University of Massachusetts Boston - Beacon Yearbook (Boston, MA)

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What is UMass Boston? lln ten words or lessl Ofeozirse, the check 's in the mail. We have no record ofyour being registered - or alive. The best cheap education in town. ls there any toilet paper in your stall?! As tar away from Harvard Square as we could get. He's not in right now. He 's in a meeting. A resthome for your mid 2O's. What are the Psychedelic Furs? Duncan Nelson, on a chair. CPCS? What's that? C-P WHA T? l'lt sure doesn 't look like hamburger. Populated ten-percent by Vietnam Vets! Bumplestilskinism. An urban Institution. The PUD. Well prepared in case of tire. What, Bat-Burgers again? Does this elevator work? A STUD 3l0f7Q the Red line- Angels dancing on the head of a pin. Could you repeat that? I don't get it. Nikes, Docksiders, Points, Pumps and Papagallos. Just a stone's throw from Columbia Point Project. Not my department, but I 'll transfer you. I don't know. Where 's the Coke machine? -fgkeyy ee I missed the G2 emfenee Weyy ge Weep The Gretta Garbo home for wayward boys and girls. A host of golden datfy pills. Getting lost in its own red tape. Old volvos, Malibus, Dodge Darts, and an occasional new How many Garabedians can there be? Mercedes. I know my name isn 't on the check, but it's me. B. U. Busters. I lost my l.D. - Really. A melting pot - melted. No, we don't do drugs. End of the semester blues. YES, we do do drugs. No place to have lunch. No, the food hasn't been tasted. A home for happy wanderers. My co-ed doesn 't understand me. The Chancellor's beard clippings. Highest consumers of bad coffee locally. Mohawks, Dutchboys, Atros, and magenta tips. Proving grounds for the NEW TASTE OF COKE. My morning bagel and cream cheese. A T-Shirt salesman's dream. Ten thousand minds in motion over methane gas. Anything you want it to be. Population Biologists enjoying their morning amebas. Either too hot or too cold. A brickland on a wasteland. lt's dandy. lt's somewhere in these tiles, Iknow it. By - Those Asked

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Watching a Bab Die When she was forced out of her mother's womb, the newborn baby screamed bitterly, reluctant to join a hostile world. She desperately located a couple of shrunken breasts with her hands, only to learn that she was not going to survive for long. The mother had no milk, but she was able to welcome the new guest with salty tears that the baby swallowed without even questioning where they came from. To an Eritrean student from the drought-stricken and war-torn Horn of Africa, this tragedy is not just news that he comes across in the daily paper or on TV, but a reality that he had seen, a fact of life he has learned to accept. Even when he comes to the West, under the pretext of getting an education, the ugly memory haunts him. Often he finds himself wondering if he should have stayed at home and helped. He feels guilty, for he knows that while the innocent cry for help, he goes to school in a country whose leftovers could feed not only the babies in his country but the whole continent as well. Sometimes he wishes he could establish an organization that would channel leftovers from his new home to his old one. He knows that the hungry children would never notice the odor of rotten food. He also knows it wouldn't be possible anyway. lt was a preposterous idea that occurred to him when he saw a huge pile of plastic bags full of leftovers waiting to be collected for dump- ing. How he wishes the truck would empty its priceless contents near the famished children. He knows of course, that his thoughts are naive. He knows the longest war in Africa, the Ethiopian-Eritrean war, has been raging for more than 23 years. He knows the indifference of the Organization of African Unity and the United Nations to the politics behind the war. He also knows the famine was not caused by drought alone, but also by the failure of the interna- tional community to come to grips with the national question of Eritrea. At the moment, however, all he wants is one thing: to feed the baby. Yes, the baby that he saw on TV the other day, the dying baby who almost shook her head in disgust when she caught his celebrating Christmas while she died of hunger. He felt like spitting out his food when he saw her on the screen. He immediately put away his plate, and before he knew it was crying again. What do you want me to do, he asked the dying baby as if she could hear him, and waited for her reply. A few moments later he realized that she did not answer because she needed the breath to survive a few more hours. He tried to go to bed but the face of the baby lingered in his mind. In desperation he begged her to leave him alone and she refused. You thought you'd forget me by simply turn- ing off your TV, but l'll stay with you as long as my weak heart is beating, she told him. Even if l die, she warned him, l'll stay in your mind for the rest of your life. He wept profusely when she opened her mouth painfully and cried, Tell everybody that l'm not a Marxist, I don't even know who Marx was. l just need food. - Russom Mesfun tThis article, written by Eritrean UMass!Boston student Fiussom Mesfun, originally appeared in the Boston Globe. - Ed.i