Did I witness a religious pilgrimage?
For reference, I am a math postdoc in the Northeastern US.
I know little of academic tradition. I don’t have family or social ties to academia.
I recently attended an AMS Sectional Meeting. I’ve never been to one before for some reason. The whole affair was very austere and formal, though I still wore a casual T-shirt because that’s the norm in math. Some people chose to wear dress clothes.
Most people in my session were my regular colleagues, but there were a few visitors around the world. However, there was a young man from the area. He said he works a dead-end job. He had been in contact with our session leader, a high ranking professor, and he profusely thanked him for the invitation to our session, even though it’s open to the public and theres no security guards checking for ID. The young man pleaded with the professor, saying he “wanted to do something meaningful with his life.”
I think I just witnessed a pilgrimage.
Has anyone else witnessed something similar?