We didn’t believe it, but dynamic duo Emma Komlosh-Hrobsky ’08 and Allison Hollinger ’08 finished our oh-so-tricky Argus acrostic puzzle created by Biology Professor Allan Berlind in under two hours, and consequently won the grand prize of a WesCeleb interview with none other than their ex-roommate. Besides being puzzle-solver extraordinaires, the two have suffered the perils of late nights at the art studios, and have a few tips as to why being an archaeology major rocks, and why it was tragic that last year’s Terpsichore piece involving dinosaurs and Beyonce never saw the light of day.
Elyssa Pachico: So how long did it take you to finish that puzzle?
Emma: Two hours. We got back from the dance performance at Psi U and just laid into that thing.
Allison: At one in the morning.
E: We didn’t use Google. We’d like that to be noted on the record, most definitely.
A: There was one clue where the answer was a word I’d never heard of before – ragamuffin?
E: We busted that ragamuffin.
EP: What else would you place prominently on your puzzle-solving resume?
E: I’m a fan of Cryptoquotes, that’s definitely my first love.
A: Monday New York Times crossword.
EP: Just Monday?
E: Not true, Allison’s a machine.
EP: Allison, you’re from Georgia—what do you find is the strangest thing about Yankees?
A: Their fascination with my lack of an accent. I’m from a city—maybe we just don’t do accents. People get really concerned and a little bit upset… [Also] we’re friendlier, we actually smile at each other on the street.
EP: You also bake red cakes.
A: I think that’s an old fashioned Southern thing. I made one for Emma’s birthday and everyone just looked really confused.
EP: Stop looking at my paper!
A: It’s making me nervous!
EP: They’re my questions, you’re not allowed to see them. Emma, you won an Olin Fellowship last semester, what project were you working on over the summer?
E: My thesis, it’s on Sylvia Plath. I went to Smith College and I got to read all her old letters and journals. It’s about self-representation in the late poetry of Sylvia Plath—there’s an actual subtitle but it’s too pretentious. I’m not gonna say it.
EP: You were also named a Wesleyan student poet last year.
E: One of five. You get your poems in a little anthology, and I think there’s supposed to be a reading, but I was abroad when that happened…I used to work for Hangman’s Lime and we got a whole range of bizarre things, these strange personal ramblings and highly pretentious haikus, and some poems that were actually really good.
EP: [As former architecture and painting majors] you guys have also spent a lot of time in the art studios.
A: I think it’s a mix of people who are really excited about art, and people who are really pretentious. It’s a lot of fun if you’re there with people who actually want to be doing things, but then when you get that one kid…[Groans].
E: The best part is when everyone’s sleeping under their canvasses and eating food that somebody stole from Weshop.
A: We kept finding beer cans in the architecture studio. It was like, who had a party in here? We used to watch Disney movies in there.
E: We never did that!
EP: You’re an archaeology major. How would you describe the archaeology program here at Wesleyan?
A: Tiny. And that every story that every archaeology professor will ever tell you will have to do with beer. Every story that you read in an archaeology book will have to do with beer.
EP: Why is that?
A: I don’t know! It’s like every excavation ends with getting drunk in a pub. I didn’t realize how clever I was when I picked this major. It’s gonna be fun.
EP: You did some archaeology in Belgium. Did you find any skeletons?
A: I dug in a castle—I found cow bones and smaller mammalian things. We were working in the inner bailey [the courtyard], and they didn’t tell us the research paradigm that they were using. We were just told to dig. We had trowels and kitchen spoons and pick-axes. We found a hand grenade from World War I. Not supposed to be there. Our professor claimed it was supposed to be the top of the bedpost, which it clearly was not.
EP: You didn’t find any skeletons when you were looking at sites in Greece during study abroad last semester?
A: No, sadly. I could go hide a skeleton for you, but one of you would have to die. Everyone would get to find it!
EP: This interview just took a bad turn…Emma, you used to do ballet—weren’t you almost in a Terpsichore dance involving dinosaurs last year?
E: I was supposed to be in two different Terp dances last year, but they got canceled at the last minute—I guess the director didn’t have time to run them anymore. That was my short-lived dance career here. I was going to be a dinosaur—the dance was about the battle between robots and dinosaurs for control of Mocon. It would have been pretty hot.
EP: And Beyonce was a character who was in there too, somehow?
E: Yeah, Beyonce was in there as some sort overlord of Mocon. I’m not too sure exactly anymore. There was going to be a fiddle solo at the beginning—I don’t know, I didn’t design any of this. That was going to be the work of Joe John [Sanchez ’07].
EP: Don’t you have a famous grandfather?
A: Harry Callahan. He’s a photographer—there’s a show right now in Atlanta called ‘Eleanor,’ who’s my grandmother…They had an article in The New York Times, if anyone wades through the arts section, which is what that is. [Points to article on refrigerator]. The opening was on the second day of classes, and I’m really mad I missed it, because they had really good food. I’m a little bit bitter, I’m not gonna lie.
EP: One last question. What was it like having me as a roommate?
E: A source of constant excitement.
EP: I hope that’s a good thing.
A: You weren’t really in the room a lot freshman year. I think I would say, “friendly popping into the room.”
EP: I guess I was off doing freshman things.
E: Yeah, like [name of ex-boyfriend].
EP: That name isn’t going in the article.
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