Admission & Financial Aid David Xu '22

Its a little late but it wouldn’t be my blog if it wasn’t! Welcome back to the thrilling second installment of the two part series, “work and leisure”. Last time I talked about many of the fun relaxing things to do on campus and today I’m gonna talk about some of the important, hefty stuff - academics.

Academics at Amherst are rigorous but manageable. With a good work ethic and good time management, there is no class load that is beyond an Amherst student. But none of us do this alone, we have professors and classmates that are willing to help. Professors each offer office hours where students can come in for individual questions or even just chat. Collaborative learning is encouraged and the students are trusted to be ethical in completing their work. And if that isn’t enough, there is a legion of student TA’s and professionals who are also available. In particular, the Writing Center and the Quantitative Center offer specialized help for students who need that tiny little extra boost.

But, I’ve forgotten to talk about the most important aspect of getting your work done at Amherst, your study space. I am a big fan of studying in different areas and there is no shortage of study spaces at Amherst. There's study spaces that are for the “final paper due in 2 hours” and for the “I’m not actually here to study I’m here to socialize”. To help me rank a few of these study spaces, I’m going to pretend like I have a 20 page research paper due in a month. And to start off this list, we’ll be going to the most relaxed study space…

Robert Frost Library : First Floor.

There’s a month left until my paper is due and I’d like to feel good about starting early on my research! But let’s be serious, I’m not going to be doing much real work. I gather up a few of my friends, arrange a “study session” and head out for Frost first floor. Here, the students are bustling. You can hear laughter, good conversation, the sound of coffee beans being ground, and tour guides giving their 2 minute spiel on the library. It’s the perfect place to relax, do a little bit of work, catch up with friends, and enjoy a delicious cup of Frost Cafe’s iced thai tea. (hands down best drink at Amherst)

Valentine Dining Hall

There’s 3 more weeks until my paper is due and I’ve gotten some stuff down. I’ve figured out my sources, made a bibliography, created a google calendar with checkpoints that I will never follow through with, and written down todo list after todo list. I’m feeling a bit hungry, so I go engage in a timeless Amherst tradition - Val sitting. This is when you take your homework to the dining hall, find a nice comfy chair, make a fresh waffle and grab some fruit and coffee and do your work. You’ll often bump into friends who will join you for a few minutes and by closing time, you’ve made a few new friends, given yourself motivation to go the gym, and gotten some work done on your paper.

My Dorm

There’s 2 more weeks, and its time to get serious about things. I’m starting to read through my sources and that requires comfort and quiet. Nowhere is better than your very own dorm room. Here you can be yourself, do homework on the bed, on the floor, standing up, or if you’re feeling really adventurous, at your desk. This is where I get the majority of my work done!

Science Center : 3rd floor

There’s 1 more week. It’s crunch time. You’re writing drafts and deleting drafts and writing more drafts. You’ve got ideas spewing out of your mind faster than your fingers can type and you need somewhere that can match your creativity. Where better to study than the most creative building on campus, the new science center? Hike up a few flights of stairs and you’ll find yourself with a beautiful view of the campus through the biggest window. It’s truly beautiful and something about the spot brings out the best ideas for any paper.

Robert Frost Library C level

It’s 10:00 pm. Your alarm clock failed you. You’ve been betrayed by your body. Your nap, that was supposed to be 15 minutes, became 4 hours, and you have less than the length of a feature film to complete this paper. There is only one place to go. You walk into Frost Library, but you’re not there to socialize. You head into the basement. You go past A level. You go past B level. And finally, you arrive at the bunker. The fabled C level. Here, thesis writers grind away in a dystopia of productivity. It isn’t the most beautiful study space, or the relaxing one. It is the most efficient one. You sit down at a desk, close yourself off from the world, hide from the sun, mute all notifications, and you write like you’ve never written before. Before you know it, its 11:30 pm, and you’re turning in the essay of a lifetime. Thanks C level.

 

(sorry there are no pictures, I haven’t gotten around to taking photos at all the spots yet but I will do so as soon as possible!)

Welcome back! I am nearly a week into my second semester of my freshman year and I wanted to write about something we all think about : leisure time. Although Amherst has rigorous academics and significant time is devoted to reading texts, writing essays, solving problem sets, and running experiments, everyone on campus has their own unique way of relaxing. It’s almost like a fingerprint! Everyone on campus has such diverse backgrounds and interests that there is a club or activity for each and every niche. There are dancers who do fencing, jazz musicians who juggle, artists who go stargazing and physicists who do improv - the campus is teeming with the artistic, the athletic, and the quirky.

As for myself, I am a part of both the badminton club and Amherst Symphony Orchestra. Now, on reading those titles you might be thinking that exercise and music sound more like activity activities rather than leisure activities, but I assure you that, to me, there is nothing better than playing badminton or playing in the orchestra after a long day of classes.

Badminton club meets every Wednesday and Saturday and is made up of a rotating cast of one to two dozen people. There are people who have played badminton their whole life and there are those who are learning how to serve (me!). There is a “coach” (a very good college student) who coaches us, but for the most part practices consist of open play on the courts. The second I get to badminton, I leave all my classwork and career goals at the door and devote my entire focus to hitting a feathered ball. I often miss, or hit it too hard, or not hard enough, but over the course of a practice I work up a good sweat, laugh, catch up with friends, and in every sense of the word : relax.

The Amherst Symphony Orchestra rehearses every Tuesday and Thursday (with additional rehearsals during concert weekends) and has anywhere from 50-60 musicians. The orchestra conductor, Mark Swanson, is a charismatic and friendly leader who makes sure we learn our pieces and also learn a bit about the music’s history. Our orchestra has many traditions - including a game show like quiz after every concert where ordinary events over the course of the semester are transformed by our conductor into a multiple choice questionnaire that pits sections against each other. The violins try and copy answers from the trumpets, the cellos google answers, and the flutes gossip, and by the end the highest scoring sections receive prizes from a very “interesting” prize pool. Known as the “Mark Swanson special”, prizes include snacks, stuffed animals (for a section mascot), toys, accessories, laundry detergent, just about anything you can find in a local Walmart is fair game.

Of course, we also play music. Rehearsals are efficient and productive. Our conductor is very understanding of the musician’s other commitments (tests, projects, interviews) and with prior notice will excuse musicians from rehearsal. This season our orchestra’s theme is South American and Spanish music. So far we have performed a Mexico concert, a Spain concert, and a Brazil/Cuba concert. This coming season we’re performing an Argentina concert and (my heart leaps when I say this) Bizet’s famous opera, Carmen. It’s a chance to play music that you might not ever get the chance to play and learn about classical music around the globe.

Outside of badminton and orchestra I do my fair share of watching Netflix and Youtube videos. I also relax through naps, walks, naps, reading, naps, and more naps. Next time I’m planning on writing about the flipside of this, work. It might take a while, but I plan on documenting my top study spots on campus so look out for that! (I will also update this article with more photos!)

 

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When I first began doing Chinese Calligraphy, I assumed it would be the most zen, most relaxing, most meditative thing that I’d ever do in college. I was wrong. Very wrong. Don’t get me wrong, Calligraphy is beautiful and I love every second of it, but like a crazed artist I find myself wanting my words to be perfect. But let me backup and explain myself first.

It all started with a conversation I had with a Chinese department professor during lunch. Amherst College has language tables that meet two to three times a week where native speakers and language students can sit down to practice their language during lunch with a professor. Its not an unusual occurrence to be eating lunch and hear English on your left, French on your right, and Russian behind you. As a native speaker, I often go to the Chinese language table during lunch to practice my Chinese speaking. Although it was difficult at first, the professors and other students were very supportive and eventually speaking Chinese felt natural.

During Chinese table, we discuss everything from current events in China, to Chinese arts and culture. One of the topics that came up was Chinese Calligraphy. Chinese Calligraphy has been a revered art form in China for thousands of years. Chinese characters (or words) originated as pictograms and calligraphy combines painting and literature into a very unique art form. In China, calligraphy enthusiasts will travel hundreds of miles to visit historical calligraphy museums and collect rubbings of their favorite writers.

Turns out, one of the Chinese professors at the Chinese table was a calligraphy enthusiast and offered to teach a couple of us the basics of calligraphy. So that’s how I found myself on a Friday afternoon with a brush in my trembling hand, making my first stroke on the paper.

Calligraphy is beautiful, but as my professor explained, it is also painful. It is painful because every single stroke is permanent and after every single word you write, you will pick out the tiniest little errors. No written word is perfect, and the more you practice, the more perceptive you are of these tiny little errors. Yet there is something alluring about the challenge that calligraphy offers. With each character I write I strive for it to be just a little bit better than the last, and slowly, word by word, I watch myself improve.

Calligraphy has been one of my favorite pastimes, not only because it helps me get in touch with my cultural heritage and my creative side, but because it represents something I love about Amherst. The fact that a casual conversation can turn into a full on calligraphy experience amazes me. The Chinese professor took hours out of his day to set up materials, lent us brushes and ink and paper, and even gifted us with our own calligraphy sets and books so that we could practice on our own.

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Now my room is decorated with various Chinese characters, each representing painstaking hours spent practicing. Although they are not perfect, I am happy with them, and they serve as a great conversation starter. In particular, I have the chinese word “yong” hung up in my room, which means “eternal”. Although I can pick out errors in it, it serves as a reminder of a very important life lesson. That just like with calligraphy, life isn’t about being perfect, but instead about making each word better than the one before it and each day better than the last.

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When I said in my last post that I would write about the winter, I was expecting to write about snow in like. December. But turns out winter came a bit early this year. In fact, on the last day of class before our Thanksgiving break we were greeted with nearly a whole foot of snow. As a Californian, it honestly felt like I was in a little snow globe some 5-year old was furiously shaking. The snow blanketed the roads, the rooftops, the cars, blanketed the campus with a beautiful sheet of white.

 

Suddenly something had awakened in all the “first-time snow see-ers”.

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The usually silent 10pm campus became a celebration of the solid precipitation. I gathered a few Californians, Floridians, and Texans and we set out to experience our first snow. I quickly learned that jumping into snow always seems less painful in your mind, that snowballs are overrated and the most damage is done by just dumping snow on your target, that sledding on cardboard down memorial hill is something I’ll never forget, and most importantly that sledding on a real sled down memorial hill is something your tailbone will never forget. (it hurts)

The snow served as the perfect start to Thanksgiving break. At Amherst we’re very lucky to have a whole nine days of break, in comparison to the typical 4-5 days other colleges receive. While most students spent Thanksgiving at home, I spent Thanksgiving exploring the east coast.

My first stop was New Brunswick, New Jersey. More specifically, a mock trial invitational at Rutgers University. It was my first time ever participating in a competition and although I had some embarrassing moments in front of the judge (including a moment where I said “I don’t know what I’m doing), by the end of the invitational I felt much more comfortable with being an attorney and a witness.

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My next stop was Boston, Massachusetts. After taking a nice nap on the short (and cheap) Peter Pan bus ride, I found myself surrounded by tall buildings and familiar faces. My sister attends college in the city and we spent the day exploring the city. The “Winnie the Pooh” exhibit at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts really brought out my inner kindergartener. For Thanksgiving, we enjoyed the company of our aunt and our cousins (and the seemingly endless plates of food).

My last stop was New York City, New York. My friends and I had planned a little east coast reunion for everyone who couldn’t afford to fly back home to California. We met up in my friends NYU dorm, and together we explored the city, cut back on sleep, enjoyed the music of jazz bars and the music of street performers. I’ve seen many sunsets and sunrises in my lifetime, but none of them could have prepared me for the sunrise in times square. Its as if the entire city wakes up. The sky blossoms from black, to grey, to soft pink, to light yellow, to a blinding orange that signals the start of the day.

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Thanks for reading! For my next blog I’ll be writing about my progress in learning calligraphy from one of the Chinese professors.

Coming from California, my notion of “autumn” was limited to the weather getting a little bit colder and pumpkin spice latte coming onto the menu at starbucks. Never before had I celebrated the coming of a season, much less enjoyed the beauty of leaves changing their colors. Needless to say, my first autumn here at Amherst will be one I will remember for years to come.

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The first thing I learned about autumn here, is that it creeps up on you. One moment you’re sweating from the hot and humid summer and the next you’re noticing a little chill, and then a big chill, and then a giant gust of wind rakes across your face and suddenly its autumn. The leaves begin to change color, not all at once, but all inevitably. The horizon is lit up during sunsets with great brushstrokes of orange and honey, and as you watch the last light of the day fade away you’re struck by the beauty of autumn. There’s something about watching things change that resonates with me. With each trip to class, I look upon the same few trees. Some lose their leaves all at once, some stay orange for a month, some prefer red and brown, but they all know it's autumn.

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The second thing I learned about autumn, is that weather exists. This statement might sound silly, but coming from California, I was unprepared for the sudden introduction of “weather”. My “winter jacket” proved to be too thin for the lightest autumn rain and I quickly invested in some serious outerwear. I learned to layer. I learned that wearing too much and sweating is always preferable to wearing too little and catching a cold. I learned that boots exist to keep your socks from becoming wet towels and that a scarf can save your neck from the onslaught of the wind. Sure, there were some numbingly cold walks to the dining hall, but you live and you learn.

One of the highlights of this autumn was the annual “Fall Festival”, an event put on by Amherst College to celebrate the coming of fall. It was a chance to skip lunch and fill up on the endless assortment of food stands. They had every autumn classic like pumpkin pie, pumpkin cheesecake, and caramel apples. They also had traditional New England foods like lobster rolls and fresh clam chowder. Food aside, they had a live band, pumpkin carving, cornhole, a giant inflatable slide, and even real horse carriage rides around the quad. I left fall fest feeling great with a very filled stomach and a massive jack-o-lantern.

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Thanksgiving break around the corner, and soon after that winter so look out for a post very soon detailing my first winter! (also enjoy what is, in my opinion, the best view on campus - memorial hill)

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To say the past month has been a life changing sequence of events would be an understatement.

Almost exactly a month ago, I left home and began a new chapter of my life at Amherst College. All my college friends had told me that the first month is the hardest, and I was anticipating the worst. On my last day at home, I reluctantly dragged myself out of my bed, saying goodbye to my room, my posters, my cluttered floor, and my bookshelf for the last time. I said goodbye to my front door, to the steering wheel, to the mountains that surrounded me for so many years and to the state I grew up in. I was now at Amherst College.

The first week passed in a flash. It was new faces, new food, professors sending emails and hours spent looking through course catalogs. Things moved quickly and campus was bustling with freshmen running from activity to activity. There was too much going on to stop and think, to stop and miss home, to stop and fear anything. Its hard to pinpoint the exact moment someone crosses the line from stranger to friend, but somewhere in the orientation icebreakers, the ping pong games in the common rooms, and the splash of canoe paddles in the Connecticut River, I made friends. People from places I had only seen in television shows, places I had only read about in books, and even some people from places I didn’t even know existed.

The highlight of my first week was an orientation event called a “FOOT” trip, which stands for First year Outdoor Orientation Trip. (very clever name I know). I was part of the canoeing FOOT trip, which meant for two days, me and a couple of classmates canoed down the Connecticut River. It was an immersive experience, which meant no technology (outside of cameras), no running water, and no plumbing. We carried everything in our canoes from our clothing, to our firewood.  I will never forget the stars we saw on the first night, the pink clouds of sunset reflecting on the Connecticut River, and the incredible array of ghost stories, riddles, and jokes told around the campfire. Although we left campus as a group of strangers, our group came back as a tight knit family that still has reunions every now and then.

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When I got back to campus things were still new, but with friends and classes, things began to settle down into a routine. Quickly, things began to feel familiar. Faces now had names attached to them, and every stranger had become an acquaintance. I no longer accidentally took freakishly long and convoluted routes from one class to another, but instead had found all the little shortcuts and passageways to move quickly. No longer did I reread emails countless times before sending them to professors, but instead they had become friends and a simple short message would do. I know I am no longer in California, but Amherst has become my new home.

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Hi there!

My name is David Xu, and welcome to a little glimpse into my life as an Amherst college student. I am originally from Pleasanton, California (near San Francisco) and am a member of the class of 2022. As a freshman, I am undecided about my major but I’ve had the most fun exploring different subject areas. I am involved in numerous on campus activities such as mock trial, Amherst Symphony Orchestra ( I play violin ), Asian Students Association, and badminton club. Keep in mind however, that like most students, I am constantly attending different events, trying out new clubs, and even considering starting my own.

I joined the Admissions Office blogging team because I want to give you all a truthful impression of what life is like at Amherst. Especially since many of you are prospective students, I want to be able to give you an idea of what your first year might be like at Amherst. Trust me, I know firsthand how confusing picking schools to apply to can be, it seems like every school boasts about how low their student faculty ratio is or how expansive their alumni network is. It's hard to visualize what these buzzwords mean, but that's why us student bloggers exist! If you have any questions regarding Amherst, especially regarding the first year experience, feel free to email me at dxu22@amherst.edu. If you are on campus for a tour I would love to talk and answer any questions you may have.