But there are so many other zombies and zombie-like critters that escape the eye of the public, so we’ll run through six with an appropriate food-based danger level for each encounter. 

6. Slow Zombies: Seen in movies such as “Dawn of the Dead (1979)”, “Resident Evil” series, “Shaun of the Dead”

Basically, the classic; your bread-and-butter zombie, based off of the archetype of George A. Romero’s zombies from films like “Night of the Living Dead,” or “Dawn of the Dead.” Slow, shambling flesh eaters that only maintain the basest traces of humanity and memory. Exceptionally dangerous in groups, comical by themselves. At its basest, symbolic of mindless consumerism and herd mentality coupled with the innate, psychological aversion to corruption and physical violation (a la biting/ consumption of flesh). They’re supposed to be slow, so it’s only by your own guard being let down that is your downfall, not actively the zombies themselves.

Danger Level of One Zombie: One over-cooked TV dinner. Danger Level of Group: Dropping frozen turkey into boiling oil.

5.  Fast Zombies: Seen in films such as “Dawn of the Dead (2004)”, “Zombieland”

Basically like the slow zombies, but fast. Like, marathon runner speeds (skip to 1:00). Sort of a fallacy, because with the assumption that zombies are dead, they couldn’t run. It’s sort of like turtles smashing a fence to get to a head of lettuce. Doesn’t happen. Regardless, the speed ramps up the tension considerably while sacrificing what zombies sort of stand for in the process.

Danger Level: Your goose is basically cooked.

4. Infected: Seen in films such as “28 Days Later,” “The Crazies”

Much like the fast zombies, but not actually dead. It’s worthy of mention because many people mistake infected to be zombies, but they are not. In the case of “28 Days Later,” it’s a mutated rabies virus that makes anyone who comes in contact with it violently insane; essentially making mush out of everything in your brain except for the part that makes you feel that particular kind of anger when your flatmate tells you he crashed your car after using your credit card to buy crack from an undercover cop after he pushed your grandmother down the stairs. THAT kind of angry. If one of these infected gets its blood or saliva in your eyes, mouth, or that annoying paper cut from that damn Scantron sheet, it’s game over, man.

No way I'd deal with this just to grab some snacks. Are you kidding me?

Danger Level: Jumping headfirst into a kiddie pool with molten Hot Pockets.

3. Voodoo Zombies: Seen in films like “White Zombie”

Technically the true zombies, they existed long before zombies ate flesh at all. They are people cast under a deep spell by a witch doctor to do their bidding, be it for malevolent, terrorizing purposes or a simple low-level slave worker kind of evil, they are still technically alive, but have no memories, no will of their own, and cannot speak. Their level of threat is as dangerous as their masters command it to be, but only as much as a drugged, mindless person can manage.

Danger Level: Eating pudding slightly past expiration date. You may get sick, but who knows?

2. Indestructible Zombies: Seen in “Return of the Living Dead”

These zombies cannot be stopped. They can run, they cannot be killed, if you burn them their ashes will make everything dead in a several-mile radius come to life hungering for your more squishy bits, and they can talk. Yeah, they talk. They are the ONLY zombies to specifically desire brains. No other type of zombie yearns for brains any more than they yearn for any other part of you.

Danger Level: Just put yourself in the oven and save them the trouble, will you?

1. Sheeple: As seen in “Black Sheep (2007)”

Yeah, this one is about as weird as it gets. Genetically modified sheep that turn you into sheep people when they bite you. Scary, isn’t it? As if the sheer number of sheep that are in New Zealand wasn’t troublesome enough, now you have to worry about them trying to murder you. It’ll take far more than Shari Lewis with a wool sock to make me trust them again.

Those eyes hide a fear only few can fully appreciate.

Danger Level: Like eating black market Haggis. Roll the dice.

So now you can take your new-found knowledge of the zombie arts, and impress your friends until they try to tear you limb-from-limb for their supper. Until then, I’ve got to nail these planks over my monitor. You can never be too safe, you know.

The UMass campus is on the verge of making some of the most drastic changes to its structure since the 1960′s and 70′s. On the surface, new academic buildings are in the works, the New Laboratory Science Building is well on its way to completion, and there have been talks of revamping the campus grounds to be far more pedestrian-friendly. The administration has a sort of guideline that it decides many of its construction and renovation projects in advance, called the Master Plan. Last updated in 2007, it has essentially been the same plan since 1993, and the times have certainly changed.

Up to this point, the Master Plan has not been fully followed, and changes in the financial position of the country, even the world, have seriously affected the university’s ability to follow its plans. First and foremost, the school has fallen critically behind in its maintenance. As it says on the Master Plan website, there are certain glaring problems that have not been adequately dealt with, or dealt with at all:

• Current deferred modernization of $2 billion impacts academic, research, and student life programs
• Almost a million square feet of space in poor condition
• Nineteen buildings not in compliance with local building codeInfrastructure systems require substantial improvement and expansion (storm water, electric, etc.)
• No swing space is available to facilitate renovation or demolition
• Historic buildings are an important connection to institutional heritage, but frequently underutilized

What this means is that whilst new buildings are being constructed, the rest of the campus seems to be falling into decay. Buildings commonly brought up are Bartlett Hall, Hills, the Old Chapel, the labyrinthine Morrill Halls, and the list goes on. Hills is technically condemned, Morrill is a labyrinth, the Old Chapel has been closed since 1996, and Bartlett has aged very poorly. Even the Horse Barn has a place, being the main barn used during UMass’ time as an agricultural college. There are plans in the works with all of these buildings, but nothing has been revealed to the public yet.

Current plans to remedy these deficiencies include the construction of a “New Academic Classroom Building,” which is to house the Journalism, Communications, and Linguistics department, and seating for at least 1,400 students. Jim Hunt, Communications Manager at the university’s Facilities Planning Division, said that the NACB will serve as a new “center of the campus.” It is being built at the north end of the campus pond in a “L” shape, so it stretches around Hasbrouck Hall, with frontage on North Pleasant street. In the middle, Hunt said, will be, “A new courtyard, so it will be a more dynamic, more useful area.” With a price tag of $85 million, construction is supposed to begin within two years, and be completed by 2014.

There will be some fate in store for Bartlett, but there seem to be no definitive plans as to what exactly that is. Hunt said it will most likely be replaced, because, like Hills, “They cost more to renovate than replace.” However, this distinction is lost when a building can be considered historical. South College is an example of this because, as Hunt said, “It’s historical, we need to find a way to fix it that won’t be overly expensive.”

A term once used for the Campus Center was, "A post-Soviet concrete monolith."

Hunt also went on to say that even buildings like the Campus Center and the Fine Arts Center can be considered historical by this point. “They’ve been around for at least 40 years or so, they’re technically considered historic.” Even the decrepit Horse Barn is considered historic, as it was built only 10 years after the Old Chapel’s construction in 1884.

But preserving the old doesn’t quite help those who need help now, like the students who have been cramped in doubles retrofitted into quads, and over 250 transfer students left without a dorm in September 2011. One building under construction now may assist in easing many student’s housing woes, or it may prove to be yet another barrier placed by the university. Janam Anand, Secretary of Registry at the Student Government Association, said that while new buildings are beneficial, there are “questions of priorities for some new buildings.” Anand lived in a converted lounge during her freshman year, and she said that the administration needed to “improve the quality of housing as well, I would have loved a lounge to go to rather than not have the option.”

The Commonwealth Honors College Residential Complex, which began being built in November 2011, may or may not aid with the housing shortages. The complex will house up to 1,500 honors students as early as 2013. At this current stage, regular students may be left in the same cramped conditions they’ve been faced with for years to come. A representative at the Commonwealth Honors College office said that housing is currently just for honors students enrolled with the Commonwealth College, “but as it is still in planning stages, it may be opened up, but for now, just Commonwealth students.” Anand disagreed to this, saying that, “because of the limitations to housing, I don’t see why they wouldn’t allow regular students to live there.”

There is much that’s discussed in the UMass administration that regular students may likely never see. One consolation Hunt gave was that “what people mistake for complexity is thoroughness; once it gets past chancellor committee and board of trustees, it just has to go through routine.” He went on to say that once contractors and designers are found, “it’s bing-bang-boom,” and done.

There are many improvements coming to the UMass campus within the next five-to-10 years, too late for the leaving seniors, and perhaps even too late for the incoming freshmen, Time will only tell if the future plans of the campus can match the hard reality of a global economic depression. Perhaps one day the Horse Barn will be a fully-restored monument to the university’s agricultural legacy, as a beacon of historical pride much like the Old Chapel. Or perhaps the rest of the campus will match up with the Horse Barn, slowly crumbling until it all fades into bemused obscurity.

However, cryptic introductions aside, this building really is a rather garish building, and one of the few in such blatant disrepair on campus.

Mullins Center, seen on the left.

Especially seeing it’s directly within eye-shot of the Mullins Center, I’m surprised that the administration has done nothing with it yet. Unlike the university apartments that they tore down a couple of years ago (and the area is still a mess, just to point out), this building is standing proud and pallid against the clear autumn sky.

However in my searches I have discovered what this building is, or more accurately, what it had been. Currently, it merely serves as a sort of impromptu parking lot for people using the marching band’s hall, or going to the Mullins Center.

George Parks Marching Band Building on the right.

The Blaisdell House, pictured on the right.

There is a small, yet cozy looking house to the right of this strange building, and luckily for me, has a marker placed upon its lawn informing me that this is the “Blaisdell House.” According to the UMass Library’s Wiki, the Blaisdell House was constructed in 1869 by an unknown architect, and served as the home for the university’s Farm Superintendent. More importantly, though, is a passage describing the surrounding area immediately around the house.

Blaisdell House is located to the east of the horse barn on a site that slopes gently from east to west. The site is framed by bituminous concrete access drives on the south and west sides. The southern side of the building has a concrete walk leading to the main entrance from the adjacent drive. Vegetation at the front (south) side of the building includes tall evergreen and deciduous shrubs, with lawn leading to a granite curb. Vegetation on the west side of the building consists of deciduous trees over lawn.

Right there- did you catch it? If not, then I’ll just point it out to you. “Blaisdell House is located to the east of the horse barn,” it says. Horse barn? It’s a start, and a very strong clue how to find out what the building really was.

Another round of searches brings up yet another page on the library’s wiki page: The Horse Barn, built in 1894.

Photo from www.library.umass.edu

According to the article, the Horse Barn was used from its creation up until around 1991, when the remaining horses were transferred to the Hadley Farm.

As of the article’s writing, it was boarded up as of at least 2008, but if it has been unused since 1991, it very very may have been boarded up since that point.

If it has been boarded up for so long and so egregiously misused, why has it languished in the southern arm of the campus for 20 years?

One piece of information I have yet to discover is what is planned for this old barn. Because of its age, it may be marked as a historical site, but given its current condition, I’d say it’s more appropriately just an interesting, if not slightly eerie, eyesore. To my best searching ability, there are no definitive plans to make this a historical site, or if it will be demolished, or if it will just sit as it does now for countless years to come.

Here’s what the current Master Plan says:

• Current deferred modernization of $2 billion impacts academic, research, and student life programs
• Almost a million square feet of space in poor condition
• Nineteen buildings not in compliance with local building code
• Infrastructure systems require substantial improvement and expansion (storm water, electric, etc.)
• No swing space is available to facilitate renovation or demolition
• Historic buildings are an important connection to institutional heritage, but frequently underutilized

As far as I’ve been able to tell, there seems to be a bit of construction coming to begin chipping away at that $2 billion, but it’s not all sunshine and dancing excavators. I don’t know if these projects have any direct relation to the $2 billion, but seeing they lead to a better campus, we’ll just say they are.

On the dancing excavator side, there are plans to build a Commonwealth Honors College, and provide a new place for the linguistics, journalism, and communications department. Construction actually began on the Commonwealth College back on Nov. 9, and is slated to finish as soon as 2013.

It was originally suggested way back in 1997, the facility is supposed to house 1,500 honors students, honors administration offices, classrooms, etc, and is planned to be plopped between the Boyden Gym and the Recreation Center in the south of the campus (handily marked by the red circle on the left). This project is supposed to take $186.5 million to build, but this hardly begins to scratch the surface of the $2 billion.

The new building for journalists, linguists, and… communicators is currently called the “New Academic Classroom Building,” and is supposed to take $85 million to build. The folks over at the Collegian seem to be getting mixed messages about its specifications though, because one article claims it will be four stories with 1,900 seats, and another claims it will have five stories with 1,800 seats. The article with the five stories was written back in Nov. 2010, and the article citing four stories was published in Sept. 2011, so perhaps the plans changed over the course of one year?

Regardless, this 150,000 square-foot building is planning to tout a energy-efficient construction, projectors, Smart Boards, dedicated audio/video labs, chalkboards…

Wait. Chalkboards? I didn’t even know people willingly used chalkboards these days aside from tired horror cliches and those people buying that spray-on chalkboard stuff for their cars. I guess college really is a valuable learning experience.

This is college junior-level mspaint skills at work.

Moving along, this building is supposed to be placed by the Campus Center, the campus pond, and the Student Union, with the two most likely places marked as a reference on the picture here on the left.

So that’s up to $ 271.5 million. Not even close to $2 billion. Let’s keep looking.

A pedestrian bridge over the campus pond is currently being tossed around as a possible option, however walking around the pond is the probably one of the more pleasant parts of the dull trek from the boonies of Sylvan to the opposite side of the campus for class. As one of the only unbroken stretches of grass and water (albeit mildly stagnant) on campus, a bridge would just sully the occasional serenity of the area, in my opinion.

I can’t find any plans for UMass’ Old Chapel, which has been condemned since 1996, and has been repeatedly denied the $10 million it would apparently need to be usable again. So I guess for now, it’ll keep being a 127 year-old paperweight for the campus.

An issue I am coming across is the lack of word about these other deferments. We’re only at $281.5 million, and there’s quite a laundry list of other issues that haven’t been covered.

We’ve still got the overbooked students, that damned damned building, and what it even takes to get something built at UMass. Stick around.

Many of the projects were brought about through contracts with bidding construction companies, and the largest projects are supposed to be along the guidelines of the university’s “master plan.”

The strangely sinister-sounding “Master Plan,” is basically a 10 year plan of the campus’ construction projects, budget surplus/deficits (mainly deficits these days), concerns about problems with previous master plans, and generally, what needs to be done to create a better campus. Talks for the newest Master Plan began about a year ago, with some low-key meetings with the public to begin shaping what should be done with the university for the next 10 years.

The current plan (currently a work-in-progress) seems sort of optimistic in an a rather aggravatingly oblique way, because there are still so many uncertain and unspecific aspects to the plan. After attending a couple of the sessions last semester, I know that many ideas are getting replaced as soon as new information about budgets or school priorities are factored in, so goodness knows when we’ll have an idea of what will or won’t happen.

But here are some key issues that have come to my attention, I can find no concise answer or administrative defense to them, and I’m working to be able to make at least some sense of them in subsequent posts:

1. With all the new buildings planned, and minor construction being done all over the campus, what’s going on with the $2 billion in deferred renovations, repairs, and new buildings? We have yet another new science building being put in while other departments have been languishing in buildings that have been splitting at the seams for years (I’m looking at Bartlett, the Agricultural Engineering building, and I know there are plenty more to mention), and for what? At face value, it makes it seem like the administration may be playing favorites with majors, and I’m hoping there’s more to that.

2. Why is the university accepting so many students while having nowhere to house them? I understand the idea of accepting more than you can actually carry, because it’s likely close to the familiar concept of party invitations: always expect some people to never show up. Problem is, these people are showing up, and this has been a problem that the administration has been dealing with (I’d hazard to say badly) for years.

Doubles made into triples and then into quads, lounges converted to quads (Orchard Hill is one example I can think of in particular). Yet the university, much like the bloated Mr. Creosote from “Monty Python’s: The Meaning of Life,” just keeps consuming more and more, before simply hitting the bursting point. Where will it end?

3. What on earth is that condemned building beside the Minuteman Marching Band’s building? It’s been condemned for years, and unlike the old university apartments destroyed in 2009, it’s been sulking in plain view of the Mullins Center for no discernible reason other than to unsettle anyone that looks upon it. If that’s the point, good show, UMass.

4. What does it exactly take to get anything built on this campus? I’ve been told by someone in the administration that after slogging through the seas of bureaucratic red tape, in order to get a building suggested, approved of, bid upon, contracted, approved of a grant, funded, and finally breaking soil, it can take upwards of 10 to 15 years. If such a thing is true, it seems to be a staggering waste of time, effort, and money on everyone’s account. Should a building conceived of up to 15 years ago still be relevant to the needs of today? I hardly think so. Can I get anyone in the administration to actually comment about it on the record?

Over the next subsequent posts, I will show what I have found for each of these questions, or what questions have continued to elude me. If there are any points that it seems that I have egregiously missed, don’t hesitate to point it out.

For me, my go-to columnists are typically Michael Swaim and Wayne Gladstone. I particularly like Gladstone because his articles have never failed to interest me, and his “Hate By Numbers” video series has been a favorite of mine for years, so his work will be the primary topic of this post.

Gladstone’s topics are usually focused on oddities within the mainstream media, pop-culture, or simple, everyday annoyances that are agitating enough to warrant an article on them.

Also, his post counts are usually in the range of 1500 words or so, but word counts may occasionally drop into the 700′s. View counts and comments can be all over the board, so it’s hard to tell if there is a rhyme or reason to one article’s popularity over another’s.

Seeing he has been writing for years, and keeping in mind that this is for a journalism class, I decided to mainly choose a few examples of articles/videos that relate more to this profession, and only put in a couple irrelevant ones for the sake of a better overall picture of his work. As I mentioned in the initial post discussing Gladstone as a potential topic, his work isn’t always the most work-safe, so those of weak constitutions, the easily-offended, and anyone with young children may wish to exercise caution.

Gladstone’s articles are almost invariably satirical, but he occasionally has moments where he drops the humor and flat-out says his opinion, especially regarding controversial topics. A specific instance would be his response (which earned almost 283,000 hits and 1100+ comments) to a particularly controversial article eulogizing Amy Winehouse.

A more topical post he made recently was “3 Types of Wall Street Protesters Hurting Their Own Cause,” which garnered over 811,000 views, and has over 2200 comments ( (at the time of writing). This was, and still is, an article with an extremely active comment board, with people arguing for all sides of the argument with extreme passion. One criticism was that the article wasn’t even all that funny, as one poster going by the handle of “flibflab” said, “This is by far the WORST Cracked article I’ve ever read. First of all, it tries to be serious on what is supposed to be a HUMOR site.” Flibflab went on to criticize the rest of Gladstone’s article, and was in turn criticized for his comment. Alas, such is the nature of internet comment sections.

But it begs the question: Should a website that usually known for humor only write for humor, or is actual commentary something to be embraced?

Another article I felt could contribute at least marginally to writing in this class is Gladstone’s article about “The Five Most Overused Jokes On the Internet,” which, as a blogger, is something decent to take into consideration. Like using crossed-out text, making posts about someone’s “TMI” moments, or using the terms: “interwebs” or “Series of Tubes.” I’m actually guilty of a couple of them, though I easily use my status as a fledgling blogger as a cheap crutch.

Not directly related to journalism, but intriguing because of it’s interesting aggravation of inconveniences and its rampant success are his “7 Obnoxious Behaviors That Should Be Punishable By Death, ” which earned an astounding 1,017,085 views and 2,211 comments at the point of writing this article.

With “Hate By Numbers,” Gladstone takes clips from news segments, music videos, movie trailers, etc, and counts off the issues he has with the clips, using a variation of cheap props, skits, straight satire, as well as a number of his videos even include cameos by his wife and his own children (a notable appearance by his daughter is in HBN 51, about Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” but that one is a little more crude than I’d like to directly discuss in this particular post).

The view counts for his “Hate By Numbers” are far lower than they should be because he has had videos hosted on a couple separate sites, so the numbers are a little skewed. As a quick example, I later mention Hate By Numbers #4, which originally had over 500,000 views, and because of its reposting, is currently down to a “meager” 23,000.

In HBN #75, Gladstone takes on a story done by Fox News about Congressman Donny Rehberg from Montana defending a statue of Jesus as not being a religious icon. I’ll let that sit for a minute. A particular point to add is that there is no counter-point to the discussion, just advocates for the statue, and none against.

To even the criticism of the mainstream media, in HBN #54, Gladstone discusses an CNN  report with Anderson Cooper about a Wisconsin district attorney threatening to sue teachers who comply with a state law mandating them to teach sex-ed in schools. The pivotal problem raised by Gladstone is that Cooper never actually asks how it makes sense that a DA would bring people to court for upholding the law actually in place.

Two “Hate By Numbers” not directly journalistic in nature, but still got a very respectable number of views/comments are #39: Black Eyed Peas Write the Worst Song Ever, and #4, about Kid Rock. I chose these in particular because I mostly agree with what he’s saying, I find them hilarious, as well as the absolutely hilarious comments both have gotten in defense of the respective artists. There are mostly supporters for what Gladstone is saying, but as anyone familiar with Youtube knows, the comment sections are, well, a joke at best.

So notwithstanding if you, my largely non-existent readers, like Gladstone enough to check out more of his articles, or if you find him to be inexcusably offensive, that is entirely your call and that’s totally fine, and please feel free to leave a message on this blog why exactly that is.

That about covers it, so in a most respectful parting rip-off (homage if anyone else asks) of Gladstone, this is Electronic Blogging Endeavors, and that’s all… for now.

I initially couldn’t think of any that really stood out until I checked my bookmarks and saw two that I check so frequently that I forget that they specifically write blogs. I guess it’s like losing sunglasses that are on top of your head, but internet-style. The two bloggers I chose were Wayne Gladstone and Steve Sneeds.

First off is Wayne Gladstone, more mononymously known as just “Gladstone,” is a humor writer and satirist who regularly writes for Cracked.com and Comedy Central’s political indecisionforever.com site, among a couple other publications.

A quick caveat: his articles can be occasionally less than “work-safe,” but it’s not typically further than some crude humor and language.

For articles, he covers the real hard-hitting, muk-raking stories of our times, like a two-part entry about the worst kinds of people to commute with. I’m partly joking. His articles really do touch upon some interesting sides of life that one may not normally consider writing about, or makes you perceive certain things through a slightly altered lens, like how much Green Day’s “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)” really sucks.

Anyways, Gladstone also has a video series called, “Hate by Numbers,” in which he often satirizes pop culture, as well as people’s occasionally bizarre reactions to it. View counts can vary depending on the topic, or what site they’re published on, as they have jumped hosts multiple times over the years.  Ripping on the Black Eyed Peas, Ke$ha, a trailer for Hugh Jackman’s new movie, “Real Steel,” or expressing his revulsion at a news story known as the “Afro Bomber” featured on CNN.

Though a point to add is that he has recently swung a bit more towards covering political subjects more so than the pop culture he had largely focused on before.

His subjects (like the hisses I’ve heard from his slandering of Green Day), are occasionally controversial, as well as his humor doesn’t particularly sit well with some, especially for his satirical eulogy of Amy Winehouse and subsequent explanation of the piece over the response.

I find him entertaining, at least.

Secondly is Steve Sneeds, who writes for his blog, “The Sneeze.“

Almost immediately less risque than Gladstone, Steve (as he is almost exclusively referred as), has nevertheless done his own strange articles and projects. His stories are often about his family, though they are not usually named, only referred to by their certain personality quirks. For example, his eldest son is referred to as “Raisins,” due to a couple particularly enthusiastic responses to receiving raisins in his Christmas stocking.

But a fews particularly interesting tidbits about his blog are his “Steve, Don’t Eat It!” entries, where he eats and documents foods most Americans would likely find… slightly unpalatable, to say the lest. Potted meat, Natto, Silkworm Pupas, and his wife’s own breast milk.

…not all at once, mind you.

Steve is also apparently pretty good friends with Adam Savage (of Mythbuster’s fame), and Savage has even worn merchandise from The Sneeze in an episode or two, yet finding an image of this currently eludes me.

Only issue is that Steve has a rather infrequent update schedule on his blog now, and has largely switched over to twitter for his posting.

Either way, these two gentlemen, Gladstone and Steve, are two very interesting bloggers with two very unique niches within the internet. I can’t say too much more or I won’t have anything left to talk about one of these bloggers for the next post!

Stick around.

Extending his arms, he plants them upon the end of the first table and swings his body forward, propelling him to the next table. Quickly replacing his arms upon the second table, he vaults forward again- but not smoothly enough- so his body slips sideways into the air past the table.

In an almost Looney Tunes fashion, he seems to pause in mid-air, looks down, and realizes he is about to fall.  He then dexterously turns his body just enough fall safely into a roll. Cats don’t look this good. But not easily deterred by the slip-up, Scott Maxson pats the soggy dirt from his grey sweatpants and prepares to try it again.

He does it not for the crowd, not for any tangible reward, but for the self-satisfaction of accomplishing the challenge. This is parkour.

Based off of a French naval officer’s experience with African tribes honed to acrobatic perfection without the aid of any guidance from a gymnast or similar tutor, parkour has currently evolved into a sort of urban ballet for recreational and harcore connoisseurs alike. However, this is not all that parkour stands for. While the physical aspect unarguably exists, it is more like a facet of the overall betterment of one’s self.

Scott Maxson reaching a 11.5ft wall behind Berkshire Dining Hall

Performed all across the world, parkour finds itself a small, but devout, community at UMass Amherst’s official Parkour Club. A registered student organization (RSO) since 2008, the Parkour Club doesn’t tout the highest enrollment, but their passion can be compared to that of any football or baseball team. Javier King, a physics major, said, “One of the first thoughts upon getting that acceptance letter [to UMass] was, ‘I wonder if they have a parkour club?’”

Scott Maxson sprinting to Southwest Residential Area

Scott Maxson is one of the leaders of the Parkour Club, and a member for over two years. He mentioned the benefits of being a traceur,  saying, “Improvements in parkour lead me to improvements in my everyday life.” Maxson, a biology major in his senior year, wants to show people to think and live outside of the average means put forth by modern schools and society, saying, “They just show you a part of something, I want to show you the whole of something.”

For some traceurs, they may simply enjoy the physical nature of the discipline, and that isn’t necessarily right nor wrong. For others, it is a means of physical and mental growth, a means to enhance their usefulness to both themselves and those around them. This sort of personal altruism is one of the tenets of Georges Hébert, the French naval officer who gave the preexisting ideas and actions of parkour its namesake, saying, “Être fort pour être utile” or, “Being strong to be useful.”

However, it must be added that one important facet of parkour is that each person’s experiences, and by extension- skills, are unique, and therefore unfair to compare to another person’s skills or shortcomings. This is one significant reason that parkour is not supported as a competitive sport by its founders and many participants. It isn’t about how you compare to someone else, because that’s not important to being a traceur.

Javier King behind Berkshire Dining Hall

Recently, however, several corporations have attempted to broaden public awareness of parkour (or arguably profit from them), such as Red Bull’s “Art of Motion” series, or MTV’s “Ultimate Parkour Challenge.”

It isn’t the goal for most of the traceurs at UMass to make it onto any of these programs, as some of the participants are merely striving to have the confidence  to call themselves traceurs in the first place. Javier King, a physics major at UMass, wouldn’t call himself a traceur, though he said he feels he is there, “psychologically, not physically.” About his performance, King said, “I’m able to see the moves, but I’m not able to do them.”

Some traceurs just have off nights. During one training session, at least three people sat out after hitting their knees during a vault, and King aggravated a previous (parkour-related) heel injury. “I hate hurt,” said King about his heel, jokingly. Even while their legs hurt, the inured traceurs compensated by doing exercises and tasks with their arms, just so they could keep moving and keep active whilst the others leapt and vaulted.

If anything, participating in parkour apparently can also give tracuers something to talk about if their majors aren’t normally seen as the most exciting. Kevin Barba, a computer science and math major, said, “If I go to parties and someone asks me what major I am ‘Oh, computer science and math,’ they’ll go, ‘Oh..really..,’ and I have to say, ‘Wait! Don’t go, I do normal things, too!” He laughed and continued on to say, “Parkour is something that lets me go out and be active after sitting in front of a computer all day, because I know other comp. sci. majors that work all day in front of a computer, then go home and sit in front of a computer. I just can’t do it.”

Kevin Barba transitioning from bar to ledge

Maxson actually intends to make parkour his life’s work. Disenfranchised with school, he said, “Just up until Junior year, I still wanted to go into med school.” One reason for the change, he said was, “Why think about microbiology when I could be thinking about bettering the people around me?” So instead, he now wishes to open up a sort of “Parkour monastery.” “Something off-grid,” he said, “totally self-reliant.”

Whether a traceur wishes to learn efficient movement, show off for their friends, defeat insecurities, or like in Maxson’s case, make parkour their life’s goal, it is impossible not to say that parkour changes the person in some way. Casting off the reins of society may not be for all up-and-coming traceurs, nor may it be the choice for seasoned veterans of the practice. However, parkour gives each traceur the tools to make these sort of decisions on their own.

Jordan Medeiros catching a ledge near Hampshire Dining Hall

To an outsider looking in, parkour may just seem like vaulting tables and scaling walls, and in a way, they’re not wrong, yet at the same time, they’re only seeing the barest tip of what the profession has to offer.

A landed vault can be a traceur’s aced exam; a clean wall-run can be their well-hit high note. Parkour embraces lateral thinking- what can be the best way to approach any given situation in the most practical way? Be it a 11.5ft wall, a midterm exam, or an on-coming car, it allows solutions and perspectives otherwise impossible to others.

Perhaps then, with that in mind, we could all use a good vault or two once in a while. ###

]]> http://dplante.wordpress.com/2011/10/18/parkours-unseen-leaps-of-faith/feed/ 1 deredp IMG_3626 IMG_3798 IMG_3645 IMG_3635 IMG_3860 IMG_3838 http://dplante.wordpress.com/2011/10/14/parkour-week-part-iv/ http://dplante.wordpress.com/2011/10/14/parkour-week-part-iv/#comments Fri, 14 Oct 2011 04:25:49 +0000 Derek http://dplante.wordpress.com/?p=91 Continue reading →]]> How time does fly! Welcome to the second to last day of Parkour Week.

Tonight I went out for a full evening with the Parkour Club. Compared to other meetings I’ve tagged along for, this one seemed to start a bit more lax and informal, and only about ten traceurs were present. Mr. Maxson was present as usual, and asked the group in front of him where they wanted to go for the evening, and one person said, “Somewhere new!” I chimed in, jokingly saying, “Somewhere well-lit!” Yeah, that went just as well as me attempting this:

Yeah, so this isn't how it would have gone.

So we took a leisurely stroll down to Southwest (quite a change of pace from previous evenings), and ended up around the commons of Hampshire Dining. An immediate observation I made was how much more…populated the area is compared to the area I’ve been to behind Berkshire. It’s flanked on two sides two sides with dorms, with pretty frequent foot-traffic from people going to/from their dorms or coming from the dining hall.

For a group of guys and gals that make it a point to be able to get over, around, or under obstacles, this is usually of little concern. For the dope following them with half of his attention on a view screen and half on tracking a traceur (yours truly), it’s a little more hazardous.

On that- I didn’t think of it much before taking this assignment, but do you know how hard it is to stay out of the way for people who, vault, jump, or climb anywhere at any point?

Jordan Medeiros grabbing a ledge following a wall jump.

Tonight seemed to be a bit of a tough night for a few traceurs, as at least three hit their knees on tables, some hit walls, one traceur, Javier King, aggravated a previous (parkour related) ankle injury by attempting a leap onto a pole and landing awkwardly. So I sat and chatted a bit with King, a physics major, as he tested his ankle against a concrete railing. I asked him what led him to parkour at UMass in the first place, and he said, “Actually, one of the first thoughts I had when I got the acceptance letter was, ‘I wonder if they have a parkour club?’ Previously, I had practiced rolls at home, but no actual parkour.”

Kevin Barba transitioning from a pole to a ledge.

He doesn’t call himself a traceur, though. Not yet. I asked him why, and he said, “I think I might be there philosophically, but not physically.”

A small aside about King: He apparently doesn’t own socks. Not a single pair. I clarified this multiple times, all with the same negative answer. He either wears those toed climbing shoes, or goes barefoot, all around campus. Though he did clarify by saying, “I may have a sock, but it’s my brothers, and I may only have it because it snuck in there when I was packing.”

The group ended the evening with a short workout, doing three sets of 25 push-ups, but Maxson tried to trip up the group by making them count off the push-ups in alternating orders, and by the third set, it had dissolved into bouts of laughter, which as it turns out, make for very painful push-ups.

They followed up the push-ups with “Russian twists,” which I had not really known the name for until this point but had always known it looked rather silly.

Lastly, Maxson had the group line against the wall for what I understood as “wall sitting,” which basically has you sit against a wall as if you had an invisible chair under you, except it’s basically just your quadriceps holding you up. It was decided to “sit” for five minutes, and I actually attempted it with them.

It’s hard.

But not as hard as doing a headstand with no hands, though. It's all perspective.

After pseudo-sitting for a few moments, you begin to get a profound burn in your legs, and the only remedy is to stand up and goose-step around until the pain subsides. You think it’ll be better when you settle back into it, but once you rest back against that wall, the burning ruses back into your legs. If mine could scream, they would have.  They would have screamed like small, frightened children.

Small wonder when Maxson referred to them as a both “endurance and mental” exercise.

Tomorrow, the last day of Parkour Week. Stick around.