Blue Devil Days from Hell

Getting that fat envelope in the mail from Duke Admissions two years ago came as more of a surprise to me than I imagine it would for most students. First, the letter wasn't addressed to me. It was addressed to someone named Julian Colbert. Knowing that this was probably just a clerical error, I thought nothing of it. What was much more confusing, however, is that I couldn't remember ever applying to Duke, or anywhere else, for that matter. According to my guidance counselor, I wasn't exactly "college material."

Nevertheless, I was flattered by Duke's offer and wanted to at least give it my consideration. I decided to sign up for Blue Devil Days.

Arriving on campus for the first time, I was blown away. Beautiful sunny weather, smiling faces everywhere, and indoor plumbing were all things that I had read about in the brochures but wasn't used to seeing in Ohio. That's when things started getting strange.

When I went to the registration desk to pick up my itinerary and housing assignment, the name tag they handed me said Julian Colbert. Not wanting to be confrontational, I put the name tag on without questioning it. Next, the people at the housing table told me that someone had just signed in with the same name and taken my host. They were forced to pair me up with someone from the alternate list.

My new host introduced himself to me as "Dirty Pete." The first thing that caught my attention when I walked into his room was a queen-sized, heart-shaped bed in the middle of the room. Pete walked around all day in a long, satin robe.

Maybe it was the strong aroma of incense, maybe it was the fact that it was hard to sleep over the constant sounds of Barry Manilow coming from the pianist in the corner, but something about Dirty Pete's room just made me feel uncomfortable.

The next day I decided to sit in on a lecture. My first choice of classes was LIT 110-Introduction to Film. However, when I got to the class, I was promptly kicked out after the teacher said that I had been disrupting an earlier class of hers. Trying once again just to go with the flow, I walked into another classroom and sat down.

After about half an hour of the teacher rambling on about nonsense, I realized that the class was being conducted in Hebrew. Suddenly, it struck me this wasn't a class at all-it was a traditional Jewish Bris. Not wanting to be rude, I stayed for the remainder of the service and even helped out with the ceremony at the end.

Unfortunately, Julian turned out to be a lot bigger and faster than he seemed under the black light, and he quickly caught up to me. No one at the party seemed to care enough to intervene. The DJ didn't even bother stopping the music. I ended up getting my ass kicked to the beat of "Drop It Like It's Hot."

After staying with a sexually predatory host, being kicked out of class, and getting beat up at a party all within my first 48 hours on campus, it seems like a logical question would be, "Why would I still come to Duke?" Well, part of the reason is that I didn't get accepted anywhere else. Actually, that's most of the reason.

But, looking back, I'm glad things worked out the way they did. Even though things didn't come easy at first, had I not been persistent and given Duke another chance, I would've missed out on so much.

Not the least of which was another ass-kicking the day I arrived back on campus. It turns out that the kid from the bris actually was a relative of Julian Colbert. Apparently, the family blames me for botching the procedure.

Nick Alexander is a Pratt sophomore. His column runs every other Tuesday.