Mayor urges calm despite city water jam By Jeff Zeleny Senior Reporter Water could become scarce in Lincoln, but Mayor Mike Johanns said the water level was still normal, and he ? urged residents not to stockpile sup plies. - “The water supply in place is the same water supply we’vealways had,” Johanns said at a Tuesday press con ference. “(There’s) absolutely no health hazard whatsoever.” Two water pipes near Ashland that supply the majority of Lincoln’s wa ter were partially destroyed late Sun day by massive floods that rerouted the Platte River. The city’s main source of water, a 36-inch pipe, remains intact, but it is in possible danger of collapse. Lincoln officials are trying now to divert the flood water by opening up Thomas Lake in Saunders County, which would send the waters back to the Platte River. This process is being hampered by an ice jam over 1.5 miles long. Diverting the water supply back to the Platte River hopefully will get water to flow underneath the ice jam, Johanns said, but it will be only a temporary solution. “We cannot do that and pack up our bags and leave,” he said. By Friday, the diversion process should be completed at a cost of more than $2.5 million, Johanns said. Sarpy County officials attempted to solve the problem by blasting through the ice jam with dynamite Tuesday afternoon. A sheriff s offi cial said late Tuesday the ice jam would be blasted again today. Lincoln officials said they were skeptical of the blasting’s chances of success and would rather wait and see if the diversion process worked be fore trying to blow up the ice jam. “It seems like a lot of material to blow away somewhere,” Johanns said. Jerry Obrist, Lincoln water system chief engineer, agreed. “What we are trying to do really operates independently of what they are trying to dynamite with the ice jam,” he said. ‘‘(But) anything that moves the ice jam solves the prob lem.” In addition to diverting the water around Thomas Lake, city officials also are trying to restore the 48-inch water main. Engineers expect the pro cess, which can’t be started until the flood waters go down, to take a mini mum of two weeks. Johanns issued an emergency dec laration as a preventative measure in See FLOOD on 6 .— ■ ■■■■—■--1 International students balance both worlds By Rebecca Ottmans Staff Reporter; It’s hard to try and walk both worlds,” said Melani Delilkan, an international studentatUNL. Like many foreign students, Delilkan said she often was tom be tween trying to blend in with the mainstream of American students on campus or sticking to her own culture. Delilkan, a senior advertising and broadcasting major, came to the Uni versity of Nebraska-Lincoln in the fall of 1990 from a college in Malay sia affiliated with UNL. She said she was luckier than many foreign students, because there are nearly 400 ocher Malaysian students at UNL, making it the largest interna tional group on campus. But Delilkan said the large number of people from her native country had both positive and negative aspects. When foreign students first leave home, they miss family and friends and want to find people they can relate to. That’s the biggest reason international students tend to stick together, Delilkan said. "But that starts a vicious cycle,” Delilkan said. "American students sometimes stick together and don’t get to know us, but when we in turn stick together and stop making an effort to know them, the cycle goes round and round.” However, the more Americanized international students’ native coun tries are, the less problem they seem to have with this cycle of separation. Few Melanie Dodd, a freshman fine arts major from Sydney, Australia, coming to school at UNL was "no problem at all.” Dodd said her country was "be coming so Americanized that it wasn’t hard for me at first or now. The big gest difference is just that there are so many more opportunities here.” One thing, Dodd said, which made the transition easier, was that she came to UNL on a swimming scholarship. She said many international students, including a few fellow Australians, were also on the swim team. Judy Wendorff, an international student adviser, said having a pre built social group made the transition easier. Graduate students have a so cial group with professors and stu dents in their own field, she said, but undergraduates are more on their own. The social lives of American un dergraduates, especially regarding alcohol use, are very different from what many international students are used to. Delilkan said the problem of trying to fit in would not seem so large if American students would take more of an interest in what makes interna tional students different. ~ -it The biggest difference is just that there are so many more opportuni ties here. -Dodd freshman fine arts major --*f - Delilkan said misconceptions and lack of interest in foreign students’ cultures were the two biggest reasons that international and American stu dents have a hard time relating to each other. If initial efforts to get to know American students fail, many inter national students try to become more like American students. Delilkan said that many interna tional students think those who switched over did the right thing and imitate them, but others don’t react that way. “It offends me,” Delilkan said. “I feel like they are trying to get as far away from being like me as possible, and that's insulting. “There is good and bad in both cultures and they should try to pick the best of both.” COLORADO IMc $156 to Wtatar Put Plant: $640 Uncctoto tamr —K$ll«J0t»DMwr SOUTH Pfflfe PImmc $298/2 pooplt 1-1 Bn $191/ttc