Western Front - 2003 May 23

              Cho-tally awesome
Margaret Gho hits the Mount
Bake?. Theatre funny bone.
S$B Story, Page 6.
The race is on
Western's Ski to Sea teams
prepare for the big day.
See Story, Page 8.
FRIDAY,. May-235:2003
Western Washington University Volume 125 Issue 15 Bellingham, Washington
Viking Helmet Car debuts at Ski to Sea
By Leslie White
THE WESTERN FRONT
The newly designed Volkswagen-Beetle-turned-
Western-Viking-Helmet will make
its first appearance Saturday in the 2003
Ski to Sea parade.
Western's Alumni Association and the
industrial design department designed a
Viking Helmet for a 2002 Silver
Volkswagen Beetle.
Susan Baksfe;vdirector, of; £lumni pro­grams
and: outreach,' a%d::' Laurie
Rossman, cOrpresident of the .Western
alumni chapter, organized the/Viking
"Helmet project.. -'.'_ \. '••,;'\.":'•.
"As far ..as, anyone can remember,
Western has hot had a presence in:the Ski
to Sea parade," Bakse said. /
The design team decorated the outside
of the Viking Helmet with Western
Alumni decals and horns. The helmet
horns are composed of a wire frame, pack­ing
foam and waterproof fabric.
Last month Bakse presented the project
to professor Arunas Oslapas in the indus­trial
design department. Oslapas sent an
e-mail to his classes, and four students
volunteered to create the Viking Helmet,
including Western junior Matt Hebert,
junior Adran Nakagawa, junior Alan
Duncan and senior Jack Pflueger.
After the students created the design,
they eagerly discussed the project with
Bakse and Rossman, Bakse said.
"They were so enthusiastic and profes­sional
when presenting a design," Bakse
said. "We walked away very impressed."
Leslie White/The Western Front
Western junior Matt Hebert,right, and senior Jack Pflueger, left, fasten
horns to the roof of a 2002 Volkswagen Beetle to finish the Viking Helmet
which will make its debut at this year's Ski to.Sea competition this week- _
end. A local dealership donated the car for future Western events.
Nakagawa said they have spent four
weeks working on the project.
"Our challenge was to transform the
Beetle into a Viking helmet by our own
interpretation," Nakagawa said. "They
gave us free range to design within a bud­get
of $400." ;
Bakse said putting horns on a
Volkswagen Beetle seemed like a great
way to start the project. '
' I t has evolved into a much larger presence
;.'' See HELMET, Page 3
Palestinian refugee dispells media portrayal of Middle East
By A n d y Aley
THE WESTERN FRONT
Ramzy Baroud said the Jenin refugee
canip is "a searing testament to Israeli
brutality and Palestinian resilience, spir­it
and grace under pressure."
Baroud, a Palestinian-American jour­nalist
who was born arid raised in a
refugee camp on the Gaza Strip spoke
Thursday in the Fairhaven College
Auditorium about the experiences of
refugees living in the Jenin refugee camp.,
Baroud recently compiled and edited the
book "Searching Jenin: Eyewitness
Accounts of the Israeli Invasion 2002,"
which includes 42 testimonies of residents
who witnessed and survived the April
2002 invasion by Israeli Defense Forces.
The goal of the book is to provide a history
of the invasion of Jenin, he said.
"Searching Jenin was our way of saying
that the voices of the victims must be
heard — their stories told," Baroud said.
Israeli forces claimed Jenin was a focal
point of Palestinian militancy and
declared it a closed military zone before
launching the invasion, according to a
BBC article. At least 50 Palestinians died
in the attack, ; '•'•'.'•?
Jenin is a n approximately one. square
kilometer refugee camp in the Gaza Strip
and is home to more than 13,000
Palestinians, Baroud said. Originally set
up as a temporary shelter for refugees,
the camp still houses refugees who refuse
to leave because the camp is the closest
location to their homeland.
Adjunct Fairhaven College faculty
member Shirley Osterhaus, who helped
organize the event, said knowing what is
See PALESTINIAN, Page 3
Organization
to revitalize
downtown area
By Matt McDonald
THE WESTERN FRONT
A revived downtown Bellingham will
soon attract students and locals who
want to live in an affordable urban
environment, said Mauri Ingram,
executive director of the The
Downtown Renaissance Network.
The network, a 2-year-old non-profit
organization, aims to revitalize the
downtown area in a number of differ­ent
ways, Ingram said. The network
participated in brainstorming sessions
with private developers to consider the
design and uses of West-Lind
Construction's 36-unit apartment
building in the 1000 block of N. State
Street currently being built.
West-Lind Construction is targeting
people who are interested in living and
working in the downtown area and
hoping to see a little resurgence and
revitalization of the whole. downtown
area, said Kuni Grant, assistant vice
president-of West-Lind-Construction.
"Two-thirds of the student body live
off-campus, and as the university
grows, that nurnber is going to look for
convenient housing," Director of
University Residences Kay Rich said.
"And I think there is a market for the
downtown and on-campus housing."
Approximately 650 people live in the
downtown neighborhood, Ingram said.
The new State Street addition will
help the downtown area become more
pedestrian friendly and establish bet­ter
clientele, she said.
"It's critical that we have a full
range of housing product in the down­town
so we. can provide affordable
housing as well as market rate and
above market rate housing," Ingram
said.
The city has made improvements to
make the downtown area more
appealing to merchants and local resi­dents,
such as new sidewalks and
improvements to downtown streets,
said Sheila Hardy, special project
" See APARTMENTS, Page 3
'Angel' play foreshadows theatre professor's retirement
By Ian Alexander
THE WESTERN FRONT
When the actors take their final bow and
the stage goes dark on Western's performance
of "Look Homeward, Angel," professor of the­ater
arts Tom Ward will retire.
"I did ("Angel") 40 years ago at the beginning
of my career, so it'll be a fitting bookend to my
career," Ward said of the play. "We'll see if I
learned anything in 40 years — I think J have."
Following the 2 p.m. performance on June 1,
Ward's career will be celebrated at a reception.
Ward said he always had an interest in the
theater, especially after he won a speech con­test
in junior high school.
"My parents could be very strict, and the char­acter
I would play would be doing things they
told me not to do and they applauded it," Ward
said. "So I guess it was my form of rebellion."
During his 45-year career, Ward taught in
schools including Loyola and New York
University before his 25 years at Western. At
Western, Ward has produced approximately
80 plays and directed 27.
In addition to producing and directing,
Ward also served as Western's theater depart­ment
chairman from 1991 to 1999. As chair­man,
Ward said he reduced his directing time
to focus on raising money for the department.
"It became more important as a chair to sup­port
other people rather than my career,"
Ward said. :
Ward sat on a committee that helped facili­tate
renovation of the PAC mairistage, said
See RETIRE, Page 3
Christina Tercero/
The Western Front
Western professor of
theatre arts Tom Ward
directs cast members
in a dress rehersal of
his farewell play "Look
Homeward Angel."
After his 45-year
career teaching at vari­ous
campuses across
the nation, Ward will
retire after 25 years
working at Western.
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