lifestyles
A revival of religion
Although the days when parents nagged their children to go to religious services are over, many students say their faith is still important.
Valerie Bontrager / KANSAN
celebration of Palm Sunday, the Lawrence Catholic Campus Center drapes purple cloth over the oss in front of the building.
A student's world can be so hectic that religion sometimes takes a back seat to careers, education and social activities.
By Kevin Hoffmann Kansan staff writer
But some think religion may be regaining importance in students' lives.
Lanny Maddux, religious adviser for Campus Christians, said he saw a growing interest in religion among students.
"Gauging from the people we work with, there seems to be renewed interest." he said.
Scott Ketrow, Campus Director of Campus Crusade for Christ, said that organization had steadily been growing over the last five years. Ketrow said one reason for that growth could be the perception that group-oriented activities are growing scarce.
"I think our culture has become individualistic," he said. "People are looking for connecting points, for a community, and they are looking at religion."
Ketrow said religion actually could help people with busy schedules, he said.
"Students who get involved in a close relationship with God find their relationship with Him reorders their lives and their priorities," he said.
Hadi Alassani, Yemen senior and member of the Muslim Student Association, said the organization helped some international students adjust to life in the United States.
Some students said religious organizations provided a spiritual environment while helping them adjust to a new culture.
"For a lot of Muslim students, when they come to America they face a culture shock," Alhassani said. "What we try to do is provide a home-like atmosphere where they can come and pray, meditate and meet with other Muslim students."
Alhassani said the Muslim Student Association at the Islamic Center of Lawrence, 1300 Ohio St., where the organization held daily prayers and most of their religious functions.
Some said they thought that students more and more were seeking the guidance offered by religion.
"We think the Bible can be used as guidance in every aspect of life and that it is the ultimate authority," said Ward Nitz, president of the Kansas City Baptist Temple Student Ministries.
Steve Jacobsen, executive director of Hillel, said that organization
provided resources and guidance for Jewish students.
"When Hiliel was first founded, its major purpose was to provide an environment in which Jewish students could practice their Judaism faith," Jacobsen said.
But Hillel offers more than the just opportunity to practice Judaism, he said.
"We offer a lot of activities and resources for anything Jewish students may need," he said.
Others said they thought religious activities could simply be a way of meeting people.
"It's a great place to meet friends, to meet members of the opposite sex," said Jay Henderson, a minister for the United Methodist Campus Ministry.
Maddux said many people joined religious organizations to help others. The Campus Christians recently helped renovate a house for innercity ministries in Kansas City, Mo., he said. The group also helped with flood relief last summer and went to Mexico over Spring Break to help with the construction of a children's home.
"I think a lot of people enjoy that kind of work." Maddux said.
Alhassani described the Muslim Student Association as "very active religiously."
"We try to contribute to the campus by having events take place on campus," he said. "We schedule speakers and set up tables to provide information."
Although some people see a growing interest in religion among college students, others disagree with this observation.
Henderson said he thought the majority of KU students were not actively involved in religion.
"Sometimes people need a break," Henderson said. "Often they use college for that break."
Some students said they found it difficult to go to church while they were at college.
"I used to go to church every Sunday, before I came to college" said Martha di Zerega, Englewood, Colo. senior. "I hardly ever go now."
Di Zerega said her religious practices changed when she came to college partly because of a lack of time.
"I don't have as much time as I used to," she said. "But, I also think that college is a time of experimenting, and I just wanted to see different ways of living my life."
Henderson said students should not feel guilty if they chose not to be active in religion.
"I don't see it as a problem unless they see it as a problem," he said.
health
A season of renewal, romance and change, spring fills some students with anticipation and others with anxiety.
Changes of season inflict spring fever
By Cathleen Slechta
Kansan staff writer
Spring is here. The flowers are blooming. The birds are singing. The moods are swinging.
Some students notice a significant change in their attitudes around this time of year, and they may have Mother Nature to thank.
“it's a lot easier to get out of bed and go to class now,” said Leslie Woodward, Fairway senior. “I just don't even like going to class when the weather is bad. When it's cold or rainy, it just ruins my mood for the entire day.”
"This disorder affects a limited number of people," said David Holmes, professor of psychology. "When autumn and winter come and the amount of light exposure decreases, depression can set in. When light exposure increases, the depression goes away."
The shorter periods of sunlight in winter can increase the body's production of the hormone melatonin, Holmes said. At high levels, this hormone can depress moods. Treatment for sufferers of SAD sometimes involves placing them under bright light, such as tanning beds.
Seasonal weather changes can affect many students' moods. For those who suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder, or SAD, spring can bring relief from depression.
However, spring and sunlight aren't always the answer to students' winter blues. In fact, Holmes said, the suicide rate among people who suffer from more severe forms of depression increases in May and June.
"It has a lot to do with everything being new and wonderful in spring," Holmes said. "Depressed people may contrast all these great things with how miserable they are and just decide to kill themselves."
Spring also can bring on a depression of
"I're really dreading the summer," Poulin said. "It's going to be really hard. I have to concentrate on working and studying for my summer classes I'm taking in Omaha. But I know I'm going to be thinking about him all the time. It's going to make me want the fall semester to get here faster."
"I am very ready to get out of school," he said. "I've had all of the college experience I can take and then some. And of course, I've already got a job lined up, so basically all I have to do is pass."
another kind. With the semester's end approaching, some students may have to put their romantic relationships on hold for the summer.
Graduation is another spring ritual that can change students' temperaments. For Nate Lankford, Overland Park senior, this spring is filled with hope and anticipation.
Dani Pouli, Omaha, Neb., sophomore, will have to spend the summer separated from her fiancé, who will stay at his home in Minnesota.
"Igraduate on May 15, and start lawschool on May 16," said Mike Heffernon, Shawnee senior. "So I guess right now i1 of kive of have mixed emotions. I'm excited an nervous."
And speaking of emotions, some students said spring just wouldn't be spring without a "spring fling" romance.
Carrie Chain, Garden City sophomore,
recently became involved with someone.
She said she thought it quite possible that the
weather had something to do with it.
Some spring graduates aren't so lucky.
"I think that a lot of relationships get started in the spring because people are just friendlier when the weather is nice," Chain said. "You're outside and doing fun things. It's just easier to meet people and get to know them because everyone is so much more outgoing. It's a very sociable season."
computers
Visit Elvis' home from your own via Graceland CD
By Woody Baird
The Associated Press
MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Say you're tired of solitaire and the other games on your home computer, and maybe you're feeling a tad lonesome for Elvis.
How about a romp through the Jungle Room or an interactive review of the King's gold records? Did you ever wonder how the felt on his pool table got torn?
Sometime this summer, you can experience Elvis on your desktop computer with a CD-ROM that features a digitized tour of Graceland, Presley's former residence.
"It allows the user to go in and kind of wander around Graceland at his own pace," said Dave Antil, a project manager at Crunch Media of Los Angeles, the company producing the disc.
A CD-ROM, or "compact disc, read only memory," has hundreds of times the storage capacity of a regular floppy disk and can carry sounds and moving pictures as well as still shots and text.
With the Graceland CD, a pilgrim will be able to put his computer's cursor on selected parts of a still photo and call up an Elvis video, an interview with his cook or even a peek inside a dining-room china cabinet.
Click on the pool table, and some of Elvis' old buddies will talk about the night the felt was torn. It happened during a pool game and Presley never got it repaired.
The CD will contain 100 minutes of interviews with former Elvis friends, backup singers and fellow musicians. There will be old interviews with Elvis, too, and clips from the 1968 "comeback special" when the king of rock 'n' roll gave him a less-than-brilliant search for movie greatness.
Longing for another look at his TV performance with a hound dog sporting a top hat? It'll be there, too.
The computer tour will feature the rooms open to the 650,000 visitors a year who visit Graceland in person, but the CD trip will show them from various angles unavailable to the general public.
It also will show close-ups of Elvis possessions, such as
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
See ELVIS,Page 10.
MARCH 29,1994
PAGE 9
People and places at the University of Kansas.
LEAD STORY
In February, the Royal Bank of Scotland announced that it would begin issuing extra check-cashing ID cards to its transvestite customers who requested them — so that they could have separate cards depicting themselves dressed as male and female in order to "avoid embarrassment or difficulties," a bank representative said.
OOPS
About 15 customers had gathered their grocery items at a Safeway in Oxen Hill, Md., shortly after 10 a.m. on Christmas morning and were lined up at the check-out lanes, but no cashiers were on duty, and no one answered calls to the back of the store. Local police were called and after investigating found that the store was supposed to be closed but that the Christmas Eve crew had accidentally left the light on and the door unlocked, giving shopper the impression it was open.
— In October, in Iran, when celebratory gunfire is traditional at weddings, a guest named Rasool lost control of his automatic weapon at a wedding in Lorastan Province, accidentally killing six people and wounding 14. In Champion, Ohio, in January, Rev. Thomas Gillum, presiding at the burial of a Korean War veteran, was accidentally shot in the face when the local VFW honor guard fired a fourgun salute.
The international food company Nestle UK was fined about $20,000 in January for injuries suffered by its employee Alex Tuvey-Smith, 36, at a plant in York, England. While cleaning excess chocolate off the sides of a giant bowl, he slipped and fell in, triggering the mixing paddles, which whipped him for more than a minute before they were turned off.
— Carsalesman Joseph LaRaviere, 29, attempting to help a couple who had run out of gas in their car near Ruskin, Fla., got his right index finger stuck in the gasoline filler pipe. It remained there for about two hours before firefighters arrived and rescued him.
WELL-PUT
— Roy Kinne, 28, an unemployed Chicago-area man, happened to be home on the December afternoon when an 8-year-old boy fell through the ice in a lake adjacent to Kinne's house. After he rescued the boy he said. "If I would have had a life, I might not have been home."
— Milwaukee juvenile court judge Mike Malmstadt said in a *Time* magazine story on how hostility by drivers increasingly provokes violent reactions by others, "I don't give people the finger from my car, and I haven't for awhile."
— Professional soccer team manager Dan O'Riordan, defending his decision to levy fines against players for flatulence in the locker room, said, "It can get fairly oppressive when you've got 20 players in a tiny dressing room all suffering the effects of a Sunday night curry."
See WEIRD,Page 10