Author Archives: Ruana

I like to consider myself a really dynamic person. I hold a lot of interests; art, writing, science, math, history. And while it seems great that I am so curious about the many topics, it does more bad for me. It’s the reason why I’ve always disliked the question, “What would you like to be in the future?”

I don’t have a good enough answer to that question. My interests are always shifting, I want to be everything. And the saddest thing is that these computer generated assessments have never worked for me because of that reason. In the Focus assessment, I got different results for each section.

But on a personal level, I found myself leaning strongly towards the arts, science, and writing. Maybe because they are the only things that truly reflect my curious nature and need to create, as opposed to anything mathematical….

Maybe I don’t like math as much as I thought and maybe I might change my major to something more scientific in nature, like biology.

I came across a small exhibit inside the Rubin Museum that gave me a visual on how Tibetan sculpting worked, specifically how the metal sculptures were made. I’d always thought that the statues were heated and molded by hand into the intended shapes, individually (like clay sculpting). Instead, I found out that artists would create a prototype first, put it in a mold, empty the mold, then fill the mold with liquid metal, and lastly paint in details (like eyes and lips).

This is a process that we still use today, though rarely is the finished product made of metal– it’s too expensive. Today, many artists (special effects artists) would make face molds so that they could create masks tailored to their facial features. It’s just surprising that the beginnings of this molding process dates back to so long ago.

I had the awesome opportunity to go to the Met museum with my fellow classmates, Halina and Ahmed, last Friday on September 16. By the time we got there, it was almost closing time (the sky was dark outside) and the entire museum was incredibly empty.

It was such a strange experience to say the least… I felt incredibly out of place, especially with the security guards spread out everywhere. Apparently, they’ve had their own fair share of thieves at the museum and a few had to remind us to wear our backpacks in front of our bodies (which made me feel like a criminal)… But I thoroughly enjoyed waddling through the exhibits for the hour we were there.

But I digress, all that’s important was that there were very little people in the museum at the time. We got to visit the Egyptian exhibit (see pictures below), the Greek exhibit, the Asian exhibit, and we kind of walked through the “American” Exhibit/hallway because there really was nothing there to see apart from some paintings.

There was something almost ethereal about going to the museum late at night when no one is there (apart from the security guards). The exhibits were lit with artificial lighting and we were able to admire the excessively detailed feet of the Greek statues without tourist shoving us to the side to get a better look. We got to race up a large set of stairs (which I’m sure is against some form of rule, but no one/nothing got hurt except for my pride). And also, there were absolutely no crying or screaming children.

So my lesson to my lovely readers is to go to the MET late at night, get in by donation (seriously, you could get in by donating a penny although I didn’t do that because I have a conscience…I donated a dollar), go with friends, and then chill out at Central Park afterwards because NYC is beautiful.