Terveisiä Suomi! I’ve taken a break from the P-N-Dub and am currently sitting on the balcony of a fifth-floor (IKEA-drenched) apartment in Helsinki, the capital of Finland. It’s truly a beautiful place that seems to only experience wintertime and uses pastels for building colors. It’s also the host of the 2016 World Press Freedom Day conference, which is why I am here, alongside four SOJC colleagues.
Back across the pond was the annual Met Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute in New York City. On May 1, celebrities used the excuse of ‘fundraising’ to get all dolled-up and wear works of art on their bodies.
The night has always been known for stars looking both ravishing and ridiculous, and this year’s event was no different with its theme of ‘Manus x Mashina: Fashion in an Age of Technology.’ Along with the costumes for the night, the guest list sure didn’t disappoint.
For all you pop culture fiends, Gigi Hadid and Zayn Malik made their red carpet debut, which Hadid needed a $2,000 manicure for — obviously. The Olsen Twins had too much fun and almost smiled. Emma Watson oozed classic elegance. Kimye looked as they always do: confusingly confident. Blake Lively attended in a prom dress. And then, there was Bey #LongLivetheQueen(B).
As mentioned last week, Beyoncé dropped her visual album, Lemonade, and Drake followed suit with the release of Views.
Everyone can stop worrying because now, ”Hotline Bling” is no longer a song-orphan, it now claims the No. 20 spot in the newest Drake family. Along with “Hotline Bling,” the other 19 tracks on this album are absolute fire, which points to the fact that Views will undoubtedly go platinum in the next few days (meaning it will reach 1 million album sales). In just its first night, 600K copies were sold and Views in its entirety was streamed over 1 million times this last week.
Drake’s success is no surprise. He knows what the people want, he realizes the current market demand and he and Rihanna have yet to disappoint on a collaboration. When considering top rappers of our time, I always choose him.
University administration had a lot of choosing to do last week with its search for new deans of both the School of Journalism and Communication and the School of Architecture and Allied Arts. The SOJC’s new Edwin L. Artzt Dean will be Juan-Carlos Molleda, as announced by University Provost Scott Coltrane on April 28.
Molleda is currently at the University of Florida, so a change of environment is most definitely in his near future. As for A&AA Dean, Coltrane deemed Christoph Lindner most fit for the job who will make the trek from his current gig at the University of Amsterdam.
Senator Bernie Sanders made quite a trek last week to little ol’ Springfield to get all riled up at a rally, and the turnout for Bernie was pretty remarkable. It was his first visit to the Eugene/Springfield area, and people were stoked. The rally took place on April 28 at Island Park.
Mr. Optimism then made his way to the UO campus and downtown Eugene. As he was eating at Glenwood – eggs benedict or bust – my social media newsfeeds were flooded with photos and videos of people meeting the senator and touching him to make sure he’s real, since all his promises for this nation aren’t. Bern.
The city is preparing for another presidential candidate visit, and I’m not sure how to feel about this one. Bernie’s rally was easy for me to skip out on because, with him, you can sort of predict the points he will cover and the bits he’ll get overly heated for, but with someone like Donald Trump, you never know.
The world’s most talked about ginger will be in Eugene on Friday, May 6 at 7 p.m. at the Lane Events Center. With it being Mr. Trumpet’s first visit to Oregon, the meeting shall be very interesting.

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Illustration by Mary Vertulfo