Last night the singles ward (the singles congregation at church) had an activity where a couple guys who blow glass at the MIT glass lab invited everyone to come for a little tour/demonstration. Actually, it was a rather long demonstration, but very cool. I've never been in a glass lab, but as my mom, 2 brothers and one cousin all tried glass blowing, I was very interested to see the demonstration. The men demonstrating first made a long string of white-inside-clear glass, about as thick as a pencil. They broke it into segments which they will later fuse together to make cool designs. (Think of venetian style glasswork and beads.) Then they made a clear drinking cup with swirls up the sides, very evenly thin and light. They dunked it quickly in cold water to make it crack all over then crumbled one side down so everyone could see and feel how the techniques they had demonstrated made it thin and even all the way down. For the final demonstration, they made one of those famous MIT glass pumpkins. Theirs was a black pumpkin with an orange stem. When the black glass was hot, it looked orange, and at one point even looked totally white, but as it cooled you could see it turning black and when they finished they had a totally black pumpkin.
It was really cool to watch the glass blowing, and pretty hot. They stretched the string of hot glass right by where I was standing, and even from such a thin string I could feel so much heat radiating out. There's a glass blowing school near my current apartment. One day a girl asked for directions to it, but I didn't know where it was. So I looked it up and discovered it's right in my neighborhood. I'll have to look up their schedule to see what's available these days.
So, for the curious part: Erin and I got there right at 7:30, when it was announced that it would start. It had already started and a small group of people were there. Other people arrived after us, and it started to get crowded by the door, where we were. The layout of the room has some lockers and workbenches down the middle of a rectangular room with the furnaces on one end. People were bunched on the furnace end. Not many people were on the other side of the room, so Erin and I went around the lockers to help spread out the crowd. Ultimately there were a bunch of people on both sides of the room. About halfway through the presentation, Erin pointed out that the side we were on was all girls and the other side was all guys. Pretty ironic, considering it was a group from a singles ward! We wondered how that happened and why. Tell me your theories!
4 comments:
I'm not really sure what was going on there but it doesn't bode well for the future of the singles ward..
That glass blowing was awesome! I never realized how painstaking the process is. I've definitely gained even more respect for the unger family blowers
*P
I got to blow a glass once in Norway. I loved that process, and it was really fun to watch the glassblowers at work--one made a swan and I got to take it home. Believe it or not, my old high school teaches glassblowing now! Wish they had back in the day...:)
Here's my theory: the men gather around the furnace because they're sure that's where the demonstration will be, and men assume that when a bunch of people want to see something, they'll all be trying to get in the right spot, so it's fair to do the best you can to be in that spot. Women think about the group as a whole, and figure if they all spread out a bit, everyone should spread out so they'll be able to see a little--maybe not as much as if they'd gone to the best spot, but, as a group, people will see better. I think both ways are fair individually, but when they're combined, the women lose out on the view and wonder why the men didn't make room, and men feel defensive and wonder why the women didn't try to get the best view just like everyone else.
It's so fun to make sweeping generalizations. Guilty pleasure. :)
haha I love sweeping generalizations too! ;P
[wv: wette]
Post a Comment