When you go to college, you start to learn the jargon and code words for certain things on campus that someone at another school would have no idea what you're talking about. One of my favorite terms to come out of my Clark experience is the idea of "Clark far." Clark University is a very small campus, you could probably walk the entire perimeter in five minutes. When you go to a small school like Clark you forget that your friends from high school go to colleges where they have to take shuttle buses just to get from one class to the next. At Clark, you could leave for class 5 minutes before your class starts and still be early. Living on a small campus is a blessing and a curse. It's a blessing because everything is easily accessible. It's a curse because we all start to get lazy when we think about going anywhere that takes more than 5 minutes to get to. Thus the term "Clark far" was born. Being on a small campus has distorted our perception of distance and going anywhere off campus is far away, or even from one end of campus to the other. Places that Clarkies think are far away are probably really close in other people's minds. Here are some examples of Clark far.
Clark far is when you complain about your art class in Traina being "off-campus" but you literally just have walk down Downing Street for 5 minutes.
Clark far is when you live in JSC and you contemplate whether or not it's worth it to have dinner because the dining hall is so far away.
Clark far is when you live in Maywood, Hughes, or Dana but you still think Lasry is far away because it's across the street.
Clark far is when you're not in the mood to get run over by Worcester drivers on Main Street just to go to the LEEP center. Your future career can wait.
Clark far is when you live in Blackstone and you don't even bother leaving your apartment for the whole day because the rest of campus is too far away.
Clark far is when you dread having a class in JC because that's a lot of stairs to climb.
Clark far is when you plan your meals around when you will be closest to the dining hall. If you're hungry and your next class isn't in the direction of the dining hall, you're not having lunch right now.
Clark far is when the 10 minute walk to Big Y or CVS feels like 10 years, and you only go when you really need something.
Clark far is when you're lowkey dying and you still have no idea why Health Services is off campus, especially when there's three feet of snow on the ground and you can't even get out of bed.
Clark far is when you're an upperclassman who lived in Bullock freshman year and are now jealous of all the current freshmen who live there because it's right smack in the middle of campus and close to everything.
Clark far is when half the battle of going to the gym is deciding if it's worth it to walk to the gym.
Clark far is when you get really confused when your friends at other schools complain about the shuttle buses never running on time. What are buses?
Clark far is envying all your friends with cars.
Clark far is wondering how you're ever gonna live off campus your junior or senior year when you're so used to everything being near by.
Clark far is leaving for class 10 minutes early because you think it takes a long time to get there but it really takes like 3 minutes.
These are just some of the many examples of Clark far. Clark friends, leave a comment of your examples of Clark far!
