<p>1) The main dining halls are in East Union and Great Hall on west. East Union is buffet for breakfast, dinner, and brunch and a la carte for lunch. Great Hall is all a la carte. Besides those, there are eateries (delis, sandwich shops, restaurants, cafes, etc) scattered throughout campus in various academic buildings and some quads and the student center. many of these are only open during work hours but some do have extended hours, especially if they are on quads or student center. You have subway, mcdonalds (24/7), armadillo grill (tex-mex), the loop (burgers), twinnies (sandwiches), sanford cafe, blue express, panda express, etc etc. </p>
<p>2) A freshmen meal plan will have 2 components: meals and points. Meals are buffet style and can only be used in the freshmen dining hall. I think you get 12 meals a week: 7 dinner/brunch, 5 breakfast. Then you have points. Points are used everywhere else on campus for a la carte dining and on vending machines. You can also use points to order delivery from selected restaurants off campus online or by phone. You can replenish point as needed. However, idk about now, but when I was at Duke 2 years ago, you cannot use your DukeCard to pay for food if you actually dined in the restaurant off campus. It’s delivery only. The food trucks probably has agreements with Duke and they are provided with handheld swipers for DukeCards. </p>
<p>3) Perkins library and Bostock (the newer addition) are open 24/7. The East Campus library closes at 2am I think. Other departmental libraries have their own hours (I hear the divinity library is a great quiet study spot). However you may also just grab a random empty classroom after hours and use it as your own personal study room. I did that all the time on the engineering quad and it was pretty awesome. </p>
<p>4) No dorm preferences unless you 1) join a FOCUS group 2) have a medical reason for needing AC 3) join the wellness dorm. FOCUS group members all live together but I don’t think they tell you ahead of time which dorm each group is assigned to. They may stay in the same form from year to year but I’m not sure. Those needing AC I think get priority for the 3 AC dorms Belltower, Blackwell, and Randolph. Belltower is nice but out of the way. Blackwell and Randolph have really small room. Aside from that, students who are assigned to nonAC dorms may have a window unit installed with a note from a doctor and pay the AC rate. All dorm common rooms on every floor also have AC. Brown is the Wellness dorm I think, it’s nonAC but close to everything. It’s right across from the Lilly library (East campus) and right next to East Union.</p>
<p>5) Anything aside from basketball, there’s no need for tickets. The attendance isn’t very high for some of them and you’ll get in just fine with a DukeCard. Basketball is a bit tricky. There are no seasonal tickets for undergrads (grad students camp out for a weekend for the season tix lottery). Most games are based on the walk up line and students get a group together and a minimum number of people per group has to be in line at all times (and they do check). </p>
<p>The only exception is the UNC-Duke game. You can either do walk up (the line forms early) or you can tent in K-ville. I think they do a max of 100 tents of 12 people per tent. Tenting starts generally in January depending on whether the first UNC game or the second one is at home. In 2012, it was the second one in early march.</p>
<p>Black tenting 2012 started mid-Jan and ran for 1 week, tents register and are assigned a letter A to Z then attendance of the 12 members are counted at the next 9 basketball home games with 1 point per person per game. The tents are then assigned order based on points. A trivia breaks ties. </p>
<p>At the end of black tenting, the black tents are joined by blue tenting, which picks up and end in late Feb. Again blue tent order is based on attendance at the following 6 home basktball games. </p>
<p>At the end of blue tenting, the black + blue tents are joined by white tenting which lasts about 2 weeks. white tent order is determined on a first come first served basis by registering your tent with line monitors at a secret on campus location released on a particular date at a particular time. </p>
<p>All tents are continuous monitors to make sure someone is in there at all times, usually 2/12 is required. There are tent checks at all hours of the day and night and you can’t miss more than a couple before your whole tent is bumped to the end. The weekend of the game it switches to personal checks and all members of the tent needs to make 3/5 personal checks (I think) which is again at any time day or night. </p>
<p>Grace can be given for low temperatures, inclement weather, and also for an hour I think after a tent check. </p>
<p>My information may be outdated since I graduated 2 years ago, but it shouldn’t have changed that much in principle.</p>