This past spring, I studied abroad in the Netherlands, a country known for windmills, tulips and its famous capital city. To many, Amsterdam has a certain reputation, but this doesn’t fully capture all that this city offers. My experience was made up of esteemed museums, delicious food and beautiful city streets. The Netherlands has been an art hub for centuries, and I saw [...]
There is a misconception that art, specifically performance and visual art, is too expensive to see. A couple of months ago, while backpacking in Austria, I attended the Vienna State Opera with a €4 ticket. This got me thinking about all the discounted art available around me. Most theaters provide some form of student or senior discount when provided with an ID. However, [...]
Now that another New England winter is finally behind me, I’ve been desperate to find more time to indulge in the sun. Sometimes it’s tough to actually enjoy summer weather with work, errands and other obligations keeping us indoors. That’s why I’ve crafted a list that—despite any busy schedule—will give you at least a few opportunities to squeeze in some quality time with [...]
You’ve probably heard some of the popular US superstitions: don’t step on a crack or you’ll break your mother’s back, knock on wood, don’t walk under ladders and avoid broken mirrors. But across the world, there are some very different superstitions! In South Korea, it’s believed that sleeping with a fan on can kill you! This superstition is so ubiquitous that many Korean fans [...]
Laws are important and should always be followed, of course, but every US state has at least one law that at first reading you wouldn’t think was actually real. I gathered some of the craziest sounding laws in New England for a sampling. Republican Representative Max Abramson filed a repeal for this law after it won a contest for “New Hampshire’s Dumbest Law”—a 40-year-old ban [...]
You’re doing some grocery shopping and come across a box of crackers priced at $3.99. “Why don’t they just make it $4?” you ask yourself. It’s a common question, and the answer might change the way you think about prices. Prices that don’t end with a rounded number are called odd prices or charm prices.You’ve probably noticed that a lot of goods have [...]
Summer is my favorite time of the year. Not just because of warm weather and beach days, but because of a celebration in my hometown of Gloucester, Massachusetts. St. Peter’s Fiesta is an annual celebration of St. Peter—the patron saint of fishermen. Gloucester is known for its large Italian American fishing community, so it’s no surprise that St. Peter is so heavily celebrated. [...]
by Alex Belloli, Spring 2018 Intern In the 1970s, my grandfather started building a house with his family, including his four, then-teenaged sons, right on the edge of Great East Lake in Acton, Maine. Decades later, my dad would take his family back there every summer. The drive was 2.5 hours—what felt like a long way from my hometown of Framingham, Massachusetts—so during my [...]
During my frequent trips to the Waltham Public Library, I noticed a plaque with the name Francis Buttrick on a wall of the brick building. Though I could safely assume that Francis Buttrick was a benefactor of the library, I was curious to learn more about him and the history of the building. Francis Buttrick came to Waltham in 1838 as a carpenter, [...]
Just kidding . . . it’s probably not best to make a speech on an empty stomach. But don’t worry, if you’re one of many people with glossophobia, the fear of public speaking, there are some tips and tricks to calm the feeling of nervousness—and, in some cases, nausea—before publicly speaking. This Harper’s Bazaar article gives some great advice to get over the fear. Some [...]