Behold, four thick, perfect triangular prisms. Creating a new standard in sandwichery, providing four attempts to master the flavors. The scent of savory bacon forms a hand with an inviting motion like classic cartoons when the character finally gets a meal. Succulent turkey atop lettuce and juicy tomato. Three pieces of toasted bread, soft to the touch but strong enough to endure all of the toppings. I present to you The Billy Club, served in our own cafeteria, the ultimate solution for starving students.

My first bite was indescribable. All of the ingredients holding hands together and dancing on my tongue not even worried about their impending doom awaiting in the bottomless pit of my stomach. However, my stomach was no longer bottomless, the love that was put into the sandwich created a foundation solid enough to fill my hunger.

I cannot take full credit for the discovery. One fateful, hungry day I ran into my friend Anthony, a very tall and portly fellow, I asked him, “I have no idea what to eat, what do you usually get?” Without hesitation, before I could finish the word “get?” He interrupts “The Billy Club Sandwich, it’s smack.” I took his advice to heart; after all, judging by our size you can tell we don’t take hunger lightly.

I placed my order with miss Carlina working the deli that day. Little did she know that she was participating in a what would be a revelation for me. Quickly, she began assembling the vessel of truth, with deft precision and care. I marveled at each ingredient just like you would do when your home team’s players as they were introduced at the championship game. She handed me the plate with a smile.

           It’s like an edible canvas, with a medley of colors and I was going to be the one who would get to enjoy the destruction of this piece of art and magic. Golden bread, smoked ham, roasted turkey, sizzling bacon, Swiss cheese, American cheese, ruby red tomatoes, crisp lettuce, soft mayonnaise and mustard with pickles and carrots on the side. Poetry for the hungry. I know it comes in four pieces, but it is still painful to share.

Hungry student, Rolando Recoder, described his initial bite with such honesty, “I’m not a huge fan of mustard, but in contrast with the other meats, the flavors were symphonic.”

“I like that the sandwich is classic. They have the whole bacon, lettuce, and mayo thing going on. Oh, I love that! The fact that is like a double sandwich is dope too!” says student Jazmine Carter, after her first Billy Club.

So many questions popped into my head, and I knew the right people to ask. Pacific Dining is the company that manages the cafeteria and kitchen. One day I shared an elevator ride with Octavio Amezcua, Pacific Dining’s General Manager at Chabot College. I had tons of questions, and I didn’t want to take away from his task at hand so I told I would have a gang of questions for him in the near future. When the time came, he was able to answer all of them!

    “The ingredients come from a local vendor in San Jose, Chef Choice,” Octavio clarified. “How many are made daily?” I asked. “About 20, we offer them in wheat, white, sourdough or a wrap. The Billy Club and AvoTurkey are my favorite sandwiches on our menu.” Octavio stated. My final question, “Who decided to put Billy Clubs on the menu?” “The owner of Pacific Dining, Rick McMahon, put the Billy Club on our menu many years ago. Since then, it’s been a staple of our operation.”

Luckily, I was able to get in contact with Mr. McMahon. I wanted to know about the meats and bread. “All our products are sourced from food service certified suppliers. We have strict specifications on the turkey breast, smoked ham, and bacon used in the Billy Club. All of these items are exclusive to Pacific Dining.  Galasso’s Bakery bakes the bread. They specialize in high-end bread for retail and restaurants.” Well damn, no wonder why when I make them at home they don’t taste the same.

“How popular is it?” I asked. “Hmm, Billy Club is very popular, but our number one item is our Angus Beef Burger.” But popular doesn’t always mean better

The term “Billy Club” originates from a slang term referring to a police officer’s knight stick or baton which can be used to knock someone out.  The origin somewhat holds up considering you might need a nap after devouring this double-decker. There is a strong underground following of the Billy Club sandwich with a “fight club” movie type of bond and meetings. Oops, I already said too much.

Check out the Billy Club for yourself and don’t forget to customize it (I usually add avocado and sprouts). And for some reason, if you genuinely dislike the Billy Club, and can look me in the eye and tell me that you don’t like it, I will gladly pay you for the remainder.

Barry Bonds took the plate facing Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher, Dennis Springer at the sold-out Pacific Bell Park, on Oct. 7, 2001. Anticipation for the 73rd home run hit was as thick as the early morning fog. Despite controversy over performance-enhancing drugs Bonds has maintained that he didn’t know the sports cream he used during the 2001 season had illegal substances. The pitch, the swing and just in case you don’t remember BOOM, home run and history was made.

There have been a ton of arguments over the last two decades about whether or not performance enhancing drugs (PED) will help you hit more home runs. Whether or not you believe PED’s will help you hit home runs most people will agree that professional athletes should know what they put in their bodies. Out of all the research I have done to find if PED’s will help a player hit home runs I found that they won’t. Now there are many factors to determine what it takes just to hit a home run, but the most informative and impartial research I’ve found was conducted by Eric Walker a writer for The New York Times as well as ESPN and can be viewed online at steroids-and-baseball.com.

I talked to the first-year head coach of the Chabot Baseball team, and I asked, do you think Barry Bonds should get in the hall of fame? he said “Yes.” I asked if he thought if professional athletes should be held accountable for what they put in their body? “Yes, I think we are all accountable for what we put in our body.”

Jeff Druin the Athletic Director at Chabot College and fan of Barry Bond told me “Every one of us should be held accountable for what we put in our body, and it was the responsibility of Bonds to know what he was putting in his body to stay on the right side of the rules, but I still think he should get into the hall of fame.”

No matter how you feel about Barry Bonds, his career is still one of the most prolific ever. Over 750 career home runs, 298 all-time batting average, 1,996 run back-ins, more than 440 on-base percentage and the most exciting single season in baseball history where he hit 73 home runs. The entire baseball community will be watching Sunday, July, 29 to find out whether or not arguably the greatest hitter of all time will be inducted into the hall of fame.

Scandals are commonplace in the world today. We hear about them every day on the internet, on news channels, even through word of mouth. Big or small, these scandals affect the population in a negative way. There will be many people jumping in on it on social media, condemning an event or person for what they caused and what was hidden over the years that was brought to light. When it happens to a person we have looked up to for years it’s a punch to the gut and a stab to the heart. What happens when it’s on an international scale?

Icarus is a documentary by Bryan Fogel about the Russian doping scandal uncovered in 2016. The documentary details Bryan Fogel’s journey into the experimental world of doping in sports and how it led him to the largest doping scandal in Olympic history.

For those who are not aware of the scandal, the story was published by The New York Times in 2016. Grigory Rodchenkov’s testimony detailed Russia’s state-sponsored doping program and how it affected past summer and winter Olympic events. Rodchenkov was originally the team’s doctor, working late at night close to the stadium in Sochi. The process of cheating drug tests was detailed by Rodchenkov and led to the Olympic committee temporarily banning Russia from competing in any other Olympic sporting events. He does not regret telling this information, but it does put his life in danger.

The film will keep you intrigued until the very end, wondering what will happen to Fogel and everyone else involved as the scandal breaks. The connections to many other smaller doping scandals, from Lance Armstrong to Barry Bonds, helps put into perspective what Bryan Fogel planned to achieve in this film as well as provide information as to how deep scandals can go.

The film drags in places in which there are slow moments that reflect on the weight of the situation, but those don’t last long as there is always some interesting scenes around the corner. Information is presented in a way so that keeps you interested and glued to the screen for the duration of the movie.

Overall, Icarus is a long, detailed look into the controversial world of doping and how it affects athletes as well as the Olympics. If you want a film to keep you interested and keeps you guessing, this is the movie to watch. With its suspenseful and emotional moments, this is one documentary you don’t want to miss.

The film was nominated for and won Best Documentary at the 2018 Oscars. Icarus is now available for streaming only on Netflix.

Chabot paid for 14 of our peers to have the opportunity to visit our nation’s capital for the National Student Advocacy Conference hosted by the ASACC (American Student Association of Community Colleges) from March 14 through 21.

SSCC advisors Ellen Corbett, Arnold Paquio, and Ben Nash made the trip possible through their efforts and organization. “The purpose of this conference is to enhance the ability of Chabot College students to effectively advocate on behalf of themselves and their peers, and to share their newfound skills and knowledge with their communities,” reads the application authored by SSCC Vice President Sharon Dang.

Following the return home, Patrick Mwamba says his highlight of the trip was, “finding out how important advocacy at the national level is.”

Nash, former Student Senate President, says, “practicing with students to perfect their presentations for our Members of Congress,” and, “attending the Town Hall event with Senators Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and filmmaker Michael Moore,” were his favorite moments.

The ASACC website describes an intention of the National Advocacy Conference is to get community college students to, “listen, learn and lead.”

“The conference will provide general sessions, keynote speakers, workshops and forums designed to educate the student participants on the major issues that are critical to community colleges,” according to their website.

Keynote speaker Ralph Nader referred to, “the fire in the belly,” speaking to the passion behind advocacy.

“My favorite workshop was the one on free community college,” says Jonathon Ortega.

The SSCC could only approve the budget for the trip because of the students who opted to pay the, “$10 student body fee,” where, “the SSCC gets its entire budget from,” says SSCC Representative at Large Lesly Avendano.

“As someone who loves art and architecture, seeing all the buildings, seeing the history of the country and its founding ideas through art was one of the highlights for me personally,” said Gladwin Sy.

Mwamba adds, “hanging out with everyone, discovering their passions, interests, our similarities, and learning different perspectives,” were a few of his favorite moments.

Mwamba, “especially loved the mac n’ cheese the first night, and all that  great food.”

Spring is celebrated in many ways all around the world. It’s recognized by many cultures as a time for new life. We will take a brief look at how spring is celebrated across the world, in America, and what Chabot college students were up to during their spring break.

In America, the most well-known recognition of the coming of spring for a student in all levels of education is the all too short Spring break.

Spring break has a notorious reputation for being accompanied by loud music, loud college students, and liquor, as well as other substances and herbs.

College students weren’t the only ones celebrating in an altered state. Some of the worlds ancient cultures did too, perhaps with more intention.

Some ancient Greek disciplines were known to use psychedelics during their celebration of the spring equinox. According to the Ancient History Encyclopedia website, some ancient Greeks, “would fast, and would then drink a barley and mint beverage called Kykeon.”

In ELEUSIS: Journal of Psychoactive Plants and Compounds, Peter Webster suggests, “the ergot species Claviceps purpurea was the probable source of psychoactive ingredient for the elixir. C. purpurea and related parasitic fungi produce lysergic acid alkaloids (a precursor to LSD), among which are several known psychedelic compounds as well as other important pharmaceuticals.”

The Lunar New Year, commonly called the Chinese New Year, is also known as the Spring Festival. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica website, the Lunar Year is also referred to as the “Chinese Chunjie, Vietnamese Tet, Korean Solnal, and Tibetan Losar.”

These are only some of the many ways that spring is celebrated around the world. So, what were Chabot college students up to during their spring break?

Chabot student Samuel Guerra says, “I used spring break to study a bunch and get caught up.”

Student Body President Zaheer Ebtikar “sent applications into east coast universities and tutored some highschool students for their upcoming June SAT’s.”

Chabot student Patrick Mwamba “didn’t really have a spring break. I still had work for my online classes and their midterms. I was also organizing the gun forum we had April 7 on campus.”

Though it wasn’t all business for some. Former student body president, now Berkeley student Ben Nash, “drove to Santa Barbara, went out with an old friend to celebrate her birthday, hiked in the Marin Headlands, and laid in a hammock to read a good book unaware of time and other responsibilities.”

Ebtikar adds, “I got the chance to go to Thornton beach, Lanark Shelby Park and Tilden Park.”

Mwamba did, “manage a weekend Vegas trip.”

So, professors and parents rest assured, most of us didn’t follow the example of the ancient Greeks and their psychedelic Kykeon beverage and really, “didn’t do too much else besides study,” says Guerra.

On March 15, 2018, Chabot College Jazz Ensemble performed an amazing Salsa Concert with special guests, vocalist Michelle Talley and the Even Swing Big Band, directed by Jon Palacio Jr. at the Performing Arts Center.

From the very beginning, the audience was encouraged to dance on the dance floor that was provided for them. Individuals of all ages took advantage of it while being serenaded by Michelle Talley and enjoying the rhythms of the Jazz Ensemble.

Michelle Talley, the vocalist of the night, is an upcoming Jazz artist with a passion for the stage. Opening with “Mama Guela” composed by Jon Palacio Jr. really got the crowd moving. Talley has a B.A. in Theater from the University of Santa Cruz. She’s been traveling and singing for about ten years now which led her from The House of Blues in L.A. to the many venues the San Francisco Bay Area has to offer. Be on the lookout for Talley. She’ll surely make a huge impact in the Bay Area jazz scene.

Things ended on a great note with the performance of the Even Swing Big Band. Their momentum didn’t slow down one bit when they performed hit after hit. The crowd’s favorites were “Save the Last Dance for me” and “All The Things You Are” which were composed by Jon Palacio Sr. and Jon Palacio Jr. respectively. There were individuals still dancing the night away, and you could hear the disappointment of the crowd when the band finished their set.

If you haven’t been to the Jazz Ensemble concerts here at Chabot College before, you’re missing out! The next shows are scheduled on May 10, 2018, with The Jazz Combo Concert at the Recital Hall. On May 17, 2018, The Big Band Concert with special guest, Francisco Torres is scheduled at the Performing Arts Center. Support the Arts here at Chabot! You will not be disappointed.