A few questions about Swarthmore...

<p>Shoot, I was imagining that your D had truly phenomenal acting skills, and had convinced you that that’s what it was called. Instead, I bow to your imaginative disguise. Nothing like a . . . crum of truth to make a fib convincing. :D</p>

<p>Okay, get the paddles, I’m going to need resuscitating!</p>

<p>Harriet,</p>

<p>In full Swarthmorean character, there was no deceit, although perhaps it may have been better if we had been spared… HOWEVER, THERE IS NO DENYING THAT SWATTIES ARE TRULY INVENTIVE.</p>

<p>D lives at Willets, so at various times we had our own first hand glimpse of the 2 day “celebration” while waiting for her and her friends to take them out for greatly appreciated dining and shopping outings. Since we were not in the vicinity during the wee hours of the night, we only observed some of the more tamer going ons. We learned from the kids about some of the more “interesting” team challenges that took place both on and off campus. </p>

<p>D and friends wanted to hear how the fest compared with our college days in the early 70’s. And Endicott, don’t faint, but the 70’s were tame by comparison. We were also told that cameras were off limits so as not to ruin future political careers…</p>

<p>AH! to be young and uninhibited…</p>

<p>PS
It is a tribute to the Swarthmore administration, and I say this wholeheartedly, that they allow the kids to be young and have fun. At my university they would have brought in the campus police, broken up the festivities and made note of who was there for referral to the Dean of Students…</p>

<p>From what I understand, the administration has some frank conversations with the organizers every year before the event. This year, for instance, folks were told to keep the nudity off campus due to parents weekend.</p>

<p>I haven’t had the ah … pleasure … of attending, but my understanding is that this year’s festivities were significantly more tame than Crunkfests of the past.</p>

<p>Swatmom - I met your daughter! She is awesome, as are the other girls there. They all made me feel so comfortable! </p>

<p>After RTT, if someone asked me to use one word to describe Swarthmore I would say passion!</p>

<p>From the students to the professors to the administration - passion!!! I squeezed in every experience and contact I could while there. From the fondue to the lecture about lost languages, it was AMAZING!!!</p>

<p>I am proud to say I mailed in my card yesterday. I AM a Swattie 2013!!!</p>

<p>I can also personally report I didn’t see any “hipsters” or dirty hippies on my visit. ;)</p>

<p>CONGRATULATIONS Tsprite!</p>

<p>dramatica made some good points that people at Swarthmore do party and that it’s not an all work and no play school. People work hard, but they know how to take time off to relax and hang out with friends. But Swarthmore definitely has a reputation, and there is truth to it. People at Swarthmore probably work harder than most college students, and because they spend so much time on work, they have less free time to party. So it’s not completely unfounded. I probably will not go so far as to say, as dramatica said, that Swatties party just as hard as people in other colleges. Some probably do, but on average the partying is much more low-key. It never really gets that wild.</p>

<p>I really enjoyed hosting for Ride the Tide, but Ride the Tide isn’t representative of a typical weekend at Swat at all. People definitely have fun here but I don’t want to give people the idea that the social life here is like that at most other colleges.</p>

<p>By the way, you don’t have to party if you don’t want to. I just want to get that out because when I applied, I wasn’t at all looking forward to parties, so for prospective students, there’s no pressure to have to start drinking if you don’t want to. At Swarthmore, you can do whatever you want, and there isn’t much pressure in that sense, even though your options are somewhat limited.</p>

<p>A professor of mine used to say that above the doorway of every theological faculty in every university, a sign should read: “Dionysus always strikes back.” His point was that no matter how hard we try to fit human experience into organized categories and societal standards, the fullness of humanity will explode these norms and defy rigid definition.</p>

<p>As a member of one year’s winning CFest team, and the year after one of its organizers, I can shed a bit of light on the festivities and their purpose. “Work hard, play hard” doesn’t quite do Swarthmore justice. The reality is a little more intertwined. Most of us enjoy our work, and philosophize in great depth about our play. CFest represents the fruits of an incredible work ethic (there are always items that involve feats of engineering or physics) and simultaneously is an insurrection against the social pressure to be serious at the expense of being mischievous, to be successful at the expense of being outrageous.</p>

<p>So, it’s true that the organizers and the administration meet before each year’s fest and hash out some boundaries (though it’s a little disheartening that the nudity is so particularly disturbing to the powers that be. Even after a couple hours, a bare body becomes no more alarming than a bare shoulder. My team clocked 63 hours of nudity between the five of us).</p>

<p>@dramatica: Yes, all things considered the administration is enlightened in an impressive way to let us step out of our Apollonian rut for a day and degauss our stressed bodies and brains before honors exams. Swarthmore is indeed an unusual and magnificent place!</p>

<p>@Miles: to be fair, many of the most impressive activities this year did require being there to understand. Second hand accounts can only convey so much. </p>

<p>@tsprite: You didn’t see any hipsters or hippies because they were too busy winning CFest. You haven’t really seen Swat until you’ve seen a mob of hippies sporting zombie makeup and tonsures.</p>

<p>But all of this will really help you understand only the shell of crunkfest - the “festival” itself. But can we really explain “crunk?” Crunk is the world soul, crunk is the pawnshop. Crunk is the world’s best lily-milk soap. Crunk Johann Fuchsgang Goethe. Crunk Stendhal. Crunk Dalai Lama, Buddha, Bible, and Nietzsche. Crunk m’crunk. Crunk mhm crunk cru. In plain language: the hospitality of the Swiss is something to be profoundly appreciated. And in questions of aesthetics the key is quality.</p>

<p>

But not chemistry? Hmm. I’m not sure how crunk this sounds.</p>

<p>terrible_doctor,</p>

<p>Loved your post!</p>

<p>ROFL terribledoctor!!! </p>

<p>I WILL fit in at Swat! One of my closest friends is actually the king of the zombies (betcha didn’t know he lived in Georgia, did ya?) ;)</p>

<p>He is going to NYU and we are already planning the Winter Solstice/Lunar Eclipse party for 2010! </p>

<p>My early years were spent growing up adjacent to Greenwich Village so those hippies won’t shock me! In fact, I rather look forward to joining them next year.</p>

<p>Work hard/play hard - can’t wait!</p>