Brown and White Vol. 110 No. 4

              the brown and white lehigh university's student newspaper founded in 1894 vol 110 no 4 friday september 13 2002 all the lehigh news first grace hall to undergo renovations by jani actman news writer renovations on grace hall are to begin this fall after 10 years of plans the changes will increase the flow of students in the building enhance practice space and give spectator visibility to the sports programs the estimated cost of the construction is 48 million the new facility which will hold more than 2,200 people will include retractable seating in the lower stands providing a more flexible feeling for spectators than the current fixed stands all spec tators will have unobstructed views of the three lower full-sized multi-purpose courts new skybox areas will be built for yip seating and various social functions after the renova tions are complete there will be space for television and radio outlets for broadcasting purposes grace hall is home to lehigh's wrestling and volleyball teams as well as various intramural and club sports a locker room designed for the women's volley ball team will be part of the new facility along with locker rooms for visiting teams more storage areas are also part of the plan to accommodate the expected increase in spectators larger rest room facilities will also be built volleyball player jill racketa 05 is eager for the renovations the whole team is really excited racketa says hopefully the new gym will bring more fans and a higher energy level to the players there will be no change b&w photo by a uivmn cruz students practice their jousting in grace hall renovations are scheduled to begin on the sports facility later this fall blood drive to remember sept 11 by lauren eisner news writer the community service office along with the september 11 memorial committee sponsored a blood drive tuesday in the ulrich student center the event was incredibly successful for the miller memorial blood center the maximum number of donors for the drive was 100 and this goal was reached early the need for blood is con tinually an issue for the blood center the center is always low and the only time we were heavily stocked was during 9/11 said ed bandies mobile unit assistant for miller memorial we're always looking for donors the donations by lehigh students are greatly appreciat ed by the center bandies said we do need the blood we have a commitment to the hos pitals and if we don't receive blood then we must buy it he said the community service office struggled with having a blood drive last year but with their continued efforts and those of the sept 11 memorial committee drives were put into action this year in the past couple of months the center has been running dangerously low on blood supply community service office representative carolina hernandez said so we had a summer drive and for those on campus we shut tled people over to the center the process of blood dona tion brought on challenges for some students all of a sudden we saw a bunch of nurses pumping a student's legs and you could see the anxious looks on the other donors faces as they thought what did i get myself into'?"said eric binter 03 students had a positive experience at the drive they were really nice i donated blood before and here it was a lot quicker said courtney kelly 06 they were very considerate of people's concerns with needles sept 11 memorial commit tee chair megan meier was impressed with lehigh's response and concern we were very happy with the response to the bjood drive one-hundred people signed up in a four day period meier said the overwhelming willing ness of the lehigh community to donate shows the everlasting impactofsept.il hernandez felt that the drive is truly about remembrance of sept 11 and is a great way to continue remem bering and give back the next blood drive is planned for november and there is a competition involved between lehigh and other local colleges including lafayette and muhlenberg to see who receives the most blood middle east speaker offers opinion by blair tapper assistant news editor as part of the series of events to commemorate sept 11 lehigh's global union sponsored what was predicted to and turned out to be a controversial speaker the lecture regarded how the attacks affected middle eastern americans and the palestinian perspective on the world post sept 11 george hishmeh an american palestinian journalist currently writing a column for the gulf daily news spoke to stu dents and faculty tuesday after noon in his presentation entitled the middle eastern perspective what does the future hold bill hunter from the office of international students and scholars and global union intro duced hishmeh he reminded the audience of acknowledging the importance respecting the opin ions of various cultures americans live in a media bubble and primarily get their news from cnn it is a shame that we are not exposed to a variety of perspectives said hunter this lack of under standing is what to some degree causes tragedies like september 11 hishmeh's presentation was not limited to sept 11 and the resulting events rather it went into the israeli-palestinian conflict in detail hishmeh is a palestinian refugee who as he stated was forced out of his home in haifa in 1968 hishmeh feels that the american government has favored the jewish people it was from this portion of the lecture that many of the audience questions stemmed shanna marcus 05 an american-israeli attended the lecture hoping to grasp the palestinian view after listening to the speaker i found myself angered by some of his views marcus said while i understand that many palestinian people were forced to leave israel i did not appreciate his comments that bashed the israeli people just as hishmeh left his home in haifa my father lived their too it is dis turbing that they could have been neighbors the strong opinions that hishmeh expressed regarding israel were met with arguments see grace page 3 see speaker page 3 tennis team gears up for season see page 20 sports 17-20 field hockey 20 golf 18 technology upgrades for more speed see page 4 news 1-4 world news briefs 2 a look inside campus square see page 5 lifestyles 5-12 face in the crowd 11 matter of opinion 11 in tune 12 qgg until the 1960's men with long hair were not allowed to enter disneyland source:www.amusingfacts.com