Voice of Will: Let it Snow

2006-02-28 - 12:54 p.m.
so the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful and since I've no place to go, let it snow let it snow let it snow.

Yes you read that right. Yesterday it snowed for the whole day. We had about 2 to 3 inches stick on the ground. It was fun. Now the fun is over though. Because it is now all ICE.

Now SIAS is a very beautiful campus (do a google search for SIAS and china and you will find pictures of our campus), but there is one major problem that the architect (a guy named peter from Auburn University) did not take into account. The weather.

We have a very nice administration building that looks over the center of campus (the quad) and the quad has a very large recessed fountain. It is a wonderful sight to behold when the water is running. The ground around the fountain (and leading to the administration building as well as the faux marble is used on every stairwell on campus) is a very intricate design that uses concrete, faux marble, and inlayed tiles. The design is very beautiful, and it helps the asetic feelings of the place. The only problem is that when the marble gets wet it is very slippery. And when it snows (or better yet freezes) it becomes as slick as an ice skating rink. To top it all off, the design is curving and you can't really tell where the concrete ends and the marble begins.

So walking across campus is a real challenge after a hard snow, or a heavy rain. If you know where the marble is you can try to make your way across it slowly, or you can try to "surf" on the ice. But usually after a snow you can't see the marble. What do you do? You follow some students across it. When you see them fall down, you know where the marble is. (I'm not joking about this)

I once asked someone in the administration about this and they deadpanned, "we sit up on the 7th floor watching it happen, and laughing our asses off." So I think they did it on purpose.
Earlier you may have noticed I also mentioned the stairs are made out of the marble. Yesterday I had the pleasure of watching a group of DRUNK chinese students slip, slide, fall, bonk themeslves as they tried to get home UP frozen marble steps. They are probably now wondering how the got so many bruises. I would teach them the english phrase "you should see the other guy" in order to explain the bruises to their friends.
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.