Spring 2014

northwestern NORTH BY

SPRING 2014

OUR

HISTORY It was 150 years ago when American troops committed one of the worst war crimes in our nation’s history.

And it all leads back to the founder of our university.

THE DATING PUZZLE / CODY STEVENS / DOJO RAP GROUP / LIFE ON A CLEANSE

MEDILL

“

NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY Journalism • Media • Integrated Marketing Communications

The Medill Undergraduate IMC certificate has been so much more than a piece of paper to me. My professors who were industry leaders, not only taught me the fundamentals of marketing and communications that I use every day, but also inspired my passion for what I hope to achieve in my career.”

Kimberly Lee (BSJ13, IMC-Cert13) WeChat US Marketing Communications Specialist at Tencent

Medill offers a five-credit IMC certificate program for undergraduates. Students develop skills for understanding and analyzing consumers in traditional markets and evolving digital communities and networks. Students must apply to be accepted to the certificate program and complete the prerequisites.

For more information and to apply: http://www.medill.northwestern.edu/ experience/imc/certificate/index.html

SPRING 2014 || IN THIS ISSUE

hookah in CHICAGO

16 34 38

We rate nearby hookah lounges on price, flavors, service and more.

r ecogniz ing JOHN EVANS What does the University do when its founder is tied to the slaughter of innocent people?

FE ATURING Marriage 101 pg. 8

Evanston’s breweries pg. 10

Lighting your room pg. 19

Battling MS pg. 32

The NU love game pg. 42

Dillo bingo pg. 51

the odyssey of CODY STEVENS

After a wild pitch left him with hours to live, a Northwestern baseball player is back and better than ever.

northwestern NORTH BY

SPRING 2014

we asked the staff...

WHICH FICTIONAL CHARACTER MOST INFLUENCED YOUR CHILDHOOD?

@BIG_BEN_CLOCK

northbynorthwestern.com

Managing Editor | Alex Nitkin Editor-in-Chief | Megan Thielking Creative Director | Christophe Haubursin Executive Editor | Preetisha Sen SPIDER-MAN D.W. FROM ARTHUR HELGA PATAKI Photo Director | Jeremy Gaines Managing Editors | Kevin Kryah, Sam Niiro Senior Editors | Sylvan Lane, Martina Barrera-Hernandez Assistant Managing Editors | Sam Hart, Anne Li, Adam Mintzer, Zach Silva Associate Editors | Megan Fu, Jasper Scherer News Editors | Rachel Fobar, Mitchell Caminer NANCY DREW Assistant Editors | Shelbie Bostedt, Rosalie Chan Assistant News Editors | Julia Clark-Riddell, Medha Imam ARTHUR FROM ARTHUR Senior Design Editor | Steph Shapiro STEVE IRWIN Opinion Editor | Seth Kelly HAN SOLO Designers | John Hardberger, Daniel Hersh, Lucy Wang, Sarah Turbin Assistant Opinion Editors | Heather Budimulia, Orko Manna SHERLOCK HOLMES Photo Assistant | Alexis O’Connor Features Editor | Zack Woznak Photographers | Michael Nowakowski, Colton Maddox, Mikhail Tsirtsan, Assistant Features Editors | Rosalie Chan, Carter Sherman David Zhang, Ned McGregor, Ryan Alva Life & Style Editors | Tanner Howard Contributing Writers | Teresa Balisteri, Gus Berrizbeitia, Hanna Bolanos, Assistant Life & Style Editor | Teresa Balistreri, Alice Zhang Tyler Daswick, Katherine Doyle, Sarah Ehlen, Sarah Elliot, Mark Ficken, Rachel Entertainment Editor | Tyler Daswick Fobar, Clayton Gentry, Amanda Glickman, Steven Goldstein, Christian Holub, Assistant Entertainment Editors | Bo Suh, Sarah Turbin Tanner Howard, Stephanie Kelly, Kevin Kryah, Shannon Lane, Jeremy Layton, Sports Editor | Shannon Lane Caroline Levy, Tara Longardner, Sam Niiro, Mark Olade, Jessica Peng, Cami Assistant Sports Editors | Daniel Hersh, Ben Sanders Pham, Katherine Richter, Grant Rindner, Preetisha Sen, Carter Sherman, HarPolitics Editor | Alyssa Kincaid rison Simons, Kate Stein Assistant Politics Editors | David Friedman, Ashley Wood Writing Editor | Amanda Glickman Assistant Writing Editor | Ali Pelczar Photo Editor | Lucy Wang Assistant Photo Editor | Olga Gonzalez-Latapi President | Megan Thielking Video Editor | Jon Palmer Executive Vice President | Preetisha Sen Assistant Video Editors | Kelly Gonsalves, Caroline Levy Vice President | Alex Nitkin Interactive Editors | Shelbie Bostedt, Alex Duner TITO FROM ROCKET POWER Treasurer | Sylvan Lane Assistant Interactive Editors | Morgan Kinney, Luis Sanchez Secretary | Hillary Thomas Community Editor | Christian Holub CORPORATE Creative Director | Lucas Matney Directors of Marketing | Andrew Dain, Andrea Swejk Webmaster | Tyler Fisher Director of Operations | Sylvan Lane

North by Northwestern, NFP Board of Directors

Director of Talent | Christian Holub Directors of Ad Sales | Grant Rindner, Saron Strait

PUBLISHED WITH SUPPORT FROM

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GOKU

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HUR

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page 7 STUDYING MARRIAGE page 8 FACEBOOK FRESHMEN page 9 ONE PRESIDENT TO ANOTHER

PREGAME GET STARTED.

“

LIFE ADVICE FROM A PROFESSOR: KEVIN BOYLE I really feel as a newcomer to Northwestern that what Northwestern really does for students or imposes on students is an obligation. I know that it’s your hard work and your accomplishments that get you guys here, but there are so many people out there who aren’t going to get the opportunities that Northwestern students are going to get. There are millions and millions of kids who would love to be at Northwestern or a place like Northwestern and will never get it. I feel that what that does is it creates an obligation on Northwestern students. You have to take advantage of this, not because you ought to take advantage of the University and all it has to offer, but because you’re obligated to. Because you’re in a spot that millions of people would love to have.

BOYLE’S BIO Kevin Boyle is the William Smith Mason Professor of American History at Northwestern. He won the 2004 National Book Award for Arc of Justice: A Saga of Race, Civil Rights and Murder in the Jazz Age. He came to Evanston in June 2013 after teaching at Ohio State, the University of Massachusetts Amherst and University College Dublin, among other institutions.

Interview by Grant Rindner

Photo by COLTON MADDOX

PREGAME

Freshman Facebook Follies We mined the ‘18 group for naïve prospies, and we struck gold.

B Y K E V I N K RYA H

I

t’s that time of year again, dear readers: the time for incoming freshmen to hit Facebook. With levels of participation ranging from frantically searching for roommates to commenting on every post on the page, these frosh will embarrass themselves online long before they throw up at a party during Wildcat Welcome. In fact, an eager bunch of Wildkittens has already begun posting away. While we at NBN couldn’t get access to the “official” Class of 2018 Facebook group because it’s a “safe zone” (read: nexus of awkward), some overzealous prospies have posted gems in their unofficial troll’s nest of a Facebook group.

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“Are there any really great study spots/libraries close to Elder?”

Worried about studying before the summer has started? You’ll fit right in with the rest of us nerds.

“Any econ or finance majors around? Haven’t seen many of my fellow weinburg admits so far!”

“Weinburg.” This one speaks for itself.

“…I hope i don’t sound like someone on e harmony….but our relationship needs to be in harmony. ;)” You hope our relationsh–did you just flirt with me??

“Can any current students speak about the social life at NU? My brother goes to Notre Dame and at Notre Dame, Northwestern and U Chicago are known for being ‘where fun goes to die.’”

This is probably a troll, but three-quarters of the people I’ve met here (including myself) hate fun, so I’ll give this kid the benefit of the doubt.

6 Degrees, Hold the Bacon Northwestern’s beloved president has a long and convoluted link to our nation’s commander-in-chief.

BY S A M N I I R O

H

e may have taught our friends in Hyde Park, but that hasn’t kept Northwestern from having an enduring fascination with President Barack Obama. If you don’t believe me, just Google “Obama’s Big Ten team.”

Of course, he’s not our only presidential object of affection: Our own president has a certain charisma, and the Cult of Morty is alive and well here at Northwestern. But what if there were a way to connect the two?

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel was closely involved with Northwestern’s campaign to demolish Prentice Women’s Hospital, and he apparently

th Star

advised President Morton Schapiro to engage in a PR blitz in response to a preservation campaign. Before that, of course, Emanuel was in the White House, serving as Obama’s Chief of Staff.

Michael S. McPherson, Morty’s longtime writing partner in economics, is now president of the Spencer Foundation, which invests in education research. The Foundation’s former president, Patricia Graham, served on the Board of Directors for the Chicago Annenberg Challenge for public school reform. Also on that board? Barack Obama, naturally.

LO RI KLETZER

ere!

of Colby College

Most academics, Morty included, can be linked to Hungarian mathmetician Paul Erdös through other co-authors and collaborators. It’s called an Erdös number, and it’s easily the most boring parlor game in the world.

Morty authored a paper about college choice and future wages with Lori Kletzer of Colby College, who later wrote a policy brief with Robert E. Litan on worker anxiety. Dr. Litan, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute, appeared on a panel together with Columbia’s Joseph E. Stiglitz at the St. Louis Federal Reserve’s 30th annual conference. Stiglitz authored with economist Partha S. Dasgupta, who wrote with Nobel laureate Eric S. Maskin, who co-authored with decision-making pioneer Peter C. Fishburn, who wrote with Paul Erdös. That gives Morty an Erdös number of seven.

Kevin Bacon needs no extensive

ROBE RT E . LITAN

of the Brookings Institute

introduction. Paul Erdös himself actually has a Bacon number of five, because he’s linked through mathematician Ronald Graham, who appeared in an experimental documentary with choreographer Merce Cunningham. Cunningham appeared in a documentary on composer John Cage with Rutger Hauer.

Hauer served as the henchman of evil queen Dianne Wiest in the fantasy miniseries The 10th Kingdom, and Wiest of course played the reverend’s wife in Kevin Bacon’s magnum opus, Footloose. The Baconator himself has an Obama number of two, because he starred with Tom Hanks in Apollo 13, and Tom Hanks was in a documentary about the Obama campaign, which, of course, Barack Obama was also in. All together, that gives Morty an ErdösBacon-Obama number of 14.

J OSE P H E. ST IGLIT Z of Columbia

PART HA S. DASGUP TA economist

MO RTY illustration by sarah turbin; photo by katherine tang, jurvetson @ flickr

E RI C S .

MAS K I N KEVIN B A C ON

Nobel laureate

TOM HA N KS

BARACK OBAMA P E TE R C .

FISHB UR N decision-making pioneer

R O N A LD G R AH A M mathematician

PAUL E RDÖS

MERCE CUN N I N G HAM

mathematician

choreographer

JOHN CA GE composer

RUT GE R HAUE R actor

DIANNE W IE ST actress

NORTHBYNORTHWESTERN.COM | 7

PREGAME

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very Spring Quarter SESP offers a popular course called “Building Loving and Lasting Relationships: Marriage 101.” This course intends to “familiarize students with the intricacies and problems of close, committed, interpersonal relationships, especially marriage,” according to the syllabus.

Here, three freshmen share their experiences in the class so far.

Married Life 101 Students give an inside look into Northwestern’s marriage class.

B Y M A R T I N A B A R R ERA-H ERN A N DEZ

Caroline Gold, SESP freshman “I signed up to take Marriage 101 because I had heard from countless people that it is a must-take class at Northwestern. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from the class given that I am not married or in a committed relationship. Now that we are a few weeks into the course, however, I’ve realized it is more about finding yourself and what you bring to a relationship. I have learned a lot about my vulnerabilities, where they come from, and why I react to them the way I do. I definitely did not expect the course to get so personal so quickly, but I have been impressed with how willing everyone is to share such private information in our discussion section.”

Sarah Lee, SESP freshman “I took Marriage 101 because I heard it was a highly recommended and competitive course to get into.

I am learning that things that seem obvious are not always so—it takes intention in thought and action to maintain a healthy relationship. I have also been thinking about my own vulnerabilities and fears in relationships and how I react when these are triggered inside. How much stems from my upbringing and how much has always been a part of me?”

Ian Pappas, SESP freshman “Marriage 101 has been a great class so far, although the concepts that are brought up during lecture are not groundbreaking. This class makes me think about things that I would not have had time to think about had I not been enrolled in this class. Because of this class, I am coming to a greater understanding of myself, my weaknesses and also what I am like in a relationship. These are all things that I can carry with me not only in my romantic relationships, but also in my friendships in the future.”

photo by michael nowakowski 8 | SPRING 2014

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page 12 CHICAGO BARBECUE page 17 DILLO WORKOUTS

page 19 LIGHT YOUR ROOM

genius Live smarter.

THE NEW KEG ON THE BLOCK The Peckish Pig, Smylie Brothers Brewing Co. and the Temperance Beer company are re-vamping the Evanston pub scene. page 12

Photo by COLTON MADDOX

genius

THE KEGS OF

Evanston Take a tour of Evanston’s newest microbreweries.

B Y M A R K O L ALD E

“WHAT ARE YOU, CRAZY?”

10 | S P R I N G 2 0 1 4

BEERMASTER Josh Gilbert, owner of the Temperance Beer Company, holds one of his signature beers. ing since college, but nothing came of it until the recession hit his architecture firm and a waning interest in the profession finally forced him to look for something new.

“I knew as an Evanstonian that there was a lot of hometown pride, and I was hoping that we could tap into that,” he says, wryly smiling at his own pun.

“And so far, there has been a really warm response from the community.”

A former owner of the Celtic Knot, Debbie Evans opened Peckish Pig restaurant and brewery on Howard Street in March along with her husband and a brewer. She says that the town has been both helpful and receptive.

“It’s the place th at prohibition started,” she adds.

“There’s a little naughtiness around it. There was never any alcohol or beer around, so it’s like ‘Wow, Evanston’s doing beer?’”

Down Chicago Avenue, Cesar Marron and Shawn Decker teamed up to form Sketchbook Brewing Company, a nanobrewery with those core concepts in mind. Fittingly, they found warehouse space just down the road from homebrewing shop Brew Camp, in a building that included science and engineering startups. The pair hopes to one day attract interns from Northwestern who could use the brewery as a science playground, studying its energy efficiency and environmental footprint.

Brewing is an energy and water intensive process, but Sketchbook’s ideas of water recycling and utilizing the great outdoors to heat and cool beer throughout the process could lessen that.

“I see us as part of the Slow Food movement, really,” Decker says. “I also think of brewing as a gateway drug because people love beer, and it’s a way of getting people into ideas of sustainability, local production, and do-it-yourself.”

photos by michael nowakowski, mark olalde and ryan alva

Mike Smylie says with a smile, remembering how his friends responded to the news that he was opening a brewpub. The former commodities broker who watched his job get replaced by computers let out a laugh as he surveyed an old unemployment office rapidly transforming into Smylie Brothers Brewing Company. The first recipient of an Evanston liquor license under new rules made specifically to include beer tasting, his brewpub on Oak Avenue is sprinting toward its opening date.

Smylie’s dream is just one of many flourishing in Evanston. With the U.S. beer industry generating $100 billion annually, Evanston is fully embracing craft beer, and brewers have found immediate success.

Smylie is confident in the future of Evanston’s new beer ventures. “[There’s a] 100-plus-year-old university here that’s not going anywhere, the town is growing in size, and there’s a lot of young people,” he explains.

For the past two decades the craft beer industry has maintained—except for a slight stagnation in the early stages of the recession—a skyrocketing trajectory. According to the Brewers Association, a national nonprofit representing amateur and craft brewers, 2013 saw craft beer continue its torrid growth across the U.S., welcoming 413 new breweries and brewpubs. The organization reported an 18 percent increase in craft production by volume, to the point where craft beer now accounts for 7.8 percent of U.S. beer production by volume and 14.3 percent by profit.

It’s a Thursday afternoon, but the sunlight streaming through Temperance Beer Company’s open doors lands on an already decent-sized crowd mingling in the taproom on Dempster Street. Josh Gilbert, the owner, hurries about taking drink orders, filling growlers and making sure his customers are happy. This is his favorite part of the job: being present with those enjoying his product.

“People who come in the taproom will tell us ‘Thank you so much, Evanston needed this,’” Gilbert says, adding that even local politicians were excited by his idea for a brewery.

Gilbert, who graduated from Evanston Township High School, entertained the notion of brew-

Not Just a Drink W Who knew beer could be so versatile?

B Y D A N I E LLE ELLI O T

hen you grab a six-pack, odds are you aren’t thinking about how you can use beer on your fish or for your face. But it can be more than just a drink.

Beer has the taste, protein and vitamins that make it great for not just pong, but for cooking and body treatments too.

Brew your ‘do

Soak your skin

Baking with beer

HERE’S A NEW TAKE ON SHAMPOO AND CONDITIONER: Bröö hair care, sold at Whole Foods. Co-founder Brad Pearsall started the brand after his mother suggested beer as a natural conditioner, which she used in college. After 53 rejected formulas, Pearsall and his wife came up with a salon-quality, all-natural shampoo and conditioner where the primary ingredient is beer. They later expanded to an entire line of hair and body products with beer as the number one ingredient.

“The barley, grain and hops [flowers] in beer provide B vitamins, minerals and proteins that make your hair stronger, healthier and shinier,” Pearsall says.

After trying the product myself, I could see what he was talking about. My hair felt softer and smoother than usual. Surprisingly, when I opened my bottle of Hydrating Porter Shampoo and Conditioner, it didn’t smell like beer at all.

Bröö doesn’t use many of the chemicals or dyes typically found in conventional hair care products, leaving the shampoo and conditioner with its natural color, an unappealing mud-brown. While using beer shampoo can sound off-putting, my concerns were quickly dispelled when I realized how much healthier my hair seemed without any of the harmful additives.

THE FOUR SEASON RESORT SPA IN VAIL, COLO. OFFERS body wraps, scrubs, a foot soak and massages that use beer in oils and lotions to help moisturize and exfoliate skin.

A year ago, Kevin Hitt, lead therapist and spa supervisor, created the “Brew and Renew” treatment after learning about the drink’s beneficial qualities.

“Beer has a lot of B vitamins and folic acids that are great for balancing the pH in skin,” Hitt says.

Instead of leaving smelling like the basement of a frat party, each different treatment pairs beer with another ingredient like honey, pine or citrus to add sweetness.

“Many of our customers are worried that they will end up smelling like beer, but the treatments leave their skin feeling really soft, buttery and plump,” Hitt says. “It’s not a fluke to pour beer on someone. It has benefits to the body.”

AT HEWN BAKERY ON DEMPSTER STREET, BREAD AND butter is replaced with bread and beer. Through a partnership with the Evanston craft brewery Temperance Beer Co., Hewn collects the rye grains used in the brewing process and adds them to their bread.

Head baker and co-owner Ellen King says their “Spent Grain” bread is popular among customers.

“The rye berries add fiber and provides more of a texture than an added flavor,” King says. “It makes the bread softer and more doughy.”

Deep-fried beer

photos by michael nowakowski, mark olalde and ryan alva

AT BAR LOUIE ON SHERMAN AVENUE, BEER CAN BE found in a glass or on a plate. The restaurant uses beer in the batter of its fried foods like fish and tempura shrimp, as well as for braising mussels. Ike Robertson, the general manager, says these dishes are solid sellers year-round.

“The Blue Moon beer we use adds a nice spice to the batter that makes the dish taste lighter,” Robertson says.

With a plate of “Drunken Fish & Chips” in front of me, I knew I couldn’t go wrong. I could taste the spice Robertson was talking about. The batter has a kick that’s distinguishable but not strong.

When beer is used in cooking the alcohol evaporates, leaving the natural flavors of the oats and barley to come through rather than the intoxicant. In the dish, the tastes of the butter, fish and beer spice blend well together, adding a pleasant twist to a classic bar food and giving a new incentive to visit any bar—not that I needed one.

DIY: Beer facial On a Friday night whim, I made myself a facial with beer. I mixed egg whites with lemon juice and Keystone Light and brushed it on my face. Honestly, the process was pretty disgusting. I got beer and egg whites in my eyes and mouth, and it dripped down my shirt. After a few minutes, it dried as a thin film and made my face feel stiff.

But after I washed it off with warm water, my face felt incredibly refreshed. Instead of feeling sticky and smelling like beer as I had expected, my skin felt rejuvenated. Someone should have a spa-themed frat party: Everyone can throw beer on one another to have great skin. It would be the most hygienic decision you’ve ever made at a frat party. Win-win.

Tip: Use hand-crafted beers for body treatments because they include a higher quality of ingredients, making it even better for your skin.

DEFINITELY NOT BUSCH Evanston breweries offer high-class beers that you won’t find at any frat party. Of course, you can do so much more with beer than drink it.

DIY: Beer bread In an attempt at domesticity, I baked my own beer bread. Using one bottle of Stella Artois and the following ingredients, I made one loaf. After 45 minutes in the oven, the bread came out toasted on the top and smelling enticingly like beer. My friends devoured it, saying it tasted like the love-child of a soft pretzel and cornbread. It was moist and dense, and would be perfect with butter as an appetizer or as a heavier snack while drinking.

Recipe for beer bread: Ingredients: • 3 cups flour • 3 3/4 teaspoons of baking powder • 3/4 teaspoon of salt • 1/2 cup sugar • 12 ounces beer • 2 tablespoons melted butter Directions: Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Butter a loaf pan and set aside. In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar and beer, and mix well. The mixture should be sticky. Pour into the loaf pan and bake for 45 minutes. At the last three minutes of baking, remove from oven, brush the top of the loaf with butter and return to oven.

NORTHBYNORTHWESTERN.COM | 11

GENIUS genius

photo by david zhang

WHO’S YOUR MAMA? Paula Haney is Hoosier Mama Pie Co.’s proud pie-prietor.

Eat dessert first . . .

A Sweet Slice of Indiana Evanston has a new favorite pie shop. BY TARA LONGARDNE R

“I

That was when the fictitious pie shop became a real plan. The Hoosier Mama Pie Co. team started in 2005 by selling at local farmers’ markets while planning to open up an actual shop.

"We sat down and made a list of iconic pies," Haney says. "After that it was based on season. We get most of our produce from local farmers, so we would see what was available, then make a recipe to correspond to it."

The Hoosier Mama team read cookbooks from the 1930s and 1940s, a time period Haney dubs the "Heyday of Pie." "The 1965 Farm Journal actually recommended not trying to make what ended up becoming one of our most popular pies, Hoosier Sugar Cream," she says.

After filling her home with diner odds and ends, Haney opened the first Hoosier Mama Pie at 1618 W. Chicago Ave. in 2009. The second location, combined with Dollop Coffee Co., opened in November at 749 Chicago Ave. and stands as Evanston’s only specialty pie shop.

As for whether Hoosier Mama Pie Co. competes with the other bakeries and pastry shops in the areas, Jory Downer—owner of Bennison’s Bakery, an Evanston favorite—isn’t worried. “[Hoosier Mama] is far enough away and different enough from our store that we really don’t compete,” Downer says.

“There are some awesome bakeries out there, and we don’t want to compete with them,” Haney agrees. “We do what we do, and let other places do their thing.”

Hoosier Mama’s thing is simplicity.

“We intentionally avoided trying to come up with wacky combinations. I was really tired of all the trends and ‘hot new’ stuff,” Haney says.

photos by michael nowakowski

t started out as a joke,” says Paula Haney, an Indianapolis native. “My husband would talk about opening this fictitious pie shop, and pretty soon we couldn’t think of anything else.”

Having spent most of her career in fine dining, Haney found herself stressed out and tired.

“On one of my days off, I went looking for pie because that was comforting to me,'’she says. “There was no place to get a slice of pie and coffee, to just sit down and read a book, to have a nice conversation.”

“Our most popular pie is apple—it’s an American favorite—and I don’t expect that to change.”

That said, the shop sells more than ABOVE: The shop’s 100 different pies with names like “Fat top-seller: classic Elvis” and “Funeral.”

Apple Pie “The ‘Funeral’ pie comes from the RIGHT: The Amish practice of bringing a pie to a funerauthor’s pick: al,” she says. “It often has raisins in it. We Hoosier Sugar put rum in ours because we’re not Amish, Cream Pie and we really like rum.”

Regarding the Evanston location, everyone at Hoosier Mama is excited to have the space and opportunity to focus more on savory menu items and invent new pie combinations.

“We aren’t even thinking about [opening up another shop],” Haney says. “We’re focusing on perfecting what we have now.”

However, most people who visit the shop think it’s pretty close to perfect.

“I love the natural lighting, high ceilings, and simple, delicious food and drinks,” says Weinberg freshman Ben Levey.

Not to worry, pie lovers: The intimate small-town atmosphere of Hoosier Mama won’t be changing. Take some reading, work or friends.

Sit at the counter to watch the bakers in action or get comfortable in the dining area. Whatever you do, get a little of pie and maybe some coffee, and you’ll find out exactly why Haney always wanted a shop like this.

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TRUE BLUE

BBQ

BY STEPHANIE KELLY

B photo by david zhang

arry Sorkin, the owner and operator of Smoque BBQ started his Chicago restaurant seven years ago. At that time there were only a handful of barbeque restaurants that did the slow smoke, oven barbecue style.

“We’ve always had our rib joints here, and I think people just accepted that as what is barbecue,” Sorkin says. “I think Chicago thought it was a barbecue town until it got some new places that came along and did what I would call true, regional, American barbecue.”

Twin Anchors, located on N. Sedgwick Street, is in its 82nd year of business and is the fourth–oldest continuously operating restaurant in Chicago.

Chicago-style barbecue, as described by co-owner Paul Tuzi, doesn’t involve smoking the meat. Because of this, Tuzi says that some people wouldn’t even call this barbecue.

“We’ve been doing this a long time— longer than most—so we don’t feel that we have to be concerned if we’re not fitting somebody else’s exact definition,” Tuzi says.

Since the 1930s, Twin Anchors has been slow-cooking its meat for seven hours and then putting it onto the grill with one of the three barbecue sauces.

Newer restaurants like Smoque BBQ are basing their barbecue off the Southern scene.

Before Sorkin opened Smoque BBQ he traveled to Kansas City, Memphis and Austin. Sorkin used his experiences in those

cities to inspire the flavors in his restaurant, while adding his own spin to the process. For instance, Sorkin says, his brisket is inspired by what he saw in Austin. The emergence of this smoking style in Chicago has led to even more barbecue restaurants.

“Once they got a taste of that, people just kind of ran with it,” Sorkin says.

But Gary Wiviott, author of Low & Slow: Master the Art of Barbecue in 5 Easy Lessons and pitmaster at Chicago’s Barn & Company, has a different theory altogether about what constitutes Chicago barbecue.

For Wiviott, there are three distinct styles of barbecue in Chicago.

First is Twin Anchors’ style, called “tavern style,” which does not have any interaction between woodsmoke and meat.

According to Wiviott this lack of interaction means it is not actual barbecue.

“Just because something has barbecue sauce on it,” he says, “doesn’t mean that it’s barbecue.”

Second, Smoque BBQ and Barn & Company use “urban barbecue,” where the meat is cooked on commercial smokers with woodsmoke. Wiviott says this type of barbecue is a little more commercialized.

“There certainly may be some established places that smoke their barbecue, and it does seem most of the newer places do,” Tuzi says. “It is always worth noting that there are numerous styles of barbecue, each with passionate followings.”

Then, there’s the third and final style.

Common in the South Side and West Side, this style uses aquarium smokers, and the meat interacts with heat, smoke and fire.

“To me, that’s Chicago barbecue,” Wiviott says. “People have been cooking since the 40’s that style of barbecue in Chicago.”

Both Sorkin and Tuzi are confident in the product they put out.

“I think that one of the great things about barbecue is that everybody does it a little bit different,” Sorkin says.

. . . then dinner. photos by michael nowakowski

CRAVING ‘CUE IN CHI-TOWN? TRY ONE OF THESE NBN-APPROVED (M)EATERIES. Rub’s Backcountry Smokehouse 6954 N. Western Ave. 773–674–1410

Smoque BBQ 3800 N. Pulaski Rd. 773–545–7427

Twin Anchors Tavern 1655 N. Sedgwick St. 312–266–1616

Pork Shoppe 2755 W. Belmont Ave. 773–961–7654

Try the brisket and the custard-filled corn bread at this authentic Rogers Park smokehouse.

The star here is anything with “rib” in the title. And don’t forget to grab some peach cobbler for the road.

Southern BBQ snobs may sneer at Chicago-style, but there’s no arguing with these famous ribs.

Treat yo’ self to some meat at this new arrival on the BBQ block—the variety of meats is bound to please all carnivores.

NORTHBYNORTHWESTERN.COM | 13

pie&BBQ.indd 27

5/18/14 3:31 PM

genius

C ALORIES

Starbucks

Plain Bagel 270 calories Blueberry Muffin 320 Black Coffee 5 (12 oz) Sweetened Iced Tea 60 (12 oz)

Dunkin’ 310 calories 460 5 (10 oz) 80 (16 oz)

Our Starbucks bagel was 5 inches in diameter.

Dunkin’s was 4.5 inches.

14 24 || SF PA RL LI N2G0 21 30 1 4

What does Norris dining look like in the future?

Some students want more.

Common suggestions include Chick-fil-A, Whataburger, In-N-Out Burger, Wendy’s, Pasta Pomodoro, Forever Yogurt and Steak ‘n Shake.

Although it may seem impossible to have these stores incorporated into Norris, Sodexo is receptive to student input. In the past, Sodexo has focused on the Norris dining experience “driven by student input,” Sophian says.

“We continue to use surveys, national and local data, and trends to drive change regarding our food and other experiential offerings at Norris,” he adds.

Sophian knows Dunkin’ is a good fit for Norris.

“I don’t know of any other college campuses that can say they have a Dunkin’ Donuts, Starbucks, Frontera and Subway all within seconds of each other,” he says.

The public has spoken, and the consensus is that the two are, indeed, very different. Just like the old saying says, “Make new friends, but keep the old!”

You don’t have to part with Norbucks forever; just give Dunkin’ a chance.

STARBUCKS vs. DUNKIN’ Are you a Norbuck or a Nornut?

BY C AMI P HAM PRICES Plain Bagel Blueberry Muffin Black Coffee Sweetened Iced Tea

Starbucks $1.25 $2.45 $1.75 (tall) $1.75 (tall)

Dunkin’ $1.19 $1.79 $1.49 (small) $1.89 (small)

Starbucks has 36,461,691 Facebook likes.

Dunkin’ Donuts has 11,414,435.

The Dunkin’ Donuts in Norris is the only location in Chicago that makes their donuts in their own kitchen.

photo by michael nowakowski, illustrations by steph shapiro

S

pring Quarter guarantees new, exciting things: sunshine, romantic walks on North Beach, new classes, shorts weather and the muchanticipated Dunkin’ Donuts, which had its soft opening in Norris on March 31. Despite the Dunkin’ hype, students all over campus were wondering why this addition was being made when Starbucks already sells coffee and pastries.

According to Sodexo marketing manager Jason Sophian, bringing a Dunkin’ Donuts to Northwestern was an effort to appease everyone’s palates. They installed a Dunkin’ Donuts partly because they “looked into the geographic parameters of where the student body is from,” and “a high percentage of students are from the Northeast, where Dunkin’ Donuts is prime,” Sophian says.

When “punching in the numbers,” Sophian noticed Dunkin’ Donuts had a huge appeal that granted Sodexo the ability to bring onto campus something that would give a large chunk of students a taste of home.

But each store has its loyal customers.

“The difference between them is like the difference between Coke and Pepsi,” Sophian says. “Coke has their following, and Pepsi has their following.”

Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts may seem the same at first glance, but here’s a deeper look into two of the nation’s biggest coffee shops and what sets them apart.

Dunkin’ Donuts has a food-heavy menu. On the other hand, the Norris Starbucks isn’t the best place to go if you’re starving. While Norbucks offers food options like muffins, some sandwiches, oatmeal, yogurt and fruit, it’s still more of a coffee shop.

Drinks are generally the bestsellers at both Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbucks, says Lauren Peerless, Sodexo retail operations manager.

“Starbucks tastes bolder, and Dunkin’ is lighter,” Peerless says. “Starbucks is probably more appealing to someone who drinks coffee regularly, while Dunkin’ is approachable to someone who doesn’t drink coffee all the time.”

Ask NBN

We took a crack at some of your burning questions.

Why does the University

Why are we on the

BURN THE LAGOON every year?

QUARTER SYSTEM?

The University website claims that the quarter system “allows students to take a greater number of courses and tends to encourage participation in internships.” Although this may be true, we have a pretty intense love-hate relationship with this system that turns midterms into a 10-week endeavor. As for where exactly this idea came from, the system was introduced in 1942 with the birth of the Technological Institute, now known as the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science.

Benefactor Walter P. Murphy required the engineering program to run on quarters (money talks, and NU is always listening). To make things uniform across colleges, officials decided to put the whole University on the quarter system. So the next time all your non-NU friends are already on summer break, you can blame the engineers.

Need a Ride?

The burning that goes on around the Lakefill is based on the same science used by farmers, ranchers and environmental workers throughout the world. Burning the grass creates an ideal environment for prairie growth to begin. Lakefill restoration has been spearheaded by Students for Ecological and Environmental Development (SEED), whose members work to eliminate exotic invasive species and dead plants, in order to restore the natural prairie habitat. Northwestern also hired landscaping company TGF Enterprises to achieve the same goal. These environmental restoration plans aim to return the Lakefill’s environment to the area’s natural state, a combination of wetland, prairie and savanna habitats.

What’s the deal with the

STEAM TUNNELS?

Dating back to the 1960s, the steam tunnels are utility paths that run underneath campus.

The underground paths are used to transfer steam, chilled water, electricity and lab gases between buildings. According to Jim McKinney, a staff engineer with Facilities Management, the steam tunnels are not safe to walk in and are considered a confined environment. “They were not designed as a pedestrian environment,” McKinney says. “There are a lot of places for people to get injured.” The steam tunnels can reach up to 400 degrees Farenheit, and there are also tripping hazards. There are various access points throughout campus, but they are “locked and monitored,” according to McKinney. Tell that to the adventurous students who still manage to find their way in.

All these transportation services can get you home from the Deuce, but which is best?

TA XI 303 Ride Experience: 4.5/5 Sidecar drivers set their own price based on the type of car, their driver rating and any possible amenities they provide. That’s right: For a slightly higher price you could get some snacks and drinks along with your ride. An added bonus is knowing the exact cost of your ride before you request it, which is something the other services don’t offer.

Ease of Use: 5/5 At the bottom of each driver profile is a small section where they convince you to pick them with wit, character and whether or not you get a bag of PopChips along with the ride.

Price: 4/5 Because the drivers name their own rates, the price for the ride may be higher than the other services. This is offset slightly by the competitive nature of getting your ride request.

Price to O’Hare: ~$30

Overall: 4.5/5

UBE R Ride Experience: 4.5/5 Uber uses a democratic system that rewards good behavior and punishes you if you throw up in the backseat of the car, because the driver rates you as a passenger. When you request a ride, the nearby drivers see this rating and decide whether they want to give you a ride.

Ease of Use: 5/5 Open the app, which uses GPS to find you, choose which service you want to use, request the ride and a text will arrive when the car pulls up. Once the ride is over, thank the driver and leave — the app pays automatically, and there’s no tipping.

Price: 4.5/5 Uber sets itself apart by providing a service for all price ranges. While it doesn’t name the price of the ride upfront, the fare calculator is usually accurate.

Price to O’Hare = ~$25 (UberX) ~$55-71 (Uber Black) Overall: 4.7/5

BY MA R K F I C K E N

SI DE CAR Ride Experience: 3/5 It’s all a crapshoot when it comes to cabs. You don’t know who the driver will be, and you don’t know if there’ll be used fast food wrappers in the backseat of the car. When you win, you win, but when you lose, you lose big time.

Ease of Use: 3/5 You can only order a cab over the phone or online.

This means you either have to call the dispatcher to request a car or log on to their website. While this isn’t a major inconvenience, it does mean the wait can be longer. Or, you could walk a couple blocks and hail a cab from the street, but isn’t the whole point to avoid walking?

Price: 4/5 Depending on the distance of the ride, it can be expensive. Price to O’Hare = $32 Overall: 3.3/5

TAX I WA R S

Uber and Sidecar’s days of unregulated bliss may soon be over. Under the conditions of HB 4075, all drivers in Illinois would need to obtain a chauffeur license and commercial insurance. This would prohibit drivers from picking up or dropping passengers off at the airport. Uber executives have accused the bill as a veiled attack on their business model by the taxi lobby, while supporters claim the bill protects the passenger’s safety. The bill passed the House and is now under consideration in the Illinois State Senate.

N NO OR RT TH HB BY YN NO OR RT TH HWWE ES ST TE ER RN N. C. CO OMM | | 31 5

genius

Shisha in Chicago

House of Hookah Belmont, Red Line

We found the best places to get your hookah on in the Windy City. 607 W. Belmont Ave.

BY A LE X I S O ’ CO N N O R After waiting 20 minutes to be seated, I ended up having to

S

hisha, also known as hookah, has been a social activity in the Middle East and Southeast Asia for centuries. Now hookah bars are popping up in cities all over America and naturally, college students are at the forefront of this trend. As 18-and-up facilities, they offer a different social scene than the dreary dorm rooms or overcrowded frats we have all gotten too used to.

After a stop by Kush, a hookah lounge in Skokie, my interests were piqued— what others exist outside our Evanston bubble? After testing out a few, I found that not all hookah bars are created equal.

share a table with strangers. The overcrowded atmosphere at House of Hookah may have been due to the warm weather on a Friday night, but it was uncomfortable nonetheless. On a good note, they sell hookahs and other products to smoke out of. The surrounding neighborhood off the Belmont Red Line stop has many restaurants and bars, so if you’re planning a night out, this could be an interesting way to spice up the night. The service is pretty friendly, and my waitress was more than happy to suggest (and warn about) certain flavors.

Price Per Hookah: $18 BYOB: Yes NBN recommended flavor: Double Apple with Mint Most Interestingly Named Flavors: Sex on the Beach, Love Potion #9, Green Genie

Samah Hookah Lounge North Loyola, Red Line 1219 W. Devon Ave.

Ambrosia Café

As the most authentic of the places I have visited in Chicago so far, Ambrosia offers a much more open and comfortable atmosphere than House of Hookah. Hookah flavors and drink choices were limited and prices were a little steep. Customers have to pay an extra $5 if they want two hoses on the hookah to share.

Even so, there was much more space and the cool breeze from an open door kept the air refreshing. Multiple sports games were being played on their TV screens and the crowd was generally high-spirited. Although the crowd seemed to be in their mid-to-late-20s, I coincidentally ran into some Northwestern students on the way out.

Stretching Your Buck

I

Total: $15.25/$8.25

Price Per Hookah: $18 BYOB: Yes NBN recommended flavor: Strawberry

For the Baseball Fan

For the Downtown Explorer

Buy Cubs tickets ahead of time on StubHub $10 Take the Red Line to Addison $2.25 Buy snacks outside the stadium $5 Eat at Bacci Pizzeria $5 Take the L home $2.25

Take the Red Line to Lake $2.25 See the Chicago Symphony Orchestra $10 Visit the Art Institute: FREE Visit the Chicago Cultural Center FREE Drink coffee at Intelligentsia Coffee $5 Take the L home $2.25

Total: $24.50

Total: $19.50

photo by colton maddox

Armitage, Brown Line 1963 N. Sheffield Ave.

26 | F A L L 2 0 1 3 16 | SPRING 2014

hookah-workout.indd 26

5/18/14 3:27 PM

photos by alexis o’connor

Dimmed lights, comfy couches and the fruity smell of shisha greet you at the door of this hookah lounge. With almost 100 flavors to choose from, Samah does not disappoint. The highlight of this lounge is the back rooms. Enveloped in curtains and surrounded by lush pillows, it’s the perfect place to relax with friends or bring a date. If you want to indulge in one of the back rooms, make sure to reserve it ahead of time, especially on the weekend. When conversation runs low, Samah also provides a number of board games to keep the vibe alive. “Party Packages,” by far the best deal, are available for groups of three or at about $10 per person.

These Chicago excursions more Located off the Loyola Red Line stop, Samah is the closest hookah bar will leave your wallet for NU students. Unfortunately it is happy. BY TANNER HOWARD not BYOB, but the shisha is good and t’s finally warm outside, which the atmosphere is even better. means your “I’ll go to the city when it’s not frostbite-inducingly cold” Price Per Hookah: $15 excuse for not seeing the city is gone.

BYOB: No While it’s easy to visit Chi-town on NBN recommended flavor: 5 Amigos paper, many students are daunted Most Interestingly Named Flavors: by the potentially high cost of making Old Gregg, Super Nintendo, Obama their way south. But that doesn’t have to be the case. Here are three different excursions, all for less than For the Adventurous Studier $25, that will let you see more of the Second City without Take the Red Line to Clark/Division $2.25 having to take out a Study at Newberry Library FREE second mortgage Snack at Sprinkles Cupcakes $3.75 on your parents’ Visit the Museum of Contemporary Art home. $7/FREE on Tuesdays.

Take the L home $2.25

You drink: Three shots of Fireball Cinnamon Whisky (324 calories) You do: Make out with six random strangers for 20 minutes—each—at an offcampus party/tailgate According to Cosmopolitan magazine, 20 minutes of making out can burn up to 59 calories. According to my calculations, it would only take six random, 20-minute makeouts to burn off those delicious, no-chaser-needed Fireball shots you just took with your sorority sisters. So put on those beer goggles, toss on some ChapStick and pucker up to burn a few extra cals during the middle of your day.

You drink: 12 ounces of Sunset Blush Franzia (228 calories) You do: 30 minutes of hula-hooping Though many of us haven’t picked up a hula hoop since approximately 2004, it’s actually a surprisingly simple and enjoyable fat-blasting workout. So if you’re worried that your early morning Tour de Franzia was a little too indulgent, just grab a hoop and get your hips moving. Forgot your hula hoop collection at home? No worries—Mayfest will provide hula hoops on the Lakefill as long as you provide the quality entertainment that comes with drunken hula-hooping.

You drink: Two Keystone Light beers (208 calories) You do: Seven laps around the Maple Ave./Gaffield Pl. block while a fraternity party clears out/you think of a brother’s name to drop at the door next time around

JUST D(ILL)O IT Burn off that beer gut with these D-Day workouts.

BY S A R A H E H LEN

photos by alexis o’connor

W

ith the arrival of each Spring Quarter, Northwestern students look forward to the same traditional spring season treasures year in and year out: walks on the Lakefill, jorts weather and the awesome concerts—and by awesome concerts, we mean abundant public intoxication—of Dillo Day. While the tradition of consuming copious amounts of alcohol on Dillo continues to reign strong, some of us are simultaneously trying to maintain/obtain/conceptualize a summer beach-bod. So fear not, fitness freaks—here are a few ways to have your cake (or many cans of Busch Light) and eat it too.

You drink: Two mimosas (331 calories) You do: Approximately 60 minutes of longboarding around campus Since everyone gets to pretend they’re really #hipster on Dillo Day, longboarding is completely acceptable for anyone looking to sneak in some exercise or just get from Elder back to the Lakefill in less than 15 minutes after a midday nap. Just beware that operating a longboard under the influence of your favorite brunch beverage is easier said than done, so maybe wait for the soberness to set in before attempting this calorie-burner. NBN cannot be held responsible for any scraped knees, faceplants or twisted ankles stemming from LBUI (longboarding under the influence).

“Ah, sorry, man. We’re pretty packed right now, but like, take a lap and we’ll clear some people out.” Though this line, dropped at the front door of many an off-campus fraternity party, is usually a terrible sign, use it on Dillo Day as an opportunity to burn off those two cans of really shitty beer you shotgunned at 8 a.m. Seven laps around an Evanston block adds up to approximately three miles, and at a brisk pace this will burn about 210 calories.

You drink: Two bottles of Mike’s Hard Lemonade (440 calories) You do: 95 minutes of dancing with that random guy from your econ discussion section Here’s the thing: Even if Sober You doesn’t like dancing, Drunk You probably does. One of the easiest ways you can burn a few extra calories this Dillo is simply by showing off your moves. The music is provided, the atmosphere is perfect, and all your BFFs who you used to dance with at The Keg (RIP) will be congregated at one convenient location.

What could be better? So keep your feet moving, throw in a couple of fist pumps and get a little weird while you exercise those sugary Mike’s away.

NORTHBYNORTHWESTERN.COM | 27 NORTHBYNORTHWESTERN.COM | 1 7

hookah-workout.indd 27

5/18/14 3:28 PM

SOUP Who You Gonna Call?

Soup Hotline!

This is an amazing story . It was written by a talented and beautiful author. B Y SOME ONE COOL

Hi l l e l p r o vi d es free m atzo bal l soup to sick stu d e n ts.

B Y K AT H E R I NE RI CHTER

T

18 | S P R I N G 2 0 1 4

can call and request soup for their children. No immediate donation is required, but parents will often make a small contribution to show their appreciation for the delivery.

But what is matzo ball soup, exactly? Matzo balls have a dumpling consistency and are made from a mixture of matzo meal, eggs, water and a fat, ordinarily oil, margarine or chicken fat. The soup is made in Hillel kitchens with parve ingredients—free from traces of dairy or meat—according to the Hillel website. The Chicago Rabbinical Council certifies the soup kosher.

The Director of First Impressions, a student who works at the front desk

of Hillel, makes and delivers the soup during his or her shift.

Jewish culture is largely embedded with a tradition of sumptuous meals. Weekly Shabbat dinners and Passover Seder meals mix ceremony and recipe.

By providing traditional food like matzo ball soup, Hillel keeps students rooted in their faith on a campus that is, in many cases, a plane ride away from home.

“Soup hotline numbers aren’t tremendously high,” Panter says. “It’s not essentially a ‘secret soup,’ but we have a million-and-one things going on at Hillel. It’s hard to take time and give it great attention.”

photo by michael nowakowski

here’s something about salty, carb-laden soup that can salvage a crummy day.

The Campbell’s Instant variety just cannot replace the homemade, medicinal quality of soup that under-the-weather students crave.

Matzo Ball Soup to the Rescue is a solution to this piteous problem.

A free and under-wraps service, the “soup hotline” delivers kosher matzo ball soup to sick Northwestern students. This soup for the soul is free and provided to students by Hillel, Northwestern’s on-campus Jewish community center.

Becky Panter, former development associate at Hillel, says parents

The “million-and-one” programs at Hillel have helped maintain a Jewish foundation for students and have additionally created a culture of diverse food on campus. “Latkepalooza” is celebrated in the winter to honor Hanukkah, an event replete with fried potato pancakes. Mega Shabbat, hosted in Allison Dining Hall, serves 400 students a traditional Shabbat dinner in the winter. During Passover Hillel is the only totally kosher dining hall on campus, Panter says, and students can swipe their Wildcards for lunch and dinner.

“Food is a very central piece at Hillel,” Panter says. “It’s a key part of the advertising we do.”

SESP freshman Caroline Gold remembers hearing about the soup hotline during the Fall Activities Fair in Norris. She ordered from the convenient service when she was sick in the winter.

“I had a good experience when I ordered it for myself,” Gold says. “The soup tasted great.”

For Gold’s mother, Beth, the soup delivery was a meaningful gesture she could not otherwise offer from Dallas.

“When I learned of the Hillel soup delivery service, I was truly touched and impressed,” Beth Gold says. “As a parent, it is a horrible feeling to get ‘that’ phone call—the ‘Mom, I don’t feel well’ phone call when you live thousands of miles away and can’t jump in the car to the rescue. Hillel’s soup delivery brings the comfort of home to the dorm room and makes moms like me feel just a little bit better about being so far away.”

Communication freshman Lizzy Michan also ordered soup when she was sick.

“The soup made me feel much better, and the people at Hillel were really nice in providing me soup that wasn’t from the dining hall,” she says.

Ultimately, the soup hotline is a program to help students remain upbeat and engaged in campus life, no matter the season.

“We’re looking for a way to support students, especially when they are sick or the holidays come around,” Panter says.

Parents can test out the complimentary matzo ball soup delivery by placing a request through Hillel’s website or by dialing 847-467-4455.

photo: michael nowakowski

genius

CHRISTMAS LIGHTS $19.99, Target

DIODER LIGHT STRIPS $29.99, IKEA Cycling color LEDs DESK LAMP $97.99, Amazon 60-watt equivalent LED bulb

FIND YOUR PHOTONS Communication junior Ned McGregor lights the way to a happier room.

BY HA N N A BOLA Ñ OS

L

et’s be honest: Dorms and first apartments are often the ugliest of spaces, particularly dorms with little-to-no decorating freedom, because apparently everything is flammable. Luckily, you can improve your space’s appearance just by playing with the lighting. The following are some tips from Communication junior Ned McGregor* on how to make your prison-like room feel homier, whether you live on campus or not.

photo by michael nowakowski

photo: michael nowakowski

PAPER LANTERN $7.99, World Market 40-watt soft white bulb

Light what you like Natural light is one of the best ways to liven up a space, but if your apartment or dorm has few windows, being able to control your lighting is important. Standing lamps and desk lamps you can turn on and off will illuminate what you like and help draw attention away from what you don’t.

“Just think about what makes sense with the space that you’re in and what you want to show off about that space,” McGregor says.

Color speaks volumes If you’re looking to give your space some personality, don’t be afraid to play with color. You can

purchase strips of colored LED lights at Home Depot, or you can order them online. Some come with remotes that allow you to change the color. White lights are great for everyday lighting, while the color-flashing options will instantly turn your room into party central.

Swapping out one or two bulbs for colored ones is also an easy way to alter the atmosphere. Don’t try to mess with the overhead dome light in your dorm, though. Some ugly just can’t be undone.

The softer the better Even if your room gets a lot of natural light, sunlight can be harsh, especially if you have white walls. Draping thin curtains over your windows will soften the light coming through them and make the room seem warmer.

“Thin curtains turn the whole window into a paper lantern,” McGregor says.

Paper lanterns are also a good way to bathe your room in soft light. Plus, they come in enough shapes, sizes and colors to compliment any style.

Stay away from opaque curtains unless you don’t want any light coming through your window.

Placement is key Choosing the right fixtures for your space is only half the battle. Making sure you put them in the right places is just as important.

“Strip lights and rope lights work best if they mirror some form of architecture,” McGregor says.

If you have LEDs or Christmas lights, McGregor suggests using them to frame your door or window.

You can easily hang them with command hooks or electrical tape.

If you have an apartment, be mindful of furniture placement. You don’t want to have a well-lit area like a desk be masked by the shadow of a large dresser. That’s a waste of good lighting.

Don’t go too crazy If you’re using color, stay away from contrasts.

If you have a red light shining on a green dresser, that dresser will look black. This is not the best way to make your space look homey and inviting. That is, unless you’re really into Film Noir, because this is as close to black and white living as you’re going to get. *Full disclosure: Ned McGregor is an NBN photographer.

NORTHBYNORTHWESTERN.COM | 19

S P OT L I G H T RIGHT NOW, WE’RE TALKING ABOUT...

TIME

The Right Way to Cram Learn the psychology behind productivity.

B Y K AT E S T EI N

S

o it’s 10 p.m. the night before your Advanced Econometrics midterm, and you haven’t started studying. Here are a few tips for what to do next, courtesy of Northwestern psychology professor Paul Reber, The Huffington Post and Business Insider.

1. Consider what you’re trying to learn.

“Trying to acquire information as quickly as possible really applies best to fact knowledge: statements, verbalizable definitions, things you can consciously memorize,” Reber says. “Some of the things we also can test on exams are more skills-based critical thinking, analysis. Skills are learned by repetition and probably don’t lend themselves to cramming.”

In other words, faced with a short amount of time, you’re better off trying to memorize facts through

repetition than trying to learn brand new concepts. For instance, instead of learning the logic behind how to do a calculus problem, just memorize all the steps for an example or two.

2. Turn off distracting electronics.

Why add to the deluge with Facebook updates on your roommate’s spirit animal or a Snapchat of the burrito your pledge dad is about to consume?

3. Structure your study time.

Having a schedule in mind for studying will be more efficient.

4. Be an active learner.

One strategy Reber recommends is elaborative encoding, in which you connect new material to other information you already know.

Another learning strategy Reber recommends is retrieval practice, recalling information you’ve memorized. In addition to practice tests, Reber suggests flashcards.

PAPA JOHN’S

Pizza by the Hour

5. Stay hydrated and snack healthfully.

Being dehydrated can make you feel tired, and caffeine is a natural diuretic, so drinking cold water will both wake you up and rehydrate you.

A snack is also a great excuse to take a break. Complex carbs and protein will fill you up without making you drowsy. Try veggies with hummus or apples with peanut butter.

6. Stay active.

Take breaks so you can refocus and have something to look forward to. Even occasionally changing rooms while studying can improve learning and keep you awake.

7. Go to Sleep.

“If you show up at the exam sleep-deprived, that’s going to potentially interfere with your ability to remember information,” Reber says.

All your last-minute studying won’t do you much good if you’re not awake

At this point, you’re probably too tired or turnt to care about taste and texture.

enough to actually access and use the information you’ve learned.

So, avoid all-nighters at all costs.

By taking a nap (or two or three), you’ll feel more refreshed and able to concentrate than you would if you had worked straight through the night.

The bottom line about cramming?

“It works,” Reber says. “The problem is, learning that way creates memories that are forgotten more rapidly.”

So, practically speaking, if the exam covers material you’re done with after one quarter, cramming is an OK–if far from ideal–way to learn.

But if it’s 4 a.m. and you’re cramming information that’s foundational to your major or your anticipated career, you might want to rethink your study strategy. You might even want to start studying a day in advance.

7-Eleven Have a wholesome breakfast with a slice.

4 a.m. - 8 a.m.

11 p.m. - 2 a.m.

20 | S P R I N G 2 0 1 4

11 a

2 a.m. - 4 a.m.

8 a.m. - 11 a.m.

There’s never a bad time for a slice.

Whether you’re coming back from a party or study session, Papa John’s has your back.

SARPINO’S

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

It barely meets the definition of “pizza,” but at this hour, it’s the only place that’s open.

WHOLE FOODS

Describe your College Experience in 6 Words Six words. That’s all we asked of these seniors.

B Y S H E LB I E B O STED T A N D ROSA LI E C HAN

“WHERE ARE ALL THE BLACK PEOPLE?” - Mike Mallazzo, Medill

- Kyra Jones, Communication

6

3 10

8

9 2

“IN A LOSING BATTLE WITH CAESAR.”

“SPENT THREE YEARS FUCKING MY ROOMMATE.”

PAPA ROMEO’S

6. “Rock the Beach” sunglasses, a sacrifice from our obnoxious supply of neon shades 7. Rubble, a symbol of our complicated relationship with construction on campus 8. A GameDay shirt, to commemorate our 15 minutes of fame 9. A Stressball, because stress is the one constant at Northwestern 10. Fireball Cinnamon Whisky, no explanation needed

Late enough to be dinner and early enough to sleep off the food coma.

GIORDANO’S

Downtown, upscale and perfect for a special occasion.

6 p.m. - 8 p.m.

3 p.m. - 5 p.m.

11 a.m. - 1 p.m.

7

We planted a Northwestern time capsule to be opened in 2048.

1. Ben & Jerry’s Core, because why wouldn’t you want a 1,200-calorie snack?

2. Snow, a lasting reminder of the pain of the Polar Vortex 3. A Chance the Rapper sticker, in honor of his Dillo appearance 4. That Art History textbook you’ve been trying to sell since freshman year 5. The highly unique Northwestern lanyard we all received during move-in

Worth the walk and the temptation of Bennison’s on the way.

5

1

- G. Levy, Weinberg

What’s in the Box?

NORTH SHORE

4

5 p.m. - 6 p.m.

8 p.m. - 11 p.m.

1 p.m. - 3 p.m.

Eat a quick lunch here. The convenience makes it tastier, we promise.

GIGIO’S

Now you can use those coupons you found in the dorm lobby!

LOU MALNATI’S

Stuff yourself with stuffed crust when family comes into town.

UNION photos by jeremy gaines

NORTHBYNORTHWESTERN.COM | 21

Help a friend 1. Notice the event 2. Interpret it as a problem 3. Assume personal responsibility 4. Know how to help 5. STEP UP!

@SmartDillo

photo: dummy name here

Play it smart.

O L L L I L D DIDAOY

+

page 29 NU BURLESQUE BARES ALL page 26 WEED POLITICS

page 32 NU FIRST KISS

QUAD EXPLORE CAMPUS.

FOUR FREESTYLING FRESHMEN photo: dummy name here

Don’t Only Just Observe (DOJO) performs in an L tunnel. DOJO wants to create a safe environment for people to freestyle rap.

page 24

Photo by MIKHAIL TSIRTSAN

QUAD

Dramatic awesome shot of quidditch

STEP INTO THE D Four McCormick freshmen are setting the stage for a new era of rap at Northwestern, and everyone’s invited.

B Y C LAY T O N G EN TRY, PH O TOS BY MIKHAIL T SIRT SAN 24 | S P R I N G 2 0 1 4

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the flow happens in the basement of Goodrich Residence Hall, where Don’t Only Just Observe co-founder Randall Harris chills behind a laptop and a stack of Mountain Dew. He says “wassup” from under his “Born Ready” trucker hat to all the rappers who wander in. People sit around awkwardly, asking one another “Do you rap?” until co-founders Steven Layne, Bomani McClendon and Michael Martinez tell everyone to circle up. They hear the same thing before every round:

“I DON’T RAP.”

KINGS OF RAP (Top, from left to right) Michael Martinez, Bomani McClendon, Steven Layne and Randall Harris, the four founders of DOJO created an environment of security where people could freestyle rap even if they don’t have any experience.

The first session was held in late February. From there, they’ve attracted more students to the group through a social media push.

But they will. Martinez hooks up a PC to some Bose speakers, and then the “two-bar” starts. A bar is the rap equivalent of a couplet, so two-bar rapping demands everyone spit four lines and pass it to the next person, but it’s rarely that smooth.

“I don’t know what to say—but that’s OK,” Weinberg sophomore David Cohen spits over Meek Mill’s “Levels” beat.

And it is OK—the group, founded by four McCormick freshmen, doesn’t aim to be the next Wu-Tang Clan. The founders advertise the club as a safe space for people with every kind of rap pedigree to experiment with a type of musical performance many Northwestern students have never tried: freestyle rap. Weinberg freshman Isaac Yampolsky’s flow sets the tone.

“Good to see—all these new faces —coming from different places, North Campus, different races­—but it’s okay because this is a space for everyone to just spit and just play— around with their rhymes—it’s all good, it’s all fine,” he raps.

In fact, McClendon, one of the club’s founders, only started rapping late Fall Quarter. He grew up in Nashville, where hip-hop takes a cultural backseat to rock and country.

“I was specifically unskilled at rhyming,” he says. “My friends kind of positively pressured me saying, ‘Hey man, don’t just sit there and say you can’t rap.’”

The four rapped together throughout early winter as they walked down Sherman Avenue, wandered to Chicken Shack and hung out in Willard’s fifth floor laundry room. It was during one of the Chicken Shack flows that McClendon suggested they develop a rap battle league.

“Bomani is into basically every

E DOJO

form of music under the sun,” Martinez says. “He was really keen on doing this, and he was sort of the person who pushed us into organizing it.”

They shaped DOJO through Facebook messages during Christmas break, and they hosted the first rhyme session on Feb. 28. That session was little more than an experiment to see if anybody would jump in, and only a few people attended. But as their social media presence expanded, people like McCormick freshman Amanuel Alemu did show up. Alemu rapped at DOJO’s third freestyle session, Round Three, on April 4 for the first time.

“I just wanted to try something new,” he says. “I knew some of the guys who were going, and it just seemed like something fun to try.”

Turnout increased, and the rounds hosted more and more people from a variety of cultural backgrounds. McClendon says one person rapped in Korean at Round Two on March 10.

During Round Three, Weinberg freshman Manny Darko dropped bars in Twi, a popular Ghanaian vernacular.

After everybody’s warmed up Layne slaughters a Chief Keef beat, opening the floor to people who want to go in on longer flows. When freestyling, even an experienced rapper like Layne can dip into spontaneous randomness: “He does his life right, acquiring stripes as he mixes lotion with the ocean and a potion.”

Later in the night, Weinberg freshman Kelsey Pukelis pulls out her violin and plays by ear a staccato accompaniment to Weinberg freshman Ben Hwang’s original electronic beat.

“We’ve had people come up and say, ‘Oh I can’t rap, but I play the guitar and I’ve always wanted somebody to rap while I play this riff,’ and we welcome that,” Martinez says.

As the night wears on, Martinez puts on “trap” beats, which are more intensely percussive. The rhymes descend from the random to the ridiculous, related to throwing computers out of windows and spitting from the

center of “Dante’s Inferno”—far from insecurity about their inexperience.

Most people rap themselves off the rails, and nobody cares.

When the round ends, people slap hands and filter out into their comfort zones again. But before he leaves, Weinberg freshman Sam Elmi drops a bar to let everyone know he’ll be back.

“I’m not as good as you—but I’m gonna keep coming to DOJO—to try to get as good as you,” he spits at McClendon over a Drake beat.

BUILDING THE BEAT Where DOJO’s founders look for inspiration Steven Layne: Reggae, but also a variety of Chicago underground rap.

Randall Harris: A mix of electronic music and R&B. Michael Martinez: He got into Luciano Pavarotti’s rendition of “Nessun Dormas” from Giacomo Puccini’s opera, “Turandot.”

Bomani McClendon: His father is a producer and soul singer, and his mother loves Nigerian music. They played him jazz records as a child like John Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme.”

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Up in Smoke

Medical marijuana may be legal in Illinois, but not at Northwestern.

B Y LU C Y WA NG

“Our law, both by its proponents and opponents, is acknowledged as one of the most restrictive medical cannabis programs in the country.”

— Ali Nagib, assistant director of the Illinois chapter of the National Organization to Reform Marijuana Laws Restrictive as the program may be, it will have little impact on NU’s marijuana policies or those of other higher education institutions across the state, thanks to a law called the Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act Amendments of 1989.

Part of Title IV of the Education Amendments of 1972, a cousin to the oft-cited Title IX, the DrugFree Schools and Communities Act Amendments require institutions that receive federal funding to maintain

drug-free policies on campus.

And federal funding, Nagib explains, gives institutions incentive to enforce federal law.

“When it comes to funding and when it comes to things like universities in particular, [the federal government] can say, ‘Well, if you don’t respond, we’ll take away your funding.’”

Students also risk cuts to federal funding if found selling or possessing illegal drugs. Federal penalties and sanctions for the illegal possession of a controlled substance like marijuana include the “denial of federal benefits, such as student loans, grants, contracts and professional and commercial licenses,” according to NU’s Policy on Drugs and Alcohol handbook.

But there are ways for students with medical marijuana prescriptions to get around this, says Andrew Livingston, a policy analyst at Denver’s Vicente Sedenberg LLC who worked closely in the implementation and rollout of Colorado’s cannabis policy, Amendment 64.

“School policies say you can’t have marijuana or marijuana product on the school premises,” Livingston says. “That means you can keep it in your car parked off-campus, but you can’t have it within the dorms. If you have chronic pain and if you’re a student, you could keep your Percocet prescription on licensed premises, but not your marijuana prescription.”

But Livingston suggests that the discrepancy between state and federal law may only exist in policy and not in practice. He cites a 2012 SSDP briefing paper which found that, “according to officials with the U.S. De-

partment of Education, not a single college or university participating in the Federal Student Aid program has ever lost Title IV eligibility as a result of violating the Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act.” Tara Sullivan, NU’s assistant dean of students and director of student conduct and conflict resolution, can vouch for as much.

“If you have chronic pain and if you’re a student, you could keep your Percocet prescription on licensed premises, but not your marijuana prescription.”

— Andrew Livingston, policy analyst at Vicente Sedenberg LLC

“To my knowledge, there have been no instances of funding being cut as a result of violations to the school’s marijuana policy,” Sullivan says.

Awareness of these facts and knowledge of school-wide, statewide and national drug policy are what Tai hopes NU’s SSDP chapter will foster in its members and in NU students.

“Our goal with SSDP is that we want our members to be the best at drug policy on campus, because it’s such a stigmatized topic,” Tai says.

“We want our members to be critical thinkers about drug policy, to discern between sensible policy and sensationalized policy.”

photo by michael nowakowski photo: someone

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and opponents, is acknowledged as one of the most restrictive medical cannabis programs in the country,” says Ali Nagib, assistant director of the Illinois chapter of the National Organization to Reform Marijuana Laws. “A lot of the politicians, when they looked at what they perceived to be problems in states like California, Washington and Colorado, decided that they needed to put many more restrictions in place on all levels, both in terms of patients and in terms of the industry side.”

photo by michael nowakowsk

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f not for the gold cannabis leaf pinned to his suit lapel, Weinberg junior Rex Tai would have looked like a delegate at a Model U.N. conference or a student at a career fair.

The occasion for his formal attire was the 2014 Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP) Midwest Regional Conference on April 12, hosted

by Northwestern’s SSDP chapter, of which Tai is co-president. From 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., students, medical professionals, lobbyists and policy analysts crowded around Harris Hall L07 and University Hall 122 for a day of discussion about alternatives to drug prohibition.

Of the handful of panel-led sessions, one called “Medical Marijuana in the Midwest” highlighted an irony in medical marijuana policy: Its discussion of Illinois’ medical marijuana program took place on university grounds, where marijuana—both medical and recreational—is still illegal under federal law.

On April 18, Illinois regulators released the first draft of rules for the state’s medical marijuana program, formally called the Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot Program. These rules outline the qualifying conditions necessary for patients, caregivers and state-regulated dispensaries to obtain and distribute medical marijuana, which is expected to begin in early 2015. For patients, the set of “debilitating medical conditions” that qualify for the program include cancer, glaucoma, AIDS, hepatitis C, Crohn’s disease and multiple sclerosis, among other ailments.

“Our law, both by its proponents

When you Give a ‘Cat a Cookie...

From Reese’s cookies to riots, how did Project Cookie become so big?

B Y P R E E T I S H A SEN

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photo: someone

photo by michael nowakowski

ands clawing. Bodies piled on top of each other. Voices shrieking.

No, these aren’t animals in the jungle. These are Northwestern students the Sunday before Finals Week, fighting their way to free cookies delivered by Project Cookie.

From Norbucks to the ground floor stairs, students crawled under tables and climbed over each other to secure one of the highly coveted cookies—some even stole them out of other people’s hands.

“As soon as I put [the cookies] on the table, I couldn’t leave,” says Priya Kumar, Weinberg sophomore and Project Cookie co-CEO. “It felt like survival of the fittest. Literally, people turned into animals.”

Norris has done orders with Project Cookie in the past to help students deal with the stress of finals—orders that usually go pretty smoothly. But the clamor that this free delivery created what would forever be known as Northwestern’s first cookie riot.

Project Cookie may seem like a Northwestern staple now, but it wasn’t always so well-known, let alone riot-inducing. When the business launched in 2011, it didn’t operate every night and ran into problems like selling out of cookies far before the end of their shifts.

Since then, executive members have revamped marketing strategies and operational models to make Project Cookie a Northwestern trademark. According to former CEO Will Ginsberg, a Weinberg junior, Project Cookie went from selling 30 cookies per night at the outset to between 80 and 90 per night last quarter.

“It was great having the opportunity to make changes to the company and see tangible results,” Ginsberg says.

Starting from scratch Project Cookie is a business housed under Northwestern Student Holdings, a parent company that oversees several student-run busi-

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nesses such as AirHop and BoxCo. While an NSH executive board and a faculty board oversee the companies, students are responsible for running the businesses themselves.

“As a CEO of a company, you submit a very different leadership experience,” Kumar says. “That’s an experience that I feel so honored to have.”

Kumar, former Chief Financial Officer of Project Cookie, now leads the team with SESP sophomore Connor Regan, former Chief Operating Officer and current co-CEO. The two say having a clear vision to move the company forward is a top priority.

The business model of Project Cookie is simple: Employees start their shifts at the Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity house, where they bake the cookies. Afterward, they head to Lisa’s Café for the first shift of sales and then move south to University Library. Employees usually hit each location one more time before selling out, ending by midnight at the latest.

On top of these nightly operations, Project Cookie also does catering orders and deliveries.

“It’s all about constantly thinking, ‘How can we serve our customers better?’”

— SESP sophomore Connor Regan, Project Cookie co-CEO But for the executive team, it’s all about seeing the big picture and giving Project Cookie a wider presence both on campus and to prospective students. Regan says he overheard a tour guide talk about Project Cookie’s signature Inception cookies—chocolate chip cookies with another item such as an Oreo or Reese’s inside—as he walked through Norris.

“From our perspective, that’s really exciting—that Project Cookie can be a unique part about Northwestern,” Regan says. “Most schools don’t have something like this.”

Why Project Cookie works Since its creation, Project Cookie has consistently stayed profitable.

Part of the reason for that is because the staff is passionate about the mission, according to Ginsberg. From the employees—called “cookie enthusiasts”—to the executive team, everyone tries to emulate the spirit of Project Cookie in whatever role they have in the company.

“As soon as people get to Northwestern, we want them to know what Project Cookie is, because that way we can keep them as customers for the whole four years.”

— Weinberg sophomore Priya Kumar, Project Cookie co-CEO

“A lot of what we pride ourselves on is a fun brand image,” Ginsberg says. “We kind of try to target our customers through that, the fun, goofy, spirit of the company and the brand.”

While the Cookie Monster hats that employees are required to wear may draw in more customers, sales also increased due to a new employee payment structure. Last year’s executive team—made up of Ginsberg, Kumar and Regan—designed a new system that attracts employees by giving a bonus for each additional five cookies sold after the 30-cookie minimum.

“We want them to love Project Cookie as much as we do, and to have as much of a vested interest,” Regan says. “That’s been a big thing for us— how do we make them love Project Cookie to the point where they want to go above and beyond what’s asked of them to get us to the next level?”

Aside from incentivizing employees, the team also looked to revamp

its marketing strategies. For example, the website now features a Project Cookie live-tracking tool, and employees use the Twitter account to update location as well. With the marketing push, Kumar and Regan hope to specifically attract incoming students to Project Cookie.

“As soon as people get to Northwestern, we want them to know what Project Cookie is, because that way we can keep them as customers for the whole four years,” Kumar says.

Moving the company forward Soon after being inducted as the new co-CEOs of the company, Kumar and Regan started Spring Quarter with a big marketing push by holding a Golden Ticket challenge. Students who could locate the 15 tickets hidden across campus would get free access to Project Cookie’s latest initiative: Sunday night deliveries of cookies and specialty coffees.

“Before this quarter, we just did nightly ops on campus,” Kumar says.

“The big thing we’re really trying to push this quarter is deliveries.”

Instead of just sticking to cookie deliveries, Project Cookie recently widened its scope to include coffee as well. This decision came after long meetings and discussions, but Regan says ultimately the choice “seemed like a no-brainer.”

“We want to be there when students want dessert,” Regan says.

“What else can we do that students are interested in with a cookie?”

The two CEOs also hope to increase Project Cookie’s presence on campus by expanding partnerships with groups like Dance Marathon, and by doing more to get every student on campus invested in Project Cookie. Regan says “conversations have already started” for new partnerships and developments within the brand.

“It’s all about constantly thinking, ‘how we can we serve our customers better?’” Regan says.

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Snitch, Please W

be athletic and competitive,” Fatemi says. “It is kind of a catch-22 because we don’t want to exclude anyone, so we want to say, ‘Oh if you’re not athletic, that’s okay; you can join and have fun’ but to the athletic people it seems like, ‘This isn’t up to my standards.’”

But for people who have already joined the team, Quidditch offers something those other teams don’t: novelty.

“If we think about sports culture in general, we think about jocks,” Herrera says. “But with Quidditch it’s very different from that. We’re very quirky. We don’t take ourselves that seriously. It just gets kind of ridiculous at times because part of it is acknowledging the fact that it’s inherently ridiculous. That’s humbling.”

Indeed, running around a field for 20 minutes straight with a stick between their legs is not most people’s idea of a sport. After all, Harry and Ron had magic to make them fly. The Kneazles have to use their legs and lungs instead.

Games are exhausting and physically demanding.

Players have to sub in and out of the game just to catch their breath. Quidditch requires tremendous amounts of stamina and endurance, something most people don’t realize about the sport, Herrera said.

The goal of the game is to score more points than the other team. Unlike in Harry’s world, though, the snitch is a real human being, often a former cross country runner, who essentially plays a game of tag with the other team’s seeker.

If the snitch is caught, the seeker only earns 30 points, not 150 like in wizard quidditch. At his or her disposal, however, the Snitch can use many means of warding off seekers. Some Snitches even bring lightsabers onto the field, Herrera says.

The rest of the players are either chasers or beaters. Chasers have to get a dodgeball through hoops

to score points, either by shooting or dunking.

But they have to face beaters, who can do basically anything in their power to prevent seekers from scoring. They carry bludgers; they can hit and tackle people. Nothing is off-limits. If a beater hits a chaser, the chaser has to drop the ball and run back to his/ her own hoops.

The only players left are keepers, glorified goalies who protect their hoops.

Every position, then, is complicated and requires much strategy. Some players can handle the athleticism and game-planning that the sport demands; others are bookworms who like a casual club they can enjoy.

However, not everyone can be Viktor Krum.

“That’s kind of rough because there’s so many people who aren’t athletic,” Herrera says. “Sometimes they just prefer to be casual. There’s others who want it to be more intense, who want to condition every day. We’re still trying to find our own sense of identity, as is the sport at large, really.”

A lack of certainty in the team’s end goals— whether it wants to be low-key or it wants to train for the World Cup—makes it difficult to explain to prospective players what the sport is about.

“If we say it’s really intense, it scares people,” Herrera says. “If we say it’s not that intense, then people are like, ‘I want something to really involved myself in’ so it also turns people off.”

It’s a quandry that Herrera and the Kneazles can’t easily shake, resulting in a motley crew of players, but one that is no less a family than Gryffindor.

“If you go to a tournament, you’ll instantly makes friends and bond with other players just because you play quidditch,” Fatemi says. “It’s such a different thing to do right now and it’s so rewarding, but not yet appreciated by enough students that it’s an incredible community to get to know.”

photo by colton maddox

ith a lightning bolt scar and a few Gryffindor-inspired robes, Weinberg junior Juan Herrera could pass for Harry Potter.

He sports black, round-frame glasses and a shock of black hair that could be covering up a childhood scar from a certain Dark Lord. All he’s missing is a broomstick, a few hoops and the Golden Snitch—just like the rest of the Northwestern Kneazles quidditch team.

Unfortunately for the Kneazles, there’s no summoning spell to make state-of-the-art equipment and enthusiastic, quidditch-savvy newcomers magically appear with the flick of a wand. Instead, the team has to rely on its captain and president Herrera, vice captain Farzan Fatemi and other executive members to set up hoops, line the fields and coordinate tournaments, a daily time commitment for them.

“It’s hard to impress people at a first glance when you don’t have that money,” says Fatemi, a Weinberg junior.

And, of course, they have to get around the misconception that they’re all Harry Potter nerds.

“People think that most of us are intense, super die-hard fans, but we’re not,” Herrera says.

In fact, he says, half the team hasn’t even finished the series, movies and books.

Rather, team members are simply looking for a sport to fill the gap left by their high school activities.

Many team members played soccer, tennis, rugby or football in their hometowns.

Those are the teams that often land former high school athletes at the expense of a sport like quidditch. The fact that most people don’t understand how “muggle” quidditch is works beyond the fantasy world of Hogwarts doesn’t help the team recruit new players.

“Anyone can join our team. But we are looking to

Watch out, Hogwarts. Northwestern’s got its own quidditch squad.

BY SHANNON LANE

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BROOMSTICK RIDE (From left) Weinberg junior Farzan Fatemi, Weinberg freshman Didi Aburaad and Weinberg junior Juan Herrera are flying high as members of the Northwestern Kneazles.

SHOW AND TELL COME HITHER Mackenzie*, a Medill freshman, performed in this year’s burlesque show under the name Gem Fatale.

From sex-positivity to mental health, burlesque can make a big difference beneath the surface. BY SHELBI E BO STEDT

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photo by alexis o’connor

ichael Fleischer stood on the stage of the Jones Great Room, wearing nothing but his underwear and a green bow tie around his neck. He bowed and exited stage left. As the crowd erupted in applause, Fleischer stripped off his skivvies, revealing a matching bow tied intricately around his junk and ran back on stage to the shock, awe and amazement of the audience.

Fleischer, a Communication sophomore, performed in both this year’s and last year’s NU Burlesque, co-sponsored by Lipstick Theater and College Feminists for Northwestern’s Sex Week.

“I was always the kind of person who preferred to not wear clothes,” Fleischer recalls of his impetus to audition for last year’s inaugural show.

Founded in 2013 by Anna Miles (Comm ‘13), NU Burlesque aims to offer participants not only an opportunity to bare as much as they’re comfortable with on stage, but also a medium through which performers and their audiences can explore their sexualities.

Though not considered normal practice to become completely nude in a burlesque performance, Fleischer eventually persuaded his directors to allow him to go full-frontal by reminding them repeatedly that it was his body and his decision, the mantra of burlesque.

“The defining factor of burlesque is that the performer is in complete control,” Fleischer says.

This factor distinguishes burlesque from stripping, allowing NU Burlesque to serve as a tool to create a safe space for sex-positivity and to combat rape culture on Northwestern’s campus.

“I learned that most students don’t get the opportunity to explore their own sexuality, or rather, the aesthetics of their own sexuality, in the same

way that performance-based majors do on a regular basis,” Miles says in an email. “Our show brought people from all different parts of campus together in one of the most intimate ways possible.”

Medill and Weinberg sophomore Taylor Cumings performed in NU Burlesque for the first time this year, also appearing fully nude on stage, though covered in full-body paint. Cumings used paint to portray a naked body in a way that wasn’t overtly sexualized, exploring a different side to burlesque, she says.

“The whole point of the show is to educate students and let them explore their sexualities without feeling shame for it,” Cumings says.

“Burlesque removes that taboo.”

Along with giving students an opportunity to reflect on their own sexual identities, burlesque also aims to open the door for a dialogue about rape culture and the negative impact it has on students.

In giving performers complete agency over how, when and what they want to show to the audience, they hope to help students create their own style of sexual expression in a space safe from judgment or coercion.

For Communication senior and two-time director Brendan Yukins, burlesque was a saving grace during his sophomore year while he was receiving counseling to cope with a sexual assault.

He became involved with Vaudezilla, a theatrical burlesque company in Chicago, at the suggestion of his counselor at the Northwestern Women’s Center.

“One of the symptoms of being a survivor of sexual assault is your self-confidence hits rock bottom,” Yukins said. “My counselor suggested I maybe go and see a burlesque show and see if I saw a sex-positive way to look at my own sexuality.”

Yukins had been performing with Vaudezilla for more than a year when Miles asked him to help get NU Burlesque off the ground, something he saw as an opportunity to bring the support and acceptance he had found in the Chicago burlesque scene to Northwestern’s campus.

Yukins was the director of “boylesque” and “neo-burlesque,” as well as other pieces inspired by classical burlesque performances in this year’s show. He worked alongside Medill and Weinberg sophomore Alaura Hernandez and Weinberg sophomore Lauren Hamilton, the directors for classic and dance-centric pieces, respectively.

“It’s a wonderful feeling to have yourself reaffirmed by an entire crowd of supportive people,” Yukins says. “I came to terms over the two years that I’ve been doing this with my body and my sexuality, and I wanted to spread the love to campus so others could have the opportunity to feel that.”

Through NU Burlesque, Yukins hopes to not only create a sex-positive culture on campus, but also provide an outlet to students constantly inundated with the reminder that Northwestern is at the “height of academia” and that they all must consistently perform at their best, inside and outside the classroom.

“What I think burlesque does is that it reminds us that we’re in college,” Yukins says. “This is the time that you can really have the freedom to do something that you may never have the opportunity to do again. We are allowed to be free not only in our sexuality, ourselves and our expression, but we are free people with an opportunity to do something and not be bound by what others think.” *Last name withheld per Mackenzie’s request.

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A House Divided Northwestern’s piecemeal architecture forces social circles farther apart. BY GU S BERRI ZBE IT IA

CONE ZONE 1976-2000

FED AND GONE Long before Frontera and Norbucks, these eateries met the needs of hungry students.

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efore the recent arrival of Nornuts, our student center was filled with some eclectic food options. When Norris was built in 1972, faculty promised to meet the “food, snack, and beverage needs of the university community.”

Have your snack and beverage needs been met? Maybe you’d be more satisfied by a blast from the past. Check out how Norris’s tastes have evolved over the years as these eateries came and went.

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This old-fashioned ice cream parlor served 30 flavors, ranging “from Banana to Vanilla,” as it advertised.

The name “Cone Zone” was chosen from a “Name the Parlor” contest. In total 521 names were submitted, 205 of them by one Weinberg junior, who got a $1 gift card for his dedication.

Since the loss of Cone Zone, those of us with ice cream cravings in Norris are left with whatever the C-Store has in stock.

THE GATHERING PLACE 1982 – 1992

#MeetMeAtNorris takes on a whole new meaning when the meetup is over drinks—and for a decade, it could have been. The Gathering Place (a.k.a.

The Bar) at Norris offered “fine spirits and good company,” and promoted itself as the only on-campus site for faculty and students to share drinks.

Just imagine ordering a “Screaming Orgasm” in the basement of Norris.

(Yes, it was on the menu.) The Bar also hosted Bullet Night for seniors: Bring a job rejection letter and get a free beer. (Limit one per person).

I

t’s 11:30 p.m. on a Saturday night.

The frat quad’s overcrowded basements bulge. Somewhere in northern Evanston, a party rages at the Manlot. At Ridge and Davis, a mile-and-a-half away, a fundraiser for Lovers & Madmen’s latest opus proceeds late into the night.

What do all these these festivities share? About 30 minutes of walking distance between them.

It seems certain types of people live North while others live South, and while there are some exceptions, most stereotypes have a kernel of truth. The partition between North and South Campus is not just spatial.

It’s social and cultural.

But where did this partition come from? How is it maintained? It all comes from the layout of the campus and the buildings themselves.

Despite a host of submissions from famous architects like Daniel Burnham, Northwestern never accepted a single cohesive campus plan on which to design the University. Because of this, campus expands organically along its spine, with Sheridan Road forming the main North-South axis.

The lack of a comprehensive campus plan meant that residential

HIGHER GROUNDS 1994 – 2006

photo by alexis o’connor

It gets better than Seattle’s Best.

At Higher Grounds, it wasn’t only the coffee that was great: Comfy couches and vintage artwork helped make the coffee shop a place where students could kick back. Students and staff wanted to renovate to make the school feel less institutional, they said. The café featured “mellow entertainment” like vocalists or poetry readings a couple times a week. Definitely sounds like a pretty laid back place to hang out—maybe Norbucks could use an artistic touch.

areas unfolded across three distinct spaces: the northern fraternity quad area (including Bobb-McCulloch and Slivka), the southeastern quad (including Hinman, Jones and the Fairchilds) and the sorority quad (including Allison, Chapin and Willard). With at least one major dining hall each, these separate ecosystems don’t lend themselves to contact. We write it off as a joke, but there could be a McCormick student who actually lives inside Tech.

The fraternity quad was built in the 1920s (then known as the “Men’s Quadrangle”) and was followed soon after by the sorority quad (“Women’s Quadrangle”). The prevailing attitude dictated that women were to live as far away as possible from the men, ostensibly to prevent unseemliness.

Frances Willard, one of the paragons of the Temperance Movement, lived and worked at Northwestern, so the school has a strong association with socially conservative behavior.

Thus, the mile-long walk of shame was born.

While the residential quads are far apart, a classic collegiate quad doesn’t even exist at Northwestern.

The separation of academic buildings doesn’t just happen around a grassy

SBARRO 2002 – 2012

Sbarro may be more common at highway rest stops than college campuses, but for a time, Northwestern had one of its own. One student wrote in an opinion piece for the Daily, “Every single time I visit Norris University Center and take the elevator down to ‘G,’ the succulent smell of mozzarella cheese draped over that warm, lard-based dough seduces me like some veiled banshee out of an imported ‘80s porn flick.”

Maybe it’s best that Sbarro left. North Shore Pizza Co. might be a little less… arousing?

field; instead it must be joined by transit areas like paths and roads.

Deering Meadow and the Lakefill lack the centrality to be convenient, so our sad stand-in for a quad is Sheridan Road, which creates more awkward eye contact than lasting friendships.

But nothing captures the state of space and experience at Northwestern better than the Main Library. Large, domineering, Brutalist and generally inefficient at deploying space, the design is the massive microcosm of the spatial and architectural phenomenon that is Northwestern. The building­—or postmodern fortress, if you will—was designed by the celebrated Walter Netsch, who had gained acclaim for working on campuses like the Air Force Academy. He also built the Rebecca Crown Center, that clunky concrete building separating us from Evanston.

Netch called his design philosophy “field theory,” placing simple geometric shapes around space to create complex structures.

But field theory’s biggest flaw is a misunderstanding of how students

CREPE BISTRO 2006-2012

When one door closes, another opens.

In 2006 Higher Grounds left, and we got Crepe Bistro. The French specialty was brought to Norris by a husband and wife from Eastern Europe. Talk to current juniors or seniors, and they’ll remind you of the delights of eating crepes for breakfast, lunch, dinner and dessert. Savory chicken, mushroom and swiss, and nutella and banana crepes were just a few options on the menu. The Bistro even offered a $1.25 Crepe Happy Hour. This classy venue also saw its end during The Frontera Wipeout of 2012.

use space. The intent to create Crown as a large open plaza ringed by the three towers failed due to its open, barren, nearly hostile concrete expanse. Students gather in grassy areas because they are soft to sit in.

Now, the library plaza serves as a divider, a transit area to get from the campus to Norris or the Lakefill.

The lack of architectural cohesion creates a lack of social unity among the student body. While the decisions that brought about this atmosphere were made almost a hundred years ago, we feel their effects every day. Administrators and architects don’t seem to understand the social experience of a student.

But we don’t do much to overcome it ourselves. We’re often funneled into a specific kind of experience depending on where we live. The student cultures artificially created on campus colonize the students who live within them, reinforcing and perpetuating these divides.

This is not the college experience.

Diversity doesn’t just mean race or socioeconomic condition, though those are integral parts. Diversity is the plurality of mindset or worldview, and diversity is not accomplished with the existence of divided quads.

JAMBA JUICE 2009 – 2012

Jamba addicts: Imagine not having to hike to Davis Street to get your smoothie on. Jamba ushered in the era of food franchises that has been continued by Starbucks, Frontera and now Dunkin’. But its life was short— only three years of $7 smoothies.

For now, Norris has resigned from its juice cleanse. If The Frontera Wipeout has taught us anything, it’s that one can never have too much guac. Jamba brought a fruity, refreshing spin to Norris’s greasy offerings.

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QUAD

Mile After Mile Adam Wozny’s mother was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Instead of running from his fear, he ran for a cure.

B Y J A S P E R S CHERER

A

illustration by lucy wang

dam Wozny was a senior at Fenwick High School in Oak Park, Ill., when he finally took matters into his own hands.

Adam’s mother, Agata, had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis more than 10 years before Adam’s senior year, and now that he fully understood the significance of his mother’s condition, the soonto-be Northwestern freshman saw an opportunity to take action.

Agata’s symptoms started when Adam was a first-grader living in Harwood Heights, Ill. One evening in March 2001, Agata went to the hospital after suffering a severe vertigo attack, the most serious outbreak after she had been showing symptoms of MS for months.

“Initially, I was really confused,” Adam says. “I hadn’t heard anything that had occurred as the paramedics had entered the house, so I just had no idea.”

Adam and his father drove to the nearby hospital where his mother was undergoing tests, but the two of them had to wait in the lobby for almost three hours before they were allowed to see Agata.

When Adam finally went in to see his mother in the early hours of the morning, she was somehow in good spirits.

“A coping mechanism that I had used to deal with [my mother] having MS had been to pretend that she didn’t have it. I don’t know if I was ever fully capable of coming to the realization [of what she was going through].”

—Weinberg

sophomore

Adam

Wozny

“She’s always the type of person to smile, no matter what she’s going through,” Adam says.

Following her outbreak, Agata sought the advice of several neurologists in Chicago. After coming away with plenty of questions and not enough answers, the bad news finally

came in April when an MRI of Agata’s brain revealed signs of MS. A chronic disease of the central nervous system, MS disrupts the flow of information between the brain and the body. The disease ultimately causes the immune system to attack myelin, the substance that insulates nerve fibers, forming scar tissue called sclerosis. This inhibits the passage of nerve impulses traveling to and from the brain and spinal cord, leading to a variety of symptoms, typically fatigue, numbness and vision problems.

Initially, Adam had trouble dealing with his mother’s severe diagnosis.

“A coping mechanism that I had used to deal with [my mother] having MS had been to pretend that she didn’t have it,” Adam says. “I don’t know if I was ever fully capable of coming to the realization [of what she was going through].”

Even though Adam had trouble dealing with it, Agata says she always knew he wanted to help fight MS. Agata recalls one of Adam’s assignments in elementary school, in which Adam decided who he wanted to be in the future. Adam said he wanted to be the president so he could find a cure for MS. But Adam still wanted to do more to show her, so he came up with an

It Started Out with a Kiss “Northwestern’s First Kiss” might have seemed awkward, but there was more to the video than you would think.

B Y K AT H E R I N E DO YLE A N D SARA H E HLE N

F

orty-five seconds to meet, 45 seconds to make a move. Eyes close, hearts race, lips touch—a first kiss, caught on film.

Although “Northwestern’s First Kiss” video may look like an awkward shot at five minutes of sloppy fame, the video, intended to promote NU Sex Week and Sexual Assault Awareness month, offered students a window into a more serious topic: sexuality and inclusivity on campus.

Sex Week co-director and Communication senior Kyra Jones wanted the Northwestern version to be more inclusive than the original viral “First Kiss” video and to draw all types of students to the Sex Week events.

More than 100 students of a mix of majors, races, body types and genders applied through a Google Docu32 34 | S P R I N G 2 0 1 4

ment to kiss a complete stranger.

“We immediately made a Facebook event and started recruiting people,” Jones says. “We thought that it would get a pretty big response, but it was a lot larger than we thought it would be.”

Of these applicants, Communication junior Bea Sullivan-Knoff was particularly moved by the format of the video application. She identifies as a “translady” and considers herself “transfeminine.”

“There wasn’t a drop-down box, it was fill-in-the-blank, which I appreciated,” she says. “I hate those fucking drop-down boxes.”

In a sophomore year Spanish class, Bea, then Benj, explained that Benj wasn’t exactly a name in Spanish, so she and her teacher decided on

PEARLY WHITES Sullivan-Knoff decided on the nickname “Benja” in a sophomore year Spanish class.

idea to truly make an impact during his senior year of high school.

“It ended up being ‘How can I raise a ton of money [to show her I cared]?’” Adam says. “I feel like a lot of people do 5Ks and 10Ks…You start to think, ‘If I can do something more extreme than that, how extreme can I go?’ It all started coming together.”

In January 2012 Adam founded Miles For MS, a non-profit organization with the mission to “assist those suffering from, and ultimately cure, multiple sclerosis,” according to the organization’s website.

“He’s doing it for all the people affected by MS. I’m the reason he’s doing it, but in his head, he’s thinking about the many, many people who have to live with that, who have to deal with pain.”

— Agata Wozny

Just a few months later, Adam completed a 500-mile bike ride across Illinois, despite never having

biked farther than 10 miles at a time.

Through pledges from friends and family, Adam raised over $4,500 to help fight MS. “I remember finishing in Wisconsin, and when we got on the highway, at some point it clicked in me that I was finally done,” Adam says. “I looked at my mom, and this wave of emotion that had been collecting over the last few days hit me. I just burst into tears. That was the moment when, for the first time, I realized that I had shown [my mom] that I cared that she was afflicted with MS.” Agata says that seeing Adam endure the difficulty of a 500-mile bike ride gives her motivation to fight her disease.

“It shows me that if he can complete the 500 miles, I have to fight, and I should never give up. I should never complain about pain, because Adam can do that for me,” Agata says. “I am very thankful for Adam, and I’m very proud of him.”

Adam was honored with the Volunteer of the Year Award from the Greater Illinois chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society in October 2012 for his efforts, and that was just the start.

Now a Weinberg sophomore, Adam finished the cross-Illinois trip again this spring break, raising an ad-

photo by jeremy gaines

ditional $2,000 after he completed the bike ride in five days. Looking forward, Adam plans to expand Miles For MS by reaching out to the Northwestern community.

“I can bike all I want,” Adam says.

“But it doesn’t really help to raise just $1,000 or $2,000 every year, every two years.”

With help from Nour Alharithi, one of his brothers in Phi Delta Theta, Adam was able to organize a group of mostly Northwestern students to participate in the Chicago Spring Half Marathon.

Before long, Adam was hearing from interested students who had heard about the run through Facebook and mutual friends.

All the hard work came to fruition on May 18, when Adam, Nour and around 30 of their fellow students completed the half marathon.

But even with these early successes, Adam plans to expand his charity in the fall.

“What Adam is doing, he’s not just doing it for me,” Agata says. “He’s doing it for all people affected

by MS. I’m the reason he’s doing it, but in his head, he’s thinking about the many, many people who have to live with that, who have to deal with pain.”

the nickname Benja. When SullivanKnoff decided to study abroad in Buenos Aires, she brought the nickname with her. The gendered language emphasized the femininity of this nickname, and Sullivan-Knoff liked it.

“There was a weird moment where I thought about my old name and I could feel a coldness, an absence of anything. I didn’t feel any attachment—it felt completely distant, and that’s when I started exploring other options,” she says.

The video’s recruitment team tried to put no boundaries on a participant’s gender identification and allowed students to voice whom they would be most comfortable kissing.

Willing participants were organized into separate categories so they could be paired with whomever they felt most comfortable.

This method allowed the recruitment team to match participants and acknowledge that sexuality exists beyond homosexual and heterosexual.

“It’s a very human desire to put people in boxes so we can easily understand and rationalize,” says Sullivan-Knoff, who finds a sexuality spec-

trum more comforting than the binary of homosexual or heterosexual.

Beyond a variety of gender identifications and sexual preferences, the video included students of different body types, races and physical ability levels, making it even more diverse and all-encompassing than the original video.

“We didn’t want everyone that looked the same,” Jones says. “We wanted to show that sex is something that affects everybody, regardless of who you are or what your background is.”

The video plays into Sex Week’s goal of creating a safe and receptive environment for students to talk about sex, sexuality, gender and everything they entail.

“Sex is something important for us to discuss in our culture, and by having a video where people can see a diverse array of people, we thought that people may be more inclined to come to Sex Week,” Jones says. “It would be a safe space, and it wouldn’t matter what you look like, who you are or what your gender is.”

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HISTORY

John Evans helped found Northwestern.

His name is everywhere.

He may also be responsible for one of the bloodiest atrocities ever committed on American soil.

Now, the University is trying to make amends.

By Christian Holub

34 | S P R I N G 2 0 1 4

photo courtesy of northwestern archives

A STAIN ON OUR

Buffalo, she said.

The Cheyenne woman thought it was a herd of buffalo approaching.

What else could it possibly be?

photo courtesy of northwestern archives

Not soldiers, surely, not when her tribe was camped so close to an American outpost, not when a peace flag was flying above their lodges.

But interpreter John Smith knew better. Looking out from his lodge on the morning of Nov. 29, 1864, on the shores of Colorado’s Sand Creek, he could tell that the approaching mass was, in fact, a company of soldiers.

And they were firing.

The years leading up to that day had seen relations between American frontiersmen and the native tribes in the Colorado Territory steadily deteriorate. As more and more settlers poured into the territory seeking gold reserves in the Rocky Mountains, the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes of the region found themselves continually signing treaties and watching as their reserved areas of land dwindled away into almost nothing.

Soon enough, this led to armed conflict. Groups of militaristic Cheyenne braves known as the Dog Soldiers refused to accede to treaties they deemed unfair. They continued to hunt buffalo where they wanted and fought white settlers who got in their way. Ranches were burned; scalpings abounded. While the American Civil War was raging across the country, a smaller Indian War broke out in Colorado.

John Evans, who was governor of the Colorado Territory from 1862-65, recognized that not all the area’s Natives were intent on war with whites.

Shortly after the war broke out, he issued a proclamation inviting all friendly Natives to gather at designated American military outposts, where they would be safe from soldiers. In response, groups of Cheyenne (led by chiefs Black Kettle and White Antelope) and Arapaho (led by Left Hand) slowly accumulated at the American outpost of Fort Lyon. There they turned in their weapons, traded buffalo skins and demonstrated their desire for peace before making camp on

the banks of the nearby Sand Creek.

Some of the Americans at Fort Lyon were on friendly terms with the local tribes. Smith, who had a Native American wife and son, was one of them. He was dispatched to the Sand Creek encampment on Nov. 26 by the Fort Lyon commander to check on the Native Americans, taking the time to trade and visit with his family. Three days later, the Cheyenne woman burst into Smith’s lodge with her frantic warnings of buffalo.

Smith soon found out the approaching horde was, in fact, 700 American soldiers under the command of Col. John Chivington. According to historian Stan Hoig in his 1961 account The Sand Creek Massacre, the soldiers had already driven off the Natives’ herd of cattle and were now firing into the camp from armed positions. Smith and his comrades approached the soldiers and tried to reason with them but were fired at until they withdrew into their lodge.

Black Kettle raised an American flag above his tent as a sign of peace, as he had been counseled to do by American officers in such a scenario, but the continued assault forced him to flee. White Antelope, described

by Hoig as “one of the bravest and greatest of the Cheyenne warriors,” also refused to fight. In an attempt to demonstrate his people’s peaceful intent, White Antelope stood in the middle of the creek with his arms folded across his chest. There he was fatally shot, and it was there that soldiers came after the battle to scalp him and cut off his ears, nose and testicles—the last to make into a tobacco pouch, according to Hoig.

Most Natives who tried to flee were chased down, though some, including Black Kettle, managed to escape.

A majority of historical accounts pin the death toll near 130 Natives, about 100 of whom were women and children. In his congressional testi-

mony from March 15, 1865, Smith described the carnage: “I saw the bodies of those lying there cut all to pieces, worse mutilated than any I ever saw before; the women cut all to pieces.

With knives, scalped; their brains knocked out; children two or three months old; all ages lying there, from sucking infants up to warriors.”

Although Chivington initially described the massacre as a glorious battle, it quickly became the subject of a congressional investigation. Evans was not in Colorado at the time of the massacre, but the congressional committee still found him culpable enough to demand his resignation as governor.

One organization that did not punish Evans for Sand Creek, though, was the Methodist college he had helped found on Chicago’s North Shore. Having been one of the founders of Northwestern University, he remained president of its Board of Trustees for years afterward.

“A uniquely cruel act” Gary Fine remembers how their jaws dropped when he told his audience about Evans.

In 2004 Fine was named John Evans Professor of Sociology for his work on political reputation and collective memory. Northwestern, like many schools, sets aside money for senior faculty whose research the University deems significant. Many schools name these professorships after important figures in the University’s history, so it’s no surprise that some Northwestern professorships are named after one of the University’s founders.

During the honorary lecture Fine gave at his investiture ceremony, he decided to mention the connection between Evans and the Sand Creek Massacre. His audience was flabbergasted.

“No one knew,” Fine says. “This was the amazing thing—there were

people from the Northwestern administration at my talk whose jaws dropped open when I explained Evans’ relationship to Sand Creek.”

Months earlier, Fine had received an email from the Weinberg Dean’s Office informing him of the professorship, which included a $5,000 research fund. Fine said he was honored to receive the nomination but curious about the man whose name seems to adorn so many institutions at Northwestern: apartment complexes, the Alumni Center, professorships and— of course—the town of Evanston itself. He took his curiosity to Google and quickly discovered that Evans’ history, like that of America itself, has a dark secret. Fine was horrified to find that Evans was tied to the one of the single bloodiest massacres of Native Americans in history.

“It was a uniquely cruel act,” Fine says of Sand Creek. “To read about it is to read about the kind of genocide that one rarely finds in American history.”

Recognizing the depravity of the Sand Creek Massacre is easy. Determining the extent of Evans’ involvement in it, meanwhile, is much harder.

No smoking gun John Evans never seemed to be able to stay in the same place for long.

Born March 9, 1814 in Waynesville, Ohio, Evans was trained as a doctor and became famous for his efforts to build a hospital for the insane in Indiana. He moved to Chicago in 1845 and joined the faculty of Rush Medical College, where he helped grow the student body and raise medical education standards. Though born a Quaker, he became a Methodist in 1841, which led to an 1850 meeting with other prominent Chicago leaders to plan the creation of a Methodist university in Chicago. After its charter, Evans heavily donated both money and property to the school that became Northwestern. For his NORTHBYNORTHWESTERN.COM | 35

36 | S P R I N G 2 0 1 4

it was implicit or explicit, there was a desire to get rid of Natives.”

Recognition and reaction After learning about Evans’s connection to Sand Creek in 2004, Fine continued to discuss it in his lectures over the years but hesitated to lead any kind of larger action.

“I thought if this was going to be serious it shouldn’t come from a professor—it should come from the students,” Fine says.

The opportunity for student-led efforts to recognize the massacre came in 2012, when Adam Mendel (WCAS ’13) became interested in the topic after coming across Evans’s name in a history textbook. Working with Northwestern’s branch of the Native American and Indigenous Student Association (NAISA) and other interested students, Mendel helped draft a petition demanding that the University recognize Evans’s connection to Sand Creek and take steps to atone for it. The petition also asked that a memorial be built to the memory of Sand Creek, that a Native American Studies program be created at Northwestern and that the school create a scholarship fund for Cheyenne and

On Aug. 11, 1864, three months before Sand Creek, Evans ordered local Colorado militias to “punish and exterminate these murdering horsestealing Indians.”

Arapaho students.

Northwestern’s first response to the petition was to assemble a committee of historians to ascertain the exact nature of Evans’ connection both to Sand Creek and Northwestern. The John Evans Study Committee, comprising history professors both inside and outside Northwestern, was given a deadline of June 1, 2014 to release a report of its findings, but it held an open forum in October to discuss its progress with the larger Northwestern community.

It did not go well.

Members of the local Native American community came to the forum—more than the committee expected—and they brought questions that the committee had not prepared for. The result was a tense atmosphere.

Forrest Bruce, current co-president of NAISA and a SESP sophomore of Ojibwe descent, was visibly uncomfortable when asked to describe the open forum. He discussed one instance in particular in which a Native American man stood up to ask a question of the committee and was yelled at to sit back down.

“It was kind of a hostile environment, I guess,”

Bruce says.

Fine believed the trouble at the open forum came from the clear disconnect between the committee’s approach to its investigation and the emotional investment some community members had in it.

“There was a certain insensitivity to the concerns of the Native people in the audience,” Fine says. “The people at the front were not prepared for strong emotional concerns. They thought it was going be a talk among academics about history, but instead it was a discussion about collective trauma that the committee was not prepared to discuss.”

From the outset, committee members said their investigation would focus primarily on historical documents (finance reports and records) that illustrated the connection between Evans’s Colorado activities and the funds he donated to Northwestern. This concerned members of the Native community, who felt that this approach would skew away from Native perspectives on history.

“They said they were only looking at finance reports and news reports, but who was writing those reports?” Johnson says. “Our people have always relied on oral tradition.”

These problems were not lost on Northwestern’s upper administration after the tense open forum. Administrators decided to assemble their Native American Outreach and Inclusion Task Force earlier than planned. According to Dr. Patricia Telles-Irvin, the vice president of student affairs and one of the co-chairs of the task force, the body was originally going to be formed after the study committee released its June 1 report. It would make recommendations to the University about how to move forward. Instead, the forum made clear that there are independent problems to work on in the meantime.

“I think what’s been brought to our attention is that we need to look at ways in which we can increase the number of Native Americans who apply to this university,” Telles-Irvin says. “I don’t know what the report will say, so depending on those results we will move forward with our recommendations. But no matter what happens with that report, we’re still committed to seeing what we can do to increase the number of Native Americans at Northwestern.”

An invisible minority Although the task force formed shortly after October’s open forum, it wasn’t announced until April 21. Telles-Irvin attributed the delay to the time it took to find representatives from the Cheyenne and Arapaho communities willing and available to be members of the task force. With that goal now reached and the task force officially announced, Bruce—who is a member of the task force, along with fellow NAISA co-president and Weinberg junior Heather Menefee—wondered why it took so long to raise the issue at Northwestern.

“I have no idea how it didn’t come up before,” he says. “I guess no one bothered looking that deep into it. It’s a hard thing to think about, that your university is related to something that atrocious. It’s pretty disturbing.”

European Americans have long had trouble acknowledging their long, dark past with this continent’s natives. Instead of dwelling on this historical

image courtesy of denver public library

contributions he was voted the first president of Northwestern’s board of trustees, and the town that sprang up around it was named in his honor.

Evans was successful in Chicago, but eventually he sought greater challenges. On March 26, 1862, he accepted President Abraham Lincoln’s nomination as governor of the fledgling Colorado Territory.

Shortly after arriving in Denver, Evans was informed that he was in charge of dealings with the area’s Native Americans. According to Harry E. Kelsey Jr.’s 1969 biography of Evans, Frontier Capitalist, there was no separate Superintendent of Indian Affairs. That was simply another one of the governor’s duties, even though Kelsey notes that the two positions “were not really compatible,” since one of them is supposed to protect citizens and one is supposed to serve the Natives. Evans’ tenure saw the two groups in direct conflict.

As Colorado’s Indian War escalated, it became clear which group Evans prioritized. Though he reached out to peaceful Natives, he spurned attempts by chiefs Black Kettle and White Antelope to sign a lasting peace, distrusting their motives. On Aug. 11, 1864, three months before Sand Creek and barely six weeks after first announcing his overture to peaceful Natives, Evans ordered local Colorado militias to “punish and exterminate these murdering horse-stealing Indians.”

Despite this edict, there exists no “smoking gun” piece of evidence proving that Evans directly ordered the Sand Creek Massacre. In fact, Evans was not even in Colorado when the massacre took place. He was in Washington, D.C., arguing for Colorado statehood, and Kelsey argues that Evans’ accountability for Sand Creek was exaggerated by political opponents who wanted to crush the statehood campaign. Evans himself published an itemby-item refutation of the claims that he was responsible for the massacre. Chivington, who was Evans’ good friend and fellow Methodist, repeatedly testified that Evans had no knowledge of the massacre beforehand.

But the congressional investigation into Sand Creek still found Evans culpable. They released a scathing report criticizing Evans and condemning Chivington. In response, President Andrew Johnson asked for Evans’ resignation on Aug. 1, 1865.

It’s worth noting that, in addition to Evans’s obvious control over Colorado’s overall Native American policy, it’s likely he benefitted financially from the Sand Creek Massacre. He was a railroad developer going back to his Chicago days, and he was heavily involved in the construction of the Denver Pacific railroad. Kelsey notes that “it’s impossible to tell how much profit Evans and his associates realized from the Denver Pacific venture,” but that “he would not have done so unless there was a chance to make a considerable profit…he was too good a businessman to do otherwise.”

The breaking of the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes at Sand Creek inarguably opened up the Colorado countryside to railroad construction, and Kelsey notes that though the railroad project had been suspended during the Indian hostilities, it was never far from Evans’ mind.

“The connection made sense given his railroad background,” says Andrew Johnson (no relation to the 17th president), the Executive Director of Chicago’s American Indian Center (AIC). “But whether

A SURPRISE ATTACK An artistic depiction of the Sand Creek Massacre. The Cheyenne and Arapaho were caught off-guard by the attack.

image courtesy of denver public library

violence, they willfully overlook it. Many Americans recognize that Native tribes once dominated North America and that they no longer do, without thinking about what the transition entailed. This, more than anything, may explain why Evans’ (and by extension, Northwestern’s) connection to Sand Creek went undiscussed for so long.

“We do a terrible job in our relationship with Native Americans and the terrible-ness is wide-ranging, from the Bureau of Indian Affairs mismanaging tribe funds to people thinking of Native Americans as being from the past,” says Doug Medin, Northwestern psychology professor and a member of the task force. “Invisibility is a big issue.”

Lori Faber, community research project coordinator at the AIC, says even talking about the Sand Creek Massacre can shroud the fact that it was far from the only massacre of Native Americans.

“There were so many massacres. Villages were sleeping and were attacked,” Faber says. “A lot of people don’t know that history. We don’t get that in schools. Northwestern as an institution has a responsibility to share these stories.”

Medin’s research focuses on differences in how European Americans and Native Americans think about nature. He has worked with members of the Menominee tribe in Wisconsin since 1997 and with the AIC for about decade, and in that time he said he has become acutely aware of some of the problems plaguing the Native community, from disheartening college matriculation statistics to bullying provoked by cultural ignorance.

“It did not take the Evans issue for me to realize NU has not been overly concerned with their relationship with Native Americans,” Medin says.

“Native Americans are one of the most underrepresented populations on this campus. But not only is there a considerable Native American population in Chicago, there are tribes close by, reservations in Wisconsin. There are relations to be developed there.”

Medin suggests that some of those relationships with the Native population in Chicago (about 5,000 as of the 2010 Census) could involve coop-

eration between Northwestern schools and Native organizations. Medill could partner with the Native American Journalist Association (NAJA), for example, or McCormick with the American Indian Science and Engineering Society. Medill Professor Loren Ghiglione, another member of the task force, wrote in an email from South Africa that he is attending NAJA’s annual National Native Media Conference in July. Ghiglione also says he is pursuing funding from Medill for an annual award to honor a Native American journalist.

“We’re hoping to expand perspective,” Faber says. “There are so many traditions that Native peoples share. Indigenous knowledge has so much to offer.”

The way forward Northwestern is not the first university to publicly confront skeletons from its past. In 2003, Brown University made headlines with its investigation into the Brown family’s history with the slave trade. Telles-Irvin says that Brown has been brought up in the task force’s discussions, and Fine has passionately insisted that Northwestern use Brown’s efforts as a role model.

“Ruth Simmons, the Brown president who took the lead on that, was remembered as the best university president in the U.S., and I would like the same for our president,” Fine says. “So far that hasn’t happened, but we’ll see.”

Northwestern’s Evans committee has already inspired a similar historical investigation at the University of Denver, a school that Evans also helped found. The University of Denver—then called the Colorado Seminary—was chartered a mere two weeks before the Sand Creek Massacre, and Associate Professor of Political Science Nancy Wadsworth says Northwestern’s investigation into Evans and Sand Creek dovetailed nicely with the commemorative efforts already in place for her school’s sesquicentennial.

“The founding of DU is infinitely linked to the historical events the two committees are studying,” Wadsworth says. “Last year we learned that NU

had started this investigation, and that got the ball rolling. I think a lot of people on campus had been thinking about Sand Creek and were interested in doing something about it.”

Wadsworth says that her committee is releasing its report on Sept. 1, in time for the 150th anniversary of both the massacre and the school’s founding.

The report from Northwestern’s Evans Committee may be due June 1, but that will by no means be the end of the reconciliation process. Though Telles-Irvin says the task force is diligently looking at ways to increase Native American presence at Northwestern, some of the original petition’s other demands, such as the creation of a Native American Studies program, may prove harder to fulfill right away, according to Provost Dan Linzer. Although Linzer has the final say in creating academic programs, he says there needs to be demonstrated interest first.

“I’m certainly open to dialogue about this, but I’m like the endpoint,” Linzer says. “Most initiatives like this, like Asian American Studies, start as a program with a minor or a concentration, then maybe eventually become a major, and maybe eventually a department. Most of this is up to students and faculty. You don’t want to dedicate time and money to a course if nobody’s going to sign up for it.”

Mendel, for one, is optimistic about the chances of a Native American Studies program, given his positive experience as a Latino Studies major.

“When people see ethnic studies they think it’s just a few people of that ethnicity or whatever taking it, but the point is to create an understanding of people,” Mendel says. I think actions around John Evans would create an interest in that study.”

Faber and Johnson are well aware that the struggle is far from over, and remain cautiously optimistic about Northwestern’s efforts.

“A naïve approach is even more insulting than none at all,” Johnson says. “We want to be taken seriously, and no, we’re not going away.”

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photo: colton maddox

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LOVE OF

inda K. Epling Stadium doesn’t have a batter’s eye. It had been bothering Greg Cypret for years.

Most baseball fields come equipped with a dark-colored covering behind the centerfield wall, to help hitters spot pitches in the light as they’re flung from the mound to home plate. But beyond the fence of Linda K. Epling lies only a throng of oak trees, a spacious patch of grass, two small scoreboards and stadium lights. Cypret, head coach of the Chillicothe Paints, kept that in mind as his players prepared to play the West Virginia Miners in Beckley, W. Va. It was June 15, 2012, and Cody Stevens was one of hundreds of NCAA ballplayers sharpening their skills in the wood-bat, May-through-August Prospect League. Stevens, a rising junior at Northwestern, saw his Paints down 4-0 to Miners starting pitcher Will Blalock as he stepped up to bat in the fifth inning.

Ball. Ball. Foul. Ball. A 3-1 count is baseball’s universal green light; a pitcher reluctant to issue a walk has little choice but to hurl a guaranteed strike across the heart of the zone. Stevens squared his stance and was ready to capitalize.

“That night, we were playing with a philosophy of backing hitters off the plate,” Blalock remembers. “But when I released the pitch, I knew right away that I let it sail. I saw it going for his earhole. I knew something serious had happened.”

Without a batter’s eye, Stevens

was slow to see the errant fastball and it drilled him in the head. A ringing persisted in his helmet as he stumbled toward first base, getting only about four feet past home before Cypret and his coaching staff decided to help him back to the Paints bench.

Reserve Vinnie Booker was called to pinch run. Stevens’s night was over.

The next four innings brought a slew of pupil, reflex and light sensitivity tests from an onsite EMT and the Miners’ trainer. The Paints lost by a final score of 6-3, and the medical staff concluded that Stevens’s injury was a concussion. He would be sidelined for three weeks, he was told, as the team packed up its equipment and boarded for a short drive home.

Air conditioning blasted through the Paints’ coach bus, but Stevens began sweating as it merged onto the West Virginia turnpike. Then came the tingling in his hands and feet. Then numbness. His jaw started hurting.

“I can’t do this,” a woozy Stevens told Cypret. “I’m in pain.”

The team pulled over to the nearest toll phone, where Cypret and bench coach Marty Dunn called for an ambulance. Stevens grabbed a blanket from the bus, found a patch of grass and gazed up at the stars. A promising summer of baseball was about to be cut short.

photo: colton maddox

SEBALL When Cody Stevens was hit in the head by a pitch, he almost died.

Two years later, he’s a lynchpin in the Northwestern lineup.

BY STEVEN GOLDSTEIN

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“Why me?” he thought to himself. “Why me, why here, and why now?”

The whirring of sirens cut short any subsequent questions. Stevens was loaded onto a stretcher with Cypret and rushed to Raleigh General Hospital in Beckley.

“Cody Stevens advances to 1st (HBP).”

Kenan Stevens picked up her phone to check her younger son’s at-bat on the Prospect League’s play-by-play stream before resuming a graduation dinner in Evanston for her older son Trevor. Nobody at the table thought much of it, and a few hours later Trevor joined his Northwestern Baseball teammates of five years to celebrate. It was midway through the party when Paul, Trevor’s father and the head coach of the team, called him to come home. Piecing two and two together, Trevor bolted for his car and sped toward his house in Glenview, a northwest suburb of Chicago.

Cody’s condition was getting worse, and Paul and Kenan wanted to go see him immediately. But midnight flights to West Virginia are hard to come by, so Trevor drove his parents to O’Hare to rent a car. Papers were filled out; goodbyes were made.

The Stevenses embarked on a nine-hour highway drive blanketed in darkness.

The first ring came from Beckley. It was a nurse at Raleigh Hospital, eager for Cody to assuage his worrying parents. After six dropped calls, a connection was finally made.

“I’m a little freaked out, Mom,” Cody admitted.

“But I’m going to be fine.”

“We’re on our way. I love you,” Kenan answers.

The next ring came from Charleston. A blood clot the size of two iPhones stacked together had developed in Cody’s skull, pushing his brain offcenter. Raleigh’s trauma ward wasn’t equipped to handle his condition, so doctors paralyzed Cody and put him on life support before airlifting him to Charleston Area Medical Center (CAMC). Paul, who was driving, passed his phone to Kenan in the passenger seat.

“My name is Dr. Joseph Crow. Your son needs immediate surgery. I’m heading to the emergency room to operate. The lawyers are going to talk to you.”

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“My name is Dr. Joseph Crow.

Your son needs immediate surgery. The lawyers are going to talk to you.”

The sun was rising by the time Paul and Kenan arrived at CAMC. Cody Stevens was awake, and he knew where he was.

“The shocking thing was when the doctor peeled that bandage off. It took my breath away,” Kenan recalls. “Looking back, we were oblivious to so much. We didn’t know just how bad he was, or how bad he could have been.”

Cody spent the next week in the hospital sleeping, idly watching “The Price Is Right,” and occasionally wandering the halls of CAMC. Every four hours, a nurse would begin a precautionary exchange: “Where are you, what day is it, and who’s the President?”

“Charleston. Sunday. Barack Obama.”

Then back to sleep.

Paul and Kenan had been awake for more than 24 hours before retiring to a hotel on Sunday. From there, each parent switched off between brief rest periods and hospital visits while assuring family members that Cody was alive and conscious. With their son stable, the Stevenses headed back to the

hotel Monday night for some needed sleep.

They made it a few feet out of the hospital elevator before getting caught by a Tennessee drawl thick as molasses with a sharp sense of urgency.

“You wouldn’t happen to be Mr. and Mrs. Stevens, would you?” he says. “My name is Will Blalock. I’m the pitcher that hit your son.”

Blalock’s parents happened to be in town to watch the final game of the Miners/Paints series on Saturday. After hearing what had happened to the kid from Chillicothe, Blalock insisted that the family drive to the hospital. The three spent an hour searching the main lobby for Mr. and Mrs. Stevens before finally finding the man that shared Cody’s flat nose, full lips and inviting brown eyes.

Both families broke down in tears. Prayers ensued, and phone numbers were exchanged.

Though CAMC’s visiting hours were over, Paul and Kenan were adamant about Blalock seeing Cody.

“Dude. I’m so sorry.”

That’s the first thing a teary Will Blalock could muster. Cody, awake but sedated, wouldn’t let him apologize.

“It’s baseball. Don’t worry about it. Don’t let this affect you.”

Blalock did let it affect him. He walked a season-high seven batters in his first start since the incident. But the bigger shock came eight months later, when a snowed-out Northwestern team scheduled a spot game against Blalock’s Lipscomb Bisons in Nashville. Cody would sit out that entire season, but the first Wildcat Blalock faced had that same flat nose and full lips. It was Trevor, batting leadoff, and for the first time in nearly a year, Blalock flashed back to that June night in Beckley.

Cody Stevens was released from Charleston Area Medical Center on June 23, a full week after he was admitted. Now much more at ease, Paul and Kenan struggled to remember the path they took through the serpentine back roads they first came through, while Cody was plagued by headaches.

But the ensuing drive still felt far shorter than nine hours.

Somehow, against all odds, Cody Stevens was coming home.

Cody’s volatile sleep schedule at CAMC meant that he slept almost 20 hours a day when he first got back to Glenview. But his daily routine returned to normal shortly after his return, something that astounds Trevor to this day. No physical rehab was required; aside from ibuprofen, no pills were needed, either. The hard part became staying away from the game Cody planned on playing all summer—the same game that nearly took his life.

Returning to Northwestern wasn’t without its obstacles. Though his brain was fine, Cody’s skull still needed time to fully heal, and his academic adviser was wary of letting him take more than two courses. Cody, however, was set on a full course load to take advantage of the time off during his medical redshirt season.

Coming back to baseball in any capacity prompted visceral concern from Cody’s friends and

photo by jeremy gaines

Cody Stevens belonged to Northwestern Baseball from the moment he was born to the longest-tenured coach in program history. A three-year varsity athlete and honor roll student at Glenbrook South High School, Cody officially joined the Wildcats after representing Team Illinois in Oklahoma’s high school Sun Belt Tournament.

Freshman year growing pains hit as expected, though, and in the spring of 2011 Cody hit a paltry .171 in 26 appearances, while Trevor, a junior, ranked third on the team with a .305 batting average.

Cody’s sophomore season showed a marked improvement, with his average climbing to .235 in 36 games as a versatile reserve. The natural next step in the progression was summer ball, where Cody could continue tuning his swing and compete

against players outside of the Big Ten. He notched a team-best .350 average through 13 games with the Paints.

But baseball was far from Paul Stevens’s mind as he frantically sped toward Charleston. Cody was being rushed to surgery, and Paul imagined a West Virginia surgeon on call at 2 a.m. to be “some guy coming out of the woodwork with a pitchfork.”

But Crow, the doctor on call, was an acclaimed neurosurgeon who has completed residencies with the Universities of Massachusetts and North Carolina. Crow shaved the left side of Cody’s head, made an incision running from his temple to the crown of his skull, and began the procedure.

family, too. While the Stevenses had been a baseball family for more than two decades, those removed from the culture had a hard time understanding why Cody would want to return to the sport after such a traumatic accident.

“People kept saying, ‘You almost died.’ But someone would have had to tell me that I couldn’t play anymore,” Cody remembers. “It was such a crazy thing that happened, and there was such a small chance that it would ever happen again. I grew up around this. I always wanted to be a part of this team, I always wanted to play for this university, and some of my fondest moments are on this field.

I wasn’t going to leave it.”

He hung around it all fall, helping film practices, gathering equipment and running errands for the team. By winter he was able to hit off a tee and take ground balls. But Cody was required to wear a helmet anywhere near a moving baseball.

“I looked like a bobblehead. I already have a really big head comparatively, and this just made it look even bigger,” Cody laughs. “But, hey, I got neck muscles.”

photo by jeremy gaines

Every seat in Chase Field, home of MLB’s Arizona Diamondbacks, points toward home plate.

Cody Stevens knows this because he’s a selfproclaimed “stadiums nerd” with a preternatural love for the sport of baseball and the fields that it’s played on. When two teammates were having a debate over Major League stadium quirks last spring, a sidelined Stevens was quick to teach them this fact, among many others. Ask Stevens about his favorite memories of Northwestern Baseball and he’ll immediately mention when the Wildcats played against Minnesota at Target Field (home of the Twins) and against the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee at Miller Park (home of the Brewers).

But for a lifelong fan from Chicagoland, the home of Chicago Cubs is in a league apart from those parks. The stadiums nerd can go on for hours about Wrigley Field, and after taking an internship with the organization as part of a graduate program residency, Cody soon learned that the Wildcats were planning to play a game at the Friendly Confines. Seeing his favorite team operate from an interior vantage point was an opportunity he never imagined having, but being unable to play on the field he worshipped for years was the most testing part of his year off. Cody gets excited when a crowd of 200 shows up to Northwestern’s Rocky Miller Park; there were more than 4,000 purple-clad fans at Wrigley on April 20, 2013.

Northwestern shut out rival Michigan 6-0 in that game, but Cody wasn’t completely left out: He was able to take batting practice before the first pitch, a crucial step in returning to baseball.

No longer needing a helmet, Cody now donned a special skull-protecting hat from Unequal Technologies, a Pennsylvania company. Toward the end of Northwestern’s season, Cody was able to step up at the end of one practice for a live at-bat against teammate Nick Fryer. Cody swung and a missed on a first-pitch fastball that sailed even with his eyeline. Then he hit a line drive to center field.

“I wasn’t thinking about the competitive aspect at that point,” Cody says. “Then, I was just relieved that I could still do this.”

The search for a summer league team to ameliorate his return didn’t last long. Cody knew there was unfinished business in Chillicothe, and Cypret and owner Chris Hanners had no reservations about welcoming him back.

The “beer batter of the night” at Don McBride Stadium—home of the Prospect League’s Richmond RiverRats—is randomly assigned to one player on the opposing team. The rules are simple: If that hitter strikes out, beers are half-priced.

The beer batter on June 9? Chillicothe left fielder Cody Stevens.

DOUBLE PLAY Since returning, Stevens has started all 50 games this season, the only Northwestern player do so.

Cody, arriving 11 games into the Paints’ season due to NU’s late academic finish, was making his season debut that night in Richmond. An otherwise relaxed atmosphere turned hostile when Cody made his way to the batter’s box and discounted drinks were on the line.

Richmond’s Kent Williams let the first pitch sit up and in to back Cody off the plate. Strike. The 788 in attendance were whipped into a frenzy. Kenan Stevens closed her eyes and, in the words of Paul, “came out of her skin.”

But Cody wound up hitting a grounder down the third baseline, and despite his 0-3 finish, his return was a promising one. If he could survive being the beer batter, he could survive anything else the Prospect League had in store for him.

Cody hit .227 in 30 games for the Paints, raising his average an impressive 75 points in the final month of the season after an arduous start.

Chillicothe finished with a record of 34-26, but the end of his Prospect stint meant rejoining his Northwestern teammates of four years, leaving a close but ultimately disjointed group of college players from around the country in the Paints.

After missing an entire season of playing time with the Wildcats, Cody didn’t expect to be an immediate contributor on a team that was returning a cadre of experienced middle infielders. Then AllBig Ten shortstop Kyle Ruchim injured his hamstring and was forced into season-ending surgery. Cody was suddenly expected to return to NCAA ball starting at the game’s premiere defensive position.

He’s been far from an emergency solution thus far. Cody leads the Wildcats in stolen bases and sits fourth on the team with a .284 batting average through NU’s first 50 games. With another year of eligibility in 2015, the jump Cody was expected to make between his sophomore and junior seasons is happening right on cue. It’s just not how he originally mapped it out.

“I consider myself so lucky. I got hit like that, and relatively no consequences. I wasn’t excited about taking a year off, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized how much good would come from it,” he says. “And if I would’ve died, I would’ve died doing something I loved.”

Cody and Blalock text each other on a weekly basis. Blalock, who was recently shut down for the season due to Tommy John surgery, jokes at the concern Cody still shows for an arm injury considerably less severe than what he battled back from. Kenan Stevens doesn’t jump out of her skin anymore, though she admits she cries when the chopping of an airlift is heard overhead.

“My chest collapses thinking about all this,” Paul says. But it’s not difficult to talk about. It’s emotional.

It’s a celebration of where he was, and where he is now. You just have to keep moving forward and believing and trusting. Whether you believe or you don’t believe, there are a lot of reasons to doubletake with something like this.”

It’s April 23, and with Northwestern tied with Chicago State 6-6 in the bottom of the ninth, Cody waits in the on-deck circle, watching as roommate Nick Linne leads from second base as the potential winning run. But he doesn’t stay there for long.

Each foul prompts him to fly around the dirt behind home plate, frenetically grabbing loose balls, highfiving teammates and jumping up and down in anticipation. Cody never gets a chance to provide the heroics, though. Pinch-hitter Jack Mitchell rips a single to left field, bringing Linne around to score.

Cody drops his bat, raises his arms and shouts in celebration as he jogs toward home plate.

“Baseball is his whole life. It’s his first love,” Trevor says. “You just watch him on the field now and he’s like a little kid on a baseball field for the first time. He’s so energetic and can’t contain himself. He’s not about the flash or any of that.

“He just loves the game and everything that comes with it.”

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LOOKING FOR LOVE c o m p a n i o n s h i p i s h a r d , a n d i t ’ s n o t o u r f a u l t.

LET’S FACE IT:

COLLEGE IS A DISMAL PLACE FOR RELATIONSHIPS.

BY AMANDA GLICKMAN

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5/18/14 3:30 PM

RIGHT AFTER MY FIRST CAMPUS TOUR OF NORTHWESTERN, I SAT AND DREAMT OF LOVE. I remember watching the downpour through the giant windows of the Norris basement, picturing the many late nights I would spend studying here. Maybe with a cute guy. He would ideally be the intellectual type because, well, Northwestern. He would be artsy. He would not complete me, not even be my boyfriend, but rather, one of many beautiful, intellectual individuals on my beltnotches of young adult self-discovery.

The pink pendant lights hanging from the ceiling combined with the warm, bready smell of fresh Sbarro’s pizza made me swoon.

Four years later, I’m making conscious efforts to keep my swooning reflexes alive as I power through a two-and-a-half year relationship.

Since arriving here, I’ve learned to keep my fast-acquired jadedness at bay when it comes to love.

A few months into school, I wrote an article bemoaning the pesky concept of “The Fizzle:” that thing that happens when a hookup starts to look like something more serious and then just gradually ends. It was only January, and I already had experienced The Fizzle too many times for my liking after attempting to immerse myself in the ever-hyped hookup culture.

Some blessed alum who sounded like she was in her 30s commented on the article and shared an anecdote about how she and her now-husband met on the set of a student film as RTVF students, and how as long as you set aside time for your significant other like you set aside time for schoolwork, you will succeed in never fizzling out.

I took her words to heart and wrote “Ask Stephen Out” on my iCal, between “Work 1-5” and “GO to ZUMBA”. Stephen* was this kid from

photo by michael nowakowski

FEATURE.indd 25

* Name changed

down the hall who showed up at the water fountain at all the same times as me. He was a drummer, held doors open and had great flippy hair. The hair got me.

Friends were mystified as to why exactly I wanted to “shut it down” halfway through freshman year before even getting to know this guy.

They wanted to know how I was OK with this, how such a thing could even happen so early. But it was happening: I had little control over my feelings and instead of closing myself off or reverting to my belt-notch dream, I swore to destroy The Fizzle for good.

It wasn’t for moral recovery, let me make that clear. It was me acting on this deep instinctual knowledge of “This is it, this is what you planned to find much later in life.” And my instincts proved right: I was head-overheels for Stephen after we went on a deep and meaningful Red Mango run (self-initiated as planned). From there things got heavy fast, and I felt like I was permanently tipsy in the best kind of way. We had been hanging out every single night, wedging ourselves in our dorm’s narrow hallways while we learned each other’s scariest nightmares and high school stories and siblings’ names. Hearing the pessimistic bray of naysayers harshed my mellow to say the least. My own current experience made me want to shout from the rooftops, announce to all of Northwestern. But then it occurred to me that none of the naysayers ever said that love was something they in fact wanted. It wasn’t even what I thought I wanted a month or two prior. I pictured my prospie self scoffing loudly in the corner, stillw pushing for more years of free, fun experimentation.

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5/18/14 3:30 PM

At risk of generalizing, I think I can say that all Northwestern students want companionship, whether that’s in the form of friends, lovers, booty calls, crush party invites or study buddies. I’ll go out on another limb and say that the majority of Northwestern students have innate libidinal urges that affect them in every aspect of life. Think of the primitive homo sapiens, hungry for food and copulation in order to survive and propagate the species. Think of “sex” on psychologist Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of

needs chart, placed on the basest physiological level next to “water” and “sleep.”

While so many students turn to hookups because they fulfill their base need for sexy time, this school doesn’t provide the environment for students to meet their third-level Maslowian need for love and belonging. Because it takes work and it’s time-consuming and who has time to consume and energy to work when we’re cramming our schedules tight with credits and certificates and Facebook events by the dozen? We

MASLOW’S HIERARCHY PHYSIOLOGY FOOD

WATER

SEX

SLEEP

S A F E T Y SECURITY MORALITY

EMPLOYMENT HEALTH

RESOURCES PROPERTY

LOVE & BELONGINGS FRIENDSHIP SEXUAL

FAMILY INTIMACY

E S T E E M CONFIDENCE RESPECT RESPECT

OF FROM

ACHIEVEMENT OTHERS OTHERS

SELF ACTUALIZATION MORALITY CREATIVITY PROBLEM LACK OF ACCEPTANCE OF

SPONTANEITY SOLVING PREJUDICE FACTS

tailor our lives to fit our fast-expanding résumés. We don’t really place sex and love as high on our priority lists as we do with eating and sleeping, and it takes a toll on us. Between our distaste for vulnerability, our propensity to be affected by soul-chilling weather and our general collegiate lifestyles, I’d say that we face a tough road ahead in terms of love, whether that love is on the horizon or already-acquired.

FEARING THE ‘DTR’ CONVERSATION After we got to the one-year mark, Stephen and I found that we were constantly clarifying the level of seriousness with which we took our relationship.

Everything had happened so fast and turned into this giant thing that sometimes proved overwhelming. Each new stage provided obstacles to jump over: How much do we spend on our first holiday gift exchanges? When do we meet the parents, the extended family? Do most people go Dutch on dates at this point? Is it romantic to go to Chipotle over actual restaurants 75 percent of the time?

Everything hinged on determining if this was for the long haul. It meant constantly checking in with each other to redefine what exactly we were doing. It seemed, frankly, a bit ridiculous for two kids in college. I found myself nostalgic for the days of our dorm hallway banter between sneaky makeouts. It had been so simple, so easy.

Paula England, a former sociology professor at Northwestern, conducted a study in 2011 compiling data about college-age hookups, and found that most people hooking up were repeat offenders, returning to the same partner for a better chance of sexual satisfaction and ease. Ease. It’s undeniable in convenience-factor: there is nothing like a reliable sex partner, especially with little energy and time to spend looking for new ones. England also determined that unlike in the days of our parents, our generation tends to start relationships by hooking up before emotional connections are formed, getting a feel for the physical attraction to said hookup partner and then determining whether to forge forward in a more formal way.

In other words, hookups lead to either moving onto the next, or having to DTR (“Define the Relationship,” which is the

actual language used in study, stolen directly from Jersey Shore). DTR is the opposite of ease.

My friend Madison Ginsberg, a Communication junior, claims “Everyone is so afraid of [DTR]. No one ever knows what they are because people have definitions for different things.” The reason why defining relationships is so hard to broach with a prospective partner is simple: fear of judgement, fear of rejection, fear of getting serious. People seem to think DTR is reserved only for those rare and oft-fictional instances of love at first sight, where things must be established or else everyone cries and bids tearful goodbyes. DTR is worthy of any sort of level of seriousness, for peace of mind if anything else.

Madison and her now-boyfriend were crunched for time in the fledgling stage of their relationship to talk about DTR. “I finally brought it up because it was two weeks before the end of school and he was going to Germany and I wanted to know,” she says. “It’s not as painful as everyone thinks it is, the ‘talk.’ But then again it worked out for me, so I should be thankful.”

Even Madison’s happy ending (or really, beginning) speaks of the negativity we steep ourselves in when it comes to potential love—why should we consider it rare, something to be thankful for, when really, love (or any sort of sealeddeal sex-filled alternative) is supposed to come naturally to human beings?

Though I felt overwhelmed when first hit with the reality that I was in a seriouslyserious situation with Stephen, I soon settled into it and realized it was a wonderful feeling, this security thing. It’s only natural—surely the DTR talk was more of a grunting, body-language-filled affair back in the Pleistocene, but it has been happening throughout history of man and womankind in order to solidify mated pairs to further the continuation of the species. Something like “Take this mixture of berries and leaves I foraged, be my mate, let’s set up a hut together for petting each other’s copious amounts of hair and making babies.” That seems easy enough. For a group of students who thrive on information, we seem to have an issue with informing those we really like that we, well, like them. Think about it: DTR is just a simple exchange of information.

Maslow’s Heirarchy of Needs is a psychological theory set forth by American psychologist Abraham Maslow. The theory suggests that a person must secure the basic needs of food, water, sex and sleep in order to secure more complex needs like personal safety, sexual intimacy and creativity. In this way Maslow attempts to rank human needs qualitatively.

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5/18/14 3:30 PM

FACING THE COLD I think it was reading week of Winter quarter, this year: I crunched through a foot of snow frozen over in coats of ice, for two and a half miles, as I made the usual trip from my apartment in the Carlson building the boyfriend’s apartment way up north on Ridge. It was a real-feel of negative 30 degrees. I should not have left my room, and yet, I wanted to celebrate the obscene weather with him, get day-tipsy from spiked coffees and watch House of Cards. I could have died from extreme frostbite, but I wanted this day of cozy fun so freaking badly.

I had real motivations to make my risky polar trek: I was feeling super low from the soul-eating coldness and I figured that if I wasn’t going to see an end in sight for my temporary bout of Seasonal Affective Disorder, I would damn sure get a nice little surge of happiness in the form of sex, TV-binging and light alcohol consumption. If I did not get my fix of these lovely things, I would wither away in my bed, deprived of oxytocin (the cuddle hormone that makes you feel warm and fuzzy and comes rushing in during physical contact) and serotonin (the happy hormone that makes you want to do sexy things), the latter which is typically replenished by the sun.

Do you see the weird contradiction in my story? I was both extremely depressed and super turned-on from the bizarre windchill. The two shouldn’t always go together, and most people find themselves somewhere in the middle of the spectrum of sad and horny during the giant unending mish-mosh of months that is winter in Chicagoland. Nature has this dual-sided trickery when it comes to sex and love in winter: On one hand, serotonin levels naturally dip and result in lower sex drive and motivation to go out and act on said sex drives due to the smaller amount of daylight and less-intense sun.

On the other hand, the weather forces us to crave warmth from other bodies and the comfort of shelter (bringing us back to Maslow’s hierarchical needs, base level) preferably with people who can provide us with warmth and sex. It’s no wonder that loads of babies are conceived during times of elongated confinement, like blackouts, hurricanes and snowstorms. Every time I curse living in Chiberia, I remind myself that extreme weather can be an aphrodisiac as long as I adjust my bad attitude.

But the awful effects of winter are not just about sex or lack thereof. We crave bonding after we crave bonking.

After the repeat-offender hookups that England studies, so many people strug-

WE CRAVE BONDING AFTER WE CRAVE BONKING. gle with classifying their actions as a type of “relationship.” The beauty and danger of the winter is that we’re all stuck inside our respective classes, activities and homes. Relationships are wont to start when two people are forced to spend time together in a specific shared area, not separated in apartments and lazily texting from miles away. I must admit that, save for that heroic snow-walk from super-south to super-north, Winter Quarter was taxing on my relationship due to my inability to want to go anywhere. When SafeRide still drove people to and from off-campus residences, I would often zip over to his place, or he to mine, but only when we weren’t bogged down by a ton of work and extra-curricular stuff. We both claimed that this past winter was the busiest quarter we’ve had in a while, and though I doubt it was actually the busiest, it was definitely the most excuse-filled.

In fact, this winter was the Winter of Excuses. The effort to get ourselves out on weekends was hilarious in its nonexistence. Why go to a bar if it meant ruining my suede platform booties in the slush? Why go to a party if it meant trekking miles away only to return to our apartments? Why pay for a singular Solo cup if we had two bottles of (shitty) wine for the same price to be drunk in the comfort of my or his living room? For months, I refused to acknowledge that being in a long-term relationship in the middle of the tundra had seriously inhibited my social life. Thawing those frozen connections takes the monumental effort of getting out of that apartment, putting on that North Face and trudging through the snow for those who are worth it.

FIGHTING OUR SURROUNDINGS Let’s return to the aforementioned “Fizzle.” It seems as if a relationship of any kind, whether it’s a bi-weekly booty call or a three-year ordeal, has a higher potential to fizzle out in a special stressheavy environment like Northwestern.

We’ve all heard it a million times: No time, so much work, boo love.

But take Northwestern out of the equation for a second and think more generally: Being in any sort of college environment is automatically harder on a relationship than if two people were to

start something post-grad.

There are dorms for the first year or two, dorms in which you probably are sharing space with a roommate. And there’s checking people in and out, not unlike prison visitors. Dorms do not foster an independent lifestyle in which one can hang out with a potential significant other and have the needed privacy for not only obvious things like sexy time, but also, quality uninterrupted conversation. Think of the Fantasy Suite night on The Bachelor, the night the couple cements their longevity because they can finally be alone. When I first met my boyfriend as a freshman, I think we had a total of two sleepovers over the course of four months. And it was definitely not Fantasy Suite material, rearraning ourselves every few minutes, trying to make a teeny twin XL mattress somehow comfortable enough to hold myself and his 6’4 self. It was... character building.

Then, fast-forward to the upperclassmen years of college. You’re more likely than not living off-campus, but not with your significant other because “that would be weird,” according to society.

Not that I’m rushing to shack up, I just think it’s funny that in the early ‘80s, my parents were doing so, as well as all their other couples-friends in college. When I asked my dad about his early cohabitation, he said, “I knew I loved Sue (my mom), we were old enough to be on our own, it saved money, we had been dating seriously for three years...it made sense.

It would not make a lot of sense today.

Don’t think about it until you have a job.

I would support you no matter what but you have time to think about just yourself right now, so enjoy it.”

I don’t enjoy it. I am looking forward to the day where we don’t have to sprint to each other’s apartments, pretending that we don’t already spend the majority of our time together. Living in two different apartments about 2.5 miles away means lots of long walks on Saturday and Sunday mornings and lots of arguments about where we’re going to stay because someone has a class down south and someone has a Zumba class up north.

So basically, we use each other’s places as strategic crash pads for scheduling convenience. Now I remind myself all the time to not just have my relationship fit into my calendar. Instead, my relation-

ship has to be better than the things on the calendar, more fun, and at least most of the time, more of a priority.

That’s the healthiest thing. It’s the hardest too.

And summers are an issue that still plagues me, my boyfriend and tons of other college couples of varying seriousness levels. College is four years spent not in your partner or your own home. It’s a limbo place and limbo time, a figurative waiting room for life that’s equal parts fun and shit.

What do you do when you get three months of a break from that waiting room? Do you bring the person who waits with you in the waiting room, or do you leave them and hope that they’ll be back to wait with you again come September? Stephen and I are facing this exact issue because I recently found out that I’ll be going home to New York for the third summer in a row, working as an editorial intern for a magazine. Stephen will be staying here, working his work-study job. We’ve already spent two summers as a couple but I have yet to see him in the month of July, except through Skype a screen.

Our latest DTR moment has been deciding that this is the last summer of interstate love for us. Next July, we are set on being in the same place, though that place is very much TBD. To Be Determined is the state of my life right now, but a part of what keeps me going is knowing that the person I’m with for the long haul is the one certainty amid all this TBDness: a source of comfort. Someone who makes me smile amidst the thousands of meetings and running miles to catch shuttles and cope with possible failing of surprise midterms. It’s impossible to say if Northwestern’s dating life is abysmal—my boyfriend and I are two among thousands, and many others of those thousands have found love as well.

But is Northwestern a dating/ relationship-friendly environment?

Hell no, it’s definitely abysmal. If we can manage to grab a hold of someone who we tolerate, like, love, are sexually-attracted to and flourish with that person, all while surviving the collective fear of vulnerability, the otherworldly weather and the unfortunate circumstances of college living? If we can barrel through any of the aforementioned roadblocks thrown in front of us and render each roadblock meaningless in comparison to the beautiful relationships we form? Well, those are accomplishments worthy of putting on a résumé.

N O R T H B Y N O R T H W E S T E R N . C O M | 42 57

FEATURE.indd 27

5/18/14 3:30 PM

SAY HELLO TO THE AUDREY ZHAO

AUDREY ZHAO PAUL AUSTIN PAUL AUSTIN PAUL AUSTIN

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page 51 DILLO BINGO

H E A D O U T.

HI

I

JUICING UP Tyler Daswick’s stomach was filled with only liquid for 96 hours. Take a look at his dayby-day reflection to see how he fared. page 48

Photo by NED MCGREGOR

HANGOVER THE

96 HOUR BODY

purge Going on a liquid cleanse taught me to trust myself.

B Y TY L ER DAS WI CK

I

48 | SPRING 2014

DAY ONE: BREAKFAST OF CHAMPS

I

began my cleanse how most people would: by deciding to put it off for 12 hours and eating the Breakfast of Champions. It was a yogurt, granola, and melon bowl with a peanut butter and jelly and banana sandwich, because I do this the right way, dammit. I kept thinking about what Pat “Life Coach” Fitzgerald would say: “Trust yourself.”

I felt great. Unfortunately, that would be the high-point of my week.

Lunch and dinner were two veggie-based shakes, meaning that I threw kale, spinach, carrots, tomatoes and a tiny bit of apple juice into a blender and pureed that sucker until it was a green, sloppy sludge. It was thick, kind of like Greek yogurt but a little chunkier, and it left green flakes all over my teeth. I hope this sounds as terrible as it was.

The first thing I learned from the cleanse (I will just call this “the Purge” from now on) was that all the poop stuff was not going to come easy. You ever hear the phrase “prairie-dogging?” Let’s just say this prairie dog was a little reluctant to see the sun. There was no poop to be had after the Breakfast of Champions. I was already in turmoil.

Morale was low after Day One.

DAY TWO: THE VICIOUS DESCENT

M

y first breakfast smoothie was a little better than the veggie stuff from the afternoon before. A banana, an orange, some strawberries, protein powder and some carrots all went in the mix, and I left for class feeling like a very hungry million bucks.

The level of satisfaction you find in a liquid cleanse is pretty comparable to drinking a huge glass of water, except there are seeds in the water, and you have to carry around the knowledge that the seed-filled water is all you can eat or drink for the rest of the day. Did I mention that this sucks?

Now, we have come to know each other pretty well, so I feel like I can share this next bit with you: At 2 p.m.—a full 30 hours (read: an entire Dance Marathon) after the Breakfast of Champions—I had the first poop of the Purge. It felt awful. It was like pebbles were falling out of me. You ever see a pile of rabbit poop out in the woods?

That is essentially what was sitting at the bottom of the toilet when I was done with it.

So, morale was low after Day Two. I threw some M&Ms into my dinner juice to see if it would help. It tasted worse.

photos by ned mcgregor (left) and colton maddox (right)

am sure there were many reasons why I agreed to do a liquid cleanse for North by Northwestern, and I am sure that one day I will look back and remember all these reasons. Right now, the cleanse (or, as I am fond of calling it, the 96-Hour Body Purge) stands more as a black hole of suppressed memories than a high point in my career here at Northwestern. But thanks to a lot of group therapy and some mild medication, I have managed to return to those dark days and give you the full story. So, let’s talk about why no one should ever do this again.

DAY THREE: THE STRUGGLE

N

photos by ned mcgregor (left) and colton maddox (right)

ow, like with anything in life, a little variety can spice up your juice cleanse tremendously. When I reached the halfway point in the Purge, I had several constants in my world: my morning fruit juices, my afternoon vegetable juices and a general feeling that my stomach was shriveling inside my body. I generally drank alone. The Allison bathroom was now my reading room (I finished a book during the Purge—the last time that had happened was Christmas), and reading was the only thing that ever took place in the bathroom. I had that one little rabbit-style poop in the first 60 hours of the whole ordeal. I hated my body, and my body hated me back. I was losing weight like crazy (Day One weight was 162 pounds, and I ended Day Four at 158), and change needed to happen fast.

Inspiration came during dessert on Day Three (and really, dessert is pretty much another breakfast smoothie). As I rinsed out my bottle from that afternoon’s salad shake (kale, cucumber, spinach, tomatoes and carrots), I thought about Pat “Life Coach” Fitzgerald and his words over the Breakfast of Champions. I had to trust myself. Right now the Purge was controlling me, and I had to take back my own life. I had to lean on myself because the people who cleared out of the Allison lounge every time I went in to make a meal sure were not going to help me out.

So, with the words of my man Pat in mind, I took control, and I threw some Nutter Butters in there with my banana and strawberry puree. It was delicious, reminiscent of the PB&J&B I had eaten those two long mornings ago. Somewhere, I heard angels singing. The world could be good again, I realized. Morale was still low after Day Three, but things were looking up.

DAY FOUR: THE FINAL BATTLE

M

y proverbial army of Gondor had just won a critical battle at Minas Tirith, but now it was time for the real test. I was staring at a fridge full of vegetables, and in my mind, Sauron’s army was marching to the Black Gate while my willpower was trying to stave it off until midnight.

I needed to start strong, and what better way to do that than with a little boost to my breakfast juice? I scored a package of Little Debbie blueberry muffins from my fraternity house and tossed them in with all my remaining fruit and a little extra water. I’m going to be honest here: It did not work out as well as I thought it would in the taste department, but mentally, I was in Eff You mode, and that was all I wanted. Breakfast of Champions 2.0.

I resumed the day with two straight salad shakes (keeping with the “Lord of the Rings” motif, this was kind of like the time where the cave troll appears at the Black Gate, and Gollum is jumping around on Frodo’s back trying to grab the ring), and as I downed the chunky, leafy gobs of the second shake, things were looking bleak. I ran to the bathroom and had the second, and final, poop of the Purge, which came out stiff and green, like a Shrek poop. I think I cried.

Somewhere far away in my mind, Gollum was biting Frodo’s finger.

I thought about ending it all right there—just running back to my room and downing a Powerbar while giving the rest of the world the finger. This was not worth the story. I sat in the fetal position on the fourth floor of Allison, locked in the world’s sorriest bathroom stall. My stomach was growling, and my strength was fading. My morale was broken. Fuck this, I thought. Fuck everything.

I looked up. In front of me was the stall door, but I was seeing far beyond that. There it was, in front of me the whole time. That was the answer.

That was how I would finish this. I was a big strong man, dammit. I knew what to do. I wiped the green off my ass, flushed what looked like the Jolly Green Giant’s shit down the tube and made for the lounge. It was time for my masterpiece.

Friends, I give you the crown jewel of liquid meals: the Fuck-it-all Milkshake.

Here is the recipe. · Chocolate-covered pretzels · Miniature Oreos · Nutter Butters · Bacon · A Twix ice cream bar · Twix candy bar · Hershey’s chocolate squares · Three Musketeers candy bar · Peppermint-flavored marshmallows · Vanilla protein powder · Almond milk · Vanilla pudding

From the moment it touched my lips, I could feel my strength returning. My mind cleared, my senses stirred. I felt things that I had not felt since, well, since a few days ago, but still. The Fuck-it-all Milkshake was everything I had not been able to do over the past 96 hours—I loved it, and it loved me back. I could almost hear it singing to me as I drank it.

Morale, after the long, arduous fourth day, was looking up.

DAY FIVE: THE AFTERMATH

W

as the Purge worth it? Well, when you consider that I pooped green for about a week afterward, lost four pounds in less than four days and nearly puked the next time I had solid food, I can absolutely say that no, it was not worth it. Unless

you are desperate to lose weight or just hate being in a state of positive well-being, I suggest you turn somewhere other than a cleanse for your dietary strategy.

My heart goes out to those who shared the fourth floor bathroom with me during these 96 hours—you were witness to a lot of pain and heartache, and you stood strong through the hard times. I also want to thank the makers of Nutter Butters everywhere, as well as Mr. Pat Fitzgerald. Man, you were my rock.

My Sam Gamgee, if you will. Your words saved me. They saved this story.

Go with those words, Wildcats.

Whatever goal you strive for, whether it be as big as a weight benchmark or as small as a difficult poop, remember the words that I leaned on during the Purge: No matter what happens, you have to trust yourself.

FUCK-IT-ALL MILKSHAKE Made from a questionable combination of chocolates, protein powder, bacon and more, the Fuck-it-all milkshake saved brave Tyler when his demise looked all but certain. Drastic times call for drastic measures.

HANGOVER

CTECs from Last Night

Electric Love

Students reveal their mobile dating experiences.

B Y C A R T E R S HERM AN

A

new app addiction is sweeping campus, and to play you only need to make one decision: swipe left or right?

Tinder isn’t technically a game, but a “hookup app.” This kind of app, which took off with the creation of the gayoriented Grindr in 2009, fuses basic human need with 21st century technology. You can find everything else through an app, so why not sex?

Released last year, Tinder’s simple interface contributes to its popularity.

Based on pictures and shared interests, users swipe left to reject or swipe right to indicate interest. If both users swipe right for each other, they have the option to chat. After that, anything can happen.

And for Northwestern students, it frequently does. North by Northwestern talked to four students about their opinions, strategies and experiences in this new realm of online dating.

“You can say what you want…

Worst comes to worst, you never see or talk to that person again,” says McCormick junior Misha Kushnir, a selfdescribed “prolific Tinderer.” ”Half the fun of it is just saying absolutely ridiculous stuff.”

What’s Kushnir’s most outrageous line? “‘I want to paint you green and spank you like a disobedient avocado,’” he recites. “Some people really liked it. Others didn’t know how to respond.”

Thanks to his Tinder prowess, friends often approach Kushnir asking for advice. He just shares the philosophy he’s learned from Tinder.

“Just have fun,” Kushnir says.

“Don’t get too worked up over things.

Whatever happens, happens.”

50 | S P R I N G 2 0 1 4

Sarah Bruyere

Sarah Bruyere isn’t looking for love. For the Weinberg freshman, Tinder is just another iPhone game.

“It definitely started out as a joke,” Bruyere says. “The pictures I put up were real pictures of me, but they were unattractive pictures. One was where my hair was Photoshopped off, and I look like I’m bald. Another was a really unattractive selfie I took of myself after I got my wisdom teeth taken out.”

Bruyere’s strategy is as unique as her photos: She always swipes right. In four months, she’s accumulated 2,000 matches. But Bruyere says she’ll never find a relationship through Tinder.

“When you’re meeting with someone on Tinder, you really don’t know what you’re getting yourself into. You can’t see if they’re honest, or hard-working,” she says. “Values to me matter more than shared interests. That’s something you definitely can’t get from Tinder. For me, Tinder is the least romantic thing in the world.”

Blake Disiere

Tinder isn’t always sordid. Sometimes, it’s the digital equivalent of Cinderella’s lost slipper. That fairy tale came true for Weinberg sophomore Blake Disiere, who matched with his girlfriend over the summer.

“We started texting, phone calls, Skype,” he recalls. “Once I’d gone up here after the summer, then we met up and started dating.”

Disiere believes online communication reveals the real person inside.

“You learn more about the person, about who they are and their personality–as opposed to how they act and their mannerisms, that you’d be pretty concerned with if you met them in person,” he says. “Tinder really brings out the idea that you need to start liking someone for who they are.”

Of course, in order to be matched at all, users judge their potential matches based on looks.

“That’s the same in any situation,” Disiere says. “You wouldn’t go up to someone in a bar who you didn’t find attractive.”

Hale

“I’ve heard people talk about how when you’re gay, dating is like finding a job. You either have to get a connection through a friend or find it online,” says Hale*, a Communication freshman. Hale chose the latter route, with accounts on both Tinder and Grindr.

While neither has resulted in a relationship, Hale has gotten a few good stories.

“Over spring break I had a very nice, smart conversation with a gay porn star who I recognized on Grindr,” Hale says. “He was on a train, passing through my town when he came through my radius. It was not vulgar.

I asked him if people recognize him.

He said he seldom ever responds to anyone, especially because he hardly ever uses it. But when people ask him for photos, he just tells people to Google him.”

*Last name withheld per Hale’s request

photo by colton maddox

Misha Kushnir

D-I-L-L-O and Dillo is the Day-o Get five in a row and win Dillo with this handy bingo game.

BY J E R E M Y LAYTO N

Y

ou probably won’t need much to spice up your Dillo Day experience. It’s already going to be a crazy, fantastic, otherworldly experience full of a type of debauchery you won’t ever otherwise see at Northwestern. But perhaps the endless alcohol consumption and

photo by colton maddox

DO A KEG STAND FOR 30 SECONDS OR LONGER

sweaty moshing on the Lakefill doesn’t excite you to the level that it does for the rest of the student body. Well look no further, master of the madness, connoisseur of the obscure, champion of all things crazy and fun, because we at NBN have the challenge for you.

TAKE A SELFIE WITH YOUR T.A.

Below is a bingo board, full of certain goals you may or may not have the opportunity to accomplish during the 14-or-so hours of non-stop raging. If you can cross off a vertical, horizontal, or diagonal row and get Bingo, you will have truly done Dillo Day right. Good luck–you’ll certainly need it.

RECITE ALL OF CHANCE THE RAPPER’S “JUICE” AS HE PERFORMS IT

CROWDSURF

SLIP-N-SLIDE

COLLECT FOUR LOOSE ARTICLES OF CLOTHING

SLAP THE BAG FOR AT LEAST 50 SECONDS

FIND A HIGH-SCHOOLER ATTEMPTING TO SNEAK IN

PASS OUT ON THE LAKEFILL

HAVE SEXUAL RELATIONS IN A PORT-A-POTTY

WIN AT LEAST SIX TOTAL GAMES OF BEER PONG

HAVE AT LEAST HALF YOUR SKIN COVERED IN MUD

FREE

TAKE A SELFIE WITH A POLICE OFFICER OR A MEMBER OF SECURITY

TAKE A PICTURE OF THE YOUNGESTLOOKING TOWNIE

GET ON THE SHOULDERS OF A BASKETBALL PLAYER

END UP IN THE LIBRARY SOMEHOW

TAKE A SELFIE WITH A HIGH SCHOOLER

SMOKE A JOINT WITH ONE OF THE PERFORMERS

PLANK ON FIVE DIFFERENT NU STRUCTURES

GET A VISITOR TO ADMIT THAT “OK, NORTHWESTERN KNOWS HOW TO PARTY.”

DRINK ALCOHOL FROM EACH CONTINENT

GET A SOBER PERSON TO DANCE LIKE THEY’VE HAD 10 SHOTS

MUD-WRESTLE (IF THERE’S NO RAIN, REGULAR WRESTLE)

PERFORM A BACKFLIP

NORTHBYNORTHWESTERN.COM | 51