Don't Tell Me Your Major North by Northwestern

Episode Notes
[“Don’t Tell Me Your Major Theme” By Malena Ramnath]
Malena: Hey guys, my name is Malena Ramnath.
Allison: I'm Allison Rhee.
Malena: And we are your hosts and juniors here at Northwestern. This is Don't Tell Me Your Major, an interview podcast where we avoid getting to know people on the surface level with questions like what their major is, where they're from, and how old they are, but try to get to know them on a more profound level. That's how you really know the kind of person someone is rather than judging them based on pre-established stereotypes. So, last time listeners, two years ago, – if you can believe it – we had our last podcast about Valentine's Day. We asked “What did you do for Valentine's Day?,” “Do you believe in soulmates?,” “What's your favorite romantic movie, love song, and flower?,” and “Is love at first sight real?” But now Allison and I are in very different places in our lives, cuffed now to two different men than we were with two years ago, in long term relationships, and I’d just say things have changed. And so I really wanted to revisit Valentine's Day, and kind of how our perspectives on it have changed and kind of how our view of love has changed based on our new experiences now. So to start off, how did you spend your Valentine's Day this year?
Allison: Um, well, Valentine's Day is only like a week or so after my one year anniversary. So we went out for that. And then Valentine's Day was on a Monday this year. And the Superbowl was on Sunday, so we decided to just go a little more low-key. So we just ordered a party platter of sushi and then we had chocolate covered strawberries and watched The Haunting of Hill House. So it was… it was really casual.
Malena: I can't stand horror movies, so I don't know why that's cute. But no, I get it. It's like “Oh, I'm scared” and then you get cuddles. I hate horror movies. They give me horrible nightmares. But I do appreciate a casual Valentine's Day because I will say once you've been with someone for a while, like you just start to appreciate that stuff more, I think.
Allison: Yeah.
Malena: Yeah, Valentine's Day for me, I am posh and I'll take any occasion to have him spend money on me. And so we decided to go to Etta which is a restaurant in River North I've been dying to go to. However, on Valentine's Day I get a call saying that my boyfriend tested positive for COVID. I tested positive two days afterwards. So we've been in quarantine for two whole weeks. Just got out, recording this podcast and we're going to the dinner tomorrow. 
Allison: Oh, that’s nice.
Malena: Yeah. Instead, he sent me, to the hotel room I was quarantining in, he had sparkling juice and chocolate covered strawberries and like my favorite ice cream delivered to me and some roses, which I thought was really cute.
Allison: Sparkling juice?
Malena: Yeah, sparkling. Yeah. I mean, I'm under 21. He's not but he had that delivered to me. And so what, you know, based on – I had chocolate, we both had chocolate covered strawberries –but what do you think is the best Valentine's Day food to get or receive? Like edible arrangements, chocolates? Chicken wings?
Allison: Chicken wings? I would – probably not. I mean, I like chicken wings. I just I don't know if I would want them for Valentine's Day. I'm not a big like, pure chocolate person. Like I don't eat like chocolate bars. I think chocolate covered strawberries are always the best bet, but when you buy them they're so expensive for no reason. Some rustic homemade chocolate covered strawberries, I think that’d be, that’s the perfect gift.
Malena: I did appreciate my favorite ice cream. It's Cherry Garcia, Ben and Jerry's, listeners  – in case you ever want to hit me up with some gifts for your loyal host. But I also like edible arrangements. Because it's like you get the vibes of like having a nice set of flowers, but it's edible. So it's like practical, they don't just like s

Episode Notes
[“Don’t Tell Me Your Major Theme” By Malena Ramnath]
Malena: Hey guys! My name is Malena Ramnath.
Hannah: I'm Hannah Fredly.
Malena: And we are your hosts and juniors here at Northwestern. This is Don't Tell Me Your Major, an interview podcast where we avoid getting to know people on the surface level with questions like what their major is, where they're from, and how old they are, but try to get to know them on a more profound level. That's how you really know the kind of person someone is rather than judging them based on pre-established stereotypes. Today we would like to welcome our guest Nate Sowder, who is a student here at Northwestern. Say hi Nate! 
Nate: Hello.
Malena: Thank you so much for coming onto our podcast, and today we will be discussing movies seeing as now as the the pandemic is ending, we can all start going to movie theaters again and so many good movies are coming out right now – such as Dune and The French Dispatch, and pretty much anything with Timothée Chalamet in it. So, I guess we'll just get started with the questions. Since we're diving in kind of profound, I'm gonna answer the first question first. The first question is what movie has changed your perspective on things the most? For me, personally, that movie was Ladybird.” It talks a lot about a girl's relationship with her mom and her father growing up in a family that's like really close together, but she's trying to become more independent. And for me, that reflected a lot of my life, I'm very close with my parents. And so it was difficult to become more independent and to leave for college, and kind of the nuances that came along with that. And it kind of just represented how your parents ultimately just love you so much. And that leads to a lot of conflict and a lot of happiness in family life. And that really resonated with me at the time. I watched it with my mom – we just both ended up in tears. So yeah, that was the movie that changed my perspective on things the most. And Hannah, what was the movie that changed your perspective on things the most?
Hannah: I think I would say Beautiful Boy, which Timothée Chalamet also happens to be in.
Malena: Yeah, classic.
Hannah: But he’s a good actor and, and I think  Beautiful Boy was really, really cool because it looks at you know, drug use and stuff like that. And it sort of just gives you like a glimpse into a life of what it's like. And it really puts you in his shoes. And it's a really cool thing to sort of experience what it would be like to have a life like that. And also it looks at parental love. And you know, if you want to help someone, all that stuff, so it's really cool. 
Malena: Yeah. What about you Nate?
Nate: I'm gonna have to go with a classic with It's A Wonderful Life – the old Christmas movie. And I don't know  if I would call this one life changing as much as life defining in the fact that it's a tradition in our family to watch that movie every Christmas holiday.  As I'm sure it is a tradition in a lot of families because it's like, public domain or whatever. But it's a really fantastic movie. That one, speaks to me a lot about the value of family, both, you know, from the movie standpoint as a movie, like emphasizing the importance of family, and also the fact that it was a familial experience every time I would watch it with my family. So both of those things really spoke to me. And obviously, also the fact that the movie, it just speaks a lot that there's always something we're like, you know, there's always something worth living for. Another thing I really like about the movie is that it really shows that life is worth living. And that's something I think that's sacred and valuable. And it's sometimes easy to forget in the business of life, but I think this movie speaks to it in a very simple and pure way. 
Hannah: Yeah, it makes you like appreciate life.
Malena: Yeah, yeah. And I mean, that's kind of the same thing with Beautif

Episode Notes
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[“Don’t Tell Me Your Major Theme” By Malena Ramnath]
Malena: Hey guys! My name is Malena Ramnath.
Hannah: My name is Hannah Fredly.
Malena: And we're your hosts and sophomores here at Northwestern. This is Don't Tell Me Your Your Major, an interview style podcast where we avoid getting to know people on the surface level with questions like what their major is, where they're from, and how old they are, but try to get to know them on a more profound level. That's how you really know the kind of person someone is rather than judging them based on pre-established stereotypes. We're also joined today by Asteris Dougalis, who is currently a sophomore here at Northwestern, although we won't tell you what his major is. Say hi, Asteris.
Asteris: Hey everybody. I'm glad to be here.
Malena: So today Asteris, I thought we'd have a little themed discussion as usual, as per the norm of this podcast. And I thought we'd play around with the idea of definitions, because for me, I feel like there's a lot of different ways you can use the root of the word definition – like definition, definite, definitively, define, you know, and you can use those in all kinds of different contexts. So, I thought that that would be like a cool way to base our questions off of. So we'll start off easy with a chill question. And it's: What is your favorite word? And what is its definition? And I’ll go first to give you guys like, a little time to think, you know, but so my word is going to be a little pretentious. And it's okay if your guys’ is too, but my word is halcyon. I think it's from Greek mythology – I don't know why I think that – but um, it's the idea of like, the good old days in the past that are like shiny and golden in your mind. And, for me, I'm a very nostalgic person. So that's why that's my favorite word. It just reminds me of the good old days. So I thought that that was cute.
Asteris: What are the good old days for you? What do you think when you think about this?
Malena: Freshman year? I don't know, I just, I felt like – not to say that I peaked. I think I feel like we are in the middle of the good old days, which is kind of a really great thing to recognize while you're in them because a lot of times you don't. But there was like a carefreeness to freshman year where, like, it's before I'm recruiting for jobs, you know. Before I, like, really start caring about my GPA – when you're just meeting people and, like, everything's an exciting, independent, like blur. And also, you're getting all your meals cooked for you in the dorm. So I think that's what it would be. But okay, Hannah, what is your favorite word?
Hannah: So I think my favorite word is hygge. And it's a Norwegian word. Originally Danish, though. And so I'm Norwegian. And it just like it technically, if you've seen these posts before that are words you can’t translate from other languages. It's this word, and it means cozy, warm — “Enjoying yourself” is the closest I can get to it. 
Malena: Dude, that sounds cozy. Not to sound just repeating what you're saying. But, you know, being like, bundled in blankets and stuff. That's the vibe. Right? 
Hannah: Exactly. 
Malena: I feel like that's something that IKEA markets about. Not to, you know. I feel like I've seen the name as like a blanket in IKEA.
Asteris: That’s true. IKEA is a place where everyone has positive memories in, you know, because it's always starting something new. All that. I think my word is a little less, maybe, profound than yours. I say aforementioned because in every single essay I always use “aforementioned this”, “aforementioned that”... So I think you know, they talk about forensic linguistics and all those things where they can see like the tracking of how you write on those things. Definitely “aforementioned” for me is a telltale sign of my writing. So I guess that's my favorite word. 
Malena: Yeah. So they

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[“Don’t Tell Me Your Major Theme” By Malena Ramnath]
Malena: Hey guys! My name is Malena Ramnath.
Hannah: I'm Hannah Fredly.
M: And we are your hosts and sophomores here at Northwestern. This is Don't Tell Me Your Major, an interview podcast where we avoid getting to know people on the surface level with questions like what their major is, where they're from, and how old they are, but try to get to know them on a more profound level. That's how you really get to know the kind of person someone is rather than judging them based on pre-established stereotypes. So today, it's just the two of us because last episode, we had a guest. So today, it's just us, the hosts, me and Hannah. And today, we really wanted to talk about the idea of imagination, because it's COVID still. We're still stuck inside. It's a panda-nemic. And I think our imagination can oftentimes be our only escape from this kind of stuff. Right? So, my first question for us to answer here on our podcast today is did you ever have any imaginary friends when you were little Hannah?
H: So this is gonna be a really boring answer, but I did not actually. I knew a lot of people who did and I have some funny stories, but I myself never had one. 
M: Okay, at least give me a funny story about it.
H: So I had a friend back home, who used to have an imaginary friend. And so when she was little, she was walking down the street and she used to talk to her imaginary friend. And so she would tell me that people low key thought she was crazy sometimes because she would like, talk into thin air.
M: Oh my gosh, like I couldn't do that. I couldn't just talk into thin air. That being said, though, I definitely imagine that my  stuffed animals and teddy bears have personalities. I still kind of do. I think it's a remnant from Toy Story being a thing. I  definitely, you know, had my teddy bears and they have personalities. You know, my boyfriend isn't necessarily so happy about the fact that I'm still a five-year-old inside, but that was – they were like my imaginary friends. You know? Also because my parents never really bought me – maybe it's like a gender stereotype thing, but also, I didn't mind it – they just never, I never even really had  Barbies, or like, Legos or anything. I just had a million teddy bears. So yeah, I guess it was safer, child-safety-wise, to just surround me with soft, plush things. 
H: Yeah, actually, you want to know something funny? So back home, in Norway, I used to have like a, like a fat big drawer only full of teddy bears. And there were some teddy bears that was like, they were too big to fit in the drawer and be like huge giraffes, like the size of my body, my little child body, like big bears, like the size. And if I put them all on my bed, I wouldn’t have space for myself in the bed. 
M: Yeah, I know exactly. We would my sister and I would like, oh my gosh, this is so silly. She's gonna hate me for saying this on the podcast. But we would do this thing called a dolly hash, where we would take all of our stuffed animals combined - easily at one point, like 100 of them - we would (consumerism at its finest), we would cover our living room in them. And there's photos of me and my sister just passed out and you can't see the carpet. It’s the two of us, like asleep on our teddy bears and our parents like “What have we created?”
H: I'm not gonna lie. If I were a parent and I came home to that I'd be thoroughly terrified.
M: But imagination comes in a lot of different ways. I think we all have like daydreams about, you know, from our imaginary friends to like our dream jobs and things like that. And I think that plays into this question that I've had for a long time of like, idealism versus realism, because I feel like, you know, for me, I'm more of a cynic. I would say I'm more of a realist, I've always seen idealists as kind of living in their imagination, like, “Oh, you

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[“Don’t Tell Me Your Major Theme” By Malena Ramnath]

Malena: Hey, guys, my name is Malena Ramnath.

Hannah: I'm Hannah Fredly.

Malena: And we're your hosts and fresh and fresh - sorry, no longer freshmen - but sophomore here at Northwestern. This is Don't Tell Me Your Major, an interview podcast where we avoid getting to know people on the surface level with questions like what their major is, where they're from, and how old they are. But try to get to know them on a more profound level. That's how you really know the kind of person someone is rather than judging them based on pre-established stereotypes. We're also joined today by our lovely guest Aida Baimenova - tell me if I got your name wrong - who is currently a junior here at Northwestern. Although we won't tell you what her major is. Say Hi.

Aida: Hi, guys, I’m Aida, it's a pleasure to be on your podcast. Thank you so much for hosting me today Malena and Hannah.

Malena: No, of course. But today, we just wanted to have a little themed discussion. And I want to have a little fun with the word play of being homesick versus sick of home, especially as quarantine drags on, and people are either too stuck at home or stuck far away from it because they can't get back. So I figured we'd chat about that. Also, please forgive any audio weirdness because we all are on zoom calling each other despite being in Evanston, which is kind of random, because we're being the big safe from Corona at this moment in time. But hopefully we’ll see each other soon. So my first question for you Aida. And then, you know, Hannah, and I can answer afterwards would be, um, where do you consider home and right now are you home sick or sick of home.

Aida: Um, so I'm, I was born and raised in Kazakhstan. And although I went to high school in Singapore, I very much considered Kazakhstan home. I did spend quite a bit of time in Kazakhstan due to COVID. I spent a lot of time in summer in Kazakhstan, which normally doesn't happen, which, I guess it was a bittersweet situation, it kind of sucked to be stuck in Kazakhstan, but at the same time, I got to spend a lot of quality time with my family, and especially my friends from home who all of us went to international schools growing up outside of Kazakhstan. And so it was really, really nice to reconnect with them, and I guess be stuck together although it did result in us all getting COVID. But I currently am healthy. I am in Evanston. And I'm not feeling too homesick because I'm very much in the mindset of, I need to grind. This is the environment where I'm going to be the most productive and I'm just happy to be safe and doing things that I enjoy, which right now are my classes and hanging out with some of my friends from university.

Malena: Okay, Hannah, tell us about home. Do you miss it? What's going on there?
 
Hannah: So home for me is France. I spent a lot of time this summer with my parents and my sister. I really, really enjoyed it. It was a lot of fun. But you know, there comes a point after like, you know, two, three, four, five months, where you're like, well, OK, I might need my own space right now. But you have your parents on you 24/7, you're like, oh, okay, I need out. So I was really happy to come to Evanston and get some sort of social interaction outside of my family. 

Malena: No, I, okay. So I'm exactly the same way where it's like, I had such a good time being home this summer. But I think it was tough because like Aida, I also graduated from Singapore. Wow. So similar. I graduated from Singapore, and then my parents moved to D.C. So I was home all summer with no friends, and they could kind of tell that I was losing it as much as I enjoyed spending time with them. So I think it's kind of a balance, but now that I'm back, I literally call my parents every day, I think I developed an attachment to them again over the summer. Literally, my mom was like, “Mal

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[“Don’t Tell Me Your Major Theme” By Malena Ramnath]
Malena: Hey guys, my name is Malena Ramnath.

Allison: This is Allison.

Malena: And we are your hosts and freshmen* here at Northwestern. This is Don't Tell Me Your Major, an interview podcast where we avoid getting to know people on the surface level with questions like what their major is, where they're from, and how old they are. But try to get to know them on a more profound level. That's how you really know the kind of person someone is rather than judging them based on pre-established stereotypes. So today, Allison and I wanted to have a little theme discussion. And recently we've all been talking a bit about dreams through our quarantine boredom, from daydreams to night dreams to actual future dreams that we have. So I figured we'd chat about that. Also, please forgive any audio weirdness that you're hearing because we're all zoom calling from DC to Korea, we’re massive global citizens, so yeah. So the first question that I have written down is, do you have any recurring dreams or nightmares? And do you believe that dreams have meaning? Kind of in conjunction, do you think those recurring dreams mean something?

Allison: Mmm, I don't think I have any recurring dreams these days. But one dream that I remember having like super vividly when I was really little. I don't remember if I was living in Korea, Hong Kong at the time, but I was probably young, in elementary school. And it was, strangely, really traumatic. I don't know why, but it was like, over the course of one night,

Allison: Or one or two nights maybe, but like the first night, I went to bed and I had this dream.

Malena: Mm-hmm.

Allison: Or maybe this was in Korea. Okay. My friend lived in this apartment complex and they had this playground, but the playground had like this little addendum where it kind of looked like, like the front window of a shop, you know, like kind of where the person would stand behind and then.

Allison: you would have customers lining up and then there's a little countertop. And so we would kind of play shop. You know what I mean? Like little kids, they use toys and fake money.

Allison: And the dream took place on that playground. And there was a strange man behind that counter. And I was paying the customer in the shop game.

Allison: And then I went to the counter to do something, you know, play shop, whatever, have fun. And then the man just starts to tickle me. And I could feel it physically. It didn't feel like a dream, I felt like I was physically being tickled in real life and I woke up and I woke up, kind of traumatized, like a little bit anxious, like crying. And I went to my parents' room, and I snuggled right in between my mom and my dad. And I fell back asleep. And I had the exact same dream, nothing changed. I woke up crying again. I was so scared. I kept being tickled. And, you know, tickling doesn't seem serious, but when you don't want to be tickled-

Malena: It’s the worst!

Allison: Yeah, it's horrible. Like, I just feel super out of control.

Malena: Violated!

Allison: And I was like, six or seven years old when this happened.

Malena: Yeah.

Allison: And I just remember waking up like three times in the night because I'm afraid to sleep because the minute I closed my eyes, I keep having the same dream. It was terrifying. I don't know if it means anything. I can see where in my subconscious that setting came from. I don't know where the man and the tickling came from. I don't think I've incurred any childhood trauma to that extent. So I don't know if it necessarily means anything. Maybe I watched something scary. It was too far ago, but yeah, that was a recurring traumatic dream that I had when I was younger. I'll never forget it, it's so fresh in my mind. It feels like it happened like yesterday. Oh god.

Malena: That's so creepy. I hate that. I hate that so much.

Allison: