Most Whimsical: Ben Cammarata

When I first meet Ben Cammarata ’25, he is wearing a shirt dripping with frogs. The frog shirt comes out on Fridays “because it’s the most goated day of the week,” Ben, a former Crimson Multimedia editor, says.

His Cabot House dorm room feels like a world of its own: Artistic prints, hand-sewn tapestries, butterfly posters hug the walls. A traditional Korean mask, Cammarata-crafted, hangs securely from a hook. The remains of a cockroach-inspired Halloween costume rest on a high shelf.

Part of his whimsy is “being crafty and tactile,” with much of his decor hand-made. “I love creating warm, inviting spaces,” he says. “I love giving people tea.”

It is true — we are drinking steaming tea from charming ceramic mugs. Having mastered the art of needle felting hyper-realistic animals, Ben is now dabbling in woodcarving and sewing patchwork Korean textiles. “Being crafty, you can curate a cozy little space — a unique space too,” he says.

An inescapable part of Ben’s whimsy is his spontaneity. “Spontaneity leads to fun little whimsical adventures,” Ben says. His spontaneity has taken him near and far, from his hometown of Marshfield, Mass., to the mountains of Samoa.

He is always glad to indulge in “whimsy and tomfoolery and shenanigans,” he says, whether living in a jungle lodge in Ecuador or briefly joining a fire circus in between film productions in San Diego. “They gave me a metal sword, and they lit it on fire,” he says. “I was like, ‘Okay.’” He is also always down for karaoke.

While visiting Fiji, Ben took the opportunity to do something very few have done: witness an elusive, newly-discovered butterfly, the Natewa swallowtail, in the flesh. “We went on this journey to this Fijian village, and then we had to give them cava root as a sign of respect,” he says. One trek through the jungle later, the butterfly appeared. Now, Ben is one of a handful of people to have seen it in person. “But I didn’t get any photos because it was too fast,” he says.

His favorite destination thus far was Samoa, where he studied abroad last semester. “Not only did I get to know the ocean landscape there, I lived for a period of time as a semi-aquatic human,” he says, semi-serious. “My skin got really burnt and salty and sticky, and my hair was grimy all the time, because I was exploring the ocean.”

As he filmed underwater, frolicking with turtles and observing reef life, the biggest lesson Ben learned from the sea was to listen. “Coral reefs are really noisy. So if you just listen, you can hear fish croaking and stuff,” he says. Later on, he notes, “You can apply that to humans — to just listen to people.”

But perhaps what makes Ben most whimsical is the bravery of his passion: to be whimsical, he says, is “to express yourself in a way that’s through your own gaze.”

For Ben, whimsy is inseparable from authenticity. “You know, this could potentially be perceived as ugly,” he says, gesturing to his shirt, frogs jubilantly prominent, “but I like it, so that’s all that matters.”

He admires those who wear their passions on their sleeves (in his case, frog-adorned ones). “I’m confident in what I like. I don’t try to hide my interests,” he says. “I search for that in people, too. I love when people are passionate.”

In addition to frogs, Ben appreciates many other small creatures. He likes treehoppers the best, but he loves fleas because of how funny they are. Case in point: He teaches me about flea circuses, dating back to Victorian England, where fleas would perform tiny feats of showmanship, like pulling around tiny chariots with a gold wire. Turns out, fleas can pull up to 160,000 times their own weight!

“Do you know why bugs are important?” he asks suddenly. I want to know. “Because I feel like we live in a very human-centric world where it’s like, ‘Oh, we're so big, stomping on a fly means nothing.’ I’m not saying bugs have mental capabilities, but Earth is mighty and meant to be respected,” he says. “If you just lie on the ground and stare at the leaves in front of you, there’s a whole world right there.”

We pause our conversation for a snack break. Several new characters emerge out of Ben’s fridge: a little bag of dried squid sticks and a container of soon-to-hatch luna moths. As we snack on the squid, Ben tells me that the moths are due to hatch come May, around the time he will graduate.

Last semester, Ben raised a butterfly whose wings weren’t fully developed. “I had to treat it like a pet dog,” he says, and it does not feel out of place to imagine a butterfly fluttering around his room, its cozy walls. Further filling the room with life, a small vial of bioluminescent algae rests above Ben’s desk. By the windowsill, a scattering of carnivorous plants.

After graduating, once the baby fridge moths have hatched, Ben plans to spread his own wings and move to Jeollanam-do, a Korean province known for its indigo dye, in order to learn the dying art of dye production. While always open to new avenues of exploration, he ultimately wants to treasure the place he will call home. “To be stationary in a location, explore the nature there, photograph it, because you can’t protect what you don’t love,” he says. He is considering running a flea circus in Korea as a side hustle.

I have learned much about Ben. He likes karaoke and being in nature, and he takes his sunset watching very seriously. He has joined, by audition, a fire circus, and he will happily teach you about flea circuses. He can make this crazy water droplet sound with his mouth (he is a proud member of the Harvard Whistler’s Society).

But above all else, Ben’s whimsy is exemplified by the way he sees the world.

“I just need a patch of grass in a tree, and I’m a happy human being,” says Ben, sitting cross-legged, contemplative, simply whimsical. “I don’t need to conquer a mountain to be satisfied. I can just find some moss and sit on it.”

— Magazine writer Elane M. Kim can be reached at elane.kim@thecrimson.com.