The Diary of Queen Mothy |
Chicago!! written @ 10:15 PM on November 16, 2004 Ahhh, Chicago... Chicago, Chicago, Chicago. So here's the skinny of my trip this weekend: There were about 45 of us on one of those nice buses with the TVs. And this was the first time I saw Starsky and Hutch (dumb, except for that incessent albeit catchy "Do it" line. If you've seen the movie, you know what I'm talking about) and Fight Club (why does Ed Norton always get roped into these weird roles? After crossing the wretched wasteland that is Indiana (although, if you want to hear something interesting about Indiana, scroll down until you see the paragraph about the suped-up McDonalds) and a time zone later, we arrived in the wonderland that is Chicago! And it wasn't windy. I was disappointed but only about that. Our hotel was right on Michigan Avenue, overlooking the Lake Michigan, next to the Hilton Hotel. We college chums occupied the entire seventh floor, except for this one elderly couple (which proved to be unfortunate for them... read on), and upon dropping our stuff off we headed a couple blocks down to the Art Institute of Chicago. Which is where I found my own little slice of heaven. Honestly, there was half of my art history book in that single museum alone. God, all the Monets, Van Goghs, Caillebottes, Degas, Renoirs, Sargeants, Whistlers, Caravaggios, Memlings, Cezannes, Tiffany-- holy art gods, Batman! Who knew that A Sunday on La Grande Jatte by Seurat took up an entire frickin' wall?! And Chicago is full of public sculpture, sculpture parks, public art-- Jesus God, I was in my element all weekend. Cincinnati is more than ten years behind; there is no reason why Cincinnati can't do what Chicago does. The city embodies this spirit, this life force, evident on every street and alley. The architecture was influenced by both the classical and modern geniuses, a lot of Frank Lloyd Wright influence. The people are this versatile mix of Polish, Greek, Mexican, Jewish, German, and so many other ethnic and cultural backgrounds. I tried Thai food for the first time that night and loved it. Coconut ice cream?! Does Sam love sugar?! Hell yeah! Afterwards we went to Navy Pier to walk around a little. I took a bunch of pictures of the Chicago cityscape lit upat night; I hope those pictures come out. I'll post them here when I get a chance to get them developed. On Saturday we were off to the Museum of Contemporary Art. Weird. And that's an understatement. Now, there were many things that I liked. And then there were those... other things. I walked into one gallery and saw the proverbial blank canvas on a wall. I rolled my eyes and gaped that such a piece actually existed. And then when I moved, the light caught on the canvas, and there was actually this gleaming geometric design worked into the white canvas that you could not see at first glance. And then it was awesome. I went around to the gallery district to see what the locals were up to. A lot of the abstract art looked the same, which I did not understand. There was this landscape artist who did beautiful grisalle-esque paintings of trees and clouds. It was at this gallery that my own painting professor dropped off his slides for review by the gallery officials. The Museum of Contemporary Photgraphy was amazing. They had this one performance piece by this Chinese artist who shaved his head and took his picture every hour of every day for a year. Then all the pictures were arranged in this streaming video media where it shows the progression of his hair growing back and all the subtle changes in his appearance over the course of a year. It was phenomenal. For lunch that day it was Gino's Chicago-style Pizza, oh hell yeah! It was actually pretty cool because on the outside of the restaurant there were all these signs reading "This is a Non-Graffiti Zone." We laughed because it seemed to us that that was an invitation for some thugs to break out the old art box. But when we stepped inside the restaurant we understood why-- all the interior walls, furniture, ceiling, floor-- everywhere-- was covered with millions of names and messages by everyone who had ever walked into the restaurant. I got pictures of that, too. It was art. That evening a bunch of us gals hopped on the subway and headed uptown for some vintage clothes shopping and struck gold. We had a good time, and later ate real Mexican food. That night the boys were having a party in their room. Again. They had had one two nights in a row. When my roommate and I got back to our room, the hall reeked of the old Mary Jane. It was so strong that it was coming through the walls, soaked into my room, and days later my pillow still smells of it. Our professor came into the room and asked if anyone was smoking "cigarettes" because it was a non-smoking room and no one should have been lighting up. "Nope," someone said. "We're not smoking any cigarettes." My professor, bless his heart, decided to turn a blind eye and a deaf ear. I must not be as worldly as I previously thought because for the rest of the night I kept a low profile in case one of the hotel staff came up investigating the noise and the smells and the proliferation of alcohol-- and I did not want to be associated with it. To tell the truth, I had so much work to do that I actually brought all my homework and my laptop with me to work in my down time while on the trip. As OCD as I am at times, it was a good thing I did. Sunday a chum of mine and I went to the Shedd Aquarium, one of the most fantastic aquariums I have ever been to. Beluga whales, dolphins, penguins, sea otters, sea turtles, sea horses, sharks, coral reefs, amazon eels, poison dart frogs, and some of the weirdest fish I have ever seen-- it was all amazing. I must have spent two rolls of film on that place alone. By two in the afternoon, we were on the road again headed for home. Folks, Chicago is awesome. Go. Somewhere in Indiana, we encountered this... McDonalds. I stepped into the restaurant and encountered-- get this-- cherry wood furniture, crown molding, chair rail molding, faux marble fireplace with a real fire, sparkling granite floors, well lit van Gogh paintings, expensive vases with thick, colorful, floral arrangements, cushions on the chairs, crystal in the bathrooms, gold wood flourish carvings-- and good old fashion McNuggets. Out in the middle of BuFu Indiana. Truly, I was at a loss and thought I had seen and experienced many oddities in American culture-- but this was... not normal. I was back at the dorm by 9:30pm. I spent two hours writing a paper that was due the next day, unpacked my shiznit, and collapsed. So far this week has been holy hell. Jeez. I did one thing that was out of the norm of my routine and my entire world crashes to my ankles and only I am left to clean up the mess and rebuild. I think the worst of it is over, though. I've taken all the tests, done all the projects, written all the papers and am now concentrating on all my finals. And after that? Thanksgiving and winter break! Hola.
A Bit of History ~ And Onward! L'Amour Toujours! - August 08, 2005 |
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