Monthly Archives: October 2010

I change the theme of the blog to a seasonal theme of Fall to give my blog a more of seasonal feeling.  Fall is a beautiful time of year when the leafs are changing colors and falling slowly to the pavement and creates a sidewalk of bright colors.  Fall has its downside of being the raining season and it makes the world just a bit grayer.

I want to say I’m extremely glad to be in this LC class because all my classmates are extremely special and talented.  I’m sure one day I will see them on T.V. and I can proudly tell people I knew them during college.  Nobody is like anybody else, everything has their own special talent, ability, and interest.  They are passionate for them as well and that is pretty amazing for me because it is hard to find students who has a true passion for a subject besides money.  Everybody is also very helpful and nice, when I’m in trouble, there are always people willing to lend a hand.  If you are reading this, I want to tell you that you are amazing and I’m glad we are in the same LC class.

My favorite song of this moment that is not a song yet is call “Dear Prince Charming”
 http://www.greatsongwriting.com/dear-pri…

I do hope this gets turn into a song.

Take away the busybody stage, the glamorized costumes, the abundance of actors and whatever else makes Broadway the spectacle that it is.  Give me the talent of actors and that alone will grant you my utmost respect. Mahayana Landowne’s directing of Euripides’ “Medea” does just that.

The air holds to the audience with a chilling grip. The theater is big enough to hold a crowd but small enough so that the farthest row can connect with the spectacle. Though the pillar at the back of the stage is small, it sure does create the ambience of the good old days in Greece.  I might as well take some creative liberty to say that the pillar serves as a sort of metaphor.  The theater requires a sole pillar to create an unforgettable experience. That pillar relies on the connection between the audience and the actors.

Talk about a connection.  The actors move to and fro on the stage and in the rows. The audience has no choice but to turn right, left and move closer to the action.  There is no forgettable part in the play.  In fact, there are a few revelations about theater itself. For example, the chorus is as a vital as Medea and Jason. This detail doesn’t translate when reading the text alone. Somehow I didn’t recognize the chorus because of a preconceived notion that the chorus is there for musical enrichment. To witness the chorus interact with Medea rather than be in a group somewhere in the corner of the stage is to witness ingenuity at work.

Another new experience is seeing actors read directly from the text. At first it seems like there is no rehearsal involved, but through the performance the reason for this technique becomes clear. Because the actors read from the text, the performance is fresh. Rather than having to memorize the lines, the actors give the text a whole new enthusiasm that translates well with the audience.   There are times when the actor looks down and it appears that the rhythm might break.  These moments, however, are overcome by the simple realization that the patrons of the theater are captivated.  The audience wants the actors to progress. It isn’t like waiting for a crash at Nascar.

For me, details such as lighting, costumes, and scenery are distractions. I find that an imagination is a terrible thing to waste.  That’s why I appreciate the lack of distractions in the performance.  Light did not set the mood because it didn’t need to. The actors did just that. The somber yet simple attire keeps the attention on the actors. If their attire isn’t so simple it is hard to notice the change in sashes, which signifies a different character. The use of sashes is another technique that takes the viewer to way back when. The scenery is simple and minute. This is another detail that forces the audience to focus on the actors.

A point of controversy in the play is the use of masks to replace children.  I appreciate the replacement because children can be hard to deal with. I also believe that the audience connects with the children on a deeper level because they have to use their imaginations to create them. The audience can also choose to treat the masks as hollow objects. It all depends on how far one is willing to open to theater.

If all theater had these attributes, I might go once in a while for curiosity.  There’s no doubt that I’d recommend this production because it’s different (in a good way) from the common notion of theater.  Greece is as good of a place as any to start a patronage to the theater.  The actors know what they’re doing, and there’s comfort in that.  There are no distractions from what theater is supposed to be: a connection between the spectacle and the spectator.

The experiences that shaped my life are many and varied, but there is undeniably a central “theme” in my life. That is my Christianity. I started going to church with my parents since I was little, and I hated it. There seemed no point in going to church on Sundays nor did I have any interest in reading the Bible. Yet, I went.

It took until only roughly 2 years ago that I began to question my faith and come to grips with what I believed. I went to a short-term mission trip to Arizona to serve the Navajos on the Reservation. During that time, I struggled with my faith, or lack of, thankfully to some avail. I came back that summer a little more mature, and promptly began to see a change in the way I served in ministries and even just my entire attitude about Christianity. I had discovered something, a glimpse of something eternal, and good, something heavenly.

Now, as a student in Baruch, I’m excited to see the challenges that await me. I’m ready to take on hard classes and tackle the workload. I’m just a little nervous about the first semester as I struggle to find a balance between school, work, and church. But I’m excited and hopeful.

There really haven’t been any particular experiences in my life that have shaped me, but i could say people and religion have.  I was not born and raised in the USA, but actually in Saudi Arabia.  Who ever is reading this blog must be thinking, “OMG THAT’S CRAZY, PEOPLE GET THERE HEADS CHOPPED OF THERE.” Its not that crazy actually.  I lived a regular life of a kid, who had no concerns about the outside world, but just cared about having fun.  You can say that living in Saudi Arabia influenced me heavily to rely on religion.  I went to Sunday school, I learned how to behave in front of other people, how to dress appropriately, how to talk, how to eat and basically everything about my life through religion.  I also learned from different cultures and religions, other than Islam’s.  My neighborhood was very diverse. A Hindu family from India, Ghana and Chicago lived in my neighborhood.  They not only came from different religious backgrounds but from different cultures also.  I have forgotten their names because it has been a long time, but i still remember how loving and affectionate all of these families were toward me.  I learned about different parts of the world from each of the family.  NYC, the current city I am living in, is even more diverse.  Its the melting pot of cultures and religions from all around the world.  Living in NYC makes me feel like I don’t belong to a certain race or country, but i belong to the human race.  This city and the neighborhood i was raised in, has certainly taught to me respect and love people from all religions and cultures.

College has begun and i feel like it is a gateway, to new opportunities, such as choosing a career path and making friends.   I want to be an accountant because my dad is one.  My father is a great role model and that’s why i have chosen my decision to become an accountant, but so far every teacher who I have told about my career path said that I will eventually come to the terms of suicide because of boredom.  I wonder how my father survives.  If he hasn’t committed suicide then i believe that i can manage the workload as well if i work hard.

Welcome to Blogs@Baruch!

This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging.

I am Dmitriy Sidorov. I moved to New York when I was five years old from Chelyabinskaya Oblast, a region near the Ural Mountains in Russia. I knew no English and was immediately put into kindergarten, even though I was supposed to go to first grade (which is why I’m a year older than most people in my grade). I quickly picked up the language.

Through elementary and middle school, I made great friends from all different backgrounds — Dominicans, Puerto-Ricans, Cubans, Chinese, etc. I loved being invited for dinner at their houses, which let me see the different cultures firsthand. I loved Spanish, and went on vacation a couple of times to several cities in the Dominican Republic. I ended up taking the language for all four year of LaGuardia High School, where I went for guitar. One of my goals for college is to travel through Spain, and other spanish-speaking countries. After that, it’ll be time to wander with wonder the rest of the world.

I’m lucky to have moved here from Russia. Being surrounded by such a slew of different cultures made me appreciate them all. It helped me learn the ability to have a much broader and more powerful perspective about people. So talk to me — I’ll listen.

In college, I’m going to continue learning and exploring. I plan on following what one of the college advisors at Baruch said: Remain open to everything. I’m still not sure exactly what I want to do, simply because there are too many things I want to do. Whether it’s fueled by my attention-deficit tendencies or not, I love to learn about random things that pop into my mind throughout the day. At one point, I’ll look up how time travel is theoretically possible. At another, I’ll learn how MDMA acts on serotonin in the brain.