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September 15, 2004

Water and big boobs

My arrival at UCSC when I was seventeen was eye-opening in so many ways. I met my first out-of-the-closet lesbian on my first night in the dorms, who lined up a group of frosh on her bed and lectured us on proper fisting techniques. I got my first roommate and met my first anti-shower campaigner--unfortunately the same person. I played my first drinking game and called Dad and the Moms triumphantly the next day to tell them all about my first hangover. And I met SoCal natives, and realized for the first time that not only is Southern California winning the NoCal-SoCal war, they actually have no idea it's happening. I came fully prepared to hate every SoCal resident I met for having big boobs and stealing our water,* but they were all perfectly friendly to me and claimed ignorance of any intrastate blood feud.

Since attending SFSU, I've discovered another one-sided war that I'm on the wrong side of. Everyone knows about the Cal-Stanford war, but how many of you are aware that there is also an intense rivalry between Cal and SF State? Well let me tell you, everyone at State is fully committed to this. Lecturers, professors, and students fill class discussions with snide little digs at Cal, with its "research" and "budget" and "white people." (Since attending SFSU I have chosen to become a sympathetic person of color, because frankly all the cultures here are way more interesting than the one I grew up in. You might be offended by this, but your opinions are meaningless to me, whitey.) Unfortunately, no one at Berkeley has any idea that this conflict is happening. Which only makes us hate them more, of course.

I'm starting to take some pride in my state education, though. SFSU is one of the most diverse campuses in the world, which is very important to me now that I have voluntarily renounced my colonialist white heritage. We may not have Nobel prize winning professors, or a lot of money, or good grammar, but we...actually I can't think of an end for that sentence. We don't have those things. But I like it there, anyway. And we started the campus protest movement in '68, whatever Berkeley claims.

Ok, I will now return to my high-paying job here at Cal.

*Amusingly, my non-showering roommate hailed from SoCal. What are they doing with all our water if they don't even bathe?

Posted by didofoot at September 15, 2004 11:48 AM

Comments

Apparently there's also a Cal-UVA war that nobody at Cal knows about. The night I met Meli she insisted that we were rivals.

Posted by: holohan at September 15, 2004 11:59 AM

I always heard that Southern Californians were stealing water in order to hose down their driveways. Dammit, don't you know there's a drought!

Posted by: sean at September 15, 2004 12:01 PM

isn't santa cruz considered nocal?

Posted by: michele at September 15, 2004 12:08 PM

yes, but a lot of socal imports go there. probably to stake out the water situation and report back to the committee down south.

Posted by: didofoot at September 15, 2004 12:13 PM

during committee meetings, members are encouraged to fill bathtubs to the top and flush toilets even if they've only peed in them.

Posted by: didofoot at September 15, 2004 12:15 PM

While I was at Cal, a SoCal guy told me that people down there don't even think about us because they're actually at war with New York City. He likened it to how we probably never consider what's going on in Oregon... what a prick. Anyway, this started my theory that rivalries like the Cal-Stanford, NorCal-SoCal wars are really about one place seeing another they identify as similar-yet-slightly-better and hating them with all their might. Cal students don't like Stanford students because they're rich, have easy rides through college and their campus is less hilly. SFSU people are mad b/c they're an underfunded CSU and they spend 99% of their time in fog. SoCal people don't know about the war b/c they're slightly better than us in that they have bigger boobs, better tans and get all of our water. Bastards.

Posted by: Kristina at September 15, 2004 02:36 PM

Kristina, you said it, and I will add:
Los Angeles is in a war with New York because LA is an upstart, cultureless, unreal looneytown with big city aspirations while NY thinks that if it doesn't happen in NY, it ain't happenin' anywhere.

Dido, SFSU will always kick Cal's ass because we have more Asians. And people of color (hereafter, PoC). That's right, whiteys! Go back to Berkeley and protect your solar rights, you'll need them to get a decent tan. (speaking as a PoC by perspective.)

By the way, SFSU also has more tranny, fag boy, girly dyke, MTF, FTM, str8-acting gay, lipstick lez, people of alternative sexualities than Cal has squirrels, so that's another battle won.

Posted by: cody at September 15, 2004 08:33 PM

SFSU has more Asians than Cal? My God, how is such a thing even possible? Does boba tea come out of the water fountains there?

Posted by: sean at September 16, 2004 01:04 AM

I don't know if we have more *actual* Asians, Sean, but with people like Cody and I jumping willy-nilly off the white train, our imaginary Asian population is probably off the charts now.

Actually, Cody you are right for all I know. 2468 State!

Posted by: didofoot at September 16, 2004 11:54 AM

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