Mr. Morley goes to Chicago

About 50 IU students from many walks of academic life including undergrads, grads and international students gathered at the Indiana Memorial Union Circle Drive in the cold last Saturday morning to board a Star of Indiana coach and sally-forth to the Midwest's favorite "Windy City" of Chicago.\nUnion Board planned the trip, and it was the first sponsored by the Union Board since a "Taste of Chicago" trip four years ago.\n"My committee members and I decided this would be a fun day-trip for students to get away and enjoy the urban Chicago lifestyle," said Roadtrips Committee Director Cory Buckner.\nThirteen other committee members aided Buckner in the planning and execution of the $20-per-person road trip.\nThe cold and rainy weather began in the morning and reminded everyone how spoiling the great, sunny weather of the last week or two had been. I was regretful myself. My Izod jacket and blue sportcoat were warm, but not that warm. I think the other 47 people on the bus felt the same way.\nI whacked my head on the overhead compartments as I bounced to the back of the bus so I could ask and see what a few of my fellow travelers expected to get out of the trip. I found out these expectations were just as individual as the people who had them.\n"I'm going to meet up with some friends and go shopping," said senior Shana Koslow, a gender studies major. \nKoslow lives in the Willkie Residence Center and learned about the trip by seeing one of the flyers on a bulletin board. Koslow, an Atlanta, Ga., native, says she prefers the metropolitan "bigness" of Chicago and plans on moving to the city that dreads the mention of Mrs. O'Leary's cow.\nBut unlike Koslow, some of the travelers didn't have to wait to get to Chicago to spend time with their friends.\n"I'm going shopping with my two sisters," said senior Sarah Glasgow.\nGlasgow, her two sisters and I talked over the sound of the movie playing over the bus' sound system. I didn't pay much attention to it. I typically don't watch movies with talking sponges named Bob.\nAbout three hours into the trip, Buckner came and sat next to me and I asked him what expectations he had for the trip.\n"I personally haven't been to Chicago, so I'm going into this with high hopes," Buckner said. "We try to plan trips that are both entertaining and educating. I think this trip is both."\nBuckner, by the way, comes across as a person with lots of ambition and a true zest for life. I found out through my interview with him that he is the son of Quinn Buckner, who played basketball for IU and was part of the 1976 season, when the team had a 32-0 record. I didn't actually know what a big deal this was until I got back to my office and started talking with some of my colleagues. My sports knowledge is a little lacking. The men in my family can't catch a cold, let alone a fly ball.\nWe got into Chicago and made the first drop-off of people at the museum campus. We pulled right up in front of the Shedd Aquarium. The museum campus, closely located to Grant Park, is a great place to visit because three fantastic museums are within walking distance of each other. \nSome people tell you how to find their house because it's the only one on the block with those tacky little pink flamingos. The same sort of thing holds true to the Field Museum. You can tell it apart from the other two museums because it's the only one with a mammoth dinosaur parked on the front lawn. \nThe Shedd Aquarium is a great place to go to find out everything you wanted to know about the undersea world. And if your fetish is celestial, at the far end of the campus right along the water is the Adler Planetarium. I have been in all three, and I think the Planetarium is by far my favorite. The Planetarium has one of the IMAX-like movie theaters. When I was last there in November 2002, I watched a really neat one about the sun, plasma and light rays. I would recommend this one over the Field Museum or the aquarium.\nAfter the Shedd stop, the bus hopped back onto Lake Shore Drive and buzzed passed the Museum of Science and Industry. \nIn my travels I've seen several museums. During a trip I made to the United Kingdom three years ago this June, I saw several museums in London including Churchill's War Rooms beneath the Ministry of Public Works and the Imperial War Museum housed in what was once the infamous insane asylum known as Bedlam. \nMy friends always did say I'd be in an asylum one day.\nThe IWM is a fantastic museum comprising several floors of exhibits dedicated to conflict. Especially "The Great War" and World War II. I saw real life WWII-era tanks, half-tracks, field artillery, an exhibit dedicated to the Holocaust, and I walked through a replicated WWI trench complete with sounds, mannequins and every other piece of human ugliness you could find. In my mind, nothing tops the Imperial War Museum. But Chi-town's Museum of Science and Industry with its Titanic exhibit and gift shop along with a German U-Boat make it a second on my list of favorites.\nBut if it were up to me, the Titanic would sink or the U-Boat would be depth charged every 15 minutes or so to provide the hands-on learning that educators agree is integral to the learning process.