In the course of scouring the University of Washington for their main campus bookstore (which, it turns out, is off campus), I’ve come up with a new motto for the institution, drawing on its unique architectural and horticultural design:
“Claustrophobia? Uh, Can I Hear It In A Sentence?”
I was trying to buy some sheets and a blanket for my full-sized bed, but instead of going to a mattress store, I decided to try the university bookstore. It would be open, I knew that much, but I left its location a mystery in the spirit of discovery.
Fast forward through an hour-plus of walking towards whatever place looked like it could hide a campus-center food court, and I think I’m qualified to pass judgment on the setup. Huskies, I know that the rain keeps you so cooped up that any extra space is a relief, but lining every single street with trees is a bit much. There’s a D.C.-style mall that’s wide open, but even that starts with a plaza barely wider than the fountain in the middle and ends with a footpath that descends into a tunnel, the approach hemmed in by ivy.
It’s like the designer had this sprawling, wide-open vision for the campus, and then remembered that by the time classes started, students wouldn’t see the sun for more than ten minutes at a time. Damned absent sun! he cried as he struck away his blueprints, forsaken by the life-giver. Months later, his tears of raging defiance watered the seeds of conifers that would one day blot out the gray, uncaring sky.
Seriously, everything is green.
If you can picture the Humanities and Social Sciences building at UC San Diego – concrete, small windows, and squat – mixed about 50/50 with brick (brick!) lecture halls, you’ve got a reasonable approximation. The latter might be of crisp, earthy tones adorned with creamy spires that could’ve been covertly imported from an Ivy League, but for this California boy, brick will always be untrustworthy. Brick is the kind of thing that falls off your chimney and is left for the spiders, because the only reasons for a fireplace are increasing the resale value and making s’mores more convenient.
In other news, it, uh, turns out that living somewhere for four years forms some biases. Who knew?
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