<p>After hearing the phrase "where fun comes to die" so many times, I'm getting a little worried about this very important aspect of the university. How is it living in the residence halls, and eating with everyone? How are the students themselves, disregarding the school? Are they, on the whole, willing to make friends, partake in social events, and enjoy life beyond studying?</p>
<p>A little searching on this forum will find many thorough discussions of this topic.</p>
<p>yes, i've read them all :) but i want something directly focused on what people do / how they act</p>
<p>"What people do/how they act."</p>
<p>Well, people hang out, play board games, pull pranks on one another, go to parties, go to movies, have sex, order pizza, play video games, watch Seinfeld, drink every night, read Shakespeare and Kant, table-dance, play music loud, volunteer for soup kitchens, go streaking, go to political rallies, write screenplays, do drugs, play guitar, argue about Biggie vs. Tupac, go to bars, nightclubs, concerts, warehouse raves, poetry readings, plays, operas, museums, speeches, used bookstores, lectures, zoos, and everything else under the sun.</p>
<p>I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's pointless, not to mention impossible, to generalize about 5,000 people (the rough UG population), especially with a single catchphrase. There are kids here who walk around in doo-rags and Timbs, there are collar-popped frat guys who will play you in beirut (or beer pong, if you're from the midwest), tortured intellectuals, sorority girls... it's just like any other school. What makes UChicago different is that nearly every single person you meet is both incredibly interesting and has a deep passion (whether they admit it or not) for intellectual pursuits. It's a group of people whom I feel comfortable identifying myself as a part of, and the student body is a huge part of how positive my experience here has been overall.</p>
<p>Awesome post, Jack.</p>
<p>If you don't get that "where fun comes to die" is a joke, maybe it is better to look elsewhere.</p>
<p>The phrase "Where fun comes to die" was started by the two students who formed the Second City improv troupe (improv theater was created at UChicago). ;)</p>
<p>It is most definitely a sarcastic statement.</p>
<p>It's a sarcastic statement that will continue to follow you around:</p>
<p>friend in another college: "Hey, how was your weekend?"
me: "It was a lot of fun. How was yours?"
friend: "But wait, you're in CHICAGO AND THAT'S WHERE FUN COMES TO DIE AND YOU SAY YOU'RE HAVING FUN! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAH!!!!"</p>
<p>if you can't beat 'em, join 'em, I guess.</p>
<p>also, a lot of what was said earlier in this thread is echoed on the PSAC FAQ site:</p>
<p><a href="http://psac.uchicago.edu/faq.html%5B/url%5D">http://psac.uchicago.edu/faq.html</a></p>
<p>What do you want to know? You can be as straight edge or as big of a fiend as you want here. You can go party at a frat a few days a week, you can be insane and hang out in the 24-hour library on First Week (note to Jack and other current students: I know someone who was in Crerar to "take Hum notes" on THURSDAY OF FIRST WEEK THIS QUARTER. She's doing it wrong.) You can do whatever you want.</p>
<p>ok, maybe Chicago does have the ability to be really fun in the nonacademic sense. Buttt, maybe to make it clearer for us prospies, could anyone maybe compare Chicago's social scene to some other schools that are similar/very different. Such as say Penn for a smart school with a notoriously good party scene, and say, um, Columbia. Both are similar enough in that they are in cities and have smart kids in them who work hard... so how would the party scenes be different and similar?</p>
<p>We don't know since we don't go to those schools.</p>
<p>I can compare with Dartmouth, since I know the party scene there pretty well. We have fewer frats with less campus involvement. The frats at Chicago are much cleaner and better cared for than those at Dartmouth. At Dartmouth you can go to any frat on a Friday night. Here you only go to frats if there are specified parties. There will be at least one frat party basically every Friday and Saturday. We have more parties in housing, particularly in Shoreland, since there are no rules against alcohol, regardless of age, in private rooms. There are more places to party at Dartmouth more days of the week. At Chicago you can go to a frat or other major party on Wednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. Outside of those days, people at Chicago drink in small groups in private rooms. At Dartmouth, frats are all you have, beer pong is all you play, and Keystone Light is all you drink. At Chicago there are a lot of entertainment options (that include partying and non-drinking activities), few drinking games, and generally better quality alcohol (sometimes Keystone-ish beer at frats, otherwise vodka, rum, better beer, punches, etc.). At Dartmouth you will see almost everyone on campus at the frats; here you will tend to see the same people and groups of friends at parties. At Dartmouth there's a lot more extreme drinking with people throwing up in trashcans and continuing to drink. People here definitely get sick from drinking sometimes, but it's not every time, and they've usually stopped drinking by that point in the night, anyway.</p>
<ul>
<li>better beer</li>
<li>very few drunken idiots stuck in that high school mentality of "i must drink as much as i can to be rad"</li>
<li>generally positive party atmosphere in general (people want to have fun, not alcohol poisoning)</li>
</ul>
<p>I don't know anything about UPenn's party scene and to be honest I don't really care. All I can say is that there are a ton of ways to have fun; drinking makes things a lot more fun but it can also really screw with you and I think Chicago kids are more responsible than most about handling that. </p>
<p>We have like one of the least pretentious party scenes in the world, because everybody likes to have fun but DOES realize that there's a whole lot more to life than getting drunk and rubbing against people on a dance floor. So you've got a lot of people who are just looking to have a good time, not prove a point about how much they can drink or how many people they can hook up with. Not only that, but there's very little pressure on people who don't drink. Overall, it's a very positive atmosphere. It's also a case of the experience being what you make of it - if you are outgoing and friendly you can have a great time and meet plenty of girls/guys, if you just hang out in the corner going "this party sucks!" you've got nobody to blame but yourself. </p>
<p>That being said, I remember the guy across the hall coming back from a week in Miami, where he went to a lot of clubs and UofM parties, and he said there's really no difference between there and here (besides every person in Miami being unrealistically attractive). You'll be at a good frat party, dancing with somebody, you can see maybe a foot in any direction because of all the sweaty drunk people dancing around, it's dark except for strobes and colored flashing lights, the music is poundingly loud and awesome - I can't imagine that parties anywhere else would be that much better.</p>
<p>Better beer is a ****ing lie.</p>
<p>great post jack</p>
<p>I'd say PBR and Coors beat out Keystone, Neverborn. Bar Night and non-frat parties have "real" beer. At a lot of schools that's not even an option most of the time.</p>