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Richard Dawkins at UT (part 1)

Yesterday I came a free event on UT campus; a lecture by Dr. Richard Dawkins whom I just know two days ago that he's apparently a very famous professor who wrote 'The God Delusion'. He holds the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford. He's an ardent atheist who is sympathetic to an observation that "when one person suffers from a delusion it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called religion'. His book was the 2nd bestseller in Amazon in 2006.

So, out of curiosity I decided to go. The facebook invitation states that doors will open at 6pm and the event starts at 7 pm. So, Sandy, Setra, Sam and I wanted to meet up at 6.30 in front of FAC building. I wanted to wait at FAC at 6 since I got nothing to do. When I was near FAC, I started seeing this looong line of people and I approached the guy at the very end of it.

Me: Is this the...
Guy: (nodding)....
Me: God delusional thing?
Guy: (continue nodding).. Shocking huh?
Me: Oh my .. (wanted to say "God" but decided to say..) gosh...

I immediately called the guys to come over as soon as possible. And being true Indonesians, of course they joined me and cut off the line :). The venue is at Hogg's Auditorium which main door is about 150 meters away from my position and little that we know that the line had circled around Hogg's building once before elongating to FAC area. At 6.45, they gave out the free tickets to the first 1200 people on the line. We got tickets!! Yayy!! Some people started joking, "Let's sell this to the guys at the back of the line!" A really good idea, by the way.

Finally at 7 pm the doors to the auditorium were opened. By that time, the line has reached UT's main mall and made a hairpin loop back to FAC, with the last people standing right beside FAC's campus store. Amazing! I felt like we're waiting for a ride at Disneyland.

As we moved closer to the entrance, a guy walked pass us waving a 20 dollar bill, "Give me your ticket for 20 bucks!" The guy in front of me, the very same guy whom I talked to before, suddenly shouted, "Heeey!! I'll give you mine!!" LOL, I'd give out mine too for 50.

I wondered why sooo many people came.. Maybe some are fans of the book, some practicing atheists, some those who's still searching for faith, some just curios, like me. It is a controversial issue and the book's content is controversial and provoking at the same time. But, still, I could not understand the super long line.

My thoughts on the talk? I'll post it some time soon under the title: Richard Dawkins and the Chick-Fil-A Cow. Stay tune!