MAHDI: Close Encounters

When a BBC crew ventured out into St. Andrew’s Bay in South Georgia, they aspired to capture revealing footage of a king penguin colony in its natural habitat. During filming that November, excitement and fascination drove the persistent travelers to these baffling creatures in search of answers and behavioral enlightenment. What they discovered was a bemusing way of life that seemed almost human in its construction. Dozens of penguins were lining up on their home glacier, waiting to immerse their bodies in cool water and thick mud. Apparently calming mud treatments are not only enjoyed by lovers of leisure in between their weekly squash games and seaweed wraps. Penguins in the wild have also learned to appreciate finer comforts in life, despite the whole site reeking of penguins’ body odor mixed with fresh mud and chilly air, which is indicative of a few minor details that take away from the serenity of animal spa experiences.

Conversely, when Michael Jackson’s doctor was found guilty of assisted manslaughter, he was painted as an inhuman beast. If politicians in Europe are dropping from office like flies, convicts are societal aliens, and penguins are pursuing human relaxation techniques, you can’t help but wonder what exactly it means to be human. Perhaps our preoccupation with extraterrestrial life is borne from a call for affirmation. With various facets of life appearing so transient, it’s tempting to become enraptured with matters outside of our own world.

One would assume news of an impending giant asteroid gliding past Earth would cause alarm and chaos. Instead, like children pressing their noses to the window glass of a candy store, experts and enthusiasts waited in anticipation. Instead of shying away in fear, numerous specialists stared imminent doom directly in the face. A myriad of telescopes pointed to the sky in suspense. Catapulting past at 30,000 miles per hour, the rocky intruder never posed a serious threat to our planet, but many reveled in a feeling of elated recklessness. The extraterrestrial body reached its closest proximity to Earth in about two centuries. Even a brief glimpse of what is essentially a giant piece of rock hurling itself through time and space elicits eager observation and scientific development. On the other hand, in response to avid petitions from about 17,000 citizens to publicize government intelligence on alien contact, the White House disappointed by stating no such contact has occurred. Experts have further dampened any hopes of us coexisting with our potential alien counterparts by stating that distances, both physical and chronological, may ensure that conversation with other intelligent life forms may never materialize. And here you thought a long-distance relationship on Earth was strenuous.

Our current economic and political climate can only be described as a tumultuous storm. A study on hummingbirds found that when faced with wet weather, they combat the rain by shaking their heads with such speed and intent, they move side to side more than twice as fast as an average racing car. An action most fitting in describing Europe’s political crumbling in the past few days. It could be advisable that we do the same to begin to recover from such a haphazard mess. Greece, the ailing great grandmother of the European Union family, has just lost her prime minister, George Papandreou. Relieved from such an unenviable position, the exhausted politician seemed much like a tired sea captain finally abandoning ship. We have witnessed the final fall of Italy’s prime minster, Silvio Berlusconi, into the bowels of political defeat and public scrutiny. While his tenure may be immortalized for shady proceedings in his private rooms as opposed to public policy, his departure will prompt serious questions about the future of Italy and her European counterparts. An asteroid may have missed our planet by a small distance, but tremors of uncertainty have threatened to ravage its surface regardless of seismic activity.

Pulses race at a mere thought of a close encounter. You can feel it brushing past a stranger unexpectedly in a busy hallway. Exhilaration as you prepare to jump out of a hovering aircraft and freefall into your first skydive. A jolt of adrenaline when you narrowly dodge impending danger. A leap of faith into the unknown. For a select few, it may even be attempting to smuggle live animals out of pet stores by shoving poor unsuspecting creatures into their pants. CNN saved us scouring the Internet for suspect shoplifting cases by shortlisting some gems. Two horrifying examples included a woman attempting to transport a fur coat out of a store by stuffing it in her underwear, and a man smuggling snakes out of a pet store. Thankfully for a significant majority of us, we don’t need to smuggle wildlife down our trousers to boast living life on the edge.

Sofiya Mahdi is a sophomore in the College of Arts & Sciences and a weekly columnist for The Daily Free Press. She can be reached at sofiya21@bu.edu.