Signs From Above

My roommates and I have been at this apartment for almost three years now. The people who lived above us moved out and that unit laid vacant for some time before being occupied again, almost two years ago by a foreign exchange program group at Stanford university.

Now every month or two, we have the pleasure of having new people living upstairs from us. It seems they take interest in very diverse activities.

At first, they seemed to be operating a cellular phone drop-test facility. As students, maybe it was to make ends meet or something. And I understand that as aspiring construction workers with jackhammers, they need to get used to starting work promptly at 7:00am. Though I'm not sure if it was the best method, practicing their marching drills upstairs is certainly one way to infuse discipline into their studies. And after all that training and working, who doesn't need to have a little fun, right? We all love pets. They love it when their pet elephants run around with lead shoes; we love it when they don't.

And sure, 300-pound men working out with free weights will probably create a little noise that permeates through their floor and our ceiling. Sure, I was a college student once, and I needed to work off some energy, and I too wanted to be buff for the ladies. And with ladies comes the need for a little spending money, so it was no surprise that they started a late-night bowling ball testing laboratory, which woke me up at 3:30am.

Well, I finally met the most recent neighbour from upstairs one day per chance. No burly buffed man, carrying a bowling ball with an African elephant in tow. No construction hat or box of cracked mobile phones. No army boots. Just a little Asian lady, maybe not even 5'2" tall. I just don't get how so much noise can come out of something so small.