Columbia University janitor cleans up with bachelor's degree

After eking out a living cleaning the school's floors, a 52-year-old refugee from the former Yugoslavia graduates with honors.

Columbia University janitor Gac Filipaj is congratulated by his boss, Donald Schlosser, assistant vice president of facility operations, at graduation ceremonies. Filipaj, a refugee from the former Yugoslavia, earned a bachelor's degree in classics. (Jason DeCrow, Associated Press / May 13, 2012)

Associated Press

May 14, 2012

NEW YORK— For years, Gac Filipaj mopped floors, cleaned toilets and took out the trash atColumbia University.

A refugee from war-torn Yugoslavia, he eked out a living at the Ivy League school. But Sunday was payback time: The 52-year-old janitor donned a cap and gown to graduate with a bachelor's degree in classics.

As a Columbia employee, his classes were free. His favorite subject was the Roman philosopher and statesman Seneca, he said during a break from his work at Lerner Hall, the student union building he cleans.

"I love Seneca's letters because they're written in the spirit in which I was educated in my family: not to look for fame and fortune, but to have a simple, honest, honorable life," he said.

His graduation with honors capped a dozen years of study, including readings in ancient Latin and Greek.

"This is a man with great pride, whether he's doing custodial work or academics," said Peter Awn, dean of Columbia's School of General Studies and professor of Islamic studies. "He is immensely humble and grateful, but he's one individual who makes his own future."

Filipaj, now an American citizen, was accepted at Columbia after learning English. His mother tongue is Albanian.

An ethnic Albanian and Roman Catholic, he fled Montenegro in 1992 as a brutal civil war loomed. He was about to be drafted into the Yugoslav army led by Serbs, many of whom considered Albanians their enemy. He had nearly finished law school in Belgrade.

He earned the Columbia degree after years of studying late into the night in his Bronx apartment, where he would open his books after a 2:30-to-11 p.m. shift as a "heavy cleaner," his job title. Before exam time or to finish a paper, he would pull all-nighters.

On Sunday morning in the sun-drenched grassy quad of Columbia's Manhattan campus, Filipaj flashed a huge smile and a thumbs-up as he walked off the stage after shaking hands with Columbia President Lee Bollinger.

Now, his ambition is to get a master's degree, maybe even a doctorate, in Roman and Greek classics. He hopes to become a teacher, while translating his favorite classics into Albanian.

For now, he's trying to get "a better job," maybe as supervisor of custodians or something similar, at Columbia if possible.

But he's not interested in furthering his studies to make more money.

"The richness is in me, in my heart and in my head," Filipaj said. "Not in my pockets."

Soon afterward, the feisty, 5-foot-4 janitor picked up a broom and dustpan and returned to work.

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Virtual Ancient Rome - Colosseum Reconstructed

Latin Around the World - Thermae Romae

Be it Japan or ancient Rome, we're all the same in the bath

Reading manga can teach you a lot, be the subject wine ("Kami no Shizuku [Drops of God]"), gourmet food ("Oishinbo") or the arcane world of feudal-era concubines ("Sakuran"). But the Japanese bath? Isn't that a subject Japanese are immersed in almost from Day One? Why would they need to read about it in a manga?

Thermae Romae Rating: (3.5 out of 5)      Water surprise: Lucius (Hiroshi Abe), a bathhouse architect in ancient Rome, finds himself a fish out of water when he emerges into a modern-day Japanese spa in "Thermae Romae." © 2012 FUJI TELEVISION NETWORK/TOHO/DENTSU/ENTERBRAIN. All rights reserved. Director: Hideki Takeuchi Running time: 108 minutes Language: Japanese Opens April 28, 2012 [See Japan Times movie listing]

But to Lucius, a fictional bathhouse architect from Rome at its ancient height, Japanese baths are an endless font of wonder, inspiration — and frustration. He is the hero of Mari Yamazaki's hit comic "Thermae Romae" (literal translation: "Roman Baths"), which has sold more than 5 million copies in four paperback editions, as well as spawning a new film directed by Hideki Takeuchi.

The foreigner who is stupendously impressed by things Japanese is a staple figure here in everything from films to tourist videos, one I usually find tiresome. The real learning about Japan, I've found, starts only after the fairy dust falls off. Also, those who natter on dubiously about Japanese "uniqueness" ("Only Japan has four seasons!" "Japanese have longer intestines!") find this figure convenient to their misbegotten arguments.

But as played by the perfectly cast Hiroshi Abe, Lucius is right to be amazed. Emerging from a time tunnel into an old-fashioned Japanese public bath, like a naked god rising from the waves, this Roman finds a world and a people utterly unlike his own. Though calling the old men in the bath "flat-faced slaves," he marvels at the wonders their culture has produced, from fruit-flavored milk (so refreshing after a long soak!) to wicker clothes baskets (so light and handy!). Then he wakes up back in his own time, but with an empty milk bottle proving that his brief visit to present-day Japan was no dream.

Recently fired from an architectural practice for being too staid and conservative, Lucius incorporates his Japan-inspired innovations into a new bathhouse — and he soon has a hit on his hands. He also comes to the attention of elderly Emperor Hadrian (Masachika Ichimura), who requests his services. Lucius would appear to have it made.

But he is a stiff-necked, perfectionist sort — think a majime (deadly earnest) salaryman in a toga, who clashes with a dissolute emperor-to-be (Kazuki Kitamura) and feels guilty about ripping off the modern-Japanese "slaves." Still, when he is hurled time and time again to the slaves' country of marvelous baths, he sees more ideas he can use, while making friends with the natives, including a pretty manga artist (Aya Ueto) who loves to sketch his classically sculpted form. Lucius, though, is more interested in the baths and toilets she sells as a side job.

"Thermae Romae" takes occasional dips into the murky waters of Roman political intrigue and war, but wisely stays close to its comic beginnings, while avoiding the jingoistic urge to trumpet the contrast between "advanced" Japan and "backward" Rome. Instead, it highlights aspects of the Japanese Way of Bathing that may strike younger Japanese, used to privately soaking in antiseptic splendor, as hopelessly uncool, but which in the fresh eyes of a man from the 2nd Century regain their original brilliance.

Also, rather than hire the usual gaijin (foreigner) no-names and amateurs for the Roman roles, the producers cleverly used established Japanese actors with "un-Japanese" features, beginning with Abe, who spends much of the film partly or totally unclothed — and looks as though he has just stepped out of the Roman statuary section of the Louvre, albeit with all his limbs intact. This sharpens the film's comic slant (though Abe and company do not play the Romans as cartoons), as well underlining its we-are-all-brothers-in-the-bath message.

Finally, just as the joke of Lucius-as-underwater-time-traveler begins to wear thin, new complications, from the serious to the silly, appear to keep things bubbling along, without bringing the plot to a melodramatic boil. Also, the Roman-era open sets at the Cinecitta studio in Rome, populated by as a many as 2,000 extras, help bring the world of Lucius and his contemporaries to vivid life. Cecil B. DeMille, the one-time king of Hollywood swords 'n' sandals spectacles, would have approved.

It's far from perfect, however: At times, the film sinks into the ponderousness of those spectacles, while the clumsily staged battle scenes look as though they were deleted from "Gladiator." By the end, though, all the patchy parts are forgotten, just as the day fades away soaking in an open-air bath under the stars. Relax and enjoy — but keep your toga on.

Reprinted from  The Japan Times Online  - Friday, April 27, 2012 = by Mark Schilling

Campaign Advice from Ancient Rome

Here's a real gem from the May/June issue of Foreign Affairs: "Campaign Tips From Cicero: The Art of Politics, From the Tiber to the Potomac." The article is in two parts. The first is an excerpt from the Commentariolum Petitionis, or "Little Book of Electioneering," a memo full of campaign advice (probably) written by Quintus Tullius Cicero for his famous older brother Marcus on the occasion of his run for Consul in 64 B.C. (A new translationhas just been published by the classicist Phillip Freeman.) The second part is a commentary by the political strategist James Carville, who notes -- mournfully, guiltily, gleefully -- that Cicero's advice is completely relevant today.

Some choice bits, about going negative early:

[One] factor that can help you as an outsider is the poor quality of those men of the nobility who are competing against you.... Who would believe that men as pathetic as Publius Galba and Loucius Cassius would run for the highest office in the land, even though they come from the best families?.... But, you might say, what about the other candidates, Antonius and Catiline?.... You should be grateful to run against men like those two.... Remember how [Antonius] was expelled from the Senate after a careful examination by the censors?.... After he was elected... he disgraced himself by going down to the market and openly buying a girl to keep at home as his sex slave.

As for Catiline, [he] was born into a poor family, brought up in debauchery with his own sister, [and] even murdered his own brother-in-law, a kindly old fellow and good Roman businessman who cared nothing for politics.... Catiline afterward was a friend of actors -- can you imagine? -- and gladiators.

About courting the elite:

You must diligently cultivate relationships with these men of privilege. Both you and your friends should work to convince them that you have always been a traditionalist. Never let them think you are a populist.

About developing the common touch:

You have excellent manners and are always courteous, but you can be rather stiff at times.... Keep the doors of your house open, of course, but also open your face and expression, for these are the windows to the soul. If you look closed and distracted when people talk with you, it won't matter that your front gates are never locked.

About cultivating the youth vote:

It will also help your campaign tremendously to have the enthusiasm and energy of young people on your side to canvass voters, gain supporters, spread news, and make you look good.

And, best of all, on why you should make outrageous promises:

If you break a promise, the outcome is uncertain and the number of people affected is small. Most of those who ask for your help will never actually need it. Thus it is better to have a few people in the Forum disappointed when you let them down than have a mob outside your home when you refuse to promise them what you want.

It was probably easier to win, Carville writes, back when your opponent was "a murderer, child molester, and 'friend of actors'" -- but, in almost every other respect, this advice is just as germane today as it was back then. It's incredible that politics works, despite everything. 

Reprinted from Boston.com Posted by Josh Rothman  May 2, 2012 12:00 PM  

Latin in the News - A Lesson or Two from the Ancient Romans

Refrigeration. What a word. Why does it start with "re?"

Shall we guess? Here's my guess:

Refrigeration started out as a way to make things cold that were inherently supposed to be cold, but had lost their coldness — sort of a "make frigid again" concept.

DICTIONARY PAUSE.

Surprise. Either I'm right or close to it. Go back to Latin, and you've got "refrigerare," with "re" meaning "back" and "frigus" and "frigor" meaning "cold."

Ergo, picture Julius Caesar taking a package of Caesar salad out of his refrigerator and grabbing a bottle of Caesar dressing from the shelf in the door. Why not? Would the Latin-speaking world have given us a verb for "refrigerate" if they didn't do some refrigerating?

Meanwhile, the electrified world has gotten a bit carried away with a good thing, if you ask me. We refrigerate everything. We miss a lot.

Me, I'm a room temperature person. Lots of things taste better at room temperature. Consider tomatoes. Cold ones may feel better when you chomp down on them, but room temperature tomatoes taste better. Same thing goes for bananas. They've got more flavor when they're not cold and crispy like some pickles we know. For that matter, I don't care that much for cold pickles either.

At this very moment I'm viewing a pineapple, an ear of corn, an onion, some tomatoes, a banana and three squashes — all unrefrigerated and sitting defiantly on top of the non-working refrigerator in our little camp trailer. Admittedly, I'm the one who's projected the element of defiance into the still life arrangement, quite attractively displayed on a red and white checked dishtowel. Did I mention it's a red onion? Anyway, if you asked the fruits and vegetables, I think they'd tell you themselves they prefer to be where they are, complimenting each other's colors, rather than tucked away in a cold dark chilly drawer. They're ripening even as we speak. Why spend money on energy to keep them cold when they can add good looks and faint nice aromas to this little living space?

OK, if the refrigerator happened to be working I might put the corn and squash in it to keep them cool until cooking time. On the other hand, why? If something doesn't have to be kept cool, why waste the energy to make it happen?

When my father was a child, they kept milk cool in the well. That was how everybody kept milk cool back in those days. Cool, huh?

When I was a child, potatoes and a few other things, like apples and onions, lay in a three-shelf vegetable bin in the pantry. We had a refrigerator, but we didn't use it for absolutely every perishable food item.

Enter global warming.

We must reduce fossil fuel use to keep the glaciers from melting.

So, why don't we hear more about refrigerating less? Probably because somebody is afraid someone will eat a rotten tomato and sue somebody.

Here's to that risk.

Disclaimer:

Don't eat any rotten tomatoes.

 This article appeared in the Times Record News, Wichita Falls, Texas by Hannah Welch on May 1, 2012