It began like any other TAP: loud music, scantily-clad students and sketchy dancing. Then, we soon realized, it really was like any other TAP. Although SoCo held Raffle TAP this past Saturday, adding the ever-popular element of winning prizes to the same old TAP debauchery, the result was TAP. With prizes.
The idea in itself appears to be a great way to draw everyone in the student body to TAP, with the allure of winning free stuff just by their attendance. However, it wasn't all too shocking to see the typical TAP-bound crowd dancing to typical TAP music on Saturday.
One winner of two tickets to the GyroGym, Meg Nelson '01, said, "It was no different from any other TAP, you just walked in and gave them your tickets." The event ended up resulting in the same sordid affairs that grace almost every Saturday evening, complete with a visit from the police, who promptly broke up the event due to a noise complaint.
Prizes distributed included gift certificates to stores in Amherst, such as Zanna and Details. Towards the end of the evening, several students were lucky enough to be handed passes to the GyroGym. Many students who won tickets to the GyroGym were dismayed by their prize; they had no idea what the GyroGym was. But not Nelson. "I wasn't really disappointed because I had wanted to go anyways," said Nelson.
At the end of the evening, the winner of the grand prize was called. Then at least three more were named before the hurried announcer reached a name of someone still present. The winner, Annie Reinish '02 said, "They called several names before getting to mine; I was really excited." She added that she had some difficulty actually hearing her name over the crowd: "There were so many people there that it ended up being sort of chaotic."
Katherine Vondy '02 was one of the unfortunate students who was denied a prize. "By the time I reached the prize table, I was informed that it was too late, [and] it made me very sad," said Vondy. "However, I can understand that things were rather hectic at the point because TAP had just been closed down and there was a lot of confusion. I just wish I could have gotten something for free."
Calling all Sarahs
The idea was simple: get all the Sarahs on campus together for one night to meet each other and have a party with an incredibly cute theme. Sarah Michelson '02 and Sarah Short '02 organized just such a get-together this past Thursday, inviting all 29 Sarahs and Saras at Amherst over to Stone for what they like to call "The Sarah Party."
The invitation read, "It sucks to have the most common name on campus, doesn't it? There's always at least three of us signed up to use the cross-trainer at the gym. There's three on the basketball team. There's three of us trying to free Tibet. There are three in English 79. And there are four living in Stone dorm."
The party was a great success, with about 15 of the 29 invited showing up at Stone for the pre-party. As Sarah DiLorenzo '03 explained, "We each got a little name tag to wear so that we'd know each other … except it only had our last names."
The party went off without a hitch-not even the Stone fire alarm could stop it. "It was an interesting way of meeting new people that you might not meet in any other way … it was fun," said Sarah Edelston '04. "We all said 'hi' to each other at parties later that night." Edelston gives props to the organizers, saying, "It was a really creative idea."
All of the Megans, Jessicas and Katies were green with envy that night, hearing of the fun they missed, including a group picture and cookies.
All Sarahs present thought it was an innovative way to meet others that share their name. "If you want a high-quality identity crisis, get almost twenty people with your name and jam them into one room," said Michelson.