Lianna Holston: A guide to Rush
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Hola from Barcelona!
I write you from a hotel coffee shop where I just ordered a mocha but I’m p sure they are making a black coffee so I will not be sleeping tonight #yolo. I was going to write this this morning on the plane so as to start a trend of writing posts while on various modes of transportation (for those of you who missed last week: I was on a bus), but alas I was very much asleep because jet lag is REAL, people.
Week 2! What? Oxford still hasn’t started but how are your psets lol.
According to Snapchat it was 90 degrees yesterday. That’s right.
*sits back and sips incredibly strong coffee while waiting for that pun to settle in*
Oh my god this is straight up espresso send help.
I haven’t seen anything this bitter since myself after they sent out the cast list for our high school production of Hairspray.
Should I just do it as a shot to get it over with?
Okay. As many of you know, Rush starts tomorrow. Thus this post has been divided up into three instruction-filled sections: one for people rushing, one for people conducting Rush, and one for people watching it all unfold in front of them.
[coffee update: I plunked the last bit of chocolate into it to see if it would help but it’s dark chocolate so I’m concerned that it might just multiply the bitterness]
To those of you rushing:
What do I know about Rush? Last year I was accidentally at Treehouse for every night of girl rush, so I saw it all happen. Also my roommate rushed (hi Alex pls hug your dog for me), as did many close friends of mine. So I heard ~a lot~ about it.
- Rush is exhausting. Rest up before it happens.
- Be yourself because why would you want to be part of a group that accepts a version of you that isn’t true to who you actually are? e.g. don’t try out a French accent for all of Rush because then you’re stuck talking about Cannes for the next three years.
- Girl flirting is always the worst so try some new discussion questions. For example: “What’s your stance on horticulture?” “Dr Seuss: hot or not?” “How familiar are you with taxidermy?”
- I don’t know anything about guy flirting (or flirting with guys, tbh), but to anyone who goes on a ~retreat~: don’t get dangerously drunk and then do risky lake-related activities. Common sense, dudes.
To those of you conducting Rush:
- You were in these kids’ shoes/wedges once. Be nice.
- Don’t get anyone killed
- Animal House is NOT a good film from which to take inspiration for a weekend that won’t get your housing revoked
To those of you who aren’t rushing:
I get it. I didn’t rush either. For a whole lot of reasons, including but not limited to: I didn’t feel like paying $20 to have girls tell me I wasn’t cute enough or skinny enough to hang out with them / I didn’t own wedges / I wasn’t good at crafts / I had a crush on one too many members to be allowed to pledge signu
In my opinion, if you’re an outsider you can look at Rush in one of two ways:
- “Rush is dumb and exclusive and dirty rush is icky and like I know it’s not 100% based on socioeconomic status or race but there’s a reason the phrase “white girl wasted” is closely tied to sororities.” ***That one’s not entirely wrong but it’s a fairly shallow view of the whole process.***
- Most of these people are just looking for a community at Stanford. Many feel that they haven’t found one yet and others feel like branching out. And that’s understandable. You don’t have to agree with their policies or their dress code or the volume at which they scream when they see one another, but take a second away from your cynicism to recognize that not everyone fits the Greek life stereotype we’ve grown up seeing in movies. ***Some people do tho and to them feel free to say “hey I’m not a huge fan of your whole vibe and I don’t need your negativity or judgment in my life bye Felicia” etc.***
Best of luck to everyone out there this weekend.
If all else fails, rush EBF: Epsilon Beta FuckIt
Lianna “my dinner last night was wine and cookies which sounds ideal and it is but also it isn’t” Holston