Today is Mountain Day.

Now, Mountain Day is a very weird annual tradition at Mount Holyoke College. It happens once a year every fall, but nobody knows what day it will be on.

On the morning of Mountain Day (which is only known to the President of MHC), the church bells are rung at 8am to tell people it’s Mountain Day. Classes are cancelled and we are all supposed to go climb Mount Holyoke.

Yes, that’s right.

Naturally this morning, when I woke up, went to the bathroom and was told it was Mountain Day, I did the only smart thing and jumped right back into bed.

I slept for 3 more hours and woke up at 11 cos Elise called me up and said we’re all going to Amherst for Chinese food!

So off we went.

::On the bus. L-R: Elise, Jeannie, Angela, AUDREY.::

::Us looking for the Chinese restaurant. But obviously its not in the alley::

::We’re stilll looking for the restaurant. Wow am I good at pan cute or what?::

::Found it, thank goodness. L-R: Elise, Mild, Carmen::

::Dammit. We did NOT know they were taking our pic. Sneaks!::

::After lunch. It was too hot for Audrey, hence the coat draped tudung-like over her head::

::Ditto. Today was 26C okay!!::

::Why don’t we get street names like this in Malaysia?::

::OMG this is a damn fugly shot. Bored and tired waiting for the bus. Angela is not trying to be breastfed, for your info::

::Why are the big ones sitting on the small? Apparently we’re still bored::

Oh ya, the Chinese food. If we were in Malaysia I would have whined and bitched then puked. Then asked for my money back. No lah, not that bad, it was nothing great. But I was so happy to eat it that even the yucky green vegetables also I sapu.

“I’m Ryan. Call me a boy. Don’t call me Mr Berman. That’s my father,” Berman, the Mount Holyoke junior lounged back in the green lawn chair and smiled. There was Ryan Berman: Mount Holyoke student; theatre major; transgendered dude.

Growing up in New Jersey and attending a Catholic high school, Ryan was involved in theatre and musical performance. These passions led him to apply to several colleges, including Drew, Douglas, Clark and Mount Holyoke.

“Mount Holyoke was my first choice. I got off the bus and saw someone wearing cow-print pajama pants in the afternoon and knew this is where I wanted to go.”

And attend Mount Holyoke he did. Since arriving, Ryan has made his mark on the theatre department and the illustrious M&C’s a capella group. Most importantly, Ryan learned the meaning of a very powerful word: “transgender”.

“I had no clue about trans-anything when I met Miles Goff [’04] my first year. I was at a party and was corrected about his pronouns and was like ‘Whoa…’ I didn’t sleep at all that night.”

What Ryan learned that night about transgenderism is this: “transgendered” refers to a person who feels the gender assigned to him or her at birth does not quite fit their self-definition or identification.

Some transgendered people choose to undergo hormonal therapy, surgeries and name changes in order to completely transition into another social gender. Miles changed his name legally and started hormone therapy (regular injections of testosterone) before graduating. Only time would show Ryan a similar path.

After much research and soul-searching, Ryan tested out what it would be like to live as a male.

“That March I started going by Taylor, then Ryan. Right around then, I hated the fact that I was female, but then I realised how cool it is to be someone’s boyfriend and know what it’s like to have a period, walk down a dark street alone at night with fear, or have guys stare at your breasts when you talk to them.”

While professors’ and friends’ understanding and support have never been a problem for him, Ryan experienced a lot of resistance to his decision at home.

“My mom was like ‘But you don’t even like sports!’ She also said, ‘I’m never going to call you a boy,’ ‘You’ll always be my daughter’ and ‘Why can’t you just be gay?’ This summer she had to call me her son, though, just not to look like a fool. People looked at her weird when she called me her daughter.

“Nobody in my family wants me to take T [testosterone], They’re worried that I’m impulsive, but I’ve been out for a year and a half. Looking back, I’ve always been a guy. I’ve always been uncomfortable with my breasts, so even if I decide not to transition completely, I still want my breasts gone.

“I’ve always imagined having a penis… I’ve never felt sexual as a woman. And I don’t identify penis with male, but rather penis with ego. I don’t need a penis to be a guy.”

A lot of gender theorists would agree with Ryan. As Susan Parsons writes in “The Ethics of Gender”, “Is the amtter of bodies some preexisting stuff onto which cultural definitions and categories write, or do bodies themselves come to matter through our knowing and understanding of them?” In other words, do our biological bodies define themselves or is it society and culture that label them for us? Ryan would rather overlook the question altogether and shoot straight for the point.

“I don’t believe in all that theory. I just know I feel comfortable when people call me ‘he’ or ‘sir’.”

So far, Ryan has met little trouble garnering acceptance from students at Mount Holyoke.

“I’ve never had a problem with students here. They always apologise for asking questions about me and transgenderism, but I want them to ask questions; how else will they ever know? I’d rather them ask than assume.”

Ryan plans on continuing work with his local therapist and has almost enough money saved for his “top surgery” (double masectomy or complete breast removal).

He hopes to soon change his name legally to Ryan but is in no hurrt to start taking testosterone, as the vocal changes might ruin his career as an M&C. His friends, professors and employers know and respect his transition and he hopes to find the same with incoming students and the generations to come.

“This is a very liberal and accepting collehe and it’s the best place to transition, but it’ll be so hard to go in for a job and have an all-women’s college on my resume because I’ll look like a guy.”

“In the meantime, firsties don’t know we exist yet, but they will. Yes, we do go to an all-women’s school. SOme of us don’t identify as women. Some of us don’t identify as anything. Some of us identify as everything. So, don’t assume. You just can’t.”

By: Milo Primeaux ’07

Mount Holyoke News September 16, 2004 page 7

Part One: Finally, a man on campus

I’ve been only 5 days here and I CANNOT stand life without guys.

ARGHH!!

I’m turning into some boy-crazy madwoman!

Everytime I see a male on campus, I go, “LOOK! A GUY!”

Like I’ve never seen one before.

But really, I don’t really notice that everyone I see around me (except some faculty members) are all female. But once in a while it hits me that its been a long time since I’ve ever set eyes on a guy.

This is so so sad.

Yesterday me and Angela were walking around campus. I turned to the side, and spied a couple of Asian guys sitting on the curb.

I grabbed Angela’s arm in a visor-like hold and shrieked, “LOOK! TWO GUYS!!”

What I got was for all my effort was a tight slap on the hand administering the visor grip and a hiss, “Shut up! Don’t be so obvious!”

Those people weren’t even cute. They had Ah Beng-like growing-out dyed hair, piggy slit eyes and acne scars. I HATE HATE HATE pockmarks.

They were staring at us. Angela said it was probably becos I was shouting at the top of my lungs when I saw them.

I prefer to think its because they thought we’re cute.

Anway, I heard in pure fear and horror the other day from a senior that 90% of all girls at Mt Holyoke at least once have lesbianic thoughts cross their mind because “the opportunity for erm same-sex r’ships are just there in front of them”. God help me.

Okay pictures time becos I’m such a cam whore.

::Me and Carmen (the photo is blurry cos I decided I look better if I off the flash)::

::Me and Angela (after eating 2 burgers each at lunch. Sei la sure fat wan).::

::Erm this is from Angela’s camera so ignore the ME there. L-R: the REAL me:P, Angela, Ning, 3 Korean girls that I dunno how to spell the names of, Xue, Jeannie and Chloe::

::Erm, these are the resident ducks in the lake. These are also the culprits who wake people up at 3am every morning cos of their quacking::