the perfect comfort food addition to a food court that seems to be teeming with vegetarians, judging by the 20–person line in front of Goldie. They’ve jumped on the digital kiosk bandwagon with two large touch screens on which you can customize the type of cheese, sauce, and toppings for your chosen burger or sandwich. Not in the mood for a traditional burger? Get the fried chicken sandwich for $9—the pickles serve up a sharp zing to contrast with the savory chicken and the rather sweet potato bun.

Chicken Sandwich Photo courtesy of KQ Burger

High Street Provisions

Giving Metropolitan Bakery a run for its money, High Street Provisions will be Penn’s new favorite lunch spot. From the creators of High Street on Market, High Street Provisions brings the same great baking as its nationally–renowned predecessor. Besides the cookies the size of your face and the ooey–gooey grilled cheeses, its lighter offerings should not be ignored. The overnight oats ($5), topped with lightly–sweetened (and lightly–spiced) jam, is the perfect pick–me–up on the way to and from class.

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Goldie Say farewell to your favorite halal cart: Goldie will have your heart after one bite of their falafel. Crunchy on the outside and pillowy soft in the center, the falafel at Goldie’s is nothing short of perfect, as should be expected from the culinary genius behind Zahav. Order the falafel salad to leave room for the tehina shake. The decadent dessert is made from sesame seed paste, a liquified version of the Middle Eastern dessert halva. With deliciously filling offerings, Goldie won’t leave you missing meat, as (surprise!) the entire menu is vegan.

Both salads and sandwiches from Goldie run around $10, with the famed tehina milkshake running for $4.50.

Falafel Salad

DK SUSHI

In the back corner of the crowded food court, students huddle around the counters of DK Sushi as chefs swiftly wrap salmon rolls and plate bento boxes. The name DK is a reference to its beloved outpost, Double Knot. At its location in the hall, orders are placed on tablets and cranked out in the matter of minutes. While DK Sushi does not have the same sophisticated ambience of its sister restaurant Doubleknot, they share the same deliciously fresh flavors. DK Sushi offers high quality sushi in a low quantity of time. When one sushi roll ($6–$8) won’t satisfy, try the Chef’s Box ($16–$26) for a little taste of everything: nigiri, edamame, rolls, and sashimi over rice. Plus, it is big enough to split with a friend and save on the cost. For those who look to sit, savor, and splurge, the Omakase Menu transports you to Japan even in the middle of Penn’s bustling American campus.

Salmon Roll

The Juice Merchant Finally, a delicious way to eat (or drink) your fruits and veggies. The Juice Merchant offers a variety of different energy shots to smoothies. Juice Merchant's opening also marks the long–awaited arrival of uber–trendy açaí bowls on campus— but be warned, the whips and bowls are only sold before 12 p.m. For the banana whip fanatics, they offer their own selections with mix–ins like granola and peanut butter. Though they may deliver you your daily dose of vitamins, the drinks are best as a weekly treat: prices run around $8.

Live music • Film • Dance • Theater Art Education • Community The 2018 Spring Equinox in Celebration of Women pres. by Poet~tree EnMotion Mar 21 @ 7:00 PM Featuring a variety of multi-disciplinary performance, arts & culture presentation. Performances begin shortly after featuring, a Fierce Female Lead Lineup of Artists ranging from Live Musical Acts to Spoken Word Flowetry to Folkloric Infused Dance Movements. A FREE community event … but donations are appreciated!

Legendary AACM musician, composer & professor Thurman Barker joined by Dan Blacksberg & Julius Masri Mar 22 2018 @ 8:00 PM Admission is FREE

Banana Rama Whip

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BioMess, Beholder & Hallowed Bells pres. by Event Horizon Series Mar 23 2018 @ 8:00 PM

Survivor Knights Philadelphia Art Show & Performance Mar 25 2018 @ 12:00 PM

Survivors of all kinds share their visual art, stories, and performance art at a FREE EVENT designed to bring the community together in mutual support. If you are a survivor who wants to display art, speak or perform at this event go here for details: http://sexabusesurvivor.com/2017/12/ call-for-survivor-artists-and-performers-for-survivor-knightsphiladelphia/

As an alcohol-free/smoke-free venue, The Rotunda provides an invaluable social alternative for all ages.

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Street Style:

Meet 3 Trendsetters from Locust Walk

Penn students are serving looks. It's time you step up your game. Here's how.

Alix Steerman

This week, Street Style is taking you down Locust Walk and featuring Penn’s most fashionable and bold looks. From wild socks to statement lipstick, our campus is full of style and I'm here to show you the best of the best and how to create these looks for yourself. Like Tyra Banks always says, it’s time to get NLF: next–level fierce.

Saagar Asnani

(C ’19)

Sabrina Elkassas

(C ’18)

Holly Li

(C ’19)

I caught up with Holly on her way to an ACCT 102 midterm; she says that as long as she’s wearing some type of sparkle, she’s bound for greatness. In single, front–pleat, pink pants; a Tokyo culture art graphic tee; and penny loafers with socks, Holly walked down Locust, earbuds in, with swift confidence. She told me that her go–to staples in her closet are usually sparkly, and that she adds the penny loafers because they feel “smart.” Holly finished off her outfit with a hunter–green fur–lined jacket from a Brooklyn thrift shop.

How to recreate your own version of this look: Pants: ASOS $48 Tee: Forever 21 $6-$15 Jacket: Rely on the luck of thrifting

I stopped Saagar because I was drawn to two things: his decision to wear shorts in winter and his adorable corgi socks. Once we started chatting, Saagar told me that he never wears pants.

I asked what he does during winter storms, and he said he wears shorts. Why? He responds bluntly: "I just don't like pants."

Saagar says he keeps it “warm up top” so that he can be cold on the bottom. He layers a shirt, sweater, and jacket so that he can comfortably rock his shorts in any type of climate. Aside from always wearing shorts, Saagar has a fascination with hats, saying that he has “one for every outfit.” He's also an avid sock collector.

How to recreate your own version of this look: Socks: The Joya of Socks $8 Hat: Overstock $19.99 Jacket: Kohls $25.60

Sabrina’s bright red lipstick was what originally caught my eye as she turned past me on Locust. As I moved on to the rest of the outfit, I was even more impressed by her effortless mixing of textiles and statement pieces. Sabrina lives for leather—she wears something leather every day.

Today, she had on a great pair of leather pants, cut off by white socks peeking out of her black and red laced–up boots. On top, Sabrina put an olive green menswear–inspired jacket–tee under a white knit overcoat. Sabrina said that she loves thrifting and is inspired by men’s clothing: mixing oversized pieces with fitted ones. Sabrina’s looks are topped off with stylish, gold–rimmed glasses that are both fashionable and functional.

How to recreate your own version of this look: Pants: Nordstrom Rack $39.97 Top: Target $19.99 Jacket: Nasty Gal $60 Shoes: Shopbop $75 M A R C H 2 1 , 2 01 8 3 4 T H S T R E E T M A G A Z I N E 1 5

ARTS

Seeing Double: Grad Students Present An exhibit on technology, surveillance, and self-perception Sherry Tseng

DOUBLE VISION Megan Kyne | Staff Photographer

Art installations at Penn tend to be ephemeral. Installed one day, taken down the next week, if not the next day. Or at least this is largely the case in the Fine Arts undergraduate program, such as in Helen Nie’s exhibit challenging the conventions of OCR, Jason Barr and Linda Lin’s reimagination of Benjamin Franklin as a woman, and Jake Welde and Izzy Korostoff’s ginger-

bread replica of the Fisher Fine Arts Library. But for graduate students, the story is a little different. With access to local galleries in Philadelphia, graduate students in the arts have the opportunities to curate, install, and showcase their work in exhibitions.

This access to such occasions is made possible by Penn’s departments, specifically the Incubation Series

program, a “collaboration between students in the Fine Arts and History of Art graduate programs at the University of Pennsylvania. The series aims to showcase the work of MFA students in focused and conceptually rigorous exhibitions, while also offering an opportunity for art history graduate students to expand their curatorial practices.” On the current exhibit of the pro-

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gram is Double Vision, curated

by Olivia Dudnik, a second– year MA, and Jeffrey Katzin, a third–year PhD student, both studying art history.

The title of Double Vision speaks to different ways of seeing. With the unprecedented scale of technology and rate of growth, there’s now this whole other mode of seeing through technology. This is what constitutes the double vision: “a relationship to reality built in part upon our own immediate experiences, but also upon highly mediated connections to parts of the world that we have never actually seen with our own eyes.” Given this, the exhibit features four artists—Junyuan Feng, Adrienne Hall, Jiaqi Pan, and Zoya Siddiqui—all of whom address this second vision through surveillance, self–image, state power, cybernetic connectivity, and personal memory in a collective society.

Walking into the exhibit is first a grid panned out on the wall of what appears to be portraits. Jiaqi’s series "27" examines an artist’s self–perception through photography and drawing. Each drawing is actually made by a stranger and how they see Jiaqi. No two is the same, revealing the variant external perceptions that mold the internal perceptions of the self. Separated by a partition is a projection of a video: "In the

Park," which consists of long stills describing the Beijing World Park. The park itself was an attempt to reimagine the world as to reenter it after the Cold War, an attempt at double vision.

Once these two main pieces were set up, the rest of the art came together, organized by how each interacts with another. This was the work of Olivia and Jeffrey: to put the pieces together to give a meaning to the exhibit as a whole. Still, the experience of the exhibit, like most presentations of art, is left up to the audience. It’s supposed to be an experience that is “empowering, so that viewers feel empowered to interpret the show on their own,” as Jeffrey puts it. The different themes stemming from the pieces prompt people to think, giving suggestive answers, but also leaving room for people to bring in their own thoughts.

Even in the wall labels, one can see how power is given to the audience: they’re minimal, only with the most basic information of title, artist name, date, and material, so as to not distract the audience from the piece itself.

Double Vision will be on display from now until March 31 at the FJORD Gallery on 1400 North American Street, Suite 105. It is open on Saturdays from 2–6 p.m. and by appointment.

ARTS

Everything Wrong with the Frida Kahlo Barbie Why the "Inspiring Women" series is not so inspiring Carly Ryan | Illustrator

Sophie Burkholder Barbie dolls are so much more than plastic toys—they always have been. For decades, they were one of the many standards that society used to define what a physically beautiful woman should look like. With blonde hair, blue eyes, and an impossibly small waist, the dolls have exacerbated problems of body image, self–esteem, and self–worth. While Mattel, the company responsible for making the Barbie dolls, has started to make dolls representing women of different backgrounds and ethnicities, the toy's representations of women are still far from accurate.

And not much has changed with their new Frida Kahlo Barbie doll. The doll was released as part of the “Inspiring Women” series among 16 other dolls, such as Amelia Earhart and NASA scientist Katherine Johnson (whose work was finally given due credit in the movie Hidden Figures).

Kahlo, a Mexican artist known for her surreal self–portraits, is one of the more prominent female artists of modern art history. These portraits weren’t merely physical likenesses of Kahlo, but windows into her identity and soul. Some of her most famous pieces, like the 1939 oil painting “The Two Fridas,” are more graphic in their imagery, particularly with the openly bleeding vein, expressing the competing sides to her personality and heritage.

Kahlo was by no means an icon of traditional beauty for her time. With darker skin and hair, she had a more masculine appearance. She often accented these features in her portraits, purposefully darkening the hair line above her lips, and emphasizing her unibrow. Beyond this, Kahlo also

suffered from complications of polio and a trolley accident that put her in a wheelchair, which left her in waves of intense pain for the majority of her life.

All of this physical pain is evident in Kahlo’s work—she was never afraid of displaying what others saw as her flaws. In fact, she embraced them. So, for obvious reasons, when I first began studying art history, Kahlo was an artist that attracted my attention.

I remember first seeing her portraits in my third grade art class, when my teacher passed around various prints of them. There was some naïve laughter over her appearance, but my teacher quieted the room when she told us that with these paintings, Frida gave us more than just a way to remember her physical appearance. She gave us a way to look into her soul, a type of vulnerability that only truly brave people can face.

Since then, Kahlo has been an emblem of feminism for me.

When I wake up in an overwhelming state of self–consciousness (as we all do every now and then), a look at her paintings gives me the courage I need. She knew that just because she didn’t fit the norm of physical beauty didn’t mean that there wasn’t still a great deal of beauty inside her. It’s for all of these reasons and more that

need to adjust anything about Frida’s appearance to make her acceptable for young girls; that’s a step in the opposite direction.

But amidst this complete tarnish of Kahlo’s identity, there is some light to be found.

Women everywhere are speaking out against the design of the doll, including both members of Frida’s family and Mexican actress Salma Hayek, every time I visit a museum, her tory Month, but I’m not so sure who played the artist in the paintings are some of the ones this is the proper way to do it. biographical film Frida. People We need to keep promoting recognize the disconnect between that I always pay my respects to.

When her Barbie doll came strong females as role models for the way Barbie dolls try to conand Double Rooms • norms, and the way theSingle younger generation, but is the out, I was Flexible heartbroken.Leasing I don’t • trol beauty bestAmenities method for and accomplishing see theIndividual Frida I had come to love.• All Leases Utilities that Included women like Kahlo tried to Barbie Frida is skinny and up- this by altering the appearance unravel that. Hopefully, the next right, with no hair above her lip of the doll that originally did the doll doesn’t need to provoke such and hardly any trace of her defin- damage? Barbie dolls have a foun- an article, but then again, such an Call ing unibrow. The doll is beautiful, dation of conformity under them, error in 2018 has me wondering understanding if Mattel should leave it to somebut it’s not Frida. It’s important so I have trouble 215.662.0802 to celebrate the legacy of not just how they can make a model of one else to undo their long history try- of damage to female body image.

Frida, but any female artist, and someone who spent her life Email especially during Women’s His- ing not to conform. We shouldn’t

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ARTS

The Best Queer Media and What They All Have in Common If you liked 'Call Me By Your Name,' you'll love these books and films with the same motifs.

Elizabeth Lemieux

Watching Call Me By Your Name (CMBYN), I was captivated, not by its lurid, nostalgic romance, but by that feeling of déjà vu that I could not shake off. Maybe it’s because queer cinema and literature has risen in mainstream prominence and acceptance (about time!), with Moonlight winning Best Picture in the 89th Academy Awards and CMBYN, Best Adapted Screenplay in the 90th Academy Awards. In these narratives are shared themes and connections—of sexuality, of fruit, and of foreignness, hence the déjà vu.

Sexuality here is best seen in many of these movies

in perhaps the least sexual ways: swimming and biking.

In CMBYN, youthful boys are buoyed in solitary bodies of water, riding bikes down deserted roads and indulging in fruit (also a running theme of queerness). The Dutch film Jongens (Boys in English) follows the relationship of two high school track teammates as they bike through forests, swim in rivers, and find themselves in the dune beaches of the Netherlands. The Brazilian film The Way He Looks recounts the relationship of a deaf high school student in Brazil and his relationship with the "new kid." The two

Las

sneak out for late night bike rides through the lush streets of their neighborhood and are constantly poolside.

Other notable films with these motifs include the Flemish film North Sea Texas and the the Brazilian film Esteros. All of these films are adapted from books, which provide an even deeper understanding of the stories with room for the imagination to run wild. For example, CMBYN is a stunning book as is, apparently, Nooit gaat dit, the Flemish book which on which North Sea Texas is based.

While the swimming/biking motif doesn't seemed to

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have origins on the page, another running theme is fruit, a metaphor for queerness, genitalia, and possible reclamation of the slur. There is, of course, that infamous peach scene in CMBYN, with Oliver biting into the fruit, the juices (among other liquids) seeping out.

The motif of fruit also appears in Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, an English novel about a young pentecostal girl who finds herself falling for another girl, and Rubyfruit Jungle, a novel about a poor, queer girl coming of age. More recently, fruit is prominent in the movie Tangerine, which details the story of trans sex workers adventuring in Hollywood.

The novel Fried Green Tomatoes could also fit into this category (yes, tomatoes are a fruit!).

In these narratives, foreignness is part of genre.

While CMBYN is an American film, the Italian setting and use of several spoken languages links the film to the foreign and the unfamiliar. The umbrella term of foreignness also encompasses some of the most signifi-

cant queer texts and films.

Narrated by an incarcerated man, Our Lady of Flowers by French novelist Jean Genet tells of the story of the deceased drag queen, Divine.

Not only is it celebrated as a LGBT text, it also influenced writers of the Beat Generation like Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg.

Additionally, the tradition of the lesbian pupil/teacher relationship has origins in both France and Germany, beginning with the French Novel, Claudine à l'école by Colette, the German film Madchen in Uniform (Girls in Uniform in English), and the French novel and adapted film Olivia by Dorothy Bussy.

There are so many other narratives showcasing the themes of queerness, especially with the rising tide of works on queerness into the mainstream. While it may seem a breakthrough, the history of queer literature and media is rich. These suggestions barely scratch the surface of the serene, Italian pond that Elio and many others like him, are submerged in.

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