User:Lukepf04

Luke Farrell

Emperor of Session 2 Saratoga Springs 2017

• 13.2 SHD: UNAG
• 14.2 SAR: POLY
• 15.2 SAR: LOGC
• 16.2 SAR: MICO
• 17.2 SAR: MIND

I like you. I love you. I CTY you.

A Little Bit About Me

Hi. As you probably guessed it, my name is Luke. I have been going to CTY for three years now and it has been a great experience. I was at Mt. Holyoke for Baby CTY in 2013 and have gone to Skidmore in Saratoga Springs for the last two. I have had a lot of fun in my past years and why not I explain why. Let's start with Mt. Holyoke.

Baby CTY at Mount Holyoke

Course: United Nations and Advanced Geography: UNAG

Instructors: Elyse and Katy (TA)

Hallmates: Kyle, Nate, Nick, Tony, Jihoon, Mike, Jake, Daniel and Kevin

RA: Andrew

As my first year at CTY like many kids I was nervous. Being away from my parents for three weeks seemed like a good thing, but it was scary at first for me. Below are the highlights and memories of my first year at CTY.

UNAG

UNAG was an eventful course to start off my CTY journey. Elise and Katy had been a fantastic duo together along with my crazy classmates. In the class, UN siulations are done on real world topics and situations. My countries included Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and [entrer other country]. One great thing was Katy would grab copies of the New York Times for everybody to look at and investigate. I was not the biggest into crosswords at the time, but it was good to look at. One memorable instance of the class was having my Ra Andrew be a representative from Syria concerning the Civil War in the country and trying to determne soultions for the conflict. We also watched a great documentary called "The Island President" in which the President of the small island chain of the Maldives sught to save his country from climate change that was sinking his islands.

The Green Ball

When I first arrived at CTY, I had brought a green ball wiht me to outdoor activities and before class started to have fun. A volleyball net was on the side of the quad outside Rockefeller and so my hall would end up plaing Volleyball with it. One time during transition to activities, one of the RAs told me to not bring it back on the weekdays. The activity in question was, of course, "Cloud Watching".

Avatar: The Last Airbender

During a rainstorm at any CTY site, students will go into their auditorium and watch programs or play quizzes. That was the case at SouthHadley, but it had gone a bit to the extreme. The first programs that were watched were educational documentaries, but the students wanted mre and so the SRA had turned on Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Everybody loved it and they really, realy wanted to see it again. We had managed to get all the way to the Winter Solstice episodes of Book 1. During a Tennis activity, students were hoping for rain to happen that they had prayed to Katara, who is a waterbender in the show, to make it rain. Suprisingly, it did end up raining with a lovely rainbow in the sky. However, the rain did eventually stop and activities continued, but the memory of A:TLA still lives on.

The Beads

In our hall, Andrew decided to give out special beads for good acts. The maximum you could get (and should get) was two. It would always be a good recognition if he had seen you help somebody or he saw you perform well in class. It would always be announced at the hall meeting who received the beads. I was able to obtain my beads for my birthday and on the last night together we all got one. They still hang around my lanyard everyday to remind me of that good old time.

The Patty Predicament

At Mt. Holyoke, the dining halls were set in the same place as the residential halls. They were very tiny, but had the usual items of juice machines, cereal options and other delectables. In order to get your main course options, they would be displayed right by the chefs who were cooking the food and you would use separate spatulas to retrieve said food.

One day, I had was retrieving my food (a sausage or a patty, I forget which one) when there was no spatula for that section to perceive. I had then used my fork to retrieve the patty. Being the silly 6th grader I was, I had stabbed it on from the prongs of my fork instead of scooping it up.

A chef had raced over to the are and said "Stop!". I was perplexed as he continued saying "What are you doing?!" It had appeared that I did something wrong by trying to get my food. He had said that because I had stabbed the food with the fork I had then "contaminated all the other patties" and that the tray was now "completely useless" and had to be thrown away. It is because of this incident that I always try to use a spatula instead, but did he really have to throw that food out.

The Dances

During the dances at this site, they were held right across the way from Rockefeller at the campus center's lower level. Down in this area was a giant space, one for recreation inside and outside the dance floor. Outside of the dance floor, all of the board games were set up that consisted of games like cards, RISK, Connect Four and it even had its own pool table.

The dancing was something I did not particularly enjoy at the time. I was still one to be shy and nervous when attempting new feats and I did not partake in that action. The other option was to watch a movie, an option that most sites do not have so much anymore. The benefit was that the movie was held in the same building so that it was not a problem. The one I could remember watching was "An Extremely Goofy Movie".

My hallmates were all in on the dances with Mike and Kevin being the best ones. During this crazy time of 2013, one song had sweeped the nation "Gangnam Style". Performed by the K-Pop star PSY, this infectious tune was beloved by everyone, sort of. Coincidentally, two of my hallmates, Tony and Daniel, were from South Korea, They were not amused in having the song be played as they had already heard it plenty of times before.

Thankfully, the last song of the dance was "American Pie". It was not the first that I had heard it because my parents would always play the song on our vacation trips to Vermont. It was an interesting time hearing it during the dances. I never felt it to be a dancing kind of song, but it was one that everyone could rally around and enjoy. This would be the only song that I would dance to until 15.2 when I partook in "Tunak Tunak Tun" at Saratoga.

Saratoga CTY

Saratoga really is an unbelievable campus. Not only does it have a great history as a town, but also some exclusives at the site for CTY. The big one are the town trips, which are awesome. Whether it's Comic Depot, Ben & Jerry's (Vermonsters), or Starbucks (Yes, you heard me), there's something for everyone on the trips.

14.2

Course: International Politics: POLY

Instructors: Rupa and Amanda (TA)

Hallmates: Henry, Duncan, Avi, Greg, Suraag, Chris, Chris, Grayson, Kevin

RA: Mike

15.2

Course: Logic: Principles of Reasoning LOGC

Instructors: Andrew and Evan (TA)

Hallmates: Johnathan, Janpal, David, Tyler, Derek, Daniel, Alvin, Cameron, Henry

RA: Dan

16.2

Course: Fundamentals of Microeconomics: MICO

Instructors: Irakli and Yolanda (TA)

Hallmates: Albert, Kevin, Avi, Ky, Quincy, Janpal, Sachin, Chris, Ryan, Ben, Luke and Adway

RA: Peter

17.2

Course: Philosophy of Mind: MIND

Instructors: Andrew and Olta (TA)

Hallmates: Riik, Peter, Andrew, Dorrian, Kyle, Gabriel, Andrew L., Andrew Q., Edward, Derek, William, Alan, Liam and Eric.

RA: Mike L.

Come Join The Legion

Come Join The Legion was an activity created by RA Mike to simulate Roman legions and a great battle was to be made. Two sets of legions were formed up to fight, with myself and I believe John Chen to be the leaders of the legions. John Chen had had trouble controlling his group during the period and was then switched with Hudson Jackubowicz.

The first day was made by creating the symbols for our shields and getting the preparatory material ready. THe next few days were based on putting our legions in formation and fighting off attacks from incoming RA's.

THe final duel was bound to happen, but never did occur due to the rainout of the Thursday. I was truly disappointed with not being able to fight, but it was problem better to not find out the final outcome.

Dave's Rave Conundrum

Dave's Rave is usually reserved for pump up and feel good jams to dance to for a wonderful and energetic time. However, that was not fully the case during this year. I had made a dance playlist beforehand of the songs I had picked and sent them over to Geoff, Marissa and Erin. By the time of the dance, the playlist had been changed slightly to include slow dance songs.

For any future CTYers, slow songs should never be played at Dave's Rave. The point of the dance is to get everyone excited and hypd for the last two days and because of the Skidmore Eleven. The dance was not entirely ruined that year, but it did seem odd to put "Iris" and other slow dance songs in the mix.

The Sideshow Situation

The slideshow presentation for the session had ended up not functioning when it was supposed to. Instead, I had pulled up a set of trivia questions from my phone and proceeded to ask students. Afterward, RA's had decided to do a debate activity in place of the slideshow presentation. This was problematic being that only two days were left in the session.

SRA Geoff and Site Director Erin had called me over after activities ended and I had to face a decision:

1. Play the slideshow during the last day of classes 2. Cut the last dance 20 minutes short and play the slideshow

I had no problem in deciding this case, being that cutting the dance short would not be favorable for any students not coming back the following year and cutting the dance short would be silly.

In the end, I chose to play the slideshow at morning class. It ended up raining during the last dance, so it seemed as if maybe it could have been a good time if we were stuck there at the end, but the rain stopped after a while.

As for the slideshow in general, it was not the greatest slideshow as problems ranged from panning in too much to using the same photo 3 times. Austin still did the best with what he could work with. Some photos that were sent in could have been better.

The Last Day

The last day of CTY is always seen as a sentimental and sad time and that was no exception with mine. It started with the usual wake up at 4:15 for Passionfruit, the time honored tradition of CTY to culminate the end of a fantastic session. Afterward, the usual meeting place in between Murray-Aikins and Howe Hall are the indication to go to the field. RA Dan had said that the Royalty was in charge of the Passionfruit and whenever we wanted to start we could. We waited until about 4:45 and proceed down to the Lower Fields to watch the sunrise. We quickly realized something was wrong.

As stated in the Hall of Shame, the Missing Royalty was a problematic situation as it should be. Future Royalty members are usually always ready to go to Passionfruit and sleeping through is not always a problem. However, these members were also in an ISO, which made it even more problematic to get them outside. RA Olivia was trying to lead them over to Passionfruit, but DRL Adrienne would not allow them to go to the proceedings in accordance with safety and other issues.

That being the case, it was decided that we would proceed with Passionfruit in the normal way until the speeches were over. There at the Duck Pond, the speeches were fantastic and the entirety of the ceremony was captured thanks to Alan Wang. Since Emperor Franz was not able to give the last speech due to his early flight back to Houston, I was able to commence Passionfruit with the final speech seen below:

In most Passionfruit speeches that you hear, most of them will be about people's own experiences, yet I feel I don't need to boast about myself and talk about my times at CTY. My Passsionfruit speech is an appreciation for everyone here. First off, The RA's and Administration have done an incredible job for these past few weeks and truly don't get the credit they deserve. Erin, Adrienne, Geoff, and Marissa, you all are amazing and wonderful people and you will keep Saratoga going strong. As for all the RA's, I truly hope you can come up with wacky activities that best the likes of Welcome to the Legion and any activity Dan Bell decides to come up with. You all will be fantastic in the sessions to come. And let's not forget about Skidmore! This college has hosted CTY for 31 years!! I'm sure that we will be able to keep Skidmore and their amazing staff in the CTY family. Finally, and most importantly, the students. You all are a smorgasbord of talent and diversity. We truly have a sense of belonging here at Saratoga. Understand that sure, us Nevermores are going to leave, but know the memories and amazing times you all have had with us will never leave. We will always be with you in your hearts. You all are the future of what CTY is. You all are going to sing along to the Canon, do these crazy activities and yell LOUIS at midnight because that is what makes CTY so special. Without that, CTY would just be another standard summer camp, but it is not. Understand that your uniqueness and your weirdness is always embraced at CTY. You can always be you and no one can judge that. You all can be a friend, lend a helping hand and truly appreciate what CTY has to offer because before you know, it will be gone in the blink of an eye. My request is that you all can Cherish Every Moment that you have. Every time at CTY is always a memorable experience and you all can truly be a part of this amazing time with Vermonsters and Passionfruit. Our time at CTY is over, but yours is only the beginning. From the biggest piece of my heart, you all will always be with me and Saratoga will be even better than before.

After Passionfruit was "semi-concluded", we all proceeded back over the Murray-Aikins and Case Green which then served the site for Royalty selection and butt wrestling. When Ed Rigney was announced, it was of course, time to butt wrestle. I was not match for Ed. Being as small and short as i am, I was virtually pushed all the way to the side of the circle.

Afterward, everybody ended up going to breakfast, but I wanted to stay back on the quad to reminisce about all the old times I had had. The TARDIS was being cut up for campers to take their share, but I was not willing to take any as more campers should have their own piece of CTY with them for time to come. DRL Adrienne happened to be around and so we chatted about CTY, how we both weren't coming back next year and that I told her that she "ended with the best group".

I eventually went to Breakfast and had a grand time with my wet sweatshirt from rolling on the hill and got to take a plate to sign. I was not able to get many signatures, but it was well worth it to get.

Class had begun and we were able to watch Inside Out to conclude a great class. Then came the Slideshow. It was not the greatest show in the world, but it still showed the memories that many CTYers had made throughout the session. During the slideshow, all nevermores traveled down to Gannett Auditorium to collect their alumni lanyards from Senior Director of Academic Programs Elizabeth "Liz" Albert.

Classes ended at their usual time, and in that time waiting for RA Mike to come, we got to enjoy another good round of don't drop the Frisbee. RA Mike then brought us to Lunch for a final meal with all of our Hallmates. It was then time to pack up.

Going back to the dorm, I looked around for a while. I liked to showcase my CTY accumulations over the years to remind myself of all the memories. The Paintbrush from 2014, The Create Your Activity and the Birthday Card from 2015 and other items. Since my mom was not there yet and many campers were leaving, I was waiting in the lounge. Ed had proceeded to say how he was 2nd Emperor, but I repeatedly told him he was not officially until I had left the Campus.

My Mom had arrived and we then started to pack, much to my mother's annoyance. I then proceeded giving my final goodbyes to the people and the place I hadn't known so long, but I felt as if I knew it for an eternity. As we drove out of the campus, it was a view I had seen often throughout all the years, Wachenheim Field. The pristine turf was measured and brought to perfection, just like CTY was. The sun had gone down on my career as a CTYer, but the sun will never set on the life of CTY at Saratoga. And as I end my story, I have to say so long and thanks for all the fish.

To be continued (2020)....

My Birthday

July 31, 2000. What's so special about that day? Well

• It's my birthday and
• It's on CTY

That's why I normally went to session 2 for CTY. On my birthday I usually got something special from my hall or the site community itself. At Mt. Holyoke, Andrew and all the kids from the hall went into my room and threw paper confetti and then Andrew made them pick it up. Ha! Also at the end of the session, the dining hall made a cake with everyone's name on it that had a birthday during the session.

At Skidmore, Mike gave my cupcakes and he starting spraying silly string at me which, not only got over me, but the wall as well.

Dan's hall actually didn't do much, but the rest of CTY did. I got a Birthday card from Maeve Brammer who then made people sign it and give it to me. It was really nice. Also during the dance (coincidentally on my birthday that year) they all started singing happy birthday to me and I heard someone yell (I think it was Christophe) "Someone pick him up!" Thankfully, that did not happen.

2016 was not the most eventful birthday at CTY. I had not alerted my fellow campers in the days before because that day was also the Town Trip. They would be too focused on Vermonsters at the time, which I could completely understand. WE went all the way to Congress Park and then it started to rain. We headed back to Case Center and waited for about an hour before we could go back to the dorms. I still was able to get celebratory cupcakes from SRA Geoff and enjoy the day.

2017 was one of the best birthdays that I ever had. Being my last year, I made sure to let people know it was my birthday, turning the big 17. It had started with plenty of birthday singing on the quad. I had then gotten a lovely card from Daisy Fernandez and other things. My birthday also fell on the TAPS Frisbee Game. Although we had gotten blown out (8-4, blew a 3-0 lead), it was still a great experience playing in a Student-Staff game. The day ended with night quad and then more celebratory cupcakes which were shared with the entire hall.