Admission into universities in New York
I went to Columbia and NYU today.
Much preferred Columbia as a campus. NYU is too much in the centre of everything.
Then again, I would never say no to working for NYU: in the heart of the Village, overlooking Washington Square Park, hyper and central. Imagine if I achieved S's former fantasy of becoming an academic at NYU - oh the irony (you know, the coppery, the silvery - ack to M).
I had no trouble at all getting inside buildings at Columbia. Within minutes, I was shaking hands with a professor I had exchanged a few emails with more than a year ago. I had no prior appointment. He remembered my name, which was a pleasant surprise. He suggested I join his research group for pizza (it is a Friday lunchtime tradition of the group), followed by a discussion of ongoing work by a member of the team. I was very pleased with this and stayed for about an hour with the group.
I then roamed around the department (few people in - summertime in academia) and ran into a Palestinian PhD student. He is doing work on automatically determining "charisma" from about a few minutes' recording. He said I was welcome to do a recording right there and then and he would tell me my score! "What if I slowed down and just put on some gravitas in my voice?" I asked. He said it would lend evidence to the theory that there IS something called charisma; he said many people are unable to be charismatic even when they try. He suggested that the research would be useful for communication training: people could be trained to have more charisma. We agreed I'll send him a recording later.
He was also working on another project: determining Arabic dialect from a five minute recording. He said the Egyptian dialect was giving them the best results, very easy to automatically recognise. It had a distinctive rhythm and range, in addition to the fact that Egyptians pronounce certain Arabic letters in a particular way. Egyptian was such a well-defined cluster by comparison to Iraqi, Levantine and other dialects.
We talked about New York. Whereas the biggest skyscrapers, the most prestigious sites, the wealthiest corporations are owned by Jews, I observed, the Egyptians had cornered the hot dog market - all the stands in the tourist areas!
As a Palestinian who grew up in Israel (20% of the Israeli population are Palestinians who originally lived in Palestine-turned-Israel), he had a good understanding of how Jews think, he said. They essentially do not want, at any price, a repetition of the holocaust. They used to have wealth and influence pre-holocaust, but they lived in ghettos and dared not to use their power. Now, they do not hesitate to use every bit of influence they have.
He arrived to New York only a few years ago and instantly felt "this is home". The diversity of the population reassured him - everyone is starting out like him, that's how he felt.
*
Within about forty minutes I was standing in the lobby of one of the many buildings that constitute the Washington Square campus of NYU. The porter directed me to a building right across from the famous Stern Business School: William Weaver Hall, housing the Maths and Computer Science faculty.
At the entrance of the building I was stopped by a stern Jamaican-sounding security guard. Unless I gave him the name of a specific faculty member, I could not go up. I said I had come to scout around and meet people. That was not good enough for him.
To help me, he called about half a dozen numbers; but got only answer-machines! (Friday afternoon in academia in the summer). But he still wouldn't let me just go up. He knew who I was, having inspected my business card; but the rules are the rules. Now, he kept stopping the various people coming through the doors to check if they are Computer Science faculty.
People walked by, flashed their ID, and did not look at him. When he called on them, they would flash it at him again as they carried on walking. He would then raise his voice repeatedly until they stopped short in their tracks and came back to the desk. Some refused to talk to him: "here's the ID, now shut up" was their attitude. I felt his frustration. People's attitude was: "you are a nobody, I can't see you". All he wanted was to ask people if they know people in the Computer Science faculty; but they saw him as an inconvenience. He asked a Maths faculty member if he had a minute; the professor said "no" and walked off.
But I also felt that his tone was loud and rather bossy, almost accusatory. "Try the innocent until proven guilty approach", I told him. This was a breach. I was advising him on how to deal with people. I was effectively saying "within minutes of seeing you do your job, which you have been doing for years (he is at least 50), I can tell you are annoying people". He looked down and let my comment pass.
Finally, a CS faculty member came along and gave us a few names. The security guard rang up one of them and the professor said I can come up. So, after about twenty minutes of leaning on the security guard's desk, I was finally in. Except that I came back three minutes later because the Professor was not in my field and was busy; he gave me three new names though. I went back to the security desk. The guard rang up all three of them; they were not in. It was time for me to leave.
Then began a ten minute chat with the guard. He is of Guyana origins. He was given his initial security training in Guyana by the British. He has a lot of respect for the British. The Americans don't understand security. When he visited London in 2004, he noticed the country was not on the straight and narrow as it used to be; but they are not too far out, they can return back to their good old ways.
At NYU, if he lets in somebody to see a professor without the professor's explicit say-so, he's in trouble. If he lets through a black-listed student, even if the student has an ID, he is in trouble. He is always polite, never over-steps the line. Otherwise, he gets reported and they summon him and he has to answer questions. His job is tough. The sign says "You must show your ID" but most people want him to recognise them. But it is not his role to recognise people; he may make mistakes. He has to look at the ID. No exceptions. If he tries to make eye-contact, to draw their attention to him, he fails; they are not looking at him, in fact, they are avoiding his eyes. If he announces "ID please" as soon as the person walks in, he may be perceived as rude.
Do I see now? It is not that he accuses people before they're guilty, it's his job to assume the worst.
When he was studying for a course a few years back, he would pass a security desk on his way in. No matter how many times they told him "don't worry, we know you", he held up his ID for them to inspect. It's their job.
I asked him if he had any kids. Seven. Three have university degrees. One finished his Master's at NYU and is in the airforce.
I told him he must be proud of himself. He said he is tough; he told his kids: "you follow what I say, do you understand? I know what is best for you."
Do I know that he once hated his father? He used to think his father did not love him because he was so strict. But as he grew older, he understood. If his father had not been so hard, he would have gone the wasteful ways of his peers: drugs, etc.
He lives in Queens in a reasonably safe neighbourhood; but these days no neighbourhood is all-safe. If there are drugs, there are turfs, and therefore there is violence. And why are there drugs? Money. And why do they want money? Greed and lust.
He knows the ways of the world. Let me not think that he cannot let his hair down - except he has none!
The few students who pause to chat with him become like children to him. Do I know that two of them have asked him and his wife to be their adoptive parents?
A much-younger security guard, grossly overweight, walked in and pretended to not hear our athletic older man, Skerrett, ask for his ID. They are obviously joshing with each other. The younger guard says he is here to sweep the trash away, so can Skerrett get out of the way! Loud laughter. I am laughing too.
A random student is caught in the middle of this in-joke; he looks at us with bemusement
