Pakistani Students Detained at U. of Oklahoma
By Ryan Chittum Oklahoma Daily
(U-WIRE) NORMAN, Okla. – A federal law enforcement agency has detained three Pakistani University of Oklahoma students, including the president of the Pakistani Student Association.
Which agency arrested the three was not disclosed, but a source said the students were picked up Thursday because of immigration irregularities.
Electrical engineering junior Mohammad Yaseen Haider, business senior Nabeel Khalid and computer engineering senior Mohammad Imran Shaikh were all roommates at 207-B Wadsack Drive in Kraettli Apartments, an OU complex south of Lindsey Street.
Neighbors saw three law enforcement agents searching the apartment last week for about an hour.
The agents also searched the students’ computers.
In September, Haider, president of the Pakistani Student Association, said three men attacked him because he is Arab.
Two were OU students, and President David Boren expelled one and brought student-code violation charges against the other.
The FBI would not confirm if it or the Immigration and Naturalization Service were involved in the students’ arrests.
“We’re not commenting on any aspect of the investigation,” said FBI spokesman Gary Johnson.
On Tuesday, Boren released a statement concerning the arrests.
“Details about the facts have not been released to us by law enforcement agencies, so we don’t know enough to comment at this time,” he said.
“It is important to remember that the vast majority of our international students are outstanding citizens of the university community who have the same concerns and values as Oklahomans and Americans.”
Two other men who lived in Kraettli Apartments, University College senior Hussein Al-Attas and Mukkaram Ali, have been under arrest since the week after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks because of their friendship with suspected terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui, who is also a former Norman resident.
Al-Attas and Ali lived at 209-A Wadsack Drive in an apartment which they did not lease.
The apartment is adjacent to the building the three Pakistani students lived in.
OU Legal Counsel said no agency has subpoenaed any records relating to Haider, Khalid or Shaikh.
OU Department of Public Safety chief Joe Lester said his department knows nothing about the arrests.
California Students Add New Meaning to Road Trips
By Andy Jacobs The Lariat
(U-WIRE) WACO, Texas – Since John Belushi uttered the words “road trip” in the classic film “Animal House,” hitting the pavement has been a college tradition. For five graduates from California, it’s become a way of life.
For the last few months the group, called Road Trip Nation, has been traveling across the country in an unmistakable green RV talking to people they find inspiring. On Monday, the group coaxed Dell CEO and founder Michael Dell into the RV in Austin for an interview, and on Tuesday they stopped at Baylor University to talk to students on campus and in classrooms.
The group hopes to help people who may not know what they want to do after college life ends, group member Nate Gephard said.
“Some of us are lost in what we want to do in life,” he said. “We are on a mission to help students listen to themselves.”
The group originated in a class taught at Pepperdine University by Blaine McCormick. McCormick eventually moved to Waco, Texas, to teach at Baylor, but not before advising Gephard and Mike Marriner, another student, to do something out of the ordinary.
It came in the form of a road trip the two took between the summer of their junior and senior years.
They purchased the RV from Marriner’s father and hit the road, hoping to pick up wisdom by talking to intriguing people like Jack Kemp, John Wooden and Tommy Lasorda.
The trip was a success, so the two decided, with the help of cCormick, to start a class at Pepperdine and coordinate future road trips.
“My dad taught me to take someone out to lunch and learn how they got where they are,” Gephard said. “So we started a class where we get credit for taking someone out to lunch.”
Perhaps the most amazing thing about Road Trip Nation is the people with whom they’ve been able to speak while on the road and how they did it: cold calls. Gephard said all their sponsorships and people with whom they’ve talked have come from relentless calling and deft phone skills.
After months of being ignored by the office of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Conner, Gephard tried a different approach.
He finally resorted to a cold call to her office, in which he insisted he was disconnected from the justice and asked to be connected to her desk.
After schmoozing with her assistants, the parties set up a meeting to speak a few months down the road. Gephard said it took two years to set up the appointment with Dell.
Fraternity Students Charged with Kidnapping Student
By Larissa Fair & Jenna Blandford The Tartan
(U-WIRE) RADFORD, Va. – Last weekend four new members of Sigma Pi Sigma at Radford University were charged with a felony.
Christopher Adam Tate, 18; Alex Cruz, 18; Chris Hilleary, 20; and Brian Du Val, age unknown, were charged by Radford (Va.) Police Friday for abducting an RU student.
These charges can carry a sentence of 20 years to life.
According to Sigma Pi Sigma President Fredric Teerling, on Nov. 4 four new members picked up Sigma Pi Sigma brother Ryan Tucker at his home. Similar to a scavenger hunt, their quest was to find a brother and “kidnap” him.
According to Sigma Pi Sigma brothers, Tucker, a sophomore, was bound by duct tape and taken down to Veteran’s Field where he underwent such rituals as being covered in flour and having a mustache drawn on him. The boys then took him back to Norwood Hall, where the fraternity holds its weekly meeting.
Upon their return, a Resident Director in Norwood found the men bringing Tucker to a room and questioned them.
At 7:45 p.m. the police were called and arrived on the scene immediately to question Tucker and another brother, Jason Burnete, who happened to stumble upon the group.
A picture was taken of Tucker bound in duct tape, and he was asked to give names of the new members who abducted him.
He also was asked to press charges against them, which he refused.
When asked to comment, Tucker said, “I was laughing the whole time; it was a joke. Every brother experiences it; I wasn’t harmed and nothing bad happened.”
Teerling said, “The problem perhaps is not in the actual incident but in the way that Sigma Pi Sigma has been scapegoats and harassed over such a middle-school prank.”
Sigma Pi Sigma is an off-campus, nonrecognized fraternity and therefore does not follow rules or regulations from National headquarters or rules from RU, like recognized Inter-fraternity organizations do on-campus.
“We have a reputation for being the bad boys,” said Vice President Drew Short, a senior. “We are being used as an example, when really we are not doing anything different than anyone else; in fact, it is not even as bad as what a lot of people do or imagine that we do.”
Foods Can Affect Mood
By Lyndsay Lundgren Mustang Daily
(U-WIRE) SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. – King Montezuma drank liquid chocolate to increase his libido – guys, don’t get any ideas.
Chocolate has long been considered an aphrodisiac, beginning with the Greeks and Indians who called it the “nourishment of the gods.”
The list of foods that can, or supposedly can, affect moods is long. From bananas and basil to coffee and coriander, a mixture of ancient traditions and scientific proof categorizes these foods as “mood influencers.”
Ancient traditions did have roots in reality. Food was not as widely and readily available in ancient times, and undernourishment created a loss of libido. In general, food increased libido and fertility rates; some were considered aphrodisiac because of their physical resemblance to genitalia.
“Most of it is a myth,” said Tom Neuhaus, associated professor of food science and nutrition. “There is relatively little conclusive evidence that says food impacts mood.”
Other foods have arguable scientific support for their mood-changing powers. Not only can foods positively affect moods, but they can also aggravate symptoms of anxiety. Caffeine, sugar and alcohol are considered to be the three greatest aggravators of anxiety, according to anxietybusters.com.
Some nutritionists deny a link between food and mood.
“It is premature to say that food impacts mood,” Neuhaus said. “It probably does, but it is so hard to define mood.”