The Sounds of Silence

Wednesday nights, in a grad school sense, are no different this year than they were the last. I have two different classes for two hours apiece, severely cutting into my “Hey Chris, you need to watch Lost!” time from 6-10pm after work. The first class is Business Government Relations, where I can now say I’ve read Wealth of Nations by the father of capitalism, Adam Smith. I commend Adam Smith, who managed to have made a place for him in history books, overcoming an incredibly dull name. Had his name been something catchy, like Mercutio de Freefrenchfries, he’s a guaranteed best seller for centuries.

The second class is Project Management. For those who are not project managers (current typers inclusive), this is a course designed to teach an applied method to make the big picture no more than a box of organized puzzle pieces (Insert Kelly Barrett joke here.) But here’s where my class differs from the Mr. deFreefrenchfries class. This method is effectively a science. There’s a right and a wrong, and if one can grasp the former, they’re set – both in practice and on tests. And what’s more, there are textbooks that clearly delineate said science. What does this all mean?

Condon can get an A, learn the stuff, and make class time observations for YAB – at the same time.

First off, there’s a girl in my class you I am completely in awe of. She’s completely deaf and is pursuing her MBA. She sits in the front row, and can only comprehend the lecture via the translation provided by her two interpreters. The reason there are two are because, like a well-coached hockey team, they make line changes when they get winded or their sign language skills are wearing down. A typical shift lasts about 20-25 minutes. There is no penalty box for inaccurate translation. (But there probable is a cool translation for penalty box.)

On the other end of the exchange is the girl. The most impressive thing about her? In order to fully understand the lecture, she must pay attention for 110 consecutive minutes. If she puts her head down or her eyes start wandering about the room, she misses what is being taught. If for some reason I had a candle in class, I surely wouldn’t be able to hold it to her. After all, putting my head down or having my eyes wander about the room are two of the things I do best. Without these two key distraction methods, I wouldn’t be able to write blog, do other homework/reading, and most importantly, prepare for the upcoming fantasy hockey draft.

But in this class, the translator(s) gives me little reason to put my head down. Why? Sign language is incredibly mesmerizing. I find myself watching the hands that convert the professor’s droning more than the professor’s slides. For most words, there are signs. For those without signs, the translators will spell them out at the speed of wow. But for a topic as unique and specialized as project management, there are already a lot of pre-programmed words. And what’s more, these translators know it. Last night, I watched signs whiz by for “jargon, mutually exclusive, and compartmentalized structure.” Unbelievable.

While these words are all rare, they aren’t exactly entertaining (now you have an idea of how thrilling project management is). I do spend some time praying that the prof will use some bizarre and funny words in his lectures. Come on, talk about a blimp or a platypus or a flugelhorn – I gotta know the signs for those words. Sadly, I’ve thumbed through the syllabus. Not a whole lot of sections regarding duckbilled dirigibles. That play in the marching band.

I wonder if she takes foreign language courses. Now that would be an impressive translator.