Well you might want to think again, because according to prominent Mayan scholar and Yale College Dean Mary Miller, the world will not end in 2012.
“I’m no seer, but I am confident that December 22 will see the dawn,” Miller wrote in a special report to CNN.
In an attempt to dispel the widespread “hoopla” and rapid stockpiling of post-apocalyptic supplies, Miller said in her report that she believes the world, will indeed, go on past December.
But Miller also took the opportunity as a teaching lesson, instructing readers that there is much to learn from the Mayans, who, at the brink of their civilization’s collapse, blithely continued their unsustainable way of life. In light of the devastation created by Hurricane Sandy and the real threat of global warming, Miller warned us that we cannot follow the Mayan lead, but rather, must tackle our environmental challenges directly and honestly. Otherwise, she warned, we may become victims of our own “brewing apocalypse.”
But for now, Miller says that we’ll all live to see second semester — so you might want to go ahead and study for that final.
Somewhere in the Dominican Republic, Jordi anxiously hauls sandbags onto the side of a road. Meanwhile, Cora panics amidst the traffic as she attempts to evacuate Manhattan by car. In another hemisphere, Akbar hurries to take shelter in his home in Karachi, Pakistan, as Jack buckles the seatbelt and ducks on his flight to China. It’s Dec. 21, 2012. And it is real. Suddenly, the Dominican Republic goes underwater, and Jordi’s frail body is washed into the Caribbean. Cora looks out the window, just in time to see a massive tsunami pummel New York. The ground splits underneath Akbar’s home in a violent earthquake, and he falls into an endless crevice. Jack screams and watches the destruction below his flight — but suddenly, a meteor falls from the sky and strikes his plane. But wait! It’s actu- ally Dec. 7 — the beginning of the WEEKEND. You have two weeks to prepare, and two weeks to anticipate your ending. How will you survive? How will you perish? WEEKEND investigates.
As we know it
// BY CINDY OK
It was the end of the world. When my parents went to New York one weekend 15 years ago and forgot to tell my sister and me. When my second-grade best friend Emily’s family moved away and we didn’t stay in touch. When I came to college, leaving the place — and all the people — I loved most. In each of those moments, I thought to myself. with childlike earnestness, everything has changed — everything.
And in some ways, everything did change, because it wasn’t just that it felt like the end of the world, it was the end of A World. But those were different worlds than my world today, weren’t they? And my world that I call “the world” today will end — maybe when I move back to California, maybe on Dec. 21, maybe before this goes to print.
Some of my favorite people in the world are graduating this spring, and you should know that it really is the end of the world. Everything will change, because everything can’t stop changing.
The world is always ending, and our hearts are always breaking, but we separate the zombie movies and the Oakland evangelicals’ predictions, and we go on. We get out of bed, we feed the cats in our backyards, we laugh till we almost vomit with the people we love and stop and chat with people we have to tolerate. Because those things are part of what it means to be one of the living, and we’re one of the living as long as we continue to be.
I know that’s a tautology, but are you really about to judge me on the strength of my reasoning at this very moment when we both know that the world is about to end?
And I feel fine
// BY AARON GERTLER
“12/21/12 survival tips?” Bah! If almost everyone’s dead and the world is covered in water/blood/zombies/killer bees/fire/ice/Britney Spears backup dancers, what’s the point of surviving? The real killer app for the apocalypse is ensuring one’s place in the world to come. Each of these tips you remember will increase your chance of a happy afterlife by 33 percent. The other 1 percent involves you being part of the 1 percent, in which case you’re reading this on an escaping space shuttle and chuckling to yourself.
1)If the afterlife is real: There are way too many gods for you to please many of them in the scant weeks remaining, but material trickery is much easier to plan for. When the looting begins, find a costume shop and grab a monk’s robe, a nun’s habit, a Sufi turban, a kippah, a toga and Groucho Marx glasses in case you get to an underworld you don’t recognize. With the right disguise, and given the billions of souls they’ll have to process, you should slip on by to heaven/paradise/Valhalla/whatever.
2)If karma is real: You’ll want to be reborn as a life-form that thrives in the post-oblivion world. I suggest great white shark or honey badger, depending on whether there’s any dry land around. Either way, that’s just a step below human, so commit a minor sin within the next two weeks. Which sin is up to you, but I’m partial to lust and gluttony.
3)If aliens are real: bone up on your math and mime skills. You’ll have to impress them enough to seem worthy of rescue; linguistic babble and/or your political science term paper won’t cut it.
Personally, I plan to mix things up by sneaking onto the space shuttle in Groucho Marx glasses. We all just need to do what comes naturally.
Lama Wilds gets s000 schwasty
// BY WILL ADAMS
I don’t know about you, but I want the apocalypse to be something I REMEMBER. We get so caught up in the hustle and bustle of preparing for the end of the world — everyone’s milling about, all, “Of COURSE I’m stealing this king-size bag of Sour Skittles and a copy of ‘Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter’ on Blu-ray because ‘HELLO the WORLD IS ENDING’” and, “What if Karmin doesn’t release another Gucci Mane cover before then, OH NO!” If we don’t take the time to step back and take a breather, we’re not going to remember the important stuff.
That’s why I’m hosting a celebration where we dedicate our last few days to treasuring these moments for posterity! It’ll be at my swanky apartment in Chicago; everyone’s free to come! I’ll set up a fun photo booth so we can take pictures, we can write letters to ourselves in the future, and — this is the best part — we’ll make a time capsule and bury it in Lincoln Park, so 15 years later we can dig it up and see just how much we’ve changed!
So it’d be really awesome if you came. I understand that people are really busy leading up to The Day, so I’ve decided to schedule the party afterwards, on Dec. 22. It’s kinda cheeky, right? Can’t wait!
Will’s “Remember December Forever Bash!”
9 p.m. on Dec. 22, 2012
Will’s Super Cool Chicago Pad
Chicago, Ill. (duh)
BYOB
RSVP at william.adams@yale.edu
Knee pains > World pains
// BY LARA SOKOLOFF
During the last alleged apocalypse, I was in my bed. I was supposed to have arrived at school by 9 a.m. for a club event. At 11 a.m., I rolled over to find multiple missed calls and text messages inquiring after my whereabouts. I had slept through my alarm — happens to the best of us. Most of the text messages and voice mails either directly or indirectly alluded to the apocalypse and how I had somehow managed to be its only victim.
And for this alleged apocalypse, I again expect to find myself in my bed. But unlike last time, I won’t be sleeping through alarms and rolling over to fan mail on my current location. I’ll be recovering from knee surgery.
Backstory: two weeks into freshman year, I tore my ACL. I decided to try out for the girls’ club soccer team the night before tryouts. Having not touched a soccer ball for two years, I knew my chances of making the team were slim, but I saw almost no possible pitfalls. Worst-case scenario, I wouldn’t make the team, and I would be exactly where I had been had I not tried out at all. Fast forward to day three of tryouts and picture me posted in my bed, my knee swollen to double its size with an ice pack on top of it to somewhat mitigate the situation.
So what am I doing to prepare for the apocalypse? I’ll be going extra-hard at my biweekly physical therapy sessions with my physical therapist, Nick.
Me and Jose by the meteors
// BY CHLOE DRIMAL
Dec. 21st: my 22nd birthday. I’ll be drinking margaritas in Mexico with those closest to me — my family and a man named Jose. Even the end of the world can turn into a party. Guess the Mayans meant for me to die at 21.
Sex = Death
// BY MILA HURSEY
In season 3 of the “The Walking Dead,” Lori dies from childbirth. Duh. People have babies when they have sex, and lots of women die from it. There are only two solutions to this problem when you’re about to enter an apocalyptic scenario: Have some foresight by taking control of all the contraceptives and OB-GYNs. You will be rich because you can grow food. You can’t grow condoms. Alternatively, you can bump ‘n grind willy nilly and have babies cut out of you. Good luck with that.
I write to you as a concerned citizen and student. I write to you to ask a simple question: how prepared is Yale to defend itself against the very worst? And yes, I am referring to an elaborate monthlong siege of Yale in the event of a zombie apocalypse. Does Yale have a contingency plan? Are there evacuation, defense and sustaining procedures in place for a “zompoc” scenario? If not, I feel it my duty to present to you my expert opinion.
Let us consider, as stated, the necessity of surviving a month on our own. The National Guard will not reach Yale until that time in this scenario. We are alone. What will most likely occur, given Yale’s current levels of preparedness? The most practical method is to assess the likelihood of success for each of Yale’s major housing areas.
Old Campus and off-campus housing
The lowest hanging fruits. Let’s just take that one for granted. Chances of survival: negligible.
Timothy Dwight and Silliman
The isolated colleges. TD’s large front gate will prove difficult to barricade, as will its open courtyard. TD students’ proclivity towards swapping saliva with one another will cause the zombie strain to spread quickly — that’s the price of college-cest, kids. Chances of survival: low.
With four airy gates and, again, a wide-open courtyard, Silliman students will have a difficult time properly defending themselves from assault. While Silliflicks, the Sillibuttery and the Sillikitchen might prove to be valuable Silli-safe houses, the rest of the Silli-college will prove Silli-indefensible. Chances of survival: Silli-low.
Morse and Stiles
You would think the zombies would bypass these two colleges because of their sheer fugliness. Not so. Recently emboldened after taking over Sushi Mizu and Popeye’s, the zombie masses will gain entrance to the courtyard. As the undead cannot feel pain, they will quickly smash through the large glass panes separating the Morse-Stiles dining hall complex from the outside, overrunning the entire complex. Chances of survival: low.
Davenport-Pierson complex
This one is tricky. Davenport students, defending the front gate and the Park Street entrance, can last quite a while. From the Dport dining hall, they can even fire upon zombies assaulting Pierson through whatever people call that alley thing. However, the number of Park and Elm Street entrances to the complex, and the fact that if one college falls, the other falls with it, is a fatal flaw in this scenario. Chances of survival: medium.
Calhoun
In this scenario, the most … okay, let’s all be honest. Given Calhoun’s inability to do anything bordering on positive in intramural sports and the fact that the entire college is just literally a giant square, they’re screwed. Granted, Hounies’ ambivalence for everything might catch the zombies off-guard, so I don’t even know. Chances of survival: medium, but who really cares?
Berkeley
I’m inclined to say that the North-South division will be a handicap for the college’s defenses, as will the easily scaled walls and flimsy gates. If all BK students massed in South Court, but still defended the buttery under North Court for food, they might have a fighting chance. Chances of survival: medium.
Jonathan Edwards
With three small gates, JE students will stand a solid chance of fighting back the hordes. If zombies enter the courtyard, JE students can continue to fight back from the complicated system of libraries that JE is somehow allowed to have. Cornered up there, though, students will eventually run out of lobster dinners. Regardless — chances of survival: high.
Branford and Saybrook
Although the complex has as many as six gates, all are small, giving their student population enough of a presence to properly guard the entrances. However, as with other college pairs, their fates are intertwined. The remainder of the Yale community would lament the fall of Branford. Somehow, though, I think we can all manage without Saybrook. Chances of survival: high.
Trumbull
Yale’s smallest college, and a “granite fortress” according to Master Janet Henrich. On three sides, Trumbull is surrounded by a moat, with the fourth shared with the impregnable cliff face of Sterling Memorial Library. In the unlikely event that the zombies break through one of the two small gates, Trumbull students can mass in one of three compact courtyards, each easily defended via a smattering of small archways. Should Trumbull students require a last resort, they can all regroup in one of the four independent towers of the college. This battle plan could successfully hold for a month. Chances of survival: very high.
So, Mr. President-Elect, this is the scenario Yale faces. We are nowhere near prepared to withstand the full force of an all-out undead assault upon Yale. President Levin has failed to plan for the worst. Will you?
