And I keep forgetting to mention them in favor of posting random ramblings. I wonder why.

First off a classmate of mine was elected to the school board! Pretty cool, eh? The day after the elections everyone was congratulating her so much I think she was utterly sick of it by the end of the day. XD English class kept getting interrupted. We received like five phone calls and then a photographer (with a really loud rapid-fire camera) from the Star-Ledger came and snapped photos for the last half hour of class.

Hilarious story, everyone was sorta messing around with her about her newly attained status, so when the photographer came one guy piped up and said, "Oh, I'm her boyfriend!" (and of course she said, "No you're not!").

... apparently the photographer didn't hear because later he was showing our new representative the pictures and he said, "I even got one of your boyfriend!"　XD I of course did my best to not help by offering her another hearty round of congratulations on the late bus and encouraging all the other kids sitting around her to do the same.

I also went to Columbia's Days on Campus yesterday which I think I mentioned but I feel I ought to detail. I attended and observed 3 classes, a Japanese class, an Art Humanities (Core) class, and an Intermediate Latin class. I think I was actually on par with the students in Latin, only since we've been doing the Aeneid the past seven months, I was used to neither Cicero nor prose. I guessed on a bunch of vocabulary and found myself forgetting grammatical structures that I later realized I knew. Ah well.

Definitely learned a lot from observing the Japanese class. Mostly reinforced and helped pin down stuff that I already knew in theory, but would not have been able to use in practice. In hindsight I should have asked where deshou fits into the conjugation scheme of desu but oh well.

Watching the Core class was really something, and this is really what it comes down to. Two huge reasons to go to Columbia: the city, and the people. Most probably I wouldn't find a classroom like that if I went to Rutgers and Maryland. And, I mean, if I went to either of those schools, yes I'd be in the Honors programs, but I'm in Honors and AP courses right now and we still don't have discussions like that. Everyone actually had something to say, and what they had to say was actually interesting and intelligent. The professor directed the discussion and taught, yes, but she made her students speak up and contribute, and contribute they did. In short, if I go to Columbia, the classes are all going to be full of not just smart people but really smart people with diverse backgrounds and viewpoints.

Add to that New York City and that's really the question: is that worth $55,000 a year? $55,000 is probably half my family's total annual income. It is a lot of money. Yes, I've always heard that I should go with my gut and ignore the money but frankly I can't ignore that much money.

So if it didn't cost nearly as much would I go to Columbia in a heartbeat? Yes, I would. Would I still be happy at Rutgers or Maryland? Most likely. What about CMU? Weeell... I'm not certain if I want to do comp sci and if I end up not doing it it would be a waste of money.

Maryland is at least right next to DC. Rutgers is... New Brunswick, you know? Not a heckuva lot happening right there. Somehow this entry has evolved into ranting about my college decision again. Oh well.

Third big advantage Columbia has, its size. It's small. So is CMU, relatively. Rutgers and Maryland... are HUGE. Massive. I'd really prefer a small school.

Then again would it be better to be top of the class in a state school or middle of the flock at Columbia or CMU? And again, $50,000, $20,000, or free? A hundred thou saved is a lot. Two hundred thou even more.

Ugh... gonna have to come up with an answer really soon...

To end on a completely different note and for those who are bored with my rambling, it's an image. I'm a little worried but I'll wait for more promo pics and a trailer and of course January 2010.