pre-dawn ghosts.

there are few instances where i've needed to awake pre-dawn into a fully-functional human being, but today was one of them. at 330 in the morning, i am called by the taxi company; the car is on its way and should arrive within thirty minutes. i gather my belongings and make final checks, crank-starting my brain to re-understand numbers and phrases in thai. an orange taxi, this time orange, instead of blue or yellow or green or red or hot pink, pulls up to the door in the carport, and i load my luggage into the back. bidding a goodbye to vanda, i am off to begin my long trip home.

the streets of bangkok are desolate at four in the morning and utterly free of traffic and pedestrians. eerily silent, it is a rare sight. as my taxi zooms along, sending the wind rushing by the windows in a whisper, i take in my last views of the sleeping city - the shells of gutted apartment buildings, the murals of the king, the dusty rooftops of nearby houses, and the wiry forest of cable antennas and radio receivers.

a light rain begins to fall, quickly turning into a heavy downpour of heavy droplets, which rap at the roof of the cab like a shower of marbles. i was sure thailand wouldn't let me leave without showing me one last instantaneous rainy-season wet-spell, and as my driver drastically reduces speed on the now-slick pavement, i have a passing thought of sticking my hand out the window to let the rain bathe it clean.

nearing suvarnabhumi airport, a field of white and amber lights slowly come into view, and i can almost sense the spirits trapped therein. the cab pulls up to the terminal, and i pay my driver before entering the skeletal behemoth before me. as i sit in the benches by my flight gate, the curved wall of windows form an arching canopy over me and the bustling two-hundred-or-so people around me - over the five young women to my right, chit-chatting over matters on a sheet of paper passed around, over the four young men to my left, conversing in voices as low as they have sank into their uncomfortable metal seats, and over the three monks before me, bald in their saffron robes, two on their cell phones.

outside the wall of windows the sky is growing brighter with each passing minute, but the sun has yet to rise. large, thick, fluffy columns of clouds, invisible just a half hour ago, now loom ominously in cadet-blue pre-dawn lighting. more and more people are arriving to the gate each second, and despite the classical music the airport tries to pipe into the void through hidden speakers, it is almost completely drowned out by the chatter of travelers, the squeaking of luggage carts, the shuffle of people, the clanks of baggage-zippers upon metal security-check tables, and the low hums from the huge air-conditioning towers inside and passing planes outside; always the hums.

bangkok, thailand.

home.

it's nice to be back in san francisco... the people are chill, the values are liberal, and the weather's always predictable - bring a light coat. at a quaint downtown café, where heavy-framed mirrors cover the walls interspersed with vintage liquor posters, patrons grab small tables to sip their coffee with a magazine or newspaper grabbed off one of the racks. overhead, ceiling fans spin gently to the pulse of the casual atmosphere, and a light stream of french tunes emanate from hidden speakers.

as i take a seat near the corner of the café for a spot of brunch, the little girl from the table beside me plays peek-a-boo with the sheer window curtains as i smile and play along. a glance at her table reveals she had already been hard at work before i arrived, doodling cartoons in a spectrum of colors on the disposable paper placemats, which cover the linen tablecloth. her mother and father, who are still finishing their meal, chat amongst themselves and seem to have left their daughter to her own devices. on the hardwood floor between my table and theirs, several stuffed animals lay by the wayside, waiting to be picked up or remembered. as i eat my order of eggs, toast, smoked salmon, and hollandaise, the little girl begins playing with a tiny stuffed-animal duck on my table, and i play along until she retreats back to fiddling with the curtains and her own unfinished plate of food.

near the end of my meal, the little girl and her parents prepare to leave, gathering the stuffed animals from off the floor. as her mother, dressed in a bright neon-pink dress and a large sparkly-green bow in her hair, and her squeeze by to leave, i say bye to the little girl, but her mother [in un-san-fran fashion] makes no attempt to interact with me, and i don’t either, deciding it would be best to give them their peace and privacy instead. it’s hard enough dealing with the press, i imagine. the little girl goes to join her father, while her mother gives a friend of theirs a parting hug and mentions something about going back to iceland soon.

i finish brunch and stroll the streets around chinatown, passing by racks of counterfeit goods, barrels of dried foodstuffs, boxes of vegetables, and carts of shiny gimmicks for tourist. chinese women on street corners hand out sheets of paper printed with menus, in an attempt to coax hungry passer-bys into a meal of good dim-sum, but know enough not to try persuading the asians. foreign tourists filter into and out of storefronts, while locals pick through piles of vegetables or saunter the sidewalks with their hands clasped behind their backs. two young women stop in the middle of the road for a photo in front of a restaurant backdrop, while two others choose a backdrop of the pagoda-topped “trade mark” building instead.

i make a stop in old st. mary’s cathedral, and in the dark foyer glass-covered display cases glow before visitors' eyes, which browse various black-and-white photos from the early 20^th century. some images show the city at a time when the structure was the tallest around and the first cathedral in california, while others show it in ruin, consumed by fire from the great 1906 earthquake. as i step out the main doors and over the steps, which were once smashed by falling stonework a hundred years ago, i take a moment to awe at the city’s rebirth and lightning progress into its present state today.

a few blocks away market street is alive with a different type of buzz. still tourist-saturated in certain areas, others are much more noticeably destitute, with street-people, pawnshops, x-rated theatres, and as expected, more locals. rainbow pride-flags, in waiting for tomorrow’s gay pride parade, flutter atop light posts lining the wide thoroughfare, and police barricades sit already stacked on the sidewalks. as i wait baking in the sun for a bus, a glance down market reveals the ferry building before a sea and sky of blue. a look in the opposite direction however, shows a hill dripping with a thick white fog that churns and spills from behind twin peaks like dry ice. good thing i brought that coat.

san francisco, california.

this way up.

the view outside my window looks cold and wet as heavy clumps of snowflakes near the ground and immediately melt into a light rain. icy snow clings to the edges of my oval port-hole framing an airplane wing powdered white with a light dusting of winter as i sit in the drowning hiss of piped-in air and the on-and-off chatter between the two women behind me, who seem to find endless inspiration to banter on about dry skin, lotions, and soaps. as we wait for the plane to get de-iced, i can only close my eyes and mindlessly drift off into nothingness. i went to the doctor and he said "your skin's so dry... you should use dove." with an awkward popping crunch all along the roof of the plane, coupled with the utter steamy-smokiness that floods the view outside, it was clear the defrosters had arrived. ...but i've been using dove for years! as a man in a cherry picker hosed down the plane with a warm foamy concoction, it became hard to ignore the strange odor that began to pervade the cabin, no doubt coming from the defrost-cocktail and seeping in with the undying hiss above. the smell, a mix of pharmaceutical detergent and alcohol it seemed, was fresh, yet incredibly irritating, in the same way an all-too-clean restroom can smell incredibly irritating at times - stabbing at my nose and brain.

as the cherry picker outside pulled away and the plane skirted along desolate runways and snow-dusted lawns, we prepared for take-off. charging against the snow and against gravity, we climb skyward to the ratchet sound of propeller blades emanating from the very non-propeller turbine outside. blanketed in white-out conditions, looking as if a sheet had been pulled over my window, we seemingly navigate blindly through the color-purgatory, where even i have difficulty telling up from down. half expecting to see heaven itself silhouetted in the abysmal void, i imagine this is what that white light really looks like. breaking through the upper layers of cloud cover however, we emerge into the golden glow of sunshine, leaving the clouds below us, now just a thick vast sea of cottony dunes rolling into the distant horizon, looking even more heavenly than ever before.

somewhere over the midwest.

smiles un-ruined.

stepping off the plane and onto foreign tarmac, a strange feeling envelops me, clinging to my mind and soul, while the thick and heavy humidity clutches my skin as i don my cap to stave off the blazing sun. in this quiet little town, closed off on all sides by dense jungle, something strange is in the air. before me, behind white waving angkor wats against red blue fields, the main and only terminal of siem reap international airport is little more than a long squat two-story building flanking the deserted airstrip. turning around to take a look at the little putt-putt twin-propeller plane that brought me here, only then do i notice the green, flat, mountain-less landscape which surrounds me, looking ever-ready to sweep in and crush my little plane and this little airport if given the chance.

in cambodia, drivers’ seats are on the left and drivers drive on the right. in certain cases where cars are [most likely stolen] from neighboring thailand however, driver seats are on the right, but in either case little details like these seem moot when the roads, hardly more than steam-rolled clay, aren’t marked with lane lines and turn to a sticky muck after every downpour, becoming riddled with muddy potholes as if to remind me that yes, this area used to be rampant with deadly minefields, an uneasy suspicion tells me some areas still are. as the soles of my shoes are dyed a rust-red each time i step out of the car or out of the hotel, i get the feeling that even the earth itself has been stained by the blood of years long past and people long forgotten. despite the fall of the khmer rouge in the nineties, with other supporters still in hiding, the legacy of those four years of torture and extermination is now blatantly evident in the crippled country itself.

as i walk towards many of the ruined monuments of an ancient jungle empire, string and percussion music reverberate through the air, conjuring up ghostly images of a bygone era, with its lavish ceremonies and dancing nymph-like asparas. under the dappled shade from nearby trees, a few temple visitors have gathered to listen to a small band draw and hammer out traditional khmer music, dropping a few bills into their donation urn between songs. the bands, which can be frequently found along the small dirt walking paths to many temples, consist of landmine survivors, and most often, it is their missing arms and legs that attest to the fact.

in the outskirts of siem reap town, along one of the heavily potholed dirt roads and past the siem reap zoo, i visit the aki ra landmine museum. as i enter the gate of the small almost residential property, a young girl greets me in what appears to be military or scout regalia and cradling a baby monkey in her arms. passing the wall of the first wood-shack building in front of me, with the word "museum" spelled out in tiny green-plastic landmines, i come upon two men on a bench, whittling down one end of wooden rods into a point for mine probing.

in the main wooden building of the museum, different types of defused mines are stacked waist-high beneath little counters with pertinent information on the specific type of mine beneath. as i take a seat on a small stool, the legs of which have been fashioned out of defused mortar shells, i flip through a few small photo albums, each taking me on a snapshot journey through mine hunts and controlled detonations. around the museum a few kids play or lounge about, each a landmine accident survivor, and one wall here is specifically dedicated to telling the stories of many of them, all of whom came to aki ra to seek help after their accidents.

in such a sobering place, i find it hard to be cheerful, despite the smiles and laughs, which beam off the children’s faces. thanks to mr. aki ra the man and donations from humanitarians and visitors, it seems the museum has been doing a good job of sending children to school and teaching both young and old alike how to play traditional instruments, giving the thousands of carved asparas a tune to dance to and temple visitors something to enjoy.

life and development in siem reap moves at a creeping pace, except for perhaps hotel construction projects. in a town so dependant on tourism, they hardly use the country’s own currency, old stone temples and palaces from a thousand years ago are now rivaled by grand inns and sprawling resorts popping up like peddler-kids along airport boulevard – still however, as law requires, in charming khmer style. while foreigners own and run hotels, restaurants, and bars, real cambodians work as tour guides, taxi drivers, market stall owners, or peddlers, parroting the same exact few phrases everywhere to tourists in an uncanny eeire likeness. as if all of them learned it together, sir, you want to buy? they all shout. you want cold drink? only one dollar, you want to buy sir? when you come back, you buy only from me, ok? i remember you, you remember me?

as our driver drove us through rural siem reap and past vast acres of waterlogged rice paddies, i strain my eyes to look across the country itself - the horizon as clear as a black line between green and gray. on our way to visit a floating village by tonle sap lake and phnom khrom hill, seemingly the only natural mountain-hill in all of siem reap, our driver points out his house by the side of the road. while foreigners live in mansions (which are hardly mansions by american standards), real cambodians live in wood or bamboo shack-houses, either set on stilts or latched to bamboo bundles to avoid the ever-present threat of flooding. local cooking here entails building a coal fire and cooking the daily bought or caught ration of fish or meat – in some cases even dog, rat, squirrel, or frog meat – while in town, restaurants provide a choice of dinner options for tourists ranging from indian to korean to british pub.

compared to neighboring thailand, laos, and vietnam, cambodia is a fairly expensive country by dollar bill standards, while its people are incredibly poor. without foreign aid and without foreign visitors however, it seems much of the country’s people would cease to exist, slowly fading into the trees and into ruin. despite the tourism dependency, it is amazing that cambodia only recently received its first international automated teller banking machines, and then again only in the capitol of phnom penh. in the quiet jungle of town of siem reap, as tourists ignore the you-want-to-buy cries from swarming kids and the cups of landmine-crippled beggars, families trek for miles by motorbike to line up early at jayavarman vii hospital, founded by swiss man dr. beat richner, which provides free treatment to sick children.

sitting at dinner on the top floor of the soup dragon, i puff a cigarette and watch smoky ghosts alight from my table, off the balcony, and into the dark forests beyond. there is something strange about this place, i say to my friends. i can’t put my finger on it, but it just feels strange here. with such a history of rise and fall, of death and destruction, i begin to think that red dirt isn’t the only thing that follows me wherever i go. somewhat sorry that the ruined state of cambodia today is a product of the khmer rouge and its programs to eliminate intellectuals in order to create equality, i think back to the real ruins i came here to see – monuments to an era when it was these people who controlled most of what is now their neighboring countries. i simply have to look in the faces of smiling kids to see the resiliency of the people to years of war and listen to people speak to feel their honesty and commitment to never war again. always friendly and eager to please, the people i have met have been most gracious with help and hospitality.

after asking a little peddler-girl to play out a song for me on the flute she was trying to sell, i like many others, also finally succumb to the smiles and hand over my dollar, this time for the art and not for the flute, thoroughly convinced that the spirits who roam these lands are just as gentle and curious as the kids. able only to hope for the best, i know that any type of positive change for cambodia itself and its people, however slow, is ultimately a good thing. they might not remember me, but i will remember them.

siem reap, cambodia.

TG 775

it is midnight, pacific standard time, of july the thirtieth, and i have been practically airborne for about sixteen hours thus far. outside the little freezing porthole window of this plane, the sky is bright, clear, and sunny, and in the distance, the almost unimaginable scales of blue lie stacked in horizontal planes along the horizon, from the deep blue expanse of space above, to the green-blue wash of the sea below. i take a moment to pause, take off my glasses and rub my eyes, which are now dry and sore with the feeling that i had stayed up all night writing a paper and staring endlessly into a computer screen. i try taking a few deep breaths through my nose, but all i get is utterly congested sniffles that crackle everytime i have to inhale to keep my nose from running. this always happens to me on planes it seems - maybe it has something to do with how the air conditioning is always blowing, causing me to feel cold on skin and warm in body. then again, it might just be my allergies to the massive amounts of dust, mold, and human dander i imagine to be blowing around in this recycled artificial atmosphere.

at kansai international airport in osaka, where i am scheduled to land and layover another hour, the time is about four thirty in the afternoon. i know this because the continuous video projection on the screen before me gives me moment-to-moment updates on flight distances, temperatures, times, and current locations in japanese, thai, and english. as my body and mind ache, trying to figure out [and actually agree on] what time it really is, i can only sit back and stare braindead at my little cartoon plane trace out a white line over the pacific. while i sit in my chair under a lone spotlight lamp overhead, the airplane cabin is awash with indirect ambient lighting from depending on their new-ness, dull-lavender or dull-golden flourescent tubes along the wall. in this strange, muted, purgatory of time, no one seems to know what is going on except for the flight attendants, who bustle up and down the aisle, opening and closing little cabinets and getting their i-don't-know-whats. around me, most people are either sleeping or watching the strange in-flight entertainment which has just switched on, putting an end to the excruciatingly exciting distance, temperature, time, and location updates. now, from what i can gather, as i am without headphones and not particularily interested, cameron jones, whoever he is, appears to be talking about smooth jazz music. ugh, smooth jazz, i think to myself. my neighbor, who earlier, rambled on about his texan homeland and this trip to visit his thai fiancée, who he met in a massage-parlor-burlesque-house, is dead asleep, having passed on most of his meals like a coke mule.

all the porthole shades have been pulled, and the eeire almost noiseless environment creeps me out. aside from the clicks and small muffled slams from staff-cabinets and lavatory doors, i am overcome by the loud, enveloping sound of whitenoise, either caused by the aforementioned continuous ac, or the sound of the wind outside trying to tear this little plane apart. either way, it sounds as if i am completely surrounded by giant waterfalls, but i prefer real waterfalls so much more. seven more hours to bangkok.

somewhere over the pacific ocean.

access denied V.

we proceed to head to south campus and find the route to the steam plant.

heading to campus a little before two at night, we walk along desolate streets lit orange by campus street lamps. every so often, a car drives by while we stroll, chat, and make big gestures with our hands to appear as if we are actually carrying on a significant conversation. first stop was franz hall and deciding against entering the alley between franz and young through a loading bay, we walk through the inverted fountain plaza instead, surveying the scene and ignoring the handful of college students talking and hanging out around the fountain. walking into the science quadrangle and rounding franz’s corner, we go down the plant-filled alley, looking in bushes for the floor grate which would let us into the depths of campus. finding the entrance locked, we head for murphey instead.

the area around murphey hall unfortunately has a small scattering of campus maintenance and facilities personnel, who from what we can guess, get off work at two. surveying the area while looking as if we were just taking a late-night final-exams study-break to walk around campus and get some air, we poke around murphey only to abandon the exploration momentarily, after finding out we were in clear view of some personnel walking down the opposite side of the street. perhaps moore would be open and kinsey under construction was looking more and more feasible.

crossing over the “bridge” between the dickson and schoenberg plazas, we take a seat on the steps of the music building to break and rethink our plan of action – we would check out moore, loop back to investigate kinsey in the more inconspicuous alley beside powell, and give murphey another go.

moore, whose doors lock at night offer us no entrance, and despite several open windows, all are too high up and out of reach. the door at the end of the loading alley across from the math sciences building is also unfortunately locked and we move on. to our surprise, kinsey is well-sealed by covered construction fences, and neither of us expected construction companies would do such a good job of it. have you ever had lecture in that hall? i casually ask a friend as a maintenance worker passed. i think people even have physics in it. time to return to murphey.

as we approach the building, two facilities workers are waiting by the curb, most likely for a ride home. few if any people are out now, and seldom do we see a random car drive by. reaching the end of murphey, looking all the while as if we were just heading to the bus stop or the sororities, we jump a low wall into some bushes. duck-walking along the side of the building, and trying not to step on too many crunching leaves, we pass by office windows and over metal grates. finding an unlocked one and noticing a small rung ladder leading down into darkness, we lift the cover and shine in our flashlights. a dead end. looking more like a dungeon or oubliette, nothing but two small windows to basement offices and a drain lie at the bottom. we slide the grate back into place and continue over to the main door of the building, around where an entrance grate should be located, according to our map.

tucked into a set of bushes, we find the grate. though unlocked, the grill is far too large and heavy to lift and secure easily. shining our flashlight down, we follow the metal-rung ladder to a puddle on the floor. it seems the wooden ladder which bridged the metal ladder with dry ground a short distance away had disappeared since my trip three years ago. we agree that we would use this entrance only as a last resort. it was time to check out haines, which had let us in numerous times, and royce, an original entrance from my first explorations.

passing haines, we take a look around the secret window, which always seemed like a good bet. this time, however, it was locked from the inside – both of them. it looked like ucla was getting smart, probably [and hopefully] at the expense of students getting dumb [and caught]. with no way in, we move to royce, hoping my old pathways were still open. royce is unfortunately locked. after a careful survey of the surrounding area and a closer investigation of the lock however, we were in with a click. quickly moving around a corner and out of sight, we pause momentarily to listen for stray noises. feeling safe, we press the elevator call and duck out of the way to insure us from any surprises when the doors slid open. coast clear, we take the lift to the basement level after noticing we could only go lower if we had an access key. emerging into the room with the shelf of blueprints and now, numerous boxes of envelopes, running on my memory we head for an unmarked door ahead of us leading to a well-lit metal stairwell. double checking the door and remembering it locked from the outside, i prop it open with a piece of cardboard. we walk down the metal staircase, which vibrated to a tremendous roar each time we moved, forcing us to pause frequently and listen for security. reaching the sub-basement and discovering the door out is locked, we are forced to head back up and abandon the attempt here. very luckily, the door i propped earlier was still open; if it wasn’t, we could have very well been stuck in the stairwell until daylight.

exiting royce, we head to dickson hall, recalling the building was also under construction, and being tucked into a corner of campus, might offer a less-secured way into the depths below. reaching dickson, we find one gate slightly ajar. moving into the shadows, we writhe through the gate and explore the construction site. the place is deserted. plastic tarps strewn about the skeletal frame of a building that once was and will be again, wave like forgotten ghosts in the abandoned wasteland. locating the stairwell to the basement, and moving about the familiar landscape – the only place that has remained familiar over the past three years, we find the concrete hole in the wall and enter ucla’s underbelly.

moving carefully through the sometimes pitch-black tunnel, i pull my arms in to keep from touching the heated pipes and electrical cords on one side and duck every so often to keep form smashing my head into the fluorescent light bulbs above. reaching the storage bay underneath yrl, we cautiously climb down the rickety metal ladder and take cover behind a large piece of machinery. maneuvering ourselves around and over some pipes, we look down the large warehouse, which is still filled with boxes of books. conveniently, there is no sign of life, and we hop over a file cabinet to reach the door into the blue hub room. unlocked, it opens with a gentle pull. moving about the giant blue pipes and immersed in the sound of the steady hum of pumping water, we find the dark entrance to the tunnel towards royce. reaching the end, we exit the door marked “service tunnel” and into a small machine room filled with steaming cracks in the floor and boxes of air filters. checking the maintenance bay under royce and finding it clear, we snake through to the other door down the hall, which luckily also opened right up. apparently, it seems most doors remain unlocked when an entire area is restricted. entering the unmarked door and going up the short flight of stairs, we were headed towards powell library.

under powell, wires and graffiti fill the tiny room connecting several tunnels. an old wooden door, looking very much like the one we could not get through on one of my first explorations, lies dusty and walked over upon the ground. on the wall another more modern and secure door seems to have replaced it. crawling over an incredibly large and treacherous bundle of wires and squeezing by some heated pipes, we were off to moore.

as we entered the earth-bottomed and broken-cement-strewn dump yard under moore hall, we notice a pair of people on the other end of the large underground room. also noticing us at the same moment, we all freeze, until a more careful scrutinizing of them leads me to wave them over. followed by a friend of hers, the girl comes skipping over, obviously relieved that we were not authorized personnel of some sort. fairly new to the underground scene, this was the girl’s third time down and the other guy’s second. i tell them that in all my subterranean trips, i had never come across other student explorers. it was truly a strange coincidence.

passing moore, we veer from the route towards the life sciences building to investigate the inverted fountain and see if there were any significant areas underneath. heading east, we notice a line of graffiti. new york, it read, followed by an arrow. under the supposed area beneath the inverted fountain, we don't find anything, and the areas under schoenberg are quite an equal let down, aside from the large graffiti covered machinery at the schoenberg-perloff junction. backtracking to the spot where we originally veered from our path, we were again heading down the life sciences route.

rectangular instead of round and incredibly hot, the tunnel lay on a straight downward slope. pausing to catch a breath and take a break from the eighty-plus degree heat, we stop at the intersection under the science quad before continuing south. below life sciences, a well-lit machine room churns out strange noises while one green piece of pump-machinery churns out water, which drips down the sides and splashes on the floor. we don’t think it is supposed to do that. continuing on, we begin the route towards the steam plant and into the belly of the smoking beast.

pitch black, the cramped tunnel snakes its way off campus and into westwood. somewhere around halfway, one connecting tunnel extends south. only graffiti would let us know it headed towards the medical plaza. skipping the detour, we keep going ahead, down deeper into the earth. with the beam from my flashlight too weak to alight the end of the tunnel, i can only point it to the ground, keeping us from walking onto anything. at the end of the tunnel, the farthest i had ever come and the farthest we would come today, lay a concrete hole that extended some ten to fifteen feet down. a propped-up wooden ladder was the only sign that someone had passed this way before. shining our flashlights down, we saw that a few feet from the bottom, lay another hole that extended even farther down – and by down i mean into the ground and not off to the side. it seemed to us that apparently one really could reach hell if they wanted to. for us however, it was time to turn back. nothing but the dim glow of a pinprick of light at the other end of the tunnel pierced the darkness when we turned off our flashlights. we were on the return to the life sciences building, the safest exit to the surface among our other medical plaza and steam plant options. back at the lit half-way junction, we pause to leave a date under a digital pressure meter on one of the ducts – one last scrawl to commemorate our college years.

under the life sciences building and passing the machinery and overflowing pump, we ascend a small flight of stairs and cautiously push open a door into the middle of a hallway. checking both sides to make sure the coast was clear like a child crossing a street, we exit the underworld and back into life. taking the stairs by the elevator, we go up to the lobby of the building and exit the main doors. inhaling a breath of fresh air and breathing out a sigh of relief, we take a moment to look at the new buildings which had sprung up around the ls building within the past three to four years. this area was no longer familiar to us; the small lecture hall on the side of the building had been demolished to make way for a new science building – i don’t even know its name. i am struck by the realization of how much time had actually pass. all that was recognizable during my first year in college as a science major had disappeared – the only thing that remained constant was the tunnel. just like dickson hall, our entrance tonight, where a large lecture hall had since been remodeled to become two building floors, the familiar had become the foreign. the only thing that remained constant was the in-between, underground.

since the construction of the campus, it is these tunnels that have remained constant and the abundance of graffiti that can attest to that fact. made up entirely of history, partly by legend, moderately by rumor, and always by adventure, the veins and arteries of ucla will always remain frozen in time and fond memory. goodbye ucla, thank you for all you have had to offer and allowed me to discover.

ucla, underground.

urban wonderland.

welcome to los angeles, the city of angels. not beautiful when it's rainy, not beautiful when it's sunny, but indisputably perfect when it's perfect. as i stand on the ledge outside my front door, smoking a cigarette and contemplating the random things that venture into my thoughts, i inhale and survey the city around me. i've generally hated los angeles... the way people are always in an angry hurry to get to their destinations, treating their cars as tanks when they drive and gold-plated museum pieces when they park... the way the thick brown sky chokes the city, asphyxiating glass-metal monoliths and blanketing my view of the snowy mountains in the distance. through the seldom blue, planes slice the sky to pieces, leaving white chemtrails across the heavens like an enormous web for some horrendous spider in hiding. a jumble of concrete veins and arteries, often clogged, transport what seem to be an endless supply of polluting blood to and from the city, and as i listen hard for the chirp of birds, all i hear is drowned out by the steady hum of the freeway beside me, just an arm's reach away. occasionally, a horn honks, a big-rig rattles, and a police or ambulance siren pierces the dull whitenoise, but all the birds.. have fled.

as the parasitic city continues to grow, it stretches its gnarled fingers to the north and clutchs the brown hills once domniated by lone oaks and green grasses. the land has been conquered and turned into a suburban hell; a labyrinth of identical streets, houses, and of course, cul-de-sacs. where residents themselves can hardly differentiate their homes from their neighbor's, it seems amazing that they can still differentiate between themselves; blinded by everything except for class and race. welcome to los angeles, the city of angeles, where the brightest stars in the night sky are planes, the tallest trees are telephone poles, and the greenest leaves are found in our purses and wallets.

how often i forget that this is los angeles and nevertheless perfect, when it's perfect. brown is the sky but beautiful are the sunsets. sitting on the beach with some friends in the warm breeze, learning to slackline between some electrical poles, i look over at the sea, at the surf breaking gently onto the sand, regretting that i left my surfboard at home. seeing us tumble like beginners onto the sand, a group of young kids come over and join us, and as we watched, soaking in the socal sun, each kid fearlessly jumped on the line, fell off, and immediately got up to give it another go. watching them persevere i revisit in my mind what it would be like to be a kid again, unbreakable and eager to learn new things; my childhood lost to a protected life, though thankful that my grandfather took the initiative to take me to parks, museums, and zoos.

as the sun dipped lower into the reddening sky, and left us in silhouettes, warm perfection beamed through the air, tanning my skin. as i sank my toes into the coolness of shady sand beneath my feet, and listened to the soft crashes of a green-blue tide, i relish feeling of being absolutely free of school and demands. nine months from now, i may be starting another six or seven years of education, but now was not the time to think about that. instead, it was the time to just kick back and appreciate the moment for what it was. it was hard to even imagine that a week ago, a cold continuous rain beat down on this same warm beach. as the breeze kicked up a black plastic bag and sent it rolling across the tan sand before us, pointing to it, a friend and i exclaimed in unison... tumbleweed! while another ran to chase it down and place it in the trash. it was an urban tubbleweed no less, and a harsh yet artistic reminder of reality in this urban wonderland. why are we living here? a reporter rhetorically asked in a segment on the afternoon news. it's for days like today.

los angeles, california.

found.

continued from the previous post.

rounding a street corner, i walk into a small café and ask once more for the hotel. the bartender-barista wasn't sure but enlisted the help of the ten people inside the café, who all began discussing where they thought the hotel was, seemingly arguing over who was more right. from what i could understand, one man sitting by the bar instructed me in spanish to walk four blocks down and one block over, using his hands to lay out perpendicular streets as he thought to himself. muchas gracias! i yell to the room on my way out to their goodbyes and return on my quest.

walking down the street and looking down cross streets, i notice a large sign with "ac" in large bold capital letters peeking above the surrounding buildings. it wasn't near where i was directed, but thinking i could check it out anyway, i head towards the intersection and immediately recognize the familiar corner façade of the building from the hotel's website i looked at out of curiosity back in the states. the sliding glass doors part with a hiss as i approach, and somewhere in the utter relief, i am sure a deep sigh escapes my lips. i enter the cooling lobby and head towards the reception desk to ask if my friend had checked in - the same friend i last saw, what now seemed like ages ago, standing on the subway platform with all our baggage before becoming nothing but a blur.

with a few taps on the keyboard in front of her, the receptionist informs me that my friend hadn't check in yet, but i do anyway, getting my key to go up to the room. picking up a book on barcelona from the bedroom desk, i go back down to the lobby to wait. one way or another, i hoped to god my friend would meet everyone here in the lobby at eight in the evening as we were scheduled to do so. flipping through my book nervously as i finished a smoke, i pull out my final cigarette from its beige and gold box - the cigarette upturned by the same lost friend when i first opened the pack, telling me it was lucky. wishing for truth, while feeling silly about even wishing such things, i light up and take a deep drag, half glad to have just ended my daylong search-and-stroll through the streets and underbelly of an alien city.

as i sat smoking my final supposed lucky cigarette, i continue to glance over articles and photos from my magazine with disinterested attention, every so often looking up through the lobby windows at passing taxi cars, imagining my friend might step out of one. as my cigarette nears its end, and i prepare to ash it in a nearby tin after one last puff, i am jolted out of lasstitude and a melancholy stupor by a slap on both shoulders from behind. suddenly, i knew.

barcelona, spain.

¿dónde estás?

continued from the previous post.

making use of the ticket machines by the turnstiles, which now seem just as familiar as the ticket man in his booth, i work the automated-teller-machine-like screen and buttons to purchase a ten-ride ticket, probably useful, i think, if i needed to use the subway again, either today or during my stay. taking the yellow line towards urquinaona, i pass by passieg de gracia again and go up to the station lobby to look again for my friend to no avail. returning underground, i take the next train to urquinaona and while exiting a small flight of stairs from the station, ask a ticket vendor in another telephone-like-booth if he knew where the ac diplomatic hotel was located.
looking briefly towards the sky, he shakes his head and says no, but pulls out a small travel-guide-like-book from under his counter. passieg de gracia, he tells me, and shows me the page of the book with lines upon lines of hotel names in alphabetical order and nearest subway stations. thanking him, i take out my wallet to purchase another ticket to return through the turnstiles. no, he says, putting up his hand with his palm towards me. buzzing the turnstile with a hidden button somewhere beneath his window, he motions me to pass with a nod. muchas gracias, i say and head back towards passig de gracia station, another station i've grown to know well, yet perhaps not as well as barcelona sants.

arriving for the fourth time at passieg de gracia, i exit the subway tunnel into the lobby and study a map on the wall of the surrounding area with the hopes of orienting myself and seeing any street names that sounded familiar. something inside me just told me i needed to get out of here, out back onto the surface of the earth, with its fresh air and sun.

a man passes by me as i stare at the map and offers to help. pointing to a green dot on the map before both of us, he repeats something in spanish with a big smile and nods repeatedly. i have no idea what he is saying, but can only assume he is the living and breathing version of the "you are here" arrow i have seen so many times before. si, si, gracias, i say with a smile, and he walks away.

taking a set of stairs up and out into the daylight, i draw a deep breath while surveying my surroundings and collecting my bearings. vehicles zoom past me on a large boulevard lined with trees and tall, yet quaint, apartment buildings - their black wrought-iron balconies lounging above me as the hustle and bustle of the city flows beneath. picking a direction, i walk down the boulevard, and ask random people on the street regarding the whereabouts of my elusive hotel to not avail, including a security guard outside a bank who seemed unsure if he was even supposed to speak to me while on duty.

reaching plaça de catalunya, i know i have gone too far. trying to recall the image of the xeroxed map i briefly glanced at weeks before my trip even began at a study abroad meeting, i faintly remember seeing the plaza towards the bottom of the page, with my hotel circled in blue pen somewhere towards the mid-to-upper-right of the page. with "lost" being a moot point already, i walk back up the street, managing to catch two strange and undulating buildings along the way, both screaming of antonio gaudí in every way possible.

passing small side streets shooting off into the distance amid proliferating apartment buildings and trees with the same quaint charm, i search the walls for any signs or street names which might ring a bell. mallorca? something about it sounded familiar… unless i am just confusing it with the island of majorca and its majolica, but i don't really care anymore. knowing i would have to venture off this main boulevard in any case, i walk down mallorca for several blocks into barcelona's urban residential jungle, looping around tall apartment buildings, through small plazas, and again, asking strangers on the street for information. no one knows where the hotel is, but i am sure it is close. how close, is a different matter...

passieg de gracia, barcelona, spain.

¿habla ingles?

continued from the previous post.

approaching a man in a tiny telephone-booth-like stall, i indicate one ticket with my finger. looking at me rather unusually, he punches in a few keys on the register before him, lighting the small l.e.d. screen in the window to let me know how much i needed to pay. pulling out euro coins from my pocket, i pay the fare and taking my ticket, head towards the turnstiles, which would take me even farther underground. studying the wall maps along the way, i arrive at the platform, which to my knowledge, would take me back to passieg de gracia station.

the stop looks nothing like the one i originally alighted at, but i don’t think about the discrepancy immediately and instead, board the first train that arrives. as the doors slide smoothly to a starship enterprise close behind me and the car pulls away into the black tunnel, i stand nervously watching the passing darkness through the windows, which has become nothing but a blur behind my own reflection. emerging back into the light, the train stops with a gentle halt, and i quickly jump out to scan the platform. the deserted place is unfamiliar, and i realize this was not the train platform i was standing on, but rather the metro platform. making my way through the underground labyrinth of tunnels, stairs, and turnstiles and unable to find a way to the train platform below – even if it meant jumping any gates, i find myself exiting into the “lobby” area of passieg de gracia station, with its ticket windows along one wall. i ascend a set of steps to see where it leads, and poking my head up like a wary gopher, i see nothing but tall apartment buildings side by side and the clear blue sky above. a rumble of cars suggest a large street nearby, but i pull my head back down before curiosity got the better of me and head for the ticket windows.

habla ingles? i ask one ticket vendor. un poqiuito, he replies and once again, i try my broken-spanish account of what happened. asking if i could just be let down to the train platform to look for my friend, my request is declined. i had to purchase a ticket first. defeated, i acquiesce, pay the fare, and get a train ticket. checking the wall maps to make sure i was headed to the barcelona sants line, i arrive at the empty platform. this was without a doubt the same platform, which whizzed out of sight about two hours earlier – the ambient lighting was the same old-fluorescent beige, the walls had the same tile pattern, and the benches were of the same polished-metal my friend had placed our luggage beside before i ran back onto the train. my friend however, was not here.

despite the fact that it probably would have been easier for my friend to stay put, since he had all our luggage, leaving me to find my way back, this did not happen, and thinking my friend might simply had boarded the next train after discovering passieg de gracia was not the station on our ticket, i boarded the next train and returned to sants. after the train pulled into and stopped in the station which had now become familiar, i step off and look for an exit different from the one i used the first time in an attempt to cover all the routes my friend could have used if he passed this way. taking an escalator to street level, i exit fifty meters or so from the station, across from a large parking lot. walking across the lot, i notice several taxi zones and it occurs to me that my friend might simply had taken a taxi to our hotel since he had my backpack with all our maps and hotel information. i make a mental note of where to return for a taxi, should i need it later. entering sants station again, i smoke and stroll around the large hall to search for my friend. unable to locate him, i go to the passenger services office and speak to an older woman who tries the best she can to help me. understanding more than just un poquito english, she listens with squinted eyes and utmost attentiveness as i slowly convey to her my situation. i ask if she would be able to put out a call across the loudspeakers in the station and let my friend know to come to the passenger services office. she says ok, it will take a few minutes, and i write down my friend’s name on a small piece of paper before thanking her and going back into the main hall to search and wait some more. the announcement is in spanish, and my friend’s name comes across as only a staticky heavily-accented attempt. nevertheless, i cross my fingers, light another davidoff and wait.

after a good while of waiting with no sign of anything fortuitous appearing suddenly, i decide to leave the station to look for the hotel. perusing the station gift shop’s scant bookshelf of barcelona maps and tour books, i am unable to find any that can tell me the location of my hotel. i go back to the passenger services office and ask a woman (different from the one who helped me earlier) if she knew where the ac diplomatic hotel was, and if not, if she could search for it on her computer. she says yes, she does know [or thinks she knows, from what i can gather] where the hotel is located and sends me to a metro station called uriquinaona, writing down the name and metro line on a small rectangle of scrap paper. walking back to the huge lighted map of the city with its crisscrossing rail lines in bold colors, i search for line four and follow its yellow path with my eyes from barcelona sants, through the city, and to a circle marked uriquinaona. as certain as i could be regarding the whereabouts of my hotel, i take the familiar escalator back beneath the city to begin a new search...

sants station, barcelona, spain.

estación de sants.

continued from the previous post.

searching for a map of some sort - any sort - i take a pamphlet advertising what appears to be special ticket prices off a stand and on a rudimentary line-drawing of the metro line, look for the name of my previous station. passieg de gracia. it looked slightly familiar to the words written on the wall of the station that i was only able to quickly glance at before it became a complete blur. walking towards a large section of wall marked sortides/salidas and footed by a series of ticket windows, i picked one of several long lines, and lit a cigarette, one of several i would have that day. as i waited, reminding myself that this was not california and that i could smoke indoors, i looked around at the people about me, trying to get a feel for the overall tone or mood, what the culture was like. despite most people's clear agitation with the slow progress of their lines, crossing their arms, glancing ahead, smoking, or tapping their feet, plenty of others were simply lounging around on the benches, perhaps waiting for their trains. i approached the ticket window, asking habla ingles? poquito, the man replied, ad i slowly explain what had happened, using as few words as possible and hand motions to indicate "friend left" and "door closed." he understood but was unable to help me, as this was a window for internationally departing trains only. sending me to another window down the way, he conveyed, where i gathered, i could purchase a different ticket. gracies, i said.

selecting another line and finishing another cigarette, i reached the window and asked habla ingles? no, the man replied. parlez vouz francais? i ventured, thinking that being a spanish-french border region, they might speak some french. no, the man replied again. kicking myself for not brushing up on and remembering more of my miniscule amounts of high school freshman and sophomore year spanish, i pulled out the map i had and circled passieg de gracia station, indicating "one fare" with an outstretched index finger. it's not like people preferred to speak spanish here anyway; this was catalunya. in broken-butchered spanish nevertheless, i tried miming and explaining my situation. train... amigo salida... la porta cerrado... estoy aqui. he seemed to roughly understand, nodding or frowning a sympathy, and pointed me to a set of escalators on a far wall. down, the clerk gestured, and thanking him, i walked over, past the track-number-marked up-escalators which brought me to ground level some two hours ago. i was headed back under the city...

sants station, barcelona.

lost.

peering out the window and knocking furiously in a futile attempt to signal to a friend that i didn't make it off the train in time, i speed past him, and our luggage, into the blackness of the tunnel. listening to the echoing clackety-clack of the tracks and trying to collect myself, i instantly begin thinking up methods of returning to the previous station. telling myself i shouldn't have re-boarded the train to double check if we left any belongings behind, i remind myself to stay calm and stand at the door doing the only thing i could do - wait until the train reached its next stop. as the train began to slow, exiting back into fluorescent daylight, i looked out the window to behold an enormous bay of parallel tracks. crawling to a halt, the train powered down, and i knew then this was the end of the line. quickly exiting the train, i immediately look down the tracks into the black abyss from which i emerged, questing whether or not it was remotely possible to actually run down the tracks to the last station, hugging the walls or laying in the tracks to avoid any other oncoming trains. it was a crazy idea that i quickly dismissed, albeit after a stroke of serious consideration. going with the flow of the crowd, i boarded one of the escalators that lifted me into a huge room filled with people bustling about. in a city i was totally unfamiliar with, with nothing but the clothes on my back and my wallet in my pocket, this was sants estacion, and i was utterly lost...

barcelona, spain.

all aboard.

what a way to spend a birthday, here on the other side of the world. it boggles my mind to think how just yesterday, i flew across continent and ocean to spend a day wandering the city of lights, only to night train into spain. here, on the leg into barcelona, i am jotting this down on my swaying locomotive, which has just left the little border town of portbou. as i whisk by green hills and open plains, with the mediterranean sea to my left, i don't think i'm in los angeles anymore, i say to myself. forests and towns are strewn about the landscape - deep fluffy greens beside ridged red brick. as we pull into a station, an old man in a black beret passes by my window. with toothpick in mouth and cane in hand, he saunters slowly along the train, walking towards the nearest door a few meters down and out of view. his face alone speaks volumes of where i am now - this, is basque country.

after several muffled shouts followed by the almost in-unison slamming of train-car doors, i am quickly speeding past countryside once again. a train attendant, dressed in blue, hands out complimentary earphones, which would allow us to watch the free in-train entertainment video that just switched on on the television screens overhead - orangutans and julia roberts. waving my hand as he passes, no gracies, i say.

the sky outside is a beautiful light blue, marked by a few bristle-brushstrokes of white wispy clouds. the morning red-orange sun warms the church steeples of sleepy towns we cursorily breeze through, leaving no trace of our evanescent presence except for perhaps a rumble of track and a scatter of birds. despite my growing desire to just hop off and take in the unspoiled sights and a breath of fresh country air, i restrain myself knowing that whatever i leave today, i save for other adventures tomorrow - adventures where i'll see new things, try new foods, and meet new people, like the rail worker i chatted with in portbou just before my train arrived.

walking along the station, i spot a middle aged man looking bored, wearing a rough 3am shadow and a fluorescent yellow vest over his clothes. he sits on the walkway with his legs hanging over the ledge above the tracks, and lighting a cigarette, i walk over, offering him one. no gracies, he replies and attempting to strike up some sort of conversation, parlez vous francais? i ask. oui, he says and i ask him in french how to say "bonjour" in catalan. bon-dia, he replies. gracies, i say. bon-dia. it was indeed una bon-dia and a good start on a new journey of culture and learning, where it was time to stamp out any previous ethnocentric notions that america was the center of the world.

portbou, enroute to barcelona.

access denied IV.

we attempt to revisit the now newly-reopened renovation-free haines hall and look for a way to south campus.

we head down to campus set on revisiting haines. the main doors were unlocked and we enter, passing the old antique wooden doors that used to slide out from pockets to secure the building at night. these doors now stand on the inside of the modern doors for decorative purposes. no longer the unfinished, ceiling-less, and dusty hall, haines is now almost completely finished and already opened up for classes. many offices have already settled in, in particular, chicano and african american studies. we walk through the halls and look for the doors we used before to enter the tunnels. we also look for the "abyss" room - the open elevator shaft that dropped down into darkness. finding many people around due to a fellowship group that just finished as well as a few janitors, we walk around to the outside of the building to find the small ground/basement level concrete room which fed us directly into the tunnels. fortunately for us, we find it with its window unlocked and unguarded. another christian fellowship group appears to have just ended over in rolfe and if caught loitering or wandering around outside, it would offer us a good alibi, at least about an hour's worth. we had originally planned to find an easier way in from haines, but without any other options, we hop in the window and jump about six feet down to the floor. we were in, without much difficulty and a little dusty.

discovering that we entered the tunnels at an endpoint, we had two options to get to our south campus goal destination. we had two options - either exit the tunnels through haines and enter through our old friend royce hall, or walk around the entire north campus tunnel system to loop back onto the main system which would take us to south campus. we choose the second plan, since there was an event going on in royce, and snake our way through the entire north campus system, taking us to the storage area underneath yrl. this was the only point on the route where it could have been problematic, as we didn't have a very good encounter here the first time, having run away from ucla personnel our first time. we knew how open the place was and how noticeable we could become. there was another problem – we were unsure if the doors to the blue hub room would be unlocked from the outside. there was only one way to find out, and we cautiously make our way around the basement of the yrl, reaching the doors to the blue hub room, we give the handles a pull and amazingly, it opens with ease. again, we were in.

we walk the familiar tunnel route between royce and the url, discovering a metal ladder we've never noticed in the past. finding an iron plate covering the opening a the top, we proceed to slide the iron plate away. pushing it open a crack, we discover it opened into a basement somewhere, but before we could find out more, the cover knocks into another metal plate, causing it to fall down with a tremendous crash. we quickly slide the iron plate back and head on.

we reach royce and entering into a machine room, we quietly move over to the side door which would connect us to the south campus tunnels. struck with the idea to head over to haines instead to see where the other entrance into the underground would be, we return to the main connecting room to head over to haines hall. after the first person moved into the room, we check the coast again and notice a maintenance person walking by. we cautiously enter the tunnel to haines, an checking to see that we weren't being followed, enter haines 41, locked to outsiders, and full of electrical panels and what appears to be various pumps. we also discover a window which would be extremely useful as a new entrance since it opened into a small desolate vending machine area behind royce. we go back into the tunnels and head for the south campus route again. reaching royce, we see another maintenance personnel in royce, forcing us to stayed low for a short while before making our way into the side door. we head south, passing moore, and following the slight slope taking us to the ls building. the tunnels, while extremely hot, emptied out into a hallway in the ls building to a cool relief. we exit the ls building, and seeing a scant scattering of lab students about, we agree this would offer a fairly decent alibi, should we need it later.

ucla, underground.

access denied III.

we attempt to find the elusive way to ackerman.

we start off in macgown, entering the building after watching a janitor exit one of the theater doors. we go backstage to find a spiral iron staircase winding down into some basement level. accidentally kicking a rolling platform which catches the attention of the janitor who yells "hey," two of us make a break for it down the steps and into the basement level of the theater filled with random props. pushing open an exit door which led to a staircase leading up, we wait for our third person, who doesn’t follow. we return to the basement, and ascend the other iron spiral staircase onto the backstage area again. our third person had disappeared. the two of us make our way outside to wait and plan but seeing our friend safe and uncaught, we get together and head for moore.

moore is unfortunately locked. we walk around the hall, looking at windows and testing doors. moore is completely closed off to us, leaving us no choice but to head to old royce. heading over, we find an enormous amount of janitors all around campus. a walk around north campus leads to us being followed by two, possibly janitorial, men who sit at a table in the shadows and watch our moves. we quickly leave to scope out other areas on campus.

we find an open door by the side of royce and enter cautiously. seeing a janitor come down a flight of stairs, we bail. going back to the front of royce, we find the main doors open and enter. the lobby is empty, although we can hear janitorial personnel upstairs. we leave. entering through another set of doors takes us to a hallway, but the jingling of keys not far away forces two of us to hide in the alcoves of doors as footsteps approach. the sounds suddenly stop and finding the coast clear, two of us dash out. our third person had already checked out. walking around and out of convenient options, we consider jumping the fence around haines, as there did not seem to be as many people around this area of campus. seeing a campus security vehicle surveying the area however quickly forces us to abandon the evening.

ucla, underground.

access denied II.

we proceed to return to the sub-yrl area and reevaluate royce hall's sub-basement level.

the sky was beginning to darken as we returned to royce, passing the many tents set up for the book festival the next day. security and personnel was heavy and a performance was also going on in royce hall which attracted many people. we casually walk down the lighted hallway and take in the scene by the water fountain as people pass by. when the coast was clear we take the elevator to the basement level, then the stairs to the sub-basement level. again, we had to prop the door to keep it from locking. exiting the stairs door on the sub-basement level, we turn right and open the white door directly in front of us. luckily for us it wasn’t locked. the small little hallway parallel to us turns left, leading to a small metal rung ladder into the steam tunnel. this tunnel is a bit wider than the first one we took, allowing us to walk through them with fair ease. it is also well-lighted.

we reach our first junction where two tunnels cross perpendicular to each other. with the aid of a map, we take the tunnel on the left, ducking under a big bundle of wires hanging across the opening. taking this tunnel, we reach the infamous "bridge." compared with rest of the areas we had come in contact with before, this subterranean room is enormous. entering the large room, we immediately run into broken slabs of concrete and dirt. the tunnel path leading straight ahead is flanked on one side by the brick work of the north inner face of the old arroyo bridge, and on the other side by large drop into the old ravine. the sound of a small creek emanates from the darkness beneath. concrete structural supports and framework of the bridge are visible, and covered with graffiti.

at the end of the large room, on the opposite corner, a door leads outside up onto dickson plaza. we instead take the wood staircase up to a higher level and into the tunnel entrance which led to murphey. we realized this route was the same one used by the head of the american nazi party when he gave a speech in royce in the 1960's and had to be led out to murphey for safety's sake, since protesters had gathered in the plaza outside. underneath murphey, we enter into a small electrical control room with a door at the top of a small flight of stairs on the immediate right of us. this door, which we didn't open, seemed to lead into a hallway. hearing a janitor just out of view, we instead enter the other tunnel entrance opposite the first tunnel entrance, moving in complete darkness. opening into a very flat room crossed with pipes, we crawl on our hands and knees, we discover that this tunnel comes to a t-end, leaving us to turn left because the route to the right leads to a dead end. we reach a small recess with a shanty wooden ladder leaned up against the wall up to a metal rung ladder in the wall leading up to a grate on the north side of murphey hall. using combined effort, we lift up the heavy grate and push it aside just enough to let us out, pulling it back in place afterwards. we emerge out of the bushes, luckily without anyone nearby.

we return to royce, with the intent to explore the sub-yrl area once more. entering the same way we used last time, we move quickly through the tunnel to the "blue hub" room underneath yrl. we exit the room back into the large storage area, prop the door a bit, and this time, quickly move to the lower level, making our way to the other side of the boxes and books by squeezing between a pipe and the wall. this area opens up in a lighted hall area and in front of us, a metal rung ladder leads up to a tunnel opening high up in the wall. we climb up the ladder, into the tunnel, and head towards dickson hall. we reach another t-junction and head straight to dickson. underneath dickson, we enter into a dark control room with running machinery and the sort. walking about cautiously, hearing stray noises here and there we explore a stairway leading up to a door. opening the door, we discover that it led outside, and noticing a man and a truck nearby, we return to the tunnel and make our way south, back to the t-junction, this time turning left towards macgown. we come upon another t-junction and turned right, deciding to skip checking out macgown. these tunnels were very hot, and crouching a bit to minimize the heat, we reach a perpendicular cross of our tunnel with another and keep straight, with the intent to ultimately reach haines hall. turning right and left, the tunnel reaches a very small junction area. we take the route on the right and squeeze past some pipes in a very tight tunnel. there was also water in the tunnel so we had to walk on the sides to avoid stepping in foot high water. we end up in a tiny room with two windows and a door that opened up into a small crossing hallway of the under-construction haines hall.

we walk about, exploring the large unfinished, unfurnished, terraced lecture halls, and wander into a very large hall which was having its ceiling light fixtures put in. peering into a small glass-less window in a door marked "15" showed it was a shaft that went down three floors or so into darkness. this probably explained why the door was screwed shut we exit haines through an open door and walked about outside, keeping in the shadows to avoid getting caught by people walking about on the other side of the covered fence. with too many people around, and not finding a way out, we go back into the building and out the main doors on the east side, hoping there might be an opening in the fence on that side. there wasn't, and we were completely surrounded by a fence. trying to go around the building instead, we come upon the bruin walk area with lots of security and people setting up for the book festival. after a thorough consideration of climbing into a window because the main doors locked when we exited, we luckily find another door nearby that was unlocked. using our map, we locate another tunnel entrance in another part of haines and use that tunnel, heading towards royce. taking this tunnel, which ended at a shaft that dropped rather far, with a metal rung ladder that led down, we cautiously climb down the ladder, discovering that it brought us back into the small room where we originally entered the other tunnel entrance. the double doors to the room were open, so we took cover behind some crates. exiting the room, we take a left and reenter the white door on the right to go back into the tunnel we started the evening with.

this time, we head down the tunnel until we reach the junction. instead of turning left, we go straight, where the tunnel began to get hot, leading us to a cramped little room with lots of debris. the door ahead of us was locked and had a ladies room sign duct-taped onto it. attempting to find the way to ackerman, we take a right. despite the fact that "high voltage" was the preferred phrase throughout the tunnels, we crawl over a mess of dangerous-looking electrical wires and squeeze by several pipes. luckily, the tunnel opened up as we headed towards moore hall, and reaching moore, the area widened into a subterranean room with pipes and a dirt floor that sloped down to the right of us beyond the pipes. straight ahead, the tunnel continued on and further down, branched off into many directions. still attempting to find the tunnel to ackerman, we leave this route alone and open the door in the opposite corner of the room. discovering that this door opens to the outside of moore, we instead take a small path in the middle of the subterranean room and open a door exiting us directly into the basement of moore hall. looking at our map which illustrated a route to ackerman nearby, we go to a door marked “vocational education services” and give it a pull. amazingly, it opened, and entering, found the most of the room closed off to us by large locked fences. one door labeled “gs12” was unfortunately locked and out of options, exit moore.

ucla, underground.

access denied I.

we proceed to discover whether or not the underground tunnel rumors are true.

entering royce from the north side door across from rolfe, we take the elevator to the front and right, down to the basement level. exiting the elevator, we walk straight and open the door ahead, leading to the stairs. propping the door very slightly because it locks from the other side, we set this as an escape route for later, should we need it. going down the metal stairs one level to the sub-basement level, we exit the stairs, across from an elevator straight ahead. turning right, we walk down the hall. this area has a lot of maintenance people around, so we keep a lookout for personnel. getting to the end of the hall, which should be a very short walk, there is a metal door on the right, with the hall extending down to the left. luckily, the metal door on the right is unlocked, and we enter the room. the room is very dingy and dirty. turning left and walking to the end of the room, we reach a door on our immediate left that reads "service tunnel." opening the door, we face a metal stairwell leading up. at the top of the stairwell, the tunnel in sight extends into the distance on our right. walking down the tunnel we are careful not to bump our heads on the overhead lights or get shocked by the wire bundles labeled "high voltage."

at the end of the tunnel there is a fairly large recess filled with dirt and junk. to our right the tunnel extends even farther into the distance, and we continue down. at the end ew come to a recessed corner with yellow machinery and lots of fraternity graffiti. a blue chair caked in dust alludes to a possible checkpoint for fraternity initiation procedures of days gone by. to our left the tunnel continues to extend, leading to light at the end. as we continue down the tunnel and near the end, it opens into a large room with huge blue pipes and loud fans. being extremely careful when entering the room from the tunnel, since the room is well kept and may have personnel about, we enter we have come to call "the blue hub."

the medium-sized room extends into another room on the right. on the left a small green chalkboard sits above a sink area. a rudimentary line drawing in chalk depicts various campus buildings as boxes and lines connecting one to another. a wall with large switches line a corner of the room to the right and farther up, controlling the cold water flowing to royce, rolfe, melnitz, macgown, and campbell halls. on the opposite wall not far from the chalkboard, a blue double door opens into a large, almost warehouse-like storage area. propping the door slightly because it will lock, we enter. ahead, a guard rail separates us on a higher level, from the lower level with many shelves and old books. to the left the concrete floor extends far on down, flanking the warehouse. guessing this area is beneath the young research library, we continue down the path, passing the books and reaching a hall with a visible elevator to our left. hearing personnel people headed down the elevator hall, we quickly make a break for it.

passing the books again, through the blue double door, and back into the blue hub, we kick away the doorstop to buy us a little time from our pursuers. we enter the tunnel and dash down it coming to a stop at the first bend. silently listening for signs of life, we hear noises coming back from the blue hub and dash farther down the tunnel, back the way we came, coming to a stop at the second bend. we proceed to exit the tunnel, down the metal stairwell, and out of the dingy room, closing all doors that were closed before. checking to see if the coast is clear, we plan going straight, down to the end of the hall, and out the door on the right, exiting us into the parking lot area behind fowler and royce, used by delivery services. after noticing a woman pass by at the opposite end of the hall however, we quickly change our plans and veer left instead, climbing the stairs opposite the elevator, back up to the basement level, and through the door we propped open earlier. we get rid of the stopper and take the elevator back up to the first floor, exiting royce the same door we entered, across from rolfe.

ucla, underground.