Drop

I'm in sociology lecture right now and I'm sick of my sociology professor. He is a perpetrator of douchebaggery and stupidity. This course has made me loathe any stupid shitty humanities like these. The balding fatass angers me after every lecture. It's like time would have been better spent sleeping in than sitting and listening to his whiny nasal voice. Right now he's just talking to himself like someone indulging in schizophrenia. This pisshead doesn't realize how dumb his own class is: incessant digressions and immaterial discussions [involving mostly himself] makes me think Sociology is the study of obvious bullshit in life. Right now he's talking about sex like he's an expert or as if knowing little factoids makes him so (he claims to have wife and kids - I pity them for having to suffer living with this airhead). (To professor: What the fuck! Stop talking already! The material you spew from your asshole is absolutely not university material! Now please, stop contributing to the decline of civilization and stop trying to think that you're teaching something! !@#$)

Sociology II

(Continuation of 'Sociology' entry.)

Wow, does he think we are second-graders? There is still half an hour left of class - half an hour too much. I think this class could probably be condensed into fifteen short, simple minutes if all the unproductive and repetitive material was trimmed off. I've done my own 'sociological' survey and noticed that more and more people are bringing laptops into class. Good for you, guys, you can make good use of your time!

Sociology

I'm in my sociology class right now. The professor is a nutty, balding old man who claims he is quite the professional with technology. I've observed in him a sense of smugness when he shows us he can use bSpace (the Cal student 'workspace' some professors use). OoOh, very impressive, professor, you can read and use your common sense to click on things! On bSpace he formats his announcements and posts with bright and fruity color combinations and plays around with italics and larger-than-necessary font sizes. Furthermore, his lectures are very disordered, intangible, impractical, useless, stupid, uninteresting, loose, repetitive, slow, flamboyant, overtly melodramatic. Dumb. I would rather read a sociology textbook. It would easily trump this extra hour and thirty minutes of sleep I get sitting in lecture.

I was planning to connect sociology to my Fourth of July experience, but this has easily become a rant. It would be very satisfying for me to continue, but.... oh, what the hell...

So the bitch has his fucking PowerPoint slides up. Good God! This douche is wasting my time! He cannot create a proper PowerPoint presentation. The slides are filled with paragraphs of text and definitions, and all he does is read them, trying to make the terms and concepts sound so important and so complex. It all goes over my head. And I chose it to. It is not worth listening to his wholly subjective, opinionated, and prideful bullshit. I can get a better education for the class reading the Wikipedia article on sociology.

Ok. I'm done.

Dime

Wow. I think Lady Luck brushed her sumptuous ass on me. Today Jeffrey and I took the bus to Safeway. I thought the bus fare would be $1.50, but it turned out to be $1.75. Jeffrey searched his pockets and totaled his coins to be $1.65. I told him I would find him a dime and started searching the ground for anything. After coming out of the store, Jeffrey asked if I had a dollar or anything to make up the shortage. I simply replied no and told him to wait. I walked over to the vending machines and lo' and behold a dime lay in the change slot! He and I just thought it was such a lucky, lucky break: we just stood speechless and laughed at this reversal of fortune.

Perhaps life's repaying us for the trouble we faced? I don't know and I can't know the answer to the speculation, but it seems to be so. I am not the superstitious type - you know, with the black cats, the ladders, and the mirrors - but I think life is indeed restituting us little by little. Jeffrey is getting his wallet back, and I found a dime to get us on the bus. Dear nature, we're still waiting for a wonder for Mr. Sam.

Sidewalks

It has come to my attention that I've been avoiding 'street, gangsta' -type black people (subconsciously or not) on the sidewalks. It's difficult to disassociate them from my attackers, who definitely used AAVE (African American Vernacular English) - when I was down on the ground picking up my papers, one of them was saying to another, "Shoot da' nigger, Shoot da' nigger!" Walking along Shattuck Avenue today, I know I heard someone say "nigga." It only connects me back to the hold up. On the way to Tako Sushi Jeffrey and I avoided peculiar people, be they black or white and in groups or alone. I suppose this supra-awareness for the every-day people on the sidewalks is going to be with me for a while.

Place

Location of Event: Go.

There

Jeffrey and I were coming down Shattuck Avenue after visiting the small claims court and Citibank. One block before reaching Channing Way and the crime scene, Jeffrey suggested we could just get on the other side of the street. There is definitely still great emotional trouble attached to that spot for Jeffrey.

I can't say it's not the same for me: I can't ignore it. I looked too as we passed by. I haven't attempted to make another visit though. [Jeffrey and Sam braved to investigate the area in the hope of finding any of their things.] It's not that I'm afraid of the place - it's more like a landmark for a very bad experience.

I don't know for Sam, but he seemed to be quite calm the last time I saw him. His girlfriend is more worried than he is for himself. Sam is taking time off from working in the lab for now for mental and emotional recovery.

Inexperience

Jeffrey is telling me still that my actions to speak with the attackers was indeed ignorant but very lucky. It's difficult to argue with that. Jeffrey tells me he has had a threatening encounter before in the subways of Paris: two men confronted him for his money. I know he's right.

I suppose I was 'inexperienced.' I type with irony to say this, but this was just my first time being held up: give me a break. How was I supposed to know I was supposed to just surrender and do what the young men wanted as they brandished their weapons at me? How was I supposed to know that I was supposed to be terrified? (Through the event I was more in the stance to fight than to flee.) How was I supposed to know how to act?

I guess I learned my 'lesson.'

UPDATE - Jeffrey reads my blog and responds that my actions were not strictly wrong. In this situation, most people would have just been 'cowards' and recapitulated. I just took a lucky roll.

Meaning

It has been almost exactly 25 hours since the encounter. I write this blog not only as an outlet but also a hunt for meaning. The title of this blog, Beyond Price, alludes to the invaluableness of life: you cannot put a price on it.

Anyone that has had the hands of death crushing them and escaped would feel very lucky and very relieved to just be alive and well after losing replaceable material things. I witnessed Jeffrey with a gun touching his forehead. Sam told me that a gun was aimed at my chest. We all were able to get out of death's clutches: we are all alive.

And we are all just fucking happy to be allowed to live more days.

Reaction

Sam and Jeffrey later told me of my really reckless, ignorant, and dangerous maneuver to have attempted negotiating or talking with the attackers. (I was able to keep my cell phone, keys, wallet and contents, and camera though.)

I don't know. I was afraid for my friends, but I remained calm for myself. The thought of being able to take the robbers down even passed through my mind - I thought I would be able to grab one of the guns and reverse the situation.

I chose to comply with their orders (to give them our money) instead - but not without stubbornness. I was unwilling to surrender any of my things. This was a move, as Sam and Jeffrey brought to my attention, that was just stupid. I was unarmed and my friends and I were clearly dominated, but I mindlessly resisted relinquishing my material things. I was basically asking to receive bullets. Jeffrey and Sam told me I should have just kept my mouth sealed and given them everything.

I was blindly lucky and luckily blind to a) confront the attackers, b) be calm and stand my ground, c) keep my things (my cell phone, for example, was and is used to keep in touch with friends and the police), d) be alive.

July 5

After my math class I met up with Sam and Jeffrey. We made our way to the SISS office (Services for International Students and Scholars - Sam and Jeffrey are students from France). The entire office was silenced as we recounted what happened. The woman we spoke with acknowledged the danger and seriousness of the event. She recommended us to visit the university police and suggested counseling services to cope with the traumatizing experience.

Sam and Jeffrey were able to obtain possible leads: they checked their phone activity online. We took this information to the city police department. A detective received the logs and said that he will try tracing the numbers.

Luckily, Jeffrey's wallet was found in a yard. We are still waiting for a response from the police about this.

July 4

Around 11:30 PM last night, on the 4th of July, two friends and I were walking home from an Independence Day celebration at a friend's place. We were pacing eastward on Channing Way through a residential area, nearing Shattuck Avenue, the main downtown street of Berkeley, California.

Three black young males were heading toward us on the same sidewalk. From what I remember they were clad in dark baggy clothing. Two had black hooded sweaters, the hood pulled over their heads. The other, Sam reports, hid his face with a bandanna. A gun was the first thing I saw when they came within five feet of us. It immediately targeted Jeffrey's head. Sam was also taken aback by one of the other black males. I don't remember the ordeal very well, but Sam says he saw another gun which was aimed at my chest.

The attackers demanded our money. "Give us your money, give us your money!" they barked. I took out my wallet, and I gave them all the cash I had in it - about $80. I was immediately obedient when I first saw guns. Jeffrey and Sam were patted down: their cell phones and their wallets were taken. The black males released them when they believed they had milked them enough.

I was the last to be let go. I had taken out my wallet, yes, but I was arguing with the attackers. After giving them my cash, I had told them all that was left in the fold of my wallet was just papers - receipts, movie ticket stubs, notes, etc. I had dropped these sundries on the ground and bent to pick them up. I was lucky to have also picked up my student ID card. One of the assailants was patting my back pockets as I was pawing the ground for my things.

I stood up to catch up with my friends. We hastily treaded toward Sam's place and called the police. They were at Sam's place within a few minutes. We gave them our statements. Jeffrey and I returned to my apartment in the back of a police car.