On Monday, November 14, I attended a poetry reading by Dr. Akhil Katyal of India, Stockton’s International Writer-in-Residence. At 7 PM, I took a seat. However, the seat I took was not in the correct location. Apparently, the reading was in the Board Room, even though countless emails had told me it was in the Event Room. So at 7:15 I took a seat in the correct room.
Luckily, I was not too late. He had only just started speaking, and not even reading the poetry, by the time I got there. I am not going to lie, Dr. Katyal had a bit of an accent. His accent made it a tad hard to understand, but I still understood most of what he was saying. Since it had only been a few days since the election, everyone was still pretty sensitive about the results. It was all so raw. He wrote a poem about how he felt when he saw the results. In another one of his poems, he slipped in that he had a boyfriend, which made me understand even more why the election results had such an impact on him and his psyche. Between being a person of color and being gay, there is a lot at stake for him when it comes to the social justice area of politics. His thoughts and poetry were profound. He wrote about his identity and his travels, from India to Chicago to New York to Stockton. Listening to his poetry was a great experience.

Last Saturday, I woke up at 5 PM. I had somehow managed to sleep through being texted by about a dozen different people and called by a few as well. I quickly downed the pills I had missed taking that morning, and began to accept that it would be nothing but an unproductive day in my dorm. That is, until I checked my text messages. My friends Mike, Kelsey, and Alex, all in the Honors Program as well, had texted me an invitation to come out with them to the Campus Center Theatre to see a movie. Little did I know, this would not be just any movie. This would be Sausage Party. Ah, but I get ahead of myself. I would first, before diving into the movie, like to state how much I appreciate that Stockton University has movie screenings like this. As all of us residential students know, campus gets very dead on the weekends, and it can be depressing. The fact that people go out of their way to screen these movies for us really says something about Stockton University, and the way it takes care of its students. I am truly grateful.
I’m sure every reader is wondering by now about Sausage Party. I assume most people at least saw commercials for it, but if you haven’t, I recommend you do so that you understand the nature of this movie. If there was one word to sum it up: raunchy. This movie pushed boundaries. Yes, I was brought up in a conservative Christian home, so any raunchy movie would have been a culture shock for me – but this was different. This movie was at the very end of the spectrum, or at least as far as you can go without getting pornographic. There was no lack of purposefully-poorly-hidden innuendos, especially at the end. There was uncensored cursing – even the F word – and I was fairly shocked that a public university was allowing this to be screened. Maybe the people in charge aren’t aware of how wild this movie is! Don’t tell them.
Yes, this movie is raunchy and absolutely not something to show the kids, but believe it or not, it was more than that. Behind the 4th-wall-breaking, naughty, and dark humor, there was a deep message – a social commentary. No, I’m not crazy. If I were next door in Atlantic City, I’d bet on a lot of money that this was a commentary on the somewhat pointless divisions we draw between ourselves based on religion. Specifically, the commentary is on the extent of how pointless they are in the opinion of the movie’s producers and writers. To fully experience how this is played out: watch the movie. I warn you, it’s very dirty, but if you can take it, watch it. However, I can tell you, the movie’s thrilling conclusion is reached when the characters unite together and reject the ideas of blindly following their religions and of allowing themselves to be divided by them. Overall, ask anyone who saw this movie: it was a wild ride.

The debate-watching party was an experience that I’m glad I didn’t miss. Truthfully, I had been anticipating this event since the beginning of the year, and I would have gone whether or not it was a course requirement to go to an event. I have no regrets about going. Some people might think I’d have rather been at a student-hosted debate party with drinking involved, but I scientifically may have died from alcohol poisoning if I had “taken a shot” every time Donald Trump said “China.”
The party gathered at 8PM in the Board of Trustees room, even though the debate started at 9PM. I was beyond excited, and for me that hour couldn’t go faster. This, for me, was the first presidential debate where I considered myself educated enough to largely keep up. I went into this knowing the meaning of acronyms like TPP and NAFTA. A young woman handed me a bingo board with instructions to mark a spot on it whenever the word on the spot was said. Among the words were “terrorism,” “Mexico,” “Obama,” “NAFTA,” and “emails.” There was popcorn out on a table, along with refreshments. I grabbed my popcorn and took my seat among my excitedly chattering peers.
The debate began and the lights went down. People (including me) gasped in excitement as the candidates walked out and laughed as they shook hands cordially. It was hilarious; they didn’t even look as though they wanted to tear each other to shreds. Worry not, they did that later – with their words. With every Trump interruption, a collective laugh resounded in the room. With every snide comment, people OOHed and AAHed and laughed and BOOed. The peanut gallery served as good company; they weren’t so loud as to make it hard to hear the debate. Best of all, I was part of it. There I was, OOHing and AAHing right along, excitedly marking my bingo board. I did not win, but it was an incredibly enjoyable event, and as the debate came to a close I found myself wishing there was more.