Filled with elaborate dance routines, emotional poetry and comedy skits that elicit roars of laughter, Africayé never ceases to catch the eye of students across campus. At the helm of the organization behind this lively cultural event this year is Eden Desta, current president of the Rice African Student Association.
When Karen Martinez Perez first met Daniel Ling in person after spending countless hours talking on FaceTime, she was relieved to find that the person she had been calling every night wasn’t a catfish. But Martinez Perez was mostly shocked, she said — she did not expect the familiar face on her phone to be 6 feet, 3 inches tall, towering over her 5 feet, 5 inches of height.
This semester is unlike any other, and that may be most true for remote students, who can’t pick up Coffeehouse drinks, study at Fondren or chat with friends on the outer loop. The Thresher caught up with four remote students in different parts of the country to hear about what their experiences have been like so far –– from eating home-cooked meals to attending classes with their pets right next to them.
Any Google search of COVID-19 will bring up lists of symptoms — fever, chills, cough, shortness of breath and more — but these lists don’t always account for everything. Missing is the impact the disease has had on the mental health of people, regardless of whether they contracted the virus or not.
The enticing aroma of spicy rice cakes wafting down the street. The stark contrast of the chilly winter air. These are some of Sarah Kim’s favorite childhood memories: walking down the street near her apartment in Seoul to get rice cakes from street vendors with her parents and younger brother. The Baker College senior said her experiences living in South Korea with her family hold a special place in her heart.
TikTok has quickly come to dominate popular culture. From the music played on the radio stations to the newest Dunkin’ menu items (anyone who has tried “The Charli,” please let me know how it is), the app is inescapable — and Rice is no exception. The Thresher spoke with five of Rice’s very own viral TikTokers about creating content, going viral and using their social media platforms to speak on issues they care about.
On a sweltering day in August, groups of students across campus braced themselves for the daunting task ahead of them: spending hours helping new students move into their dorms. Move-in day kicks off Orientation Week every year, and nearly all Rice students are familiar with the ritual of sweaty, beaming advisors running back and forth with labeled cardboard boxes as incoming students start exploring their new home.
Aparna Shewakramani was a freshman at Lovett College when she signed up for an introduction to Hindi class at Rice. She couldn’t have predicted what the class would lead to — that she’d meet one of her two closest friends in the class, and that eighteen years later, the two would briefly appear on Netflix’s reality TV show “Indian Matchmaking” to support her. Or that, during the show, Shewakramani would use her Hindi to communicate with a matchmaker.
While teaching about projectile motion in PHYS 125 this semester over Zoom, physics Professor Jason Hafner gave students a hypothetical scenario: A hunter is trying to shoot a monkey sitting in a tree. At the sound of the shot, the monkey falls from the tree — will the bullet hit the monkey? When teaching the scenario this semester, Hafner gave it a twist: Instead of teaching completely theoretically, he decided to make it real.
Calista Ukeh was in the middle of throwing at a track meet during her senior year of high school when she received her admissions decision from Rice. As far as the throwing went, she was not having a great day — but that changed after she read the acceptance letter.
In early May, as a challenging spring semester came to an end, the Department of Education released the final version of a new Title IX policy, leaving school administrations across the country scrambling to adjust their own Title IX policies to reflect the federal policy before an Aug. 14 deadline amidst navigating a global pandemic. With these new rules came a slew of student advocacy at Rice as students pushed administrators to implement the new policy in a way that minimizes the harmful effects the updated federal guidelines have for survivors of sexual assault.
This is the first installation of Keeping up with the Sidizens, a features series that checks in with various members of the Sid Richardson College community as they navigate a semester without a physical college to call home.
