STOMP!

On Wednesday the 20th I went to my second big Biola Alumni event, accompanied by Tad, Amanda, and Amanda's boyfriend Ben. Before seeing Stomp at the Balboa Theater in downtown San Diego, they held a lovely hors devours reception at the Bristol Hotel. Amanda and Ben met us at the condo and we carpooled down to the hotel.

The reception was on the top floor of the hotel, in a ballroom that was open air (there is a ceiling, it's just retractable.). I imagine it's a lovely location forn evening summer wedding reception. We mingled with a few of the people there and greatly enjoyed the food. Free food, even if it is appetizers, is still very welcome to us students. They did a little presentation about what's new with Biola, mostly building projects and the like. There was a current student there playing guitar and artwork on display by an alumna who lives in San Diego.

After the presentation they did the drawings for Biola apparel prizes (I didn't win anything, but Amanda did.) and we walked as a group over to the theater. Tad had studied the maps and directions and was able to lead the way, tkaing a short cut through Horton Plaza. We arrived in our seats just in time for the show to start.

It was quite an interesting and fun show. If you're not familiar with Stomp, it's a percussion group that uses every day items to make music. There were numbers using brooms, sinks with rubber gloves and water, decks of cards, newspapers, lighters, and trash cans. The lighters number was one of my favorites with the combination of the clicking noises and the flickering lights. It reminded me of the the book The Outsiders, hehe.

Something I didn't expect about the show was how much comedy was involved. It's all non verbal, but that made it even more fun. For example, in one of the numbers with brooms, one guy walks out with a mop, looks round, and then goes off stage to get the right "instrument".

After the show, we took a few pictures outside the theater, and then Tad went to get the car to pick us up. Amanda, Ben, and I enjoyed the stylings of a saxophone street performer, who ended up being joined by two of the Stomp performers, styling on the metal newspaper boxes. It was way cool. When they had finished, we walked up to say hi. Ben got his program signed, and we all took a picture with them.

I had a really good time. It was great to get to spend more time with Amanda (and Ben) and to have a fun night out in San Diego. :)

Hollywood!

My family didn't make any particularly big plans for summer, partially because we had our cruise in January, and partially because of other expenses that came up, but my dad took the last week of August off from work. Thus Friday kicked off our family vacation time. The Biola Alumni Association planned an event to go to one of the Hollywood Bowl concerts, and since the Griffith Observatory is only a short distance from the Bowl, we planned a day trip out of it.

We ended up with a little extra excitement before our trip when my dad came home Thursday night to find water trickling out of the water softener in the garage. It became worse, to the point where we had to shut off the water to the house. This meant that we had to brush our teeth out of water bottles, and I didn't get my shower for the day. I greatly disliked the idea of doing a whole car trip, without having had a shower. Fortunately, the LA Fitness that my dad and Dave are members at agreed to let me shower there.

The Culligan man was able to fix the problem, and we left only about an hour later than originally planned. Our drive went pretty well until about 10 miles past Biola when we hit tons of traffic, and continued to hit traffic until we reached our destination, 2 hours later. We got lunch from a little golf course cafe and then drove up the hill to the observatory. The Griffith Observatory has beautiful views of the LA area. You can even see the Hollywood sign off in the distance. We browsed the exhibits for a couple hours, and then made the short drive over to the Bowl.

The Alumni Association provided a picnic dinner prior to the concert. We enjoyed chatting with alumni from different eras of Biola. Steve won a "I went to Biola" tshirt for answering that the eagle is our mascot. After dinner we looked through some of the Bowl shops, and then took our seats. The concert was incredible. It was an all Tchaikovsky performance, a coronation march for the czar, a violin concerto, Capriccio Italiano, the waltz from Swan Lake, and the 1812 Overture. The USC band joined in at the end of 1812 during the most amazing fireworks display I've ever seen.

The conductor for the evening was a guest conductor, but I liked him very much. He was British and had a wonderful sense of humor. Some favorite quotes from the evening:

"The trombones have exited. They don't play in this piece (referring to the violin concerto)...this is a piece of beauty and enchantment."

"You can't ignore trombones, though it's well worth the effort."

"The percussionist would follow the music, allegedly,..."

During intermission we were given the delightful treat of chocolate chip cookies from the Biola cafeteria. While eating these cookies, I discovered that the people sitting directly behind me were Beardo and Ali Rader. It was nice to get to see some people I knew, and who were close-ish to my age.

Following the concert was an adventure I didn't expect. The Bowl parking is done in ferry ashion, cars are just all packed in. This is great for saving space...but it means that the people who get to their cars first, can't necessarily leave first. My mom and I ended up walking back to our car in what felt like a stopped freeway. There were break lights everywhere and people trying to figure out how to get out as soon as possible. We made it safely to our car, and in turn safely home.

It was a great way to start our week of vacation, and a wonderful first Hollywood Bowl experience.