During our fall initiation my senior year, our chapter president fell down outta no where. Hard. We were doing so well with initiation up to this point, so when she went down, everyone looked really shocked. I shot a death look to the younger sisters so they wouldn't laugh, and I think that is what put everyone over the edge to hysterical laughter. Yes, it is funny now that I think of it. :)

man, I thought this was just our chapter. apparently it is an ASA thing. I've wished more than once that we had stickpins. And I just want to say, wait till you do this for a whole colony...I see now why they begged us all to come or the poor installing officers would have been there all day.

more than once, we've had people holding candles and the person standing next to them accidentally blows them out.

One year, a girl who was "leaving" the chapter showed up to initiation in white silk pajamas just to piss everyone off! :o

Another candle problem with my chapter - they always go out, so we are constantly relighting. It is going to weird going to rituals at another chapter this year...I wonder if they are as crazy as us.

I belong to the Moose Lodge, and, I don't know if Mason's "compete" to see who's best, we do (thankfully, we are the current international champions...) - but I have seen all kinds of weird things happen...from bowties unclipping, to someone sitting, and literally blowing the seam of his tux pants all the way around AND NOT EVEN NOTICE IT FOR THE REST OF THE RITUAL....wow.

In college, during one LXA ritual - we had two new members going through, with FOOD POISONING. Made for a very long, interesting, nauseating evening.....'nuff said.

In a way, we Masons do. We have annual certification exams on ritual, depending on the level of proficiency "A", "B" and "C" certificates are awarded. The "A" covers everything in the ritual of all three degrees, opening and closing the lodge (both normal and funeral Lodges of Sorrow) and the Tiler's Oath. The "B" covers all of the "A" except the explanatory lectures, and the "C" covers only the categorical lectures, opening and closing and the Tiler's Oath. Members who exhibit proficiency in any level for at least three years only have to renew every three years; those who maintain proficiency for at least 25 years earn a lifetime certificate.

Lodges sometimes assemble degree teams for a graded Entered Apprentice, Fellowcraft or Master Mason degree. Start off with a perfect score of 1000 points, then count off points for errors in the language, floor work etc. To receive recognition in Grand Lodge (and a nice certificate the Lodge can display) you need at least 901 points. On one EA graded degree team we scored 980 out of 1000.

Well, not to brag (well, OK, I AM..)...same sort of thing - we have six individuals on a ritual staff, individual scores of 100 are perfect, 600 perfect for a team (by the way, "perfect" scores are NEVER attained, much of the judging is too subjective in nature)....

At this year's convention, I scored 99.0417 (personal best), and our team scored 593.9375 (also our personal best).

It's all for bragging rights - and with over 2000 lodges, only 66 teams qualified for international - so it was quite an accomplishment. The only Texas staff (Grand Prairie) placed 5th, and no Oklahoma staffs qualified this year.

We get hits on words (.25 for each one missed, .5 if you need a prompt to get going again), floor work, unison movements, quality of delivery, etc....it can be very stressful, and is EXTREMELY competitive. Our staff has won first place honors three of the past four years (last year we missed two words, the only hits, and that dropped us down to 5th)...so it's hard to stay at the top.

Moose, Elks, and Masons actually compete...are there any GLO's that do this? LXA does not, but you can be nominated to the Ritual Staff that does initiation at our conventions, so that is an honor to participate in, but not much is done by way of competition at an official level....

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Someone gets the pledge and initiation ritual confused, EVERYTIME! They study the wrong ritual. :D

We had a few people SIT DOWN in the middle of a ritual once. There were chairs present, and they took a seat like five minutes into the ritual, then I told them to stand up. :eek:

A few people took out their cameras to take pictures, until our advisor told them to put them away.

One poor girl had her ass stared at while we were pledging her. An active pointed her finger at the pledge's ass and whispered "ooh yeah, look at that ass on her!".



Maybe we should add ritual behavior guidelines during pledge education. :o

Most inappropriate: a couple of members of another campus sorority came into the campus building that we had reserved (where we had initiation since there were unhoused), walked passed the signs that said "Private: Initiation" and sang their own sorority songs. Our NMs had to hear this in the middle of the initiation ceremony. The other sorority members later characterized this as an "accident" when asked by panhellenic and never got in trouble.

Wow. What did you all do after that? That was wrong...

arg, I am officially "that girl" in terms of ritual giggles. We have a *very* serious and important ritual every year, and every single feckin' year, I manage to get delirious with giggles about half way through and i can't can't can't stop. I get all sorts of hell for it, but I can't help it!

When I came back from Ireland, I had a really ridiculous mish mash of accents. I picked up a serious Belfast accent, and I couldn't shake it. The word "four" sounds more like "far" and can't doesn't sound like c-ant, it's more like, "canna" and I just in general have a different emphasis to my words...so my sisters thought it would be HILLARIOUS to make me have the card with all the "can'ts" and "for to" and "for that" and "forward" because, you know, one ridiculous accent is feckin' hilarious in the middle of a solemn ceremony.

This comes from one of my friends who attended an Ivy League school. They were in the middle of initiation when a member who was trying to sneak out of the house tumbled down the steps into the foyer...Drunk...and with her boyfriend in tow.

The next day, she moved out of the house and became inactive.

wait, she went inactive because of that?

and she was sneaking out because she was avoiding going to ritual? or cause she was trying to sneak him out?

i mean sure thats embarassing, but no reason to be inactive over.

Have many people passed out during your Initiation?

I had a bizarre experience when visiting another KD chapter for initiation. I had always thought that initiation decorum would generally be the same at all chapters. I was mistaken.

First, one of the collegians was wearing flip-flops. :eek: KD's former National Vice President was there and the two of us both noticed the shoes at the same time then looked up at eachother. The look on her face was priceless. She didn't do or say anything about it. Personally, I would have kicked the girl out and told her not to come back without proper attire.

Later on during the same initiation ceremony one woman (I think she had just recently graduated) was wearing jeans and a flannel shirt under her, um "catsuit". ;) About half way through the ceremony she just crossed the room and walked out. Maybe 5 minutes later she walked back in and crossed the room again. I couldn't believe it. She did it so nonchalantly. I couldn't help but wonder what on earth she left for. Bathroom break? It was a small pledge class! Phone call? Attack of the munchies? :confused:

Finally, at one point one of the initiates pulled a camera out and took a picture! No one said anything at the time but as soon as initiation was over I saw one of the chapter officers run up to her.

I'd have to say that this was unlike any KD initiation I'd ever seen (or hope to see again). I'm not without my own initiation mess ups though. As a collegian I did have a laughing fit once when it came time to do my part. It didn't help that one of my sisters was making faces at me and trying to fix something that might have appeared that I was botching, but actually had under control. In between laughing I kept whispering to her, "no, no. stop it. it's fine!"