New York City is a place full of history, tradition, and character. I had the privilege of traveling there for a few days over Spring Break, and although the sheer size of the city is enough to overwhelm many people, I saw no need to worry. I felt prepared for the New York experience because it is one of the most popular settings in the movies.

On a tight budget with very little time, I sought to see as much of the city as possible and soak up the “New York Experience.” I arrived on Monday, March 26, at approximately 7:00pm. After taking a shuttle to my hotel room, I went out for dinner before going to bed. I had a long day planned, and I wanted to get to sleep early knowing that my chances of uninterrupted sleep were slim to none since I was staying in a hostel.

      The cost of food has to be factored in on any trip, but New York is a very cheap city to eat in as long as you’re content with living on pizza and hot dogs like I was. After two slices of pizza, I went back to my room and passed out. The next day went as follows:

 

7:00am – Rise, clean up, and mingle with roommates. The only other two that were awake are a young Canadian lady named Sarah (currently living in England) and a middle-aged Danish lady named Anna. We talk about our plans for the day, and it turns out that all three of us plan on going to the Staten Island Ferry to get a look at various sites (Ellis Island, Statue of Liberty, etc). Sarah plans on walking downtown to the financial district and spending the entire day there. I mention that I’m taking the bus because I don’t feel like walking through an area where most of the people “judge others by the size of their wallets,” quoting Martin Sheen from Wall Street.

 

7:23am – Walk into a shop around the corner and buy an orange juice. However, I have an ulterior motive. I want change in ones so that I can ride the bus. I hand the man a 20 and asked for eight ones and a ten for change.

“Sure, Chief”, he replies.

I immediately pick up on the fact that I’m the “Chief” because in Spiderman, Tobey Maguire uses the local NY lingo before he goes back into a burning building.

 

7:28am – I stop on Park Ave. to wait for the #1 bus

7:30am – I get tired of waiting and decide to start walking south to the next bus stop

7:31am - #1 Bus passes me heading south on Park Ave. I decide to just walk the entire way to the Staten Island Ferry

8:22am – I get tired of walking and wait for a bus

8:28am – I board the #1 and look for a place to insert my one dollar bills like they have on the Corvallis Transit System. The bus driver tells me “coins only.” I consider going into the Bruce Willis character from Die Hard With a Vengeance and insist that the bus take me non-stop to the ferry, but I’m not a badass in a bloody wifebeater bur rather a punk with a college t-shirt on

8:32am – I walk into a Chase Bank (there’s one on every corner) to get some $6 in quarters

8:46am – I step onto the Staten Island Ferry and take a seat on the outside deck with some Canadian tourists. As we all admire the view of Ellis Island and Lady Liberty, I remark that, “It’s no wonder Melanie Griffith was such a hard working girl. Taking this ferry every morning would be a good start to any day.”

 

“Is this the ferry she took?” asks one of the Canadian gals.

“Actually, I’m not really sure,” I reply

 

9:23am – Returning to Manhattan after the ferry turned around, I begin to walk towards the Brooklyn Bridge with the full intention of walking all the way across. Then, I come to my senses and realize that if I walk all the way across I will be in Brooklyn and out of the safe sanctuary of Manhattan. One viewing of The Bonfire of the Vanities will reveal the consequences of leaving Manhattan. I decide to walk about halfway to get a good view of the city, but then it’s back where I came from

 

9:50am – Time for a break. I buy two hotdogs and a Gatorade near City Hall. As soon as the Arab man at the stand hands me the first hotdog, I take a bite and proclaim, “Hey, this is good. It tastes nothing like dung.” The man throws me a confused look, but I explain that Linda Kozlowski from Crocodile Dundee could be hurting his business because she claimed that NY hotdogs taste like “dung.”

 

“I sell lots of hotdogs,” he assures me.

 

10:05am – I begin my walk through the Bowery. Luckily, there aren’t a lot of pedestrians, so I can keep my distance from people. Regardless, I take my wallet out of my back pocket and hold it with a firm grip not knowing whether pocket-pickers like Cameron Diaz from Gangs of New York are on the prowl looking for an innocent tourist

 

10:43am – Board the #103 Bus that will take me to the Metropolitan Museum

11:32am – Arrive at the museum and I am thrilled to find that even Oregon State students receive the 50% student discount. The museum is fairly crowded, mostly with Asians who are constantly being reminded not to use flash photography.

 

11:53am – I walk by Jackson Pollock’s Autumn Rhythym and overhear some uppity pedant explain to whom I can only conclude were students of some sort that he “hated saying it”, but he felt the lower left corner of the painting was “wrong.” Naturally, several tourists who were previously staring at the painting until they “got it” move in closer to hear the “expert” talk.

Wrong? I think. The entire painting is wrong. “Autumn Rhythym” my rear. You could dump a pile of horseshit on canvas, have a chimpanzee smear it all over the place and call it “Desert Sunset.” Then again, I would see “art pieces” that were eerily close to that at the Museum of Modern Art.

 

On the way out, a Chinese man strikes up a conversation with me.

 

“Beautiful,” he says.

“Pretty spectacular”

“No Picasso in Beijing,” he informs me (That’s also how I know he was Chinese).

“No kidding? Andy Warhol’s portrait of Chairman Mao is in the lobby of my hotel,” I tell him.

“Ahh,” he replies. I don’t know what he was thinking.

 

12:45pm – I cross through Central Park and head over to W. 81^st street in search of Christian Bale’s residence in American Psycho. I had been walking a lot up to this point, so rather than search for it myself, I decide to ask a traffic director.

 

“Where is the American Gardens Building?”

“The what?”

“American Gardens Building”

“It ain’t around here. I know that”

 

Damn

 

“Well, what about Waldorf Astoria? Is that around here?

“Nah, that’s Midtown”

“Does Paris Hilton live there?”

“Uh, I think maybe. Who cares?”

“I hear ya, Chief”

 

I receive a dirty look for speaking in their Native tongue

 

1:31pm – Arrive at Broadway and 112^th at the Seinfeld Restaurant. A Hispanic guy walks by and I ask him if he’ll take a picture of me under the sign.

 

“Sure,” he replies.

 

I look at the picture he just took and he completely cut the sign out of it. I explain it to him again, and he nods. The second picture was no better

 

“Thanks,” I say as I send him on his way. I’m convinced that “sure” was the only word he knew in the English language. I ask a white guy to take my picture the next time

 

1:58pm – Stop at a pizzeria for lunch. As I sit eating my NY style pizza, I laugh on the inside watching all these other tourists incorrectly fold their pizza as they eat it. I know that the “NY pizza fold” is a myth because in the beginning of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze, there is a real New Yorker eating it sans fold

 

2:07pm – Get on the #7 towards Empire State Building

3:02pm – Get off the bus

3:14pm – Walk into the Empire State Building and use the bathroom first thing

3:17pm – Get in line to go to the top

4:29pm – Arrive at the top and enjoy the view of the city. A couple next to me (Turned out to be from Billings, Montana) are wondering if the Statue of Liberty is visible from out vista point. I tell them that it isn’t, and then I ask them which movie they more closely associate the building with, An Affair to Remember or King Kong.

 

“The original King Kong,” the guy says……………. I like this man already.

“What was the other one?” the girl asks.

“An Affair to Remember. The one they talk about in Sleepless in Seattle” I tell her.

“Oh, Meg Ryan is so cute,” She remarks.

That wasn’t my question, but oh well

 

6:30pm – After cleaning up at the hostel, I walk to the Golden Theater to see Avenue Q

6:37pm – Stop for two hotdogs on the way and ask for mustard, ketchup, and sauerkraut.

 

“I know what you’re thinking. No one puts ketchup on a hotdog,” I say to the Arab man, referring to Clint Eastwood as Dirty Harry.

“Lots of people get ketchup. It’s why I have it.” He replies

I’m extremely confused. Even though Dirty Harry worked in San Francisco, I thought the hotdog rules were universal.

 

7:02pm – After eating my dinner and arriving at the theater, I talk to New York City Police Officer Smith (Seriously, that was his name), who had the unique job of being a horsecop. Being extremely impressed with how calm the horse was able to remain while vehicles shot by and missed the animal by mere inches, I decide to strike up a conversation with him. I ask him what the primary use of the horse is, and he says that he wanted the job to pick up women. Now that he’s married, he’s “as much of a gelding as the horse.” He also says that if someone decides to make a run for it, the horse is great because “they can’t outrun this guy.”

 

“With a horse, it's all in the gene. It's the gene that does the running,” I say, referencing Eric Roberts from The Pope from Greenwich Village.

“Yeah, you bet,” agrees Officer Smith.

 

10:22pm – Walk back from the show, which was great, and buy two hotdogs on the way. This shop has a sign that reads, “The Best Hot Dogs in New York”.

 

“Is that true?” I ask

“They all the same,” says the worker.

“Well, then I guess it is true”

“Yeah”

 

        So, at the end of the day, the biggest price I paid for anything was the blisters on my feet. I still don’t know if the city is correctly portrayed in the movies, but every time I put that theory to the test, I seemed to get ambiguous or perhaps indifferent responses.

 

       The flight back was hell as I circled over the Twin Cities for almost an hour and then had my flight to Portland get delayed another three hours. Oh well, I’m back in Corvallis now, and Hollywood hasn’t taught me anything about this place.

Since it is impossible to be immortal, the object of a person’s life should be to create something that is. History has its share of figures who continue to inspire us today by their contributions, but it’s important not to forget the man who simply does his work.

People who join the military do so for various reasons, but if they dig deep enough within themselves there lies the fact that they want to serve their country. The Marines I knew in Alpha Company not only served their country, but they fought for it.

It has been two years since my friend, Neil Petsche, was killed in Iraq . I don’t plan on writing a perennial piece on the anniversary of his death, but I wanted to make an important point: Most of our fallen heroes won’t make it in the annals of history, so it’s up to the people who knew them and loved them to keep their memory alive.

Neil grew up in the tiny town of Lena, Illinois. Upon high school graduation, he joined the Marine Corps. I met him in October of 2002 at the School of Infantry. I think everyone that knew him could attest to the fact that while he was probably the worst runner they’d ever seen, he always put on an ostensible display of alacrity. He was always up to the task, and no matter how miserable the conditions, it was hard to wipe the smile off of his face.

I remember sitting on top of a bunker at the “retrans” site (Those in Alpha know all about it) reading a book while Neil was breaking up some firewood with an axe. He missed the piece he was aiming for and hit a rock instead. He didn’t know I was watching, but he dedicated the next dozen swings or so to breaking that stubborn rock. Once he finally conquered it, he raised the axe in victory. Granted, that’s only something a man would do, but it’s amazing what can lift one’s spirits when stranded in the middle of the desert. Neil didn't know it at the time, but that moment was immortalized because I will never forget it and how it made me laugh.

Every fallen warrior ought to have their memory kept alive, not in a painful way, but in a way as to make them “immortal”. Akhilleus chose not to remain in Greece and live out a long and prosperous life because he wanted to be remembered for his action rather than inaction. His name still goes hand in hand with the famous warriors throughout mythology and history because people tell his story.

It’s not taboo to talk about our lost loved ones. Rather, we should honor them by getting their stories out.

I read this quote from Virgil's "Aeneid" at Neil's funeral in Iraq, and I don't think I could have picked a more pertinent quote from literature.

Every man's last day is fixed.
Lifetimes are brief, and not to be regained,
For all mankind. But by their deeds to make
Their fame last: that is labor for the brave

Semper Fidelis, Marines. God bless you all

The only reason Miss America candidates can’t have their dream of “world peace” is because there’s this little thing called “evil”. The idea of peace is not the problem, but the methods in which to achieve it are what lead to a great schism in today’s society. Breaking down this particular problem Socratic style doesn’t give an accurate result. The methods one individual utilizes to settle matters with another individual don’t pertain to matters on the grand scale. Peace is truly desired by all, but it is only achieved when good forces clash and defeat their enemies.

And isn’t all of it relative (It shouldn't be, but it is)? Cindy Sheehan has disgraced her son who extended in order to be deployed to Iraq by thinking on selfish terms. I don’t recall Sheehan being such a prominent anti-war figure before her son died, so I can only conclude that she’s nothing but a crackpot mother who was unable to see beyond her own happiness (See crackpot mother in Jaws who slaps Chief Brody).

Bumper stickers that read inane slogans such as “War is Terrorism” or “Another Mother for Peace” are nothing but typical liberal nonsense. What does any of that mean? Are there mothers for violence and destruction (Besides Sheehan who wishes she could have killed our president when he was an infant)? Liberals try to get away with dodging major issues by vomiting catchy slogans that seem to have some credence at face value, but when they are applied to real matters they are complete and utter tripe.

If there’s anyone who’s truly “anti-war” it’s the people who’ve actually fought in one. It would be nice if we lived in a world where a warrior’s death was so rare that they all received the same attention that Akhilleus gave Patroklos, but that will never happen as long as liberals undermine our noble efforts in the name of politics.

I don't know if Veteran's Day falls near the Marine Corps Birthday by coincidence or not, but my personal attention that's paid to our men overseas is magnified on this particular weekend.

There ought to be no anti-war or pro-war sentiment during this special weekend. Young men with warrior's hearts have made and kept great civilizations free for thousands of years, and it all boils down to one common, innate quality: these men are heroes simply for doing their duty.

In 480 bc, the Great King Xerxes led the Persian invasion into Greece. Joining the fight to defend their common homeland, the Spartans held their ground at Thermopylae to slow down over 100,000 Persian troops. While the Athenians prepared for the pending naval battle at Salamis (which would eventually be the deciding battle in the Greco-Persian Wars), the Spartans were tasked with holding their ground against Xerxes' fierce troops. There was one major problem with this. There were roughly 300 Spartans, and several hundred other Greeks, present at the "Hot Gates" to complete the task.

The Spartans led the defense and held off the Persians for over two days before being attacked from both sides of the narrow pass (after a traitor informed the Persians of a path which would allow them to attack from the rear). Eventually, every last Greek was killed, and their King's body was mutilated by the Persians. These men knew they were going to die, but they groomed themselves for battle and stood their ground for one reason: Duty.

To this day, there is a monument with an epitaph to these remarkable Spartans that translates as:

Go tell them in Sparta
That here we lie, obedient to their laws

The Spartans would never forget the stand made at the Hot Gates, and Americans, regardless of their opinion about the war in Iraq or war in general, should never undermine the efforts of our warriors overseas.

God bless all of America's Veterans. And, on a personal note to the Marines of Alpha Company, 1/7:

Semper Fidelis, my friends. Remember, fortune favors the brave.

 

 

Liberals love skin color. It serves as their means to judge, make excuses, and promote “equality” where there’s no inequality. Their love for skin color, along with their harebrained optimism, allows them to keep the stranglehold they have on minority support by making something out of nothing. There is no racism problem in the United States, but I don’t suppose liberals will be content until there is literally not a single racist on American soil. Anyone who overtly discriminates based on race instantly and rightly becomes a social pariah. Of course, there are racists out and about, but they hide their prejudices the same way a sexual predator hides at home (at least they have Myspace now). The ubiquitous “diversity” movement is a mere façade to show minorities that the liberals care about them. That is why liberals cater to minorities by promoting (or insulting them) with affirmative action (you’re not good enough to make it on your own merit), various periods of culture focus like “Black History Month” (no one cares, so we’ll shove it down their white, Republican throats), and by sending the pit bulls (favorites are Sharpton and Jackson) to avoid taking personal responsibility and assuring minorities that there’s a serious injustice in the air.

All of this essentially creates more segregation. Why are there Latin Grammy Awards, articles like "The Top 50: The Most Influential Minorities in Cable”, or Raza and Black Graduation Celebrations at Sonoma State University? Are these people not successful enough to be put on the same level as white people? Of course they are, so how about that old melting pot?

 

I’ll come right out and say it: I believe homosexuality is a sin and rather grotesque. I also believe lying is a sin, and eating fast foot everyday is digusting. I sin every day, so I would be a hypocritical fool to despise homosexuals because of their behavior and lifestyle. My problem lies with the militant, in-your-face movement that dominates the gay agenda on college campuses. The drag contest held in the Memorial Union Ballroom on November 3^rd was nothing but a lecherous display put on by people who hate conservatives. I would have found the picture proudly displayed on the front page of the Daily Barometer to be in bad taste even if it depicted a married man and woman. If gays want to be taken seriously as people who are simply attracted to the same sex, here’s some advice: Don’t prance around in a thong with anti-Bush rhetoric written on your chest. Coming out of the closet doesn’t mean you have to live a piquant lifestyle void of all reason and responsibility.

 

Defending Islam shouldn’t be such an arduous task. There are millions of decent, peaceful people who practice the religion, but of course there are radicals who wish to spread jihad. Don’t tell bin Laden and company that Islam doesn’t fuel their movement, or they’ll make a home video of your decapitation. Listen to these crackpots. Read about their decree. These psychos hate everyone who isn’t like them, but we’re too busy debating over whether or not the architect of the 9-11 attacks was waterboarded.

Wait! What about the Crusades? What about fundamentalist Christians who blow up abortion clinics? What about the Spanish Inquisition? Besides the obvious fact that it’s either history long gone or nowhere near the same, grand scale as radical Islam, it still fails to address the issue. When an attack worse than 9-11 occurs, will anyone say, “Yeah, but what about the Crusades?”

If you are a part of “stupid middle America” who prefers apathy to solid opinion, beware of the Daily Barometer’s frequent attacks on Capitalism and western ideals. The cretins on that staff are probably still trying to figure out why America brought the 9-11 attacks upon itself through disrespect of foreigners and expansion of pernicious western thought. That is, if their one-dimensional writers can branch out just a tiny bit and stop writing about queers, Indians, and the “illegal” war in Iraq. 

 

 

 “’Tis strange, Theseus, that which these Lovers speak of”

“More strange than true. I never may believe these antique fables nor these fairy toys"

-William Shakespeare

An educated person (Someone who lives in the real world and pays taxes. Not a college student) knows the difference between the ideals of conservatives and liberals. The core strength of each side lies in these ideals and in the people who unconditionally support them. People’s indifference to civil issues such as abortion, gay marriage, or gun control forces them to make decisions based on whether or not a party can provide instant gratification. Right now it’s quite evident what the conservative base’s plans are because their side is the only one publicized both by conservatives being overt about them and by the left’s vituperation of them. The fact that President Bush is a Republican and this nation is engaged in an unpopular war (as if any war is innately popular) allows Democrats to fallaciously associate every Republican candidate with the President. I can criticize their methods based on the fact that they won’t lay down an agenda of their own, but I acknowledge their apparent success only made possible because of a an American public that can be blown by any wind.

We’re always hearing about the “moral base” in politics, but that’s a dangerous subject to discuss because it’s a common practice of virtually all politicians to abandon their morals. Now, I’m not talking about lascivious members of congress soliciting themselves to teenage boys. That’s disgusting, but it’s not the type of morals I’m talking about. Let’s go back to the war that America is fighting against evil Muslims (If you don’t believe “evil” exisits, stop reading now).

The torpid and dastardly liberals in Washington would be fools to come out with their own war strategy when the American people require nothing but their incessant criticisms. They can avoid the responsibility backing up their remarks by being vague while continuing on with their superficially ominous masquerade in which they pretend to be tough. So what is their plan? I don’t know, and neither does anybody else. I do, however, know the popular sentiment that I hear every day coming from the left. Granted, they are only college students, but they are our future (yikes).

Lately, I’ve been hearing about “love” and “tolerance”, but we can’t be tolerant of intolerance can we? It’s the notion of love (Not romantic, Midsummer Night’s Dream Love…….. I don’t know anything about that) that I want to focus on. Loving our enemies does not mean disregarding the fact that they are our enemies, so it begs the question: What do we do to our enemies? Love them or kill them? How about both?

If these Muslim fanatics think they are dying for a noble cause and that they’ll be rewarded with dozens of hairy virgins, I guess we could use the Richard III logic and say that sending them to heaven is doing them a favor. As a Christian, I think I know what it means to love them. It means I should try and influence them through the Holy Spirit and help them accept Jesus Christ as their savior. However, what if I didn’t believe in God? How do I love them then? Who says that I have to love them?

There are also people who hide behind the barricade of Christianity and condemn the killing of terrorists based on “love your enemy”. I would suggest they read the history documented in the Old Testament. I certainly believe that killing Muslim fanatics is the right thing to do, and I don’t respect people who disagree with that. I guess you could say that I love Killers.

I also love God, my family, friends, America, and the principles that made this country free. The ability to see things as right and wrong allows people to make prudent decisions and dig deep for the will to fight and survive. Loving everything is far more destructive than killing evil things because in a world full of Lovers, the one evil man is king.

The Lovers I’m referring to are people who think that all the world’s problems could be solved if we lost our insecurities and loved our “brother” man. Lover, of course, is a mere euphemism for Hippie, but that term is too ambiguous because of its correlation with drugs and incredibly bad music. When the Biblical question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” is raised, I have no problem with saying that Muslims who want to kill me for the simple fact that I’m not a Muslim are not my brothers. These Lovers don’t know who their brothers are because they haven’t faced real trials and tribulations that create true character built on perseverance.

In the military we used the word “Killer” every day. All right, fine, I still do because I’m a brainwashed pawn. Really though, it’s been Killers who made and have kept this country safe and free. Killers can come to know the world of the Lovers simply by witnessing it. They see the insanity and illogic and steer clear of it because of their understanding of the world around us. Lovers, because of their sheer cowardice and neglect for reason, are never able to fathom the mind of a Killer.

President Bush signed a bill that denies captured terrorists habeus corpus, but Hillary Clinton is seeing agents grabbing people off the street and torturing them until Kingdom come.

 

The apparent “need” for diversity on college campuses is a mere lie. Why do campuses need to be diverse? Don’t different types of schools in different parts of the country attract different types of people? I saw take applications and accept the worthy candidates. As for color, gender, sexual orientation…….. come what may.

 

If North Korea has one thing to sell it’s a nuke. President Bush should make it clear that if such a weapon is detonated on U.S. soil or on that of our allies, we are going straight to the source. If Kim Jong “mentally” Il doesn’t think there are repercussions for selling a bomb to terrorists, we have a serious problem.

 

Why the heck does October, the month in which I was born, have to be "Gay History Month”. How long has this been the case, and why do we have a month to publicize gays? Maybe we should allocate other months to honor people who have behavior problems. I propose: “Morbidly Obese Appreciation Month”, “Drug Dealers Awareness Month”, and “People Who Enjoy Lindsay Lohan’s Music Awareness Month”.

 

Islam is a blast………… literally

 

If young girls’ parents were notified at least 48 hours prior to their daughter getting an abortion, maybe it would deter the girls from engaging in slutty behavior and getting knocked up in the first place.

 

And lastly…….. if you blame guns for the Amish School Massacre, then you should be tortured along with all the other innocent people that President Bush arbitrarily picks.