The Great Shakeout, the annual earthquake preparedness drill, was canceled on Oct. 20. Chabot College has done the Great Shakeout for many years, but this is the first the school has canceled the event. 

Due to the past few years of the coronavirus pandemic, the school has not many staff and students on campus. Along with the construction taking place around campus with the Paths to Parking project and the public address system stopped working. 

With a mixture of factors of construction, the pandemic, and electronic malfunction with the public address system, it was ultimately decided the Great Shakeout was canceled. 

“We feel pretty confident we’ll be able to circle back around some point next year. In the spring, hopefully. If we don’t get to it in the spring, we’re going to get back in business and we’ll do the ShakeOut for sure,” said Vice President Dale Wagoner.

Now that Thanksgiving has past and the Christmas holidays are around the corner, the Barangay Chabot Club held a parol making event on Nov. 29 in the Event Center.

Parol making is a Filipino tradition that includes making parols out of bamboo sticks and paper into the shape of a star. They are illuminated with candles or battery operated lights.

“Parol making is creating a Filipino lantern star that is commonly held outside or inside of people’s homes to celebrate Christmas,” said club president Maika Jeciel. “It symbolizes the three kings who went to see Jesus at the time of his birth.”

President of the Barangay Chabot Club, Maika Jeciel, presented a Disney animation on the parol star and Christmas holiday and then a tutorial on how to make a parol lantern. Many attendees were of Filipino or Asian descent and came to partake in the activities and socialize.

Barangay Chabot is one of the clubs MOVEMENT learning supports for Asian American and Pacific Islander students coming to Chabot College. Other clubs MOVEMENT supports are Association of China, Punjabi Club, Vietnamese-American Association, and many more.

“I enjoyed celebrating the culture with our fellow club members since Christmas is a big occasion in the Philippines. Being able to share and create a parol means a lot not just to the officers and the club but also us as Filipinos. We hope we have more activities like this!” said club secretary Stephanie Cornelio.

“I enjoyed most the club hosting a parol making event, the idea of being able to share this important tradition in the Philippines, with the community here at Barangay Chabot, that not only educates our community, but bonds us,” said Jeciel.

Netflix’s newest show, created by Leah Fong and Mike Flanagan, The Midnight Club, was released on Oct. 7. The show is about eight terminally ill young adults that reside in Brightcliffe Home hospice and tell haunting stories every night. When one of them is near death, they make a pact to try to communicate from beyond the grave.

Starring Iman Benson, Igby Rigney, Sauriyan Sapkota, Aya Furukawa, Ruth Codd, William Chris Sumpter, Annarah Cymone, and Adia.

The show starts off with Ilonka, played by Iman Benson, who is diagnosed with thyroid cancer and enrolls into Brightcliffe Hospice in hopes of finding a cure for her illness. She arrives at the hospice having learned of its previous past of being a home to a cult and a miracle patient Julia Jayne. Soon, she finds the other patients are in a club where they tell scary stories called the Midnight Club.

Flanagan’s The Midnight Club is adapted from Christopher Pike’s book The Midnight Club released in 1994. Flanagan is known for taking inspiration from previous works and turning it into terrific horror shows.

As someone who has watched Flanagan’s other shows such as The Haunting of Hill House, The Haunting of Bly Manor, and Midnight Mass, I was excited to see what The Midnight Club would hold. I was excited to see what jumpscares or hauntings would be at the hospice where the eight teens resided.

The show did not reach my expectations on how Flanagan’s prior work did well with the horror element. While I think the show is a good premise with telling scary stories in the dark, I was expecting more ghosts and scares.

What I did enjoy the most was the connection between all the characters, they all knew they were on borrowed time and made the most of relationships with love and care for each other. The episode where Anya, played by Ruth Codd, was passing away made me cry. They all joined together to be with her in her final moments.

I had more questions than answers when I finished the show. For example, what gave Ilonka visions to visit Brightcliffe Hospice or why did Kevin, played by Igby Rigney, never mention he was sleep walking until the last episode? I found out recently that Flanagan is going to have another season for The Midnight Club, so hopefully my questions will be answered and be more engaging.