August 15, 2020

It was the first day of class and the teacher had us do an experiment. She handed everyone a metal spoon and a toothbrush and told us to stand apart from each other facing the wall. She asked us to start brushing along the curve of the spoon. I held the spoon and toothbrush horizontally in both hands as I brushed into the concave part of the spoon.

After a few moments, she instructed us to start turning the spoon, while maintaining the brushing motion. I took this to mean along the long axis of the spoon - and did so until I was brushing thin air while the spoon was now above the brush.

Our teacher reported that only about half of the class kept turning the spoon when it stopped being in contact with the toothbrush. She used this as a basis for splitting the class into two groups who would “work well together.”

I didn’t even know anyone’s faces yet.

–

We were talking about going to Japan sometime soon when I was told that one of our friends got busted in their own home for not declaring goods while entering the country.