You know Fuqua has something special afoot when the BMO moves the black benches out of the Fox Center and into the mallway. Perhaps it’s the fresh alignment, the extra places to crash and chat, or simply a gerrymandered absence of blank space that brings the school a fresh, inviting look. Hi, nice to see you. Welcome home. For the first time, the honored guest, the debutante, is you.
Growing up, my father always used to tell us the Riddle of the Sphinx, the winged gatekeeper that guarded ancient Thebes: “What walks on four legs in the morning, two in the afternoon, and three at night?” Why, that, Oedipus solved, is the man! He crawls when he is a baby, walks upright in his prime, and uses a cane in his old age. For his wisdom, the Thebans named him king.
While we’ll save Oedipus’ other deeds for Behavioral Econ, I’m thinking he was onto something. BDW tells you the same riddle, only you don’t realize it until the third go-around, when you effectively are the answer. You drive or fly down to Durham, walk into Fuqua on the proverbial four legs, green and awestruck – ohmigahd this is really happening; wait, the lights went down and they’re cheering for me; they want me, they really want me!; this is my school now, I don’t have to kiss ass anymore... A year later, it’s your show – time to groom the new class, read them, mold them, pep-talk them, guide them. Nice to meet you, see you soon. Let’s have fun next year... Then, suddenly, blink!, you’re the old man, preparing for your pasture. It’s BDW again, and you’re not the debutante, not the guest of honor; there’s little left but to watch and smile with the grace of an elder statesman.
For me, BDW personified the most seismic shakeup in life since I studied abroad at 16, bigger even than college, first job, or trip to New Zealand. In the months prior, the MBA had been a distant mirage – yeah, Duke, that’s happening at some point, but let's hit Mackey's for happy hour – and suddenly, poof!, Duke shoved itself, regally, to the front of the line. I wouldn’t be living in Washington much longer; Afghanistan would have to stand or fall without me. Goodbye, Nationals; hello, Bulls (an upgrade, in case you’re wondering). Now, BDW portends another bittersweet change, a move out of Durham, back to world that sent me. I hope I've fared well.
My friend Stacey, Duke ’07, had raved about BDW since before I had even applied. We caught up when I was on the way home.
“So,” she asked. “Did you meet a lot of great people?”
“Yes.”
“Are they the people you want to spend the next two years of your life with?”
At the time, it felt like “are you going to marry this girl?” after a first date. Now, I’m looking back wondering why I had even thought of going out with anyone else.
And so, Class of ’12, here’s your MBA: Synergies good. Labor unions bad. Don’t T-Rex.
But Duke is so much more, and for now, BDW is your movie trailer, a harbinger of two years of emotions on speed – of deep despair and soaring exhilaration, of paradise lost and regained, of friendship born and emboldened, of slings, arrows, and outrageous fortune.
Welcome home, 2012.
You have no idea.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Raising Sedona (3/18/2009)
You folk come through the canyon?”
“Yah.”
“Last night?”
“Yah.”
“In the snow?”
“Yah.”
“Son… ain’t no one ever survived the canyon in such a blizzard before...”
The last 26 miles of Arizona 89A were a flaky white powder that had smothered our 2,000-foot decent from the highway to Sedona, and Ellen, Kristin, and I were mildly dismayed. The nearest town, and lights, were miles back in Flagstaff, which may well have been on Mars. Funny, the locals told us later, they usually close 40 and 89A in a blizzard like this; for a city that draws 17 inches of precipitation a year, the fact that we were drawing a quarter in a few hours was remarkably unsettling.
Behind the wheel, I wasn’t scared of skidding off road per se (lie alert) as I glanced at the GPS every six seconds, but more of a coyote, an elk, or The Shining twins that might be waiting around the next hairpin. “Totus tuus,” Pope John Paul would have surrendered; and when your SUV is running a marathon straight downhill with no civilization, no lights, no space to turn around, and sheer rock face beckoning six feet to your left, theology turns appetizing: Call on God. Ask forgiveness. Thank him you’re not in a Toyota.
Earn this, Sedona cackled.
The night, we deduced later, was a blessing, both since it veiled the rock cliffs abutting the road and the red buttes towering above it, as foreign to a New Englander as the rattlesnake meat on the saloon’s menu. Turns out the buttes are foreign to everyone: their power, or wisdom, heal-iocentricity, or whatever, has turned Sedona from backwater Wild West town – think Hill Valley, 1885 – to gathering ground for new-age mystics and healers where “crystal,” “vortex,” and “you’re f*cking kidding me, right?” dominate local dialect. Miss Cleo, meet Buford Tannen.
Two mornings later, I got my McFly on and decided to explore. Still jetlagged, I snapped awake at 5:30, a wholly unreasonable vacation hour. With few options, I bounded out the door, camera in tow, to see auroral Sedona, capture the sun as it met the red rocks, examine up close the new-age splendour (yes, that deserves a “u”) that the storm two days hence had hidden. For two hours, Sedona teased me incessantly – cute initially, but eventually a man v. foul temptress chicken game that kept me outdoors, matching wits with mountain air, strolling up and down 89A and Jordan Road, in 24-degree pre-dawn cold.
Earn this, Sedona cackled.
Suddenly, dawn awoke, a swell like Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man ripping through the street. The bronze sculptures, the wooden facades roared to life, the ravens pecked around me, as I stood, pallid, a witness to Sedona, tired, frigid, awed...
Twelve hours later, Ellen, Kristin, and I boarded a jeep tour, a last fling with the splendour off-road and personal. The trail, which wound us through buttes, forests, red mud, and bacteria-ridden topsoil, took us up and down 45-degree inclines and around sharp turns. Good evening, red rocks, nice to see you. “This was the bed of a prehistoric ocean. The limestone that starts here forms the Colorado Plateau” our guide explained, “the red you see comes from a 1/10 of 1 percent iron pigment that your is trained to pick up.”
As we stood on Submarine Rock overlooking the eventide, the light bouncing from strange angles illuminating scars of ancient iron, Utah Spruce trees, and (perhaps) mystical vortexes that stretched beyond fault lines and buttes, through the Old West town. Slowly, we headed back downhill to our jeep.
We had earned it.
Las Vegas, a Love Story (3/16/2009)
The morning light hits Las Vegas early, a radiant yet unwelcome call to life from eastward. My coast, some 3000 miles its orient, has already bustled away two hours, and Vegas, wanting none of it, continually hits the snooze. “If it be thus a dream,” it picks from Twelfth Night, “then let me sleep.”
Rita Hayworth famously held “They go to bed with Gilda, they wake up with me.” Befitting a starlet who distracted America through depression and war, Vegas will indulge you and dine you, intoxicate your vices and wax your splendor. Slots! Music! Blackjack! Strippers! In nowhere but Vegas can you waltz to bed with Gilda on a continuous desert high, glorious and deafening, with neon flickering outside your window begging you to come back for another hand, another dance, another tryst. But before the light can bounce off the golden windows of Mandalay Bay, Gilda slinks away to primp anew, and leaves you to wake up alone.
Vegas is an American gem, as part of the cultural canon as baseball, Gone with the Wind, or the Super Bowl, a sanitized snapshot of how wildly we dream. Dance with Gilda down Las Vegas Boulevard and get lost in neon, in flashing dreams, in names that roll off like lovers. Bellagio. Mirage. Mandalay Bay. Encore.
Vegas will take you around the world in eighty minutes, to indulge your worldliness without leaving the desert. Eschew your passport and in less than four miles, you can paddle the canals of Venice, stare down a pale, blue-eyed sphinx; swim amid Roman gods and flirt with Kipling on the Road to Mandalay. If you want to rekindle your childhood (our deepest longing, if Glenn Beck has taught us anything), there’s King Arthur’s castle, the Emerald City, and a pirate ship. Want some guarantees on the local nine? Grab a sports book. Sox at 6/1? Sign me up.
Which is why the Vegas morning is such a bleaching experience, a sobering gap between ecstasy and banality, between Gilda and, well, not Gilda. "Remember last night?" the empty slots seem to ask: "Sorry we couldn't stay... we know you understand." Checking out? Here’s your airport cab, we’ve got more coming, thanks for the memories. More new hopes, more dreams, more Americans willing to forego worries, war, and Depression, for a tryst or three with Gilda.
In Vegas, you can forget your perils at will, and let Gilda glide you to sleep. When you wake up and she's gone, at least you know you got a goodnight kiss.
Rita Hayworth famously held “They go to bed with Gilda, they wake up with me.” Befitting a starlet who distracted America through depression and war, Vegas will indulge you and dine you, intoxicate your vices and wax your splendor. Slots! Music! Blackjack! Strippers! In nowhere but Vegas can you waltz to bed with Gilda on a continuous desert high, glorious and deafening, with neon flickering outside your window begging you to come back for another hand, another dance, another tryst. But before the light can bounce off the golden windows of Mandalay Bay, Gilda slinks away to primp anew, and leaves you to wake up alone.
Vegas is an American gem, as part of the cultural canon as baseball, Gone with the Wind, or the Super Bowl, a sanitized snapshot of how wildly we dream. Dance with Gilda down Las Vegas Boulevard and get lost in neon, in flashing dreams, in names that roll off like lovers. Bellagio. Mirage. Mandalay Bay. Encore.
Vegas will take you around the world in eighty minutes, to indulge your worldliness without leaving the desert. Eschew your passport and in less than four miles, you can paddle the canals of Venice, stare down a pale, blue-eyed sphinx; swim amid Roman gods and flirt with Kipling on the Road to Mandalay. If you want to rekindle your childhood (our deepest longing, if Glenn Beck has taught us anything), there’s King Arthur’s castle, the Emerald City, and a pirate ship. Want some guarantees on the local nine? Grab a sports book. Sox at 6/1? Sign me up.
Which is why the Vegas morning is such a bleaching experience, a sobering gap between ecstasy and banality, between Gilda and, well, not Gilda. "Remember last night?" the empty slots seem to ask: "Sorry we couldn't stay... we know you understand." Checking out? Here’s your airport cab, we’ve got more coming, thanks for the memories. More new hopes, more dreams, more Americans willing to forego worries, war, and Depression, for a tryst or three with Gilda.
In Vegas, you can forget your perils at will, and let Gilda glide you to sleep. When you wake up and she's gone, at least you know you got a goodnight kiss.
After Sunrise (9/26/2009)
The most haunting scene in Richard Linklater's “Before Sunrise” is a montage right before the fade to black. A solo violin resonates over empty Vienna; chairs, a graveyard, a bridge, a park, a river, empty wine glasses, each of which Jesse and Celine – our travelers – had visited while falling in love hours before. The Danube flows unashamedly; Vienna lives on. The message is clear: travel is never about landscapes or landmarks, the military parades or luxury hotels. It’s the fleeting moments – the late afternoons on outdated trams, the fleeting connections with strangers, the midnight strolls through empty Hapsburg streets.
"Before Sunrise" is my Europe, an emotional time capsule of bright-eyed youth. There I was, 17 and idealistic, wandering the same streets, alone or with two, three, four friends. Vienna, Munich, Nuremberg, Berlin ... a smoky cafe, a train station where fog obscured everything beyond the platform, a sip of hot wine and cinnamon sticks, no thought of home or even tomorrow... It was, for a romantic, idealistic kid, a banquet of discovery and imagination.
Of course Jesse and Celine could fall in love. When time and circumstance converge, in Central Europe, no less - you would too. The Danube, the sunset, the eerie silence... the unashamed guts to plant one, as Jesse did, on French girl atop Orson Wells’ “The Third Man” Ferris wheel.
Ten years later, I ventured back to Budapest - a new city this time, but still my Europe, an expense account, and three days' wages for (yes) 30 minutes of work. A chance to reconnect to say hi to the blue Danube, to wander and discover through those same Hapsburg streets. I was no nervous teenager, but still twenty-six, wry and plucky.
In Budapest, though, something had changed. Maybe it was the digital invasion - yes, that was it - the Internet cafes in the old stucco buildings, the wireless ads whitewashed over the hammer and sickle. Or maybe it was the sleek, modern airport; convenient, yes, but a thrill below the transient, watch-thy-pockets train station... Or the rain - always an easy culprit...
But no... Budapest was gorgeous, particularly in the morning. I couldn't begrudge the conveniences, and I always harbored a secret love for the Central European rain - reading in a cafe, watching it fall, or seeing how the sleek streets shimmered in the moonlight.
Maybe the change was me. The idealism was gone, usurped by an uninvited day-to-day order. Ten years ago, tomorrow didn't matter. Now, six more months till b-school applications are due - oh, this back pain is really getting to me - I can really go without seeing that park, who cares - better rest up so I can catch that early flight...
Somewhere, a lonely violin was twanging.
Thus the empty Vienna of “Before Sunrise” still resonates: a hallmark, a reminder of bygone idealism, of young love and friendships blossoming in the fading daylight. Twelve years and four continents on, little can equal the awe of discovery in a musty Vienna (Prague, Munich, Nuernberg) café beside the echoes of an rickety steel tram.
"Before Sunrise" is my Europe, an emotional time capsule of bright-eyed youth. There I was, 17 and idealistic, wandering the same streets, alone or with two, three, four friends. Vienna, Munich, Nuremberg, Berlin ... a smoky cafe, a train station where fog obscured everything beyond the platform, a sip of hot wine and cinnamon sticks, no thought of home or even tomorrow... It was, for a romantic, idealistic kid, a banquet of discovery and imagination.
Of course Jesse and Celine could fall in love. When time and circumstance converge, in Central Europe, no less - you would too. The Danube, the sunset, the eerie silence... the unashamed guts to plant one, as Jesse did, on French girl atop Orson Wells’ “The Third Man” Ferris wheel.
Ten years later, I ventured back to Budapest - a new city this time, but still my Europe, an expense account, and three days' wages for (yes) 30 minutes of work. A chance to reconnect to say hi to the blue Danube, to wander and discover through those same Hapsburg streets. I was no nervous teenager, but still twenty-six, wry and plucky.
In Budapest, though, something had changed. Maybe it was the digital invasion - yes, that was it - the Internet cafes in the old stucco buildings, the wireless ads whitewashed over the hammer and sickle. Or maybe it was the sleek, modern airport; convenient, yes, but a thrill below the transient, watch-thy-pockets train station... Or the rain - always an easy culprit...
But no... Budapest was gorgeous, particularly in the morning. I couldn't begrudge the conveniences, and I always harbored a secret love for the Central European rain - reading in a cafe, watching it fall, or seeing how the sleek streets shimmered in the moonlight.
Maybe the change was me. The idealism was gone, usurped by an uninvited day-to-day order. Ten years ago, tomorrow didn't matter. Now, six more months till b-school applications are due - oh, this back pain is really getting to me - I can really go without seeing that park, who cares - better rest up so I can catch that early flight...
Somewhere, a lonely violin was twanging.
Thus the empty Vienna of “Before Sunrise” still resonates: a hallmark, a reminder of bygone idealism, of young love and friendships blossoming in the fading daylight. Twelve years and four continents on, little can equal the awe of discovery in a musty Vienna (Prague, Munich, Nuernberg) café beside the echoes of an rickety steel tram.
Rue the Day (7/9/2009)
It was late Tuesday afternoon on the Boulevard Saint-Germain, and the Parisian traffic was whipping by in the waning time that it could move somewhat steadily before rush hour. My friend Chuck and I had just alighted from the Odeon Metro, burdened with 50 pounds of luggage, overtired, and lacking any idea where the hell we were.
This was, perhaps, our fault. Theoretically, London and Paris should be the most easily connected European capitals, though we had gone to significant lengths to make the trip as complicated as possible. We’d caught a cheap (like, 15 pound cheap) flight out of distant and obscure Luton airport, which required us to be out of our Kensington hotel before 4 a.m., catch a Tube to a regional train that might as well have taken us to the Industrial midlands as far as we were concerned, only to have to run to our general-admission-seating flight, and had been ripped off by buying more expensive train tickets than we’d needed to get into Paris. Added to that, it was cloudy. Louis XIV had not drawn it up this way.
Paris had always been the dessert that I was content to save. My designs – probably like yours — had been purely romantic – a sip of wine in the Latin Quarter with my lady love, or if that didn’t work, Sophie Marceau. A drive through the Provence countryside in the spring … a twilight gaze at Mont Saint Michel at high tide … a trek up the Rouen Cathedral…
And now, I’m stranded on the curb at rush hour. In March.
With my roommate.
Paris marked, in effect, the first time I had been anywhere without being able to get by with English, German, or Russian. As a language student – and one who could read rudimentary French but not form a diphthong to save my life — this frustrated me to no end. The best I could do was name drop some Montreal Canadiens lineup and recite untranslated passages from Les Mis, which needless to say, did me little good here.
Our hotel – which we’d found through a friend – was tucked away in an alley off a side street, roughly halfway between Odeon and Pont Neuf. For all we knew, every hotel in Paris may well have been between Odeon and Pont Neuf. We flagged a cab: “Rue de Nesle, si vous plait!” “Non,” the cabbie responded, rolling off. Pedestrians, maps and tour books didn’t mark alleyways… finally, we ducked into the post office, a few minutes before it closed. They drew us up a map on goldenrod scratch paper. Success.
Hotel de Nesle is an independent travelers’ hotel, one owned and run by a proprietor who, despite the fact that one reviewer confirms that “La clientèle est en majorité anglo-saxonne,” speaks no English. In retrospect, this was hysterical and, perhaps, defied logic or common sense. She was a very polite, extremely nutritionally gifted woman who collected daily bills in cash and didn’t budge from behind the desk in the back corner of the lobby, which strategically always remained in the shadows. The only indication that she moved – or was moved – was her periodically changing muumuu.
There are about 20 rooms, give or take, off the spiral staircase up the building’s backbone, up which, of course, we had to schlep 50 pounds of luggage. Each room, furthermore, was painted with murals that depicted famous figures from French history. I was crossing my fingers for Victor Hugo, and thought fleetingly, that reciting some of Enjolras’ lament might woo the matron, though quickly dashed the thought when realizing that, no exceptions, you never sweet-talk anyone wearing a muumuu. Climbing the stairs, I tried to guess.
Marie Antoinette … an endless supply of cake.
No, too much of a downer. How about de Gaulle and governing in exile…
Nah. Too modern. But Napoleon would be fitting of a small hotel…
Athos. Porthos. Aramis … Richelieu … Voltaire… Rodin, I think…
We climbed to third floor and threw open the door: Paul Gauguin and the conquest of Polynesia.
The fact that this rang like a PBS miniseries aside, the decor added to the peculiarity. Plastered against the wall were two four-foot Polynesian women who looked sort of like Mulan, dressed only in flower wreaths and grass skirts. Because you can never have enough blanket stereotypes. Gauguin himself occupied maybe a twentieth of the space – just a head peeking out of the upper left corner, his tongue from a promiscuous grin.
And so, my first two hours in Paris taught me that you can run an Anglo-centered business without knowing Anglo, that cab drivers would rather blow you off than earn easy cash, that no one can differentiate the “numerous” hotels that sit between Odeon and Pont Neuf, that the French penchant for nudes extends to cartoony wallpaper, and above all, that Mr. Synthetism was a peeping tom.
Sacre bleu, this was going to be a fun week.
This was, perhaps, our fault. Theoretically, London and Paris should be the most easily connected European capitals, though we had gone to significant lengths to make the trip as complicated as possible. We’d caught a cheap (like, 15 pound cheap) flight out of distant and obscure Luton airport, which required us to be out of our Kensington hotel before 4 a.m., catch a Tube to a regional train that might as well have taken us to the Industrial midlands as far as we were concerned, only to have to run to our general-admission-seating flight, and had been ripped off by buying more expensive train tickets than we’d needed to get into Paris. Added to that, it was cloudy. Louis XIV had not drawn it up this way.
Paris had always been the dessert that I was content to save. My designs – probably like yours — had been purely romantic – a sip of wine in the Latin Quarter with my lady love, or if that didn’t work, Sophie Marceau. A drive through the Provence countryside in the spring … a twilight gaze at Mont Saint Michel at high tide … a trek up the Rouen Cathedral…
And now, I’m stranded on the curb at rush hour. In March.
With my roommate.
Paris marked, in effect, the first time I had been anywhere without being able to get by with English, German, or Russian. As a language student – and one who could read rudimentary French but not form a diphthong to save my life — this frustrated me to no end. The best I could do was name drop some Montreal Canadiens lineup and recite untranslated passages from Les Mis, which needless to say, did me little good here.
Our hotel – which we’d found through a friend – was tucked away in an alley off a side street, roughly halfway between Odeon and Pont Neuf. For all we knew, every hotel in Paris may well have been between Odeon and Pont Neuf. We flagged a cab: “Rue de Nesle, si vous plait!” “Non,” the cabbie responded, rolling off. Pedestrians, maps and tour books didn’t mark alleyways… finally, we ducked into the post office, a few minutes before it closed. They drew us up a map on goldenrod scratch paper. Success.
Hotel de Nesle is an independent travelers’ hotel, one owned and run by a proprietor who, despite the fact that one reviewer confirms that “La clientèle est en majorité anglo-saxonne,” speaks no English. In retrospect, this was hysterical and, perhaps, defied logic or common sense. She was a very polite, extremely nutritionally gifted woman who collected daily bills in cash and didn’t budge from behind the desk in the back corner of the lobby, which strategically always remained in the shadows. The only indication that she moved – or was moved – was her periodically changing muumuu.
There are about 20 rooms, give or take, off the spiral staircase up the building’s backbone, up which, of course, we had to schlep 50 pounds of luggage. Each room, furthermore, was painted with murals that depicted famous figures from French history. I was crossing my fingers for Victor Hugo, and thought fleetingly, that reciting some of Enjolras’ lament might woo the matron, though quickly dashed the thought when realizing that, no exceptions, you never sweet-talk anyone wearing a muumuu. Climbing the stairs, I tried to guess.
Marie Antoinette … an endless supply of cake.
No, too much of a downer. How about de Gaulle and governing in exile…
Nah. Too modern. But Napoleon would be fitting of a small hotel…
Athos. Porthos. Aramis … Richelieu … Voltaire… Rodin, I think…
We climbed to third floor and threw open the door: Paul Gauguin and the conquest of Polynesia.
The fact that this rang like a PBS miniseries aside, the decor added to the peculiarity. Plastered against the wall were two four-foot Polynesian women who looked sort of like Mulan, dressed only in flower wreaths and grass skirts. Because you can never have enough blanket stereotypes. Gauguin himself occupied maybe a twentieth of the space – just a head peeking out of the upper left corner, his tongue from a promiscuous grin.
And so, my first two hours in Paris taught me that you can run an Anglo-centered business without knowing Anglo, that cab drivers would rather blow you off than earn easy cash, that no one can differentiate the “numerous” hotels that sit between Odeon and Pont Neuf, that the French penchant for nudes extends to cartoony wallpaper, and above all, that Mr. Synthetism was a peeping tom.
Sacre bleu, this was going to be a fun week.
The Lamp, Part 4 (7/6/2009)
Soaked, I headed back down Mariahilfberg, across town to the only person I could pay a surprise visit to on a Sunday evening: my advisor, Inken. I had met her a solid month before, and we’d established a good rapport as I worked through the original jitters: She was a gorgeous, blonde 21-year-old law student at Passau University, and had spent her own exchange, five years previous, in rural Maine. Her German was a clean Lubeck dialect, free from the vowel mutations of back-country Bavarian. Her English was littered with the dropped “-r” of a New Englander.
Inken smiled as I opened the door. We hadn’t chatted in a while, and now that the Lechner tempest had quelled, we talked idly in English and German for half an hour or so. We tried a few times to call my host family. By this point, I had a feeling that something was wrong – I thought (correctly) they were at their grandmother’s in neighboring Vilshofen, but played dumb and said I didn’t know. I wanted to delay; maybe they’d have blown off steam by the time they came home.
They finally picked up the phone, and I headed back up around eight. The sky was clear now, the walk a bit more pleasant. When I got home, I knocked on the side door; my host mother threw it open and thundered “Get changed. I have to talk to you.”
I was screwed. I knew it.
And so, I did, and as expected, they laid into me. You broke your vow. You are a liar, an actor, a manipulator. All the progress from the last month had dissolved. My explanation – or attempted one, of “actually, I was telling people I can’t email” didn’t hold water, they didn’t want to hear it. Hand in the modem. You can’t call home until Christmas. You betrayed us. How could you do that? O the times! O the mores!
My host sisters stood, one to each side, openly lamenting like the women on Calvary. “Why, Matt? What’s wrong with letters?” You’d have thought I’d knocked one of them up.
That was that. No use explaining my side, how I was doing it for a longer-term good. I admitted I was wrong, and accepted defeat.
I retired to my room, shaken. I knew I had screwed up, but the task certainly hadn’t warranted the reaction. As I opened my door, wondering where this would lead, I noticed the patio light was off.
On Tuesday afternoon, my host parents made it official; they were tossing me out, effective at noon the next day. Frau Renner, who oversaw all students in Passau, would pick me up and find me a new abode. Forget school and pack your stuff now. But at least, my host mother said, “this wasn’t an easy decision. We barely slept last night.” I took slight consolation.
Leaving the Lechners was bittersweet. On the one side, I was relieved. I had literally no idea what the next eight months could hold – that village in Saxony, perhaps – but at the same time, I had just started to feel comfortable, had a superficial yet tangible rapport with a family who, on the surface, seemed to like me. And now, an innocent mistake dashed it all for an unknown beginning.
Wednesday morning, I was stuffing the last pieces into my backpack, one of which was my black folder containing all my letters. There among them was the Lechners’ treatise – 95 things we hate about you – staring at me in Consolas font and with five signatures waxed across the bottom. I contemplated for a moment whether to keep it, a last memory of them, a paper trail of their passive aggression and a reminder that, sometimes, you can’t please everyone.
I read it once, tore it into 200 pieces, and piled them on the desk.
*********************************************************************************
Epilogue:
Twelve years on, I wish I had kept the letter. It was, in hindsight, a break-up note nonpareil, and since the rest of the letters from that year – filed, neatly in my parents’ house – are truly my most treasured possession, it would have been a perfect yardstick in tracking my own growth and friendships as they matured throughout the year.
My decision – Blink! – not to extinguish the light on that Friday evening was far more seismic than I realized at the time, or even that year. Without it – and the escape it provided – my year would likely have stagnated. A continuing détente at best, a time bomb at worst. The subsequent eight months, none of which would have happened as they did, snowballed into events that shaped my life, relationships, and worldview.
I began to list them all here – highlighted by a fateful trip to Prague – but stopped. Each trip its own nut, each relationship its own gem, each lesson its own thread. And each one, its own story.
A last word on the Lechners, though: I never saw them, as a whole, again. On subsequent Passau trips, I have seen a few of them in passing – my host mother in the shopping district, Flo walking from a bus, Anna on the footbridge headed to university. None of them have flinched, and I’m guessing they didn’t recognize me. Who's to say they would, too? They had convinced themselves fully that I didn't want to be there, that I didn't love Germany the way I they wanted me to. Hard to think they'd ever see me returning. The joke, I guess, was on them.
Several times since, I’ve found myself making the walk back up to Schaerdingerstrasse. Most of the time I go all the way to the border; the station is abandoned now, the arm permanently raised. On the way to and from the station, I spend a few minutes staring at the house, wondering how life would have differed had I flicked the switch back in November ’97. The basement rooms are probably empty, the path to the back patio less trampled than it was a decade ago.
I smile, sometimes. Laugh, even. The light, I’m sure, is out.
Inken smiled as I opened the door. We hadn’t chatted in a while, and now that the Lechner tempest had quelled, we talked idly in English and German for half an hour or so. We tried a few times to call my host family. By this point, I had a feeling that something was wrong – I thought (correctly) they were at their grandmother’s in neighboring Vilshofen, but played dumb and said I didn’t know. I wanted to delay; maybe they’d have blown off steam by the time they came home.
They finally picked up the phone, and I headed back up around eight. The sky was clear now, the walk a bit more pleasant. When I got home, I knocked on the side door; my host mother threw it open and thundered “Get changed. I have to talk to you.”
I was screwed. I knew it.
And so, I did, and as expected, they laid into me. You broke your vow. You are a liar, an actor, a manipulator. All the progress from the last month had dissolved. My explanation – or attempted one, of “actually, I was telling people I can’t email” didn’t hold water, they didn’t want to hear it. Hand in the modem. You can’t call home until Christmas. You betrayed us. How could you do that? O the times! O the mores!
My host sisters stood, one to each side, openly lamenting like the women on Calvary. “Why, Matt? What’s wrong with letters?” You’d have thought I’d knocked one of them up.
That was that. No use explaining my side, how I was doing it for a longer-term good. I admitted I was wrong, and accepted defeat.
I retired to my room, shaken. I knew I had screwed up, but the task certainly hadn’t warranted the reaction. As I opened my door, wondering where this would lead, I noticed the patio light was off.
On Tuesday afternoon, my host parents made it official; they were tossing me out, effective at noon the next day. Frau Renner, who oversaw all students in Passau, would pick me up and find me a new abode. Forget school and pack your stuff now. But at least, my host mother said, “this wasn’t an easy decision. We barely slept last night.” I took slight consolation.
Leaving the Lechners was bittersweet. On the one side, I was relieved. I had literally no idea what the next eight months could hold – that village in Saxony, perhaps – but at the same time, I had just started to feel comfortable, had a superficial yet tangible rapport with a family who, on the surface, seemed to like me. And now, an innocent mistake dashed it all for an unknown beginning.
Wednesday morning, I was stuffing the last pieces into my backpack, one of which was my black folder containing all my letters. There among them was the Lechners’ treatise – 95 things we hate about you – staring at me in Consolas font and with five signatures waxed across the bottom. I contemplated for a moment whether to keep it, a last memory of them, a paper trail of their passive aggression and a reminder that, sometimes, you can’t please everyone.
I read it once, tore it into 200 pieces, and piled them on the desk.
*********************************************************************************
Epilogue:
Twelve years on, I wish I had kept the letter. It was, in hindsight, a break-up note nonpareil, and since the rest of the letters from that year – filed, neatly in my parents’ house – are truly my most treasured possession, it would have been a perfect yardstick in tracking my own growth and friendships as they matured throughout the year.
My decision – Blink! – not to extinguish the light on that Friday evening was far more seismic than I realized at the time, or even that year. Without it – and the escape it provided – my year would likely have stagnated. A continuing détente at best, a time bomb at worst. The subsequent eight months, none of which would have happened as they did, snowballed into events that shaped my life, relationships, and worldview.
I began to list them all here – highlighted by a fateful trip to Prague – but stopped. Each trip its own nut, each relationship its own gem, each lesson its own thread. And each one, its own story.
A last word on the Lechners, though: I never saw them, as a whole, again. On subsequent Passau trips, I have seen a few of them in passing – my host mother in the shopping district, Flo walking from a bus, Anna on the footbridge headed to university. None of them have flinched, and I’m guessing they didn’t recognize me. Who's to say they would, too? They had convinced themselves fully that I didn't want to be there, that I didn't love Germany the way I they wanted me to. Hard to think they'd ever see me returning. The joke, I guess, was on them.
Several times since, I’ve found myself making the walk back up to Schaerdingerstrasse. Most of the time I go all the way to the border; the station is abandoned now, the arm permanently raised. On the way to and from the station, I spend a few minutes staring at the house, wondering how life would have differed had I flicked the switch back in November ’97. The basement rooms are probably empty, the path to the back patio less trampled than it was a decade ago.
I smile, sometimes. Laugh, even. The light, I’m sure, is out.
The Lamp, Part 3 (7/5/2009)
I had had the choice to leave my host family after the first four weeks. It was standard operating procedure in those days for the student to choose, two weeks in, whether to stay with the orientation-time family or to play Roulette and be placed elsewhere in the country. The Lechners and I had always considered this a long-haul gig; the first two weeks had gone fine, I loved Bavaria, and I had no real reason to uproot myself and head for what may well have been a tiny village in Saxony.
It was, I maintain, the right choice. And as I continued to make friends, see Bavaria, and improve my German, I fell in love with my new life. My friends at home were battling PSAT and balancing around on college visits while I was bouncing around Germany, speaking a new language, tasting the delicacies. True, my host family was growing more distant, but I never considered it more than the honeymoon wearing off – perhaps school was too heavy, or the quiet American wasn’t novel anymore.
I loved seeing, breathing, experiencing Germany and wanted to share it. I needed to talk. And so, on top of sending copious letters and postcards, I also called home – friends and family – every couple of days. It was, even I knew, too much. I’d given thought to quitting and relying solely on snail mail, but for some reason I couldn’t break the tie completely. Maybe by November, I thought…
My host family, it turned out, drew up a lot of negative connotations from the phone calls, and strikingly, never told me save a few veiled references in passing. Slowly, their anger waxed. They talked to other host parents, vented behind my back. Vietnam barbs aside, I barely noticed.
The fever broke 10 days before Halloween, and 48 hours before I left for a week to visit some German friends up north. At around 7 p.m., my host family and I sat down around the dinner table. They sent their youngest to another room, and one by one, teed off. Four months of rage poured out.
“You don’t really want to be here.” (Actually, I really like it…)
“You never walk our dog.” (You never asked me to…)
“You get your news from CNN, so you only care about America.” (Logical fallacy aside, the CNN you get is CNN international. Its US coverage is paltry at best…)
“You call home too often.” (You got me there. But I’ve slowed down; give me some time…)
“You don’t like our food.” (That’s a new one…)
“You never ask us how our day was.” (I suck at small talk. You should see me try to chat up women…)
“You’re unfriendly.” (Shy, yes. But unfriendly … that’s excessive…)
“You probably sleep in school.” (That’s conjecture, but no, I actually don’t…)
On it went for over an hour, a repeated tongue-lashing where I sat, largely silent, picking at walnut shells. Unequivocally and remarkably, none of their opinions varied. Five voices spoke as one. At the end, they handed me a letter – a typewritten 95 theses we hate about you, ratified by all of them – to ruminate on, before they left the table en masse. I retreated to my room, shocked and awed, before I read and shoved the letter out of sight.
And so, for the next few months, I made myself who they wanted. I BSed. Lauged with them. Said thanks for dinner every night. Walked the dog. Played hockey with the six-year-old. Stopped calling home. Stayed off e-mail. My conversations about their days were, sometimes, downright remnant of the German 101 textbook.
“Hi Dorothea! How was your day today?”
“My day was great, Matt. Thanks for asking! How was your day?”
“Thanks for asking, Dorothea. My day was excellent. My math teacher came in today with the letters ‘VD’ emblazoned across his belt buckle. That’s probably not funny to you, since you know it’s just his initials, but to me…”
Small talk is hardly my game, but my host family liked it. And more importantly, they liked me. It was forced, yes. Stereotypical, yes. But in the don’t-screw-up détente of Schaerdingerstrasse, I was hardly one to argue.
A month later, the first weekend of Advent, I shared a joke with my host parents before retiring to my room at 7:30. It was Friday, but I had to be up in 10 hours anyway to catch an early train to Nurnberg for the Christkindlmarkt, an outdoor holiday market with wooden toys and Lebkuchen and Gluhwein – with the slight snowfall that the paper expected, it would be the typical German Christmas. Somewhere, the Brothers Grimm were smiling.
It was already dark out as I walked downstairs. My host brother had left an hour or so before, and the outside light was still illuminating the back stairs. I went to the door, and put my hand on the switch. I contemplated for a second whether to flip it. No, I decided – better leave it on. Flo must have wanted to light his way home, maybe in case the stairs ice over or something. I thought nothing more of it and went to my room.
I read some letters that night to pass the few hours before bed. A few were imploring me to check my e-mail. With the pax dontcallica reigning above, I figured it better to end the e-mail thing by sending a quick blast – Hi guys, love you all, but I want to rely on snail mail now rather than calls and e-mails. Write me that way. Peace, Matt – to everyone. I fired up the ancient laptop.
As I did, my host father came down to shut the light off – drat, I knew I should have done that. He looked at me typing, saw the modem’s cord to the phone jack, said goodnight, and went to bed. I wondered if he was pissed: but when a couple hours passed and no one came down, I figured he trusted I hadn’t broken our détente.
The next morning, I headed to the train station and spent a memorable weekend with students from Germany, Norway, Russia, Finland, Denmark, and the US. Nurnberg – which I still consider one of Europe’s most striking cities – was in full holiday regalia. If the American Christmas comes from anywhere, it’s decidedly Germanic – one which I couldn’t wait to chat about once I got home.
By Sunday, the dusting of snow had turned to a deep rain. When the train pulled into Passau around five, I decided, stubbornly, to walk back up Mariahilfberg. I was already wet, I thought, plus it’ll give me the chance to burn off the Lebkuchen I’d been chomping down all weekend. If nothing else, the tranquility of that walk never got old.
I reached the house on Schaerdingerstrasse about 45 minutes later. The lights, strange for a Sunday, were all off. I plodded around the house to the basement entrance and shook the water off my hair as I fished for my key.
Finally, I grabbed it. I shoved it into the lock. It didn’t move. I tried again, a few more times, but no luck. A key was in the other end. I stood outside, in the rain, locked out.
It was, I maintain, the right choice. And as I continued to make friends, see Bavaria, and improve my German, I fell in love with my new life. My friends at home were battling PSAT and balancing around on college visits while I was bouncing around Germany, speaking a new language, tasting the delicacies. True, my host family was growing more distant, but I never considered it more than the honeymoon wearing off – perhaps school was too heavy, or the quiet American wasn’t novel anymore.
I loved seeing, breathing, experiencing Germany and wanted to share it. I needed to talk. And so, on top of sending copious letters and postcards, I also called home – friends and family – every couple of days. It was, even I knew, too much. I’d given thought to quitting and relying solely on snail mail, but for some reason I couldn’t break the tie completely. Maybe by November, I thought…
My host family, it turned out, drew up a lot of negative connotations from the phone calls, and strikingly, never told me save a few veiled references in passing. Slowly, their anger waxed. They talked to other host parents, vented behind my back. Vietnam barbs aside, I barely noticed.
The fever broke 10 days before Halloween, and 48 hours before I left for a week to visit some German friends up north. At around 7 p.m., my host family and I sat down around the dinner table. They sent their youngest to another room, and one by one, teed off. Four months of rage poured out.
“You don’t really want to be here.” (Actually, I really like it…)
“You never walk our dog.” (You never asked me to…)
“You get your news from CNN, so you only care about America.” (Logical fallacy aside, the CNN you get is CNN international. Its US coverage is paltry at best…)
“You call home too often.” (You got me there. But I’ve slowed down; give me some time…)
“You don’t like our food.” (That’s a new one…)
“You never ask us how our day was.” (I suck at small talk. You should see me try to chat up women…)
“You’re unfriendly.” (Shy, yes. But unfriendly … that’s excessive…)
“You probably sleep in school.” (That’s conjecture, but no, I actually don’t…)
On it went for over an hour, a repeated tongue-lashing where I sat, largely silent, picking at walnut shells. Unequivocally and remarkably, none of their opinions varied. Five voices spoke as one. At the end, they handed me a letter – a typewritten 95 theses we hate about you, ratified by all of them – to ruminate on, before they left the table en masse. I retreated to my room, shocked and awed, before I read and shoved the letter out of sight.
And so, for the next few months, I made myself who they wanted. I BSed. Lauged with them. Said thanks for dinner every night. Walked the dog. Played hockey with the six-year-old. Stopped calling home. Stayed off e-mail. My conversations about their days were, sometimes, downright remnant of the German 101 textbook.
“Hi Dorothea! How was your day today?”
“My day was great, Matt. Thanks for asking! How was your day?”
“Thanks for asking, Dorothea. My day was excellent. My math teacher came in today with the letters ‘VD’ emblazoned across his belt buckle. That’s probably not funny to you, since you know it’s just his initials, but to me…”
Small talk is hardly my game, but my host family liked it. And more importantly, they liked me. It was forced, yes. Stereotypical, yes. But in the don’t-screw-up détente of Schaerdingerstrasse, I was hardly one to argue.
A month later, the first weekend of Advent, I shared a joke with my host parents before retiring to my room at 7:30. It was Friday, but I had to be up in 10 hours anyway to catch an early train to Nurnberg for the Christkindlmarkt, an outdoor holiday market with wooden toys and Lebkuchen and Gluhwein – with the slight snowfall that the paper expected, it would be the typical German Christmas. Somewhere, the Brothers Grimm were smiling.
It was already dark out as I walked downstairs. My host brother had left an hour or so before, and the outside light was still illuminating the back stairs. I went to the door, and put my hand on the switch. I contemplated for a second whether to flip it. No, I decided – better leave it on. Flo must have wanted to light his way home, maybe in case the stairs ice over or something. I thought nothing more of it and went to my room.
I read some letters that night to pass the few hours before bed. A few were imploring me to check my e-mail. With the pax dontcallica reigning above, I figured it better to end the e-mail thing by sending a quick blast – Hi guys, love you all, but I want to rely on snail mail now rather than calls and e-mails. Write me that way. Peace, Matt – to everyone. I fired up the ancient laptop.
As I did, my host father came down to shut the light off – drat, I knew I should have done that. He looked at me typing, saw the modem’s cord to the phone jack, said goodnight, and went to bed. I wondered if he was pissed: but when a couple hours passed and no one came down, I figured he trusted I hadn’t broken our détente.
The next morning, I headed to the train station and spent a memorable weekend with students from Germany, Norway, Russia, Finland, Denmark, and the US. Nurnberg – which I still consider one of Europe’s most striking cities – was in full holiday regalia. If the American Christmas comes from anywhere, it’s decidedly Germanic – one which I couldn’t wait to chat about once I got home.
By Sunday, the dusting of snow had turned to a deep rain. When the train pulled into Passau around five, I decided, stubbornly, to walk back up Mariahilfberg. I was already wet, I thought, plus it’ll give me the chance to burn off the Lebkuchen I’d been chomping down all weekend. If nothing else, the tranquility of that walk never got old.
I reached the house on Schaerdingerstrasse about 45 minutes later. The lights, strange for a Sunday, were all off. I plodded around the house to the basement entrance and shook the water off my hair as I fished for my key.
Finally, I grabbed it. I shoved it into the lock. It didn’t move. I tried again, a few more times, but no luck. A key was in the other end. I stood outside, in the rain, locked out.
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