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The University Daily Kansan
THE STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS Tuesday. May 1, 2001
Sports: Softball player gets asked a special question after Saturday's game. SEE PAGE 1B
Inside: KU professor finds evidence that dinosaurs may have had feathers.
(USPS 650-640) • VOL. 111 NO. 132
SEE PAGE 3A
For comments, contact Lori O'Toole or Mindie Miller at 864-4810 or editor@kansan.com
WWW.KANSAN.COM
International students must adjust to laws about alcohol
By Michelle Ward
writer@kansan.com
Kansas staff writer
Kazumi Maniwa is puzzled by American alcohol laws.
She is one of many international students used to lax drinking laws in their home countries surprised to find out that Americans check IDs at bars and liquor stores.
When Maniwa, Izumo, Japan, graduate student, found out alcohol laws were stringently enforced, she thought it was a rule only in Kansas. She said she thought places like New York and California couldn't possibly follow such a strict policy.
"This is a country based on freedom," she said. "At least in Japan, we can have a drink when we want. People think Japan is very strict and controlling, but even it's legal age is 18."
Maniwa said she was never carded at bars or liquor stores in Japan, and that in high school, she would even have an occasional glass of wine or beer with her parents.
But restrictions on alcohol have a long history in the United States, said Richard Schur, visiting assistant professor.
fessor in
Answer
American Studies.
He said this level of acceptance didn't exist in America.
Prohibition was an obvious example, he said. The 18th Amendment took away brewers' and distillers' licenses in 1919, but was repealed in 1933 by the 22nd Amendment.
"People have traditionally tried to eradicate alcohol and drugs in this country." Schur said.
The drinking age was raised from 18 to 21 after
"At least in Japan,we can have a drink when we want. People think Japan is very strict and controlling, but even it's legal age is 18."
Kazumi Maniwa
Izumo, Japan,
graduate student
a federal mandate in the late 1970s to the early 1980s. To receive federal money to construct and improve roads, states had to enact the 21-year-old drinking age.
The federal government did this in part to cut down on drunk driving fatalities, Schur said. He grew up in Illinois where people had to be 21 to drink. But next door in Wisconsin 18-year-olds could legally drink.
cancer's note: This is the first in a series of stories about the way international students view American culture.
High school students would drive a couple of hours to get drunk at bars in Wisconsin and drive home drunk, Schur said.
Livia Theodoro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, freshman, said there were just too many rules about alcohol in the United States. She said its forbidden nature led to young people's abuse of alcohol.
Although the legal drinking age is 18 in Brazil, no one enforces it, and bars and liquor stores do not check IDs, Theodoro said. She said drinking was much more acceptable at home, and young people would often have a glass of wine with dinner. American students approach drinking differently than people from home, Theodoro said.
"They drink much more than Brazilians," she said. "Students here drink to get wasted. Brazilians socially drink."
And although Theodoro, who is 18,
doesn't drink, Matif Lajid, Peshawar,
Pakistan, senior, has taken a cup or two
from the keg. But he said Americans
drank too much.
"I have seen a lot of house parties where people just sit around the keg and get drunk," he said.
Growing up, he spent several summers in Europe, and became accustomed to their lax alcohol laws. He had never been carded until he came to the United States. It took him about a year to adjust to the laws on alcohol.
"I was surprised when they checked my ID for the first time," he said. "I had been used to sitting down at a bar and ordering anything."
- Edited by Jacob Roddy
Festival to help find 6-year-old child
Girl's mother says she is in Indonesia
By Erin Adamson
writer@kansan.com
Kanson staff writer
Tara Budiman and Tammy O'Shields are a Lawrence couple who have looked for Tara's daughter Miranda for two and a half years.
Tara says her ex-husband Iwan Budiman kidnapped Miranda when the girl was four, and Tara believes he has been holding the child in Indonesia. But so far, private investigators, calls to his family and an international crime alert from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation haven't brought Miranda home.
Sharon Sullivan, KU lecturer in theater and film and women's studies, is among
faculty and students who have organized the Miranda Film Festival to raise money to help the couple find Miranda.
The festival will present five lesbian films from 3 p.m. to midnight Saturday at 3199 Wescoe Hall. The Miranda Film Festival is free and open to the public, Sullivan said, but donations are appreciated.
Sullivan became interested in Miranda's story through Christine Robinson, graduate teaching assistant in Western Civilization and women's studies. Sullivan and Robinson organized The Vagina Monologues and invited Budiman and O'Shields to have a bake sale at the show to raise money for their search. But Sullivan said she wanted to do more and latched onto the idea of a film festival.
The four women will also be speaking at 6 p.m.tonight on KJHK's Real Talk radio show
Budiman said she hadn't seen Miranda
See CHILD on page 2A
Tara Budiman, left, and her partner Tammy O'Shields hold a photo of Budiman's missing daughter Miranda. Budiman says twan Budiman, the girl's father, took Miranda to Indonesia two and a half years ago, and the mother and daughter have not been in contact since. Photo by Laurie Sisk/KANSAN.
Rachel Magario fingers pages of braille text at her bedroom desk. Few university-level textbooks are available in braille, so Magario depends primarily on audio books provided by the University.
Sophomore envisions herself doing anything she wants
Rachel Magario, Santos, Brazil, sophomore, needs no music books to play popular piano tunes in her living room. Because she is blind, she learned to play songs by listening to them rather than by reading sheet music.
by cassio furtado kansan staff writer photos by matt j. daugherty kansan managing editor
Rachel Magariate strides down Jayhawk Boulevard with her dog Hamlet, smiling at people she can't see. She walks fast because four years have familiarized her with the routes she walks every day
From the voices of KU students, she recognizes friends speaking a language that was unfamiliar to her four years ago.
Her ears, nose, hands and mouth — and Hamlet's eyes — are her windows to the world. The Santos, Brazil, sophomore in journalism has been blind since a car accident at age 6.
Rachel, 24, is one of 13 visually impaired students at the University of Kansas and the
only blind international student.
She has struggled to master a new language in a foreign land, where just getting around campus can be a challenge. She has also worked hard to get the resources she needs for her classes, and she overcame a serious injury after being struck by a car on campus.
Rachel is determined to have a normal student life. She is active on campus, a member of the honors program and the vice president of the International Student Association.
For Rachel, blindness is just a detail, like being tall or short, blonde or brunette. It doesn't stop her from doing what she wants.
Learning independence
Rachel doesn't even remember the accident that blinded her.
I was just scared for a said. "I was afraid of darkness." But the transition to a life without vision wasn't difficult, Rachel said, because she was too young to understand what had happened or to know it would last forever. Also, Rachel had her family by
Also, Rachel had her family by her side.
Marilene Magario, Rachel's mother, was 34 and had four other children before Rachel was born.
The youngest of Marilene's children, Rachel always had received special attention. After Rachel was
See STUDENT on page GA
Hispanic conference leads teens on collegiate path
By Danny Phillips
writer@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
Area junior high and high school students were encouraged at every turn to pursue their education yesterday at the Hispanic American Leadership Organization's first student conference.
The conference, called "Cruzando El Puente (Crossing the Bridge): Taking the Next Step," served 80 students from the Lawrence, Topeka and Kansas City areas. They perused the Kansas Union, listened
to keynote speakers and attended workshops.
Eulalio Munoz, co-chair and Topeka sophomore, said the goal of the Hispanic leadership conference was to get across to students the importance of finishing high school and continuing their education beyond that.
"The younger you can get the message to them, the better," he said.
Munoz's co-coordinator, Belinda Hinojos, Kansas City, Kan., senior, said Hispanic students have the highest attrition rate of any group. Nationally, the
dropout rate among males is 32 percent and 21 percent among females.
"That's horrible," Hinojos said. "It doesn't matter if we're big in numbers if we're not educated."
The conference's workshop sessions dealt with subjects ranging from college scholarship ties to what it meant to be a Latino.
Robert Rodriguez, KU academic services coordinator, gave a multimedia presentation that explained the intricacies of Latino diversity.
Keynote speaker Luis Cordova, social worker and substance abuse counselor.
concluded the conference by challenging the students to make education a higher priority than their friends and social lives.
He said a "real man" didn't think about getting high and having sex all the time, and he told the females not to place their trust in men.
Ending on a positive note, Cordova said the key for young people was to begin thinking about each other as valuable.
"If you don't see hope, then something is wrong," he said.
- Edited by Jay Pilgreen
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