Attracted to Harvard's reliance on a variation of the tutorial system she had enjoyed as a child, an insistence on academics overpowered extracurricular impulses. Her activities in Amnesty, as publicity manager of the Dunster House Film Society, and as a cellist in Musica Modus Vivendi have been minimal in order to accommodate the five- to six-course load she has maintained since freshman year. Leisure time is spent reading novels, her favorites being those of the Bronte sisters and Charles Dickens, playing the piano, and occasionally attending Japanese Cultural Society events.

When it came time to choose a House in the spring of freshman year, she acted independently once again. Conscientiously attending events sponsored by all 12 of Harvard's residential Houses, she selected Dunster on the basis of its four piano practice rooms (which facilitated her daily one-hour practice sessions), its proximity to the Charles river, its flourishing film and music societies, and its "quiet, studious" atmosphere. Floating into the House alone and rooming with three seniors as a sophomore, she has for the last two years lived with Roberta Peterson '87.

According to Peterson, who rowed crew freshman year and who has been an active figure on the Harvard drama scene, the two make an interesting pair.

"She seemed incredibly organized, and I was just the lost freshman."

Introvert and extrovert, they met at the Union freshman year when Peterson spied her seated alone at a table.

"I thought she was a really unusual person, so I just sat down and had a meal with her."

Even though Peterson maintains that "it's been very smooth rooming with her," she confesses that "I think sometimes she's kind of startled [by me]."

But it is Ueno who surprises many--with her gentleness as well as her academic and scholarly prowess. Choquette describes her as "endearing," McKinsey as "poised and mature," and Peterson as the type of person who "goes out of her way to be polite and helpful." A living alarm clock who helped her roommate make it to House crew practice all through spring semester, this quiet studious soul is sure to carry her confident and insatiable inquistitiveness into whatever she endeavors.