Part 2 / 4 ..... by Yazgi Akata - unedited
Spring semester was a fruitful semester in terms of both academics and campus life.
Earlier in the semester, UB had its International Fiesta, which I volunteered at. The tickets for the fiesta ran out quicker than most people expected. This fiesta was truly an experience! It is “Student Association’s largest cultural dance event”. During this event several student clubs of different cultures and nationalities around the globe came together and performed cultural dances for either exhibition or competition purposes. With its colorfulness and music, International Fiesta was an event of dance shows, but more importantly it was a great introduction to different perspectives and histories of different cultures. This great celebration truly embodied UB’s diverse community, and how intertwined it is with UB’s student culture.
This semester, I also attended first improv show ever of my life. UB has an improv club that performs biweekly on Fridays. These shows introduced me to what improv is, which is “a performance, for example of comedy or acting, that is improvised (= invented as it is done rather than using words or music written and practiced in advance)” according to Cambridge dictionary. Witnessing how a play is unfolds spontaneously at an exact moment is a noteworthy experience. A special moment during one of the shows was when the whole room including the audience sang “Blank Space” by Taylor Swift. After attending UB Improv shows regularly with my friends this semester, I look forward to the shows next semester.
Believe it or not another activity I am looking forward to this next semester is collectively solving crosswords with my friends. Yes, the crossword puzzles. Despite not having solved a crossword puzzle in years, UB Spectrum’s puzzles that are based upon the campus culture and UB life got us back into solving them.
Also, did you know that UB also has its own talk show? This semester I accomplished one of my long-awaited goals by attending Late Night at UB! Late Night at UB was truly like a professional talk show. It is organized by the Residence Hall Association, and has a huge crew behind it. UB Musicians performed throughout the show, which was very engaging, and had guests from both campus and outside the campus. The first guest was Ally Chun, president of SUNY’s Student Assembly, who talked about the work that Student Assembly does. Followingly, the second guest was FASA (Filipino-American Student Association) that won several awards at the International Fiesta. At the talk show, in addition to their interview, they also taught how to perform a snippet of their dance performance.
Towards the end of the semester, my friend’s sister, who is also a UB alum, came back to campus to perform at UB’s The Enchords’, which is an acapella group on campus,10 anniversary concert. This concert brought alumni, some of whom have not seen each other in years, from the music group together after years apart to connect and rejoin as a group to sing together once again on the stage. In addition to a wonderful concert that had both UB alumni and current UB students perform together, it was remarkable to experience the atmosphere of connectedness the concert provided.
click on the photos to enlarge
UB Fiesta (photo by Yazgi)
UB Fiesta (photo by Yazgi)
UB talkshow (photo by Yazgi)