Day 14
(This is the only picture I could find of a prominent figure gracing the stage of the Satellite Student Union at Fresno State University.)
I love that Fresno State has a University Lecture series to invite distinguished guests to speak and spread their words of encouragement, humor, provocateur, and other though-provoking orations. You can see these guests, depending on who, for an average of about $3-5 or if you’re a student at Fresno State, free!
Over the years, I’ve gotten to see Mo Rocca begin his entire presentation with a humorous several minute nod to Fresno including many things people never knew including the volume of our water tower, fertile soil by building canals, and raisins being an accident. You know, typical Mo Rocca rambling if you’ve never listened to him as a contestant on NPR’s Wait, Wait! Don’t Tell Me! when he doesn’t know the answer to a question, he’ll come up with an intricate story through improv.
Just recently, I got to see Ben Stein lecture on how to save this country from an economic meltdown followed by a question and answer. The thing I remember most was a 24 year old student mentioning his 401K and Ben Stein sort of laughing at him and telling him to take it easy and let that wait for a few more years.
These two speakers just scratch the surface of what the University Lecture Series has to offer. One lecture I was not able to attend due to not buying my tickets early was Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman from Discovery Channel’s “Mythbusters”. I was pretty bummed to not be in attendance. I’ve also gotten to see the charming man behind the “Series of Unfortunate Events” series Daniel Handler. Sergiou Arau and Yareli Arizmendi spoke to a predominantly Latino audience through their work “A Day Without a Mexican”.
All of these speakers have been very entertaining and life-altering to me on a cosmic level. These people you see on TV and hear on the radio are just regular people that have something to say just like you and me and I’m astounded by it. I got the pleasure to meet most of these people afterwards and they seem to be a lot like the friends I hang out with. Even as a graduate, I plan on keeping up with the University Lecture Series to be enlightened by the guest speakers they invite on stage.
This is why I love Fresno.
=ryne=
