Before speaking to Luis Velasquez, I never knew it was possible to be in Peru, China, Harlem, and on Wall Street all at once.

Edward

The concrete halls of the mechanical engineering department are decked in dim grey blocks and starved of natural light, but Mike Massimino’s office feels lively. Inside, the walls are lined with tidy rows of memorabilia: photos of Massimino’s crew in their space station hailing from his two missions, a proper portrait of him beaming in his space suit, and awards written in dramatic typefaces, adorned in heavy golden frames. There are more eclectic objects too, like a plush Snoopy that grins at me from the corner of Massimino’s desk, donning a clear astronaut’s helmet. This space holds an entire universe—spanning from intimidating-looking official letters to objects like Snoopy that seem almost like inside jokes, winking at whomever ventures into this abode...

Amid the trove of phone wallets, flash drives, club flyers, and other miscellaneous merch in my desk lie a collection of Broadway Playbills. Five, to be exact, amassed over the span of my first eight weeks in Morningside Heights. The special Sharpie used exclusively by Broadway enthusiasts cloaks two of my Playbills in a vast array of silver signatures...

Henry Williams, a sophomore at Columbia College, is fresh out of the shower, standing in his pajamas with a towel draped over his shoulders, as he welcomes me into the basement lounge of River Hall. There is a lot to talk about, and he does not waste time. He speaks quickly and eloquently—it’s clear that he has told this story many times before. As Williams laments the uninspiring centrism that he believes has plagued leftist politics since the end of the ’60s, a student plays violin across the room. The melancholic crooning is like a funeral march for politics as we know it...

If I’m going to order a Lyft in this city, I better have a damn good excuse, because my conscience is a tough crowd. “Really, asshole?” I’ll challenge myself. Maybe it’s a steamy August day, and I’m due across town. “You’re not willing to stand on a bus for, like, an hour? You think you’re too good for the MTA? Maybe you’re not up for New York. Maybe some place like Boston is more your speed.”..