Retro Fraternity Rush from the Midwest
 

I've been a lurker here for a long time at GC, so this is my first real posting.

My rush happened at a small school in the midwest that has a fairly large greek population for both guys and girls.

Before I came to college, joining a fraternity was the last thing on my mind. I was the first person from my high school to ever come to this school, so I knew nobody at campus. Campus itself was relatively strange and unfamiliar to me since I had only visited once before I decided to go to that school. Rush for both fraternities and sororities is deferred which mean that it happened at the beginning of spring semester at night, which meant that it was very cold outside between rounds. Although my older sister was in a local sorority at her school, I never really thought about joining a fraternity until the interest meeting for freshmen who were interested in going through rush happened and it seemed like it would be fun. Also, it was assumed that everyone would rush, even the people who would just become independents and not join a house. That, and the major factor was that it was not hard to figure out that if you wanted to have any kind of social life at all, you were going to go Greek. That's just the way it was. There was a stereotype of GDI's that never left their rooms and were socially awkward and never had any fun at all and were out of touch with the campus mainstream.

My parents were fine with my rushing, more than anything because I emphasized that I could go through rush all the way through the final round and not join a house if I decided it wasn't for me.

Being that rush happened at the beginning of fall semester, freshmen guys had the opportunity to visit houses on their own time during fall semester, most of the visiting happened during weekends at parties and stuff like that. Girls weren't allowed to go to sorority houses at all fall semester; they didn't even get house tours of any kind like the guys did during fall semester.

At my school there were 11 ifc fraternities. I follow major league baseball, so I'm going to use major league baseball teams as pseudonyms for the houses.

After listing the house is the general impression I had of the house going into rush.

Braves - I didn't know this house even existed until house tours fall semester, and they seemed like ok guys but I didn't really know any of them and none of my friends had really heard much about them either.

Astros - This was traditionally referred to as the soccer house, since most of the soccer team was in this house. Aside from that, I knew nothing about them, other than that the girls I knew never went there alone on purpose.

Phillies - This house liked to party alot, and they were pretty nice guys who had a relatively good house, but they were known as drinkers...and nothing else.

Yankees - This was the supposed football house, way out on the edge of campus...they threw some wild parties fall semester but didn't really appeal too much.

Indians - This was THE house. They had the most members, they had a nice house, threw cool parties, had the top fraternity gpa, and the rumor was that they could get any girls they wanted to attend their formals. This was the house that seemingly everybody wanted to be in, regardless of whether they liked to party. I knew a few of them.

Twins - The smallest house, I knew quite a few of brothers in this house. They had a less than favorable stereotype, but they still seemed like pretty cool people and I could tell during fall semester that they really wanted me in their house.

Giants - The stereotype of this house was that they were all the basketball and baseball players and that they were about the "frattiest" of any fraternity. I knew a few guys in this house.

Rockies - Aside from Indians, this was the largest fraternity. They were known for being really fratty and having parties almost every night of the week, but not really standing out from all the other houses which partied hard all the time. I knew a few of the guys in this house but didn't really like it too much.

Cardinals - I'd visited this house a few times late in fall semester, and they seemed like the house I would join if I had to pick one. Cardinals partied a little bit; not as much as the most "fratty" houses but moreso than other houses like Braves and Twins. the guys were pretty chill and I knew quite a few of them.

Red Sox - This was the country club house. They partied quite a bit and were known as the dressiest house, this is what I imagine most of the SEC fraternities to be like from reading GC. Their parties constantly had country club themes such as golf and they were somewhat uppity. They sorta seemed like wannabe southern gentlemen to me. I didn't really know anybody in this house.

Marlins - Although this wasn't the "frattiest" house, they were known for being the most wild and crazy. This was I think the only fraternity where you were allowed to smoke indoors and breaking stuff was encouraged; I'd visited here quite a bit during fall semester for no other reason than that they were really close to my dorm.

I made two really good friends during fall semester that played a part in my rush story. They will be referred to Mark, who I lived next door to me in my freshman dorm and Greg, who I met the first day at campus and I also had a class with.

Go Cardinals!

Oh good Lord, a GC'er after my heart!

I am in love with baseball so I absolutely adore the names.

GO BRAVES!

*tomahawk chop*

This is greeeeaaat!
 

This is super! I do the JYA (Junior Year Abroad) and really not been on gc for a long time. Of course my computer crashes and I cannot remember my password nor any of the prompts as I am not that into wanting to know any or everything computer, so I just finally gave up and started a new account which makes me feel even more like a geek. Oops, soory, too much!

But good grief, WOW, come back to all of these great stories! Love it! LOL!

Hope you get the best for you. How chill!

What, no Cubs? :p

Red Sox are the Southern Fraternity? Interesting combo. GO SOX!

I'm really anxious to hear your story because I have a good guess that I know what school you're talking about! And since my daughter attended this school, I'll be extra curious...!

Since I'm a Florida girl, I'll root for the Marlins. Even though I don't think they're going to last very long.

Why reading guys' rush threads is so much fun. :)

Day 1 of Rush
 

The first round of rush was organized that every dorm floor(s) had two rho chis assigned to them and led the same group around to every house first round. First round took two days, 6 houses on Sunday and 5 houses on Monday...this being the Sunday before and Monday of the first day of classes, when everybody is busy anyway and most of campus comes down sick from exhaustion.

Anyway, the houses I visited the first night were

Braves
Cardinals
Giants
Yankees
Indians
Twins

All I knew going into first round was that each section at each house would be half an hour long.

Sunday night started at Braves, which was conveniently the house furthest away from my dorm. At first it was really weird for me to see all of the guys in the house come line up outside and form what would become a line of handshakes. Just about every house did this, and I didn't really see the point because the line moved very quickly and the handshakes were superficial at just about every house with the brothers saying "Hi, robrun" or "Welcome to Braves". As I said, this happened at every house first round.

After the line of handshakes we came upon a food table which had really good beef kebabs. We were then seated in their formal room which was weird because all of the rushees and all of the brothers only took up half of their formal room; Braves was the smallest fraternity after Twins. It became more weird when the brother surrounded all of the rushees and started clapping and doing this weird non-sensical chant that didn't talk about the house at all. Then what happened at this house and just about every other was a speech about why Braves was the best house and how they liked to party. The speech was interesting, mostly because the president of the house was not a very good public speaker.

I was then taken to a room by a brother whom I introduced and when I told him where I was from the brother "just so happened" to be from a town close by. The conversation was pretty superficial stuff about school although the guy did seem pretty chill but before too much longer it was time to go and we were whisked out of the house because there were steep fines for going over the half hour time limit. Overall, the two or three guys I talked to seemed nice and I decided that I wanted to get to know this house more before I would cut them.

Next was Cardinals. Just like at Braves, there was a line of handshakes then getting some food (chicken strips and cheese sticks) and then hearing about how Cardinals like to party hard all of the time which struck me as weird because I knew that they didn't party near as much as they said they did in their presentation.

During and after the one-on-one (or actually 2-on-1) at Cardinals I guessed that they really wanted me in their house because the president and the ex-president both talked to me about how Cardinals was such a great house and how they could see me in the house, although it was kind of awkward when they asked me what I thought about rush when this was only the second house I had visited, and rushees were strictly forbidden to talk about what happened at other houses during rush rounds. Overall though, the conversation was pretty good and I thought I could really see myself in this house.

Then the same routine as before, whisked out of the house to avoid the time penalty yada yada yada and it was off to Giants.

I could tell from the moment I stepped in at Giants I wouldn't fit in there. During their opening presentation they talked about how they took hazing very seriously and said that they didn't haze at all, which I would have believed if not for some of the brothers smirking or laughing during this bit. During the one-on-one it was pretty much me in a room with someone who I had never seen before and would probably never see again, although we both understood that there was no chance in hell I'd join this house so we had a civil although somewhat half-hearted conversation. This house definitely had the loudest chanting as the rush group left the house.

Next was Yankees, the football house. This was probably the funniest presentation because all of the presenters were very, very drunk and the presentation itself was filled with lots of innuendoes (two curvaceous hills right next to each other? what they could possibly be talking about?) and jokes about the brothers themselves. The one-on-ones here were pretty funny and laid-back too as it turned out everybody in the house was drunk (breaking rush rules, btw) wich led to fun moments. Although I could tell I probably wouldn't join this house, the guys were still pretty chill and nice.

This was followed by Indians. Indians' house was kind of close to my dorm so I knew quite a bit about the house. I came in with the stereotype that this was THE house, but I ended up disappointed. The guy doing the opening presentation wasn't near as funny as he thought he was and the 70 or so guys in the house made an effort to surround the rush group of 18 which was pretty weird, as they all had stern and serious looks on their faces during a presentation which was supposed to be funny. The presentation talked about how great the house was and that being a member of Indians would immediately put you on top of the social ladder and that you could get any girl you wanted, as well as that everybody in every other house wished that they could have been in Indians. The one-on-one was weird too as I was paired with the house president and the rush chair, they really didn't talk to me as much as talk at me telling me about why Indians was such a great house, pretty much repeating what the presenter had talked about earlier.

Last on Sunday night was Twins. By this point I was getting tired; this round started at aroudn 10:30. Twins was hurting for members it was not hard to tell. The presentation talked about the great experiences that a certain brother had at Twins and how Twins was not like the other houses and how the stereotype of their house wasn't true. Unlike most of the other presenters, this speaker actually seemed sincere and earnest which was a definite plus. I was paired with with someone who I knew very well in the house who gave me a house tour even though I had visited the house on multiple occasions which didn't make very much sense to me.

By the time I had gotten to Twins, all of the different food that the houses had started running together as three different houses had some form of cheese sticks or fast food. I made the mistake of not pacing myself and getting sick which led to a visit to the restroom at Twins. The guy giving me the house tour actually handled this pretty well and used it as an opportunity to show off the newly remodeled bathroom which made the situation funny more than anything else. Overall, Twins seemed like they were genuinely interested in me

After the first night of rush, I ranked the 6 houses I had visited so far as follows:

Cardinals (easily #1 so far)
Twins (Impressive, but not as impressive as Cardinals)
Braves (From what I learned about the house, I could see myself in it but I really didn't know that much about the house)
Indians (I got the impression they were interested in me, but I wasn't very interested in them)
Giants & Yankees (there was no chance I would ever fit into either of these houses, and they realized this too)

2nd half of first round

This was on a Monday night. Having been through the first part of first round, I felt more prepared about what to expect. On this night I visited houses in the following order:

Phillies
Rockies
Red Sox
Marlins
Astros

The opening presentation at Phillies was one of the funnier ones during first round, as the skit had multiple characters that were stereotypes of the other houses asking if they could be a member of Phillies and the head presenter would tell them no for some reason. They made sure to talk about how much they partied. The one-on-one here didn't go well at all because I put in a room with two guys from India (the only two Indians in the house) - what made it go badly was that I could not understand what they were saying at all and when I could understand what they were saying it was only questions about how much I drank. I left this house almost hoping that they would cut me because there was no way I wanted to return if they only cared about how much I drank.

Rockies was next. Their opening happened in the lobby of their house which was a fairly small room which made all the screaming and chanting when we came in sound that much more impressive. Their presentation made repeated hints that their house mom was promiscuous. The food here sticks out more than any other house mostly because it was fried chicken....except it was cold chicken. The one-on-one was okay at best because the guy I was paired with and me didn't have much common ground at all which made for forced conversation...however, I was leaving the house, one random brother in the stairwell started talking to me and we did have some common ground and all of a sudden Rockies seemed like a much better house. Overall, the first 29 and a half minutes of the round at this house sucked but the last 30 seconds was good which meant that I was considering going back there 2nd round.

The country club house, Red Sox, was next. All of the brothers were dressed like they had just left church. Their skit was all about how much classier they were than all the other houses and how Red Sox could turn even the most socially inept guy into a "refined gentleman with class and manners that all mothers would approve of". the one-on-one was more of this, except they tried to talk about how much they partied and all the kick ass parties they had which seemed a bit forced. I left this house thinking I probably wouldn't come back.

Next was Marlins. All of my friends who had seen Marlins on Sunday night told me this was easily the best ski during round one. I was not disappointed. To play up the image of being badasses who didn't care about grades or anything, one of the brothers took a large sip of gasoline and then produced a huge flame with the help of a blowtorch. Next, another brother had someone throw a clay pot. At his forehead. It shattered into many pieces although I would find out later that all of the clay pots had been pre-broken so that nobody got injured. The last wild stunt featured the fire guy needing something to get the gasoline out of his mouth so he grabbed the closest available bottle which had a blue liquid and was labelled Windex. The one-on-one played on all of this more as they talked about how they had a party that involved 2 tons of velveeta cheese and the brother himself showed me all of the illegal parking and drunk in public warnings he had amassed on the wall. This was easily the best skit as far as shock value was concerned and it all seemed like fun.

The last house of first round was Astros, the soccer house. Their presentation was crazy but not as crazy as Marlins. It was fairly obvious that the speaker was quite drunk as he at one pont forgot the name of the fraternity itself. They combatted their image as the soccer house by saying that they had other varsity athletes and IM athletes as well, which for the most part cemented that I would not be coming back to this house. The brother paired with me for the one-on-one acted like he didn't want to be there so we actually ended up watching tv for a majority of the time before the round was over.

At the end of the night, this was the ranking for the 5 most recnet houses:

Rockies (i wanted to see if the last 30 seconds there were a fluke or not)
Marlins (this house was lots of fun and it was easy to tell that everybody there enjoyed themselves)
Phillies (just because it wasn't as bad as the last two)
Red Sox (i didn't really like the whole country club thing)
Astros (no chance I would fit in there)

That was the end of first round. On Monday night, we found out who cut us after first round and then we preffed houses for second round. This is where Mark comes into the story. After first round, me and Mark talked about the houses we liked and didn't like and he told me that he wanted to suicide Cardinals and that he wasn't really interested in any other house, and he tried to convince me to suicide Cardinals as well. He was first in alphabetical order and I was near the bottom, so he got to find out what houses he got cut by first.

As it turns out, he got cut by Cardinals. And 5 other houses. It ended up that he didn't get to pick 5 houses becuase that's all that was left in the first place. I felt anxious at this point because I didn't know why Cardinals would cut Mark which made me worried about whether or not they had cut me.

As it turns out, I was cut by:
Giants
Phillies
Red Sox
Astros

I wasn't surprised about any of these. This left Braves, Cardinals, Yankees, Indians, Twins, Rockies, and Marlins.

I knew that I wanted to go back to Braves, Cardinals, and Twins and that I didn't want to go to Yankees anymore. This left Indians, Rockies, and Marlins for the last 2 houses. In the end, I cut Indians because I decided that I would rather be associated with a house that partied hard or broke lots of stuff than a house that had its head up its ass.

After the first round of rush, I went from having 2 houses that I thought I could see myself in to 5. Little did I know, the hardest decisions of the week hadn't even happened yet.

More please. The retro fraternity rush threads are awesome:D

Well, I never would have guessed Marlins would make it so far! Can't say this would be a moms dream fraternity, but it does so sound like it would be a standout for a lot of guys.

Please More. Im addicted to retro recruitment threads ~

nice thread! haha you managed to pick all of my least favorite teams...but i am going to have to go with the marlins! :) please post more!

I'm pulling for the Braves!

2nd Round

For 2nd round, sections at each house were 45 minutes long with 10 minutes for travel between each house, which meant that 2nd round dragged on until almost 11 pm, although this was a Friday night - 3rd round would be Saturday night. Each rushee was responsible to go to each house on their own, they could not go to houses they were scheduled to if they didn't want to. The only thing rho gammas did was do check-in at each house to see how many people showed up for each section.

The order I visited houses during this round was:

Rockies
Braves
Twins
Cardinals
Marlins

At this point it should be mentioned that Rockies and Twins are close to each other and that Cardinals, Braves, and Marlins are relatively close to teach other as well. What this meant was that my schedule for 2nd round had just about the most walking possible for 2nd round. Although campus was small, this still resulted in time conflicts as rounds didn't get out on time that often and 10 minutes of walking time in some cases was just not enough time - this will play a part later.

I started this night at Rockies. Before entering the house, I noticed there weren't very many people in this section of the round, which I thought was weird for one of the larger houses on campus. One thing I immediately noticed at this and other houses was how much the attire was ramped up for 2nd round. Whereas first round was nicer stuff that could normally be worn to class, this round was stuff you'd wear when going out on the weekend or going to church. The president of Rockies spoke with a spiel about how glad he was that we all decided to come back and learn about more and that they would learn a little more about the rushees as well. There was then a video about how much this house liked to party, the most impressive part was one of the brothers punching another one bare-fisted and knocking out teeth, another impressive bit was watching a girl at one of their parties smash a beer can...between her boobs - it was very impressive. After the video and another speaker, was the one-on-one. This was actually a 2-on-1. Again, as happened the last time at Rockies, I didn't really have much commong ground with either of the brothers I talked to, although they tried really hard to get to know me. After another speaker, it was time to go to Braves. Overall, I was mildly impressed, the atmosphere of the house seemed fun and they seemed interested in me but I just had a bad vibe of sorts about the house.

Then, to Braves. Right when I walked into Braves (houses didn't do handshake lines very much 2nd and 3rd round) the brother who I had spoken to first round welcomed me back, which seemed nice. Again, Braves had very good food - this round was an ice cream buffet. Whereas other houses had talked about their social events during first round, Braves did it during 2nd round. The presentation was energetic but not over the top, I liked it alot. Then, an alum who had to be in his 50s or 60s talked about how Braves had given him the best experiences of his life both during and after college. Then was individual conversations. To hide the fact their house was small, each rushee was placed in a room and through a period of about 20 minutes brothers would switch in and out of each room, so that each rushee talked to 3 brothers. These one-on-ones were good as I connected with the people I talked to, and one of them really went out of his way to assure that Braves did no hazing (this ended up being a huge lie in the coming months, Braves had some of the worst hazing being almost as bad as Marlins, but I had no clue about any of this at the time). Then, there was a final speech by someone who had better speaking skills than the first round speaker which really made me feel good. After this round, I felt as though I could really see myself as a member of Braves since I connected to everyone I talked to there which was something that didn't really happen at Rockies.

Next was Twins. Twins and Braves were the two most remote houses on campus. Braves was at the south edge of campus, Twins was the northeast edge of campus. My round at Braves ended 2 minutes before my round at Twins was supposed to start. This presented a problem. By the time I got to Twins, it turned out they were waiting for me to start the round for 5 minutes. I felt pretty embarrased at this point. This round started with a speaker, and I noticed quickly that there was only 10 people during this round, which was a very low number to be in a section of 2nd round. I knew most of the people in this group of 10. After a speech that didn't really stick out, we got Subway sandwiches and cake and were then paired into 1-on-1's. I was paired with the president. this was significant because I had known the president since the first day I had arrived on campus and we were very good friends - he had rushed me hardcore fall semester inviting me to every even the house held. He did a very good job of telling me to do what was best for me and that Twins would be very happy to have me. We talked about the one person in the house that I did not get along with, and the president assured me that it would not be a big deal. There was a closing speech that was fairly impressive. After leaving this house, I couldn't decide how I felt because this was easily the house I knew the most about and was the most comfortable about but at the same time I wondered whether or not I would have more fun in a different house that I didn't know much about yet - the impressive 2nd of Braves was really sticking out in my head.

At this point, Rockies was definitely out of the picture as I could only go to 2 houses 3rd round and Braves and Twins had both been better than Rockies.

Then I went to Cardinals. After greetings, I was offered pie and ice cream - apparently I missed the memo that 2nd round was the unilateral dessert round (who knew? :confused:). Being that I had eaten at all 3 houses previous and had to jog to get to Cardinals just to be 5 minutes late, I turned the food down - I was starting to feel a little sick anyway. The brother who was offering me the food seemed to take personal offense to this which to a small degree weirded me out. The opening was a speech which more than anything else struck me as how much more serious it was than anything at any of the other houses during 2nd round - Cardinals made joining their house and greek life and general almost sound like a life or death decision. Cardinals were dressed up more than any of the other houses, and the conversations were structured as a house tour then a 1-on-1. The house tour didn't go too well as 1) I already knew the house layout inside and out and 2) the brother giving the tour didn't seem like he really gave too much of a damn. The 1-on-1 with a different brother went a little better - both the tour and the 1-on-1 were with 2 of the few people in the house I didn't know. After a final speech that was still pretty serious but not as uptight as the opening, I started having serious doubts about Cardinals, even though they had been my favorite house heading into rush. Not really knowing what to think, I then went to Marlins.

Continuing with the apparent dessert theme, Marlins offered choclate chip cookies that ended up being the best food of any house 1st or 2nd round. the presentation was about what would happen during the pledge period, mostly social events but also weekends blocked out for "brotherhood activities" (fancy term for hazing). This presentation was good in that it maintained the fun aspect of 1st round while still being somewhat serious. The 1-on-1 here went fairly well, as me and the brother had a very good conversation about not only Marlins but also the greek system in general. The final speech was one of those super-emotional speeches about how this one senior had almost failed out of college and made other bad choices but his brothers at Marlins had rallied around him and helped him up - the speech showed what good Marlins could do for a person. Although what Marlins did during first round wasn't necessarily my cup of tea, 2nd round seemed much more down to earth and like a fraternity that I would be happy to live in.


After I got back to my dorm, the rho gammas announced that we would have two hours to make our choices for next round.

These were easily the most stressful two hours of my rush experience. I had to cut 5 houses down to 2. I knew I would not join Rockies, but I was torn between the other 4 houses. Braves easily had the most impressive round - I decided after 5 minutes or so I would definitely be going there 3rd round. Cardinals, which had been my #1 house going into rush, sort of rubbed me the wrong way and made me feel uncomfortable. Although I really liked Marlins 2nd round, I couldn't really tell if they were more like how they acted 1st round or how they acted 2nd round - the 2nd round Marlins seemed much more like an environment I'd like to be in than 1st round. And there was Twins. I knew the house very well and had fun there in the past, but I couldn't decide whether or not familiarity with the house now necessarily meant it being the house for me. Deciding between these three houses was hard enough to me that I ended up making a diagram what I thought to be the pros and cons of each house and if some things outweighed others. I ended up calling an independent upper-classman girl friend asking her what houses she thought I would fit into; she gave me the answer I was afraid I would get - I could fit into any of those houses. Eventually, I finally came up with a ranking of the houses after 2nd round.

Braves (far and away the best house 2nd round and rush overall)
Marlins (the last speech really got to me - I thought this house could be very good to me)
Cardinals (everything i'd experienced before 2nd round at Cardinals had been fun, but then this awful 2nd round made me think perhaps it wasn't all that fun and that I might not have a good time as a member there)
Twins (although I knew most of the brothers in the house and thought they were cool, i just decided they weren't the best fit for me)
Rockies (no way I could be in this house, no matter how interested they were - I decided the 30 seconds at the end of first round had been a fluke)

If I had kept thinking about it for another 5 minutes, it's quite possible that Marlins/Cardinals/Twins could have ended up in a different order.

Finally, the rho gams came back with our lists for who invited us back for 3rd round.

My list was the last one in the rush group.

I scrolled down the page.

I had been invited back by Braves - that was a sigh of relief.

Rockies had invited me back - I couldn't have cared less.

Cardinals and Twins had both invited me back.

But Marlins had cut me.

Not really having time for it to soak in and think about it because it was 1 am at this point and 3rd round was the next night, the rho gam told me to hurry up and pick another house other than Braves - these rho gams would not allow suiciding. Just going down to the next house on my list, I half-heartedly put down Cardinals.

Greg comes into the story now, as we had gone to somewhat similar houses 2nd round - he was suiciding Braves. Right picks for 2nd round, Greg asked me why the hell I was going back to Cardinals and was peer pressuring me, telling me that Braves was the only house I would have any fun at. After comparing schedules, me, Mark, and Greg were all going to be at Braves at the same time.

I talked to Mark after 2nd round; at third round he was going to be at Braves and Marlins. We both had the same idea about Braves - we wish we had gotten to know this house sooner but were both very interested. Although, the funny thing was that we had gotten each other's favorite houses - Mark had wanted to be in Cardinals since the first day he arrived on campus and I at the time would have preferred Marlins to Cardinals.

My 3rd round schedule would be Braves and then Cardinals. All in all, I had decided I would try to go into 3rd round with an open mind about both houses but that Braves would have a slight edge. Essentially, I had gone from knowing nothing at all about Braves to liking them more than any other house, even previously well-liked Cardinals and Twins.

Why is it always STL vs ATL? I'm still pulling for the Cardinals.

ETA: This thread is very interesting to me because I have never heard of a formally structured fraternity recruitment.

I'm really enjoying this thread. So the Marlins took themselves out of the playoffs.....:rolleyes:.....their loss.

HELLLLLOOOO?

Robrun? Are you there? I am really enjoying your story, I think this college is where my in laws went and they always speak of how great the greek scene is there. I'm loving hearing a more up to date version than the 1950's one that I've heard for years!!;)

3rd Round / Bidnight
 

First, before I eventually reveal the house I joined, here are the 10 houses at my school that I did NOT join, in alphabetical order :

Alpha Tau Omega
Beta Theta Pi
Delta Chi
Delta Tau Delta
Delta Upsilon
Phi Delta Theta
Phi Kappa Psi
Sigma Alpha Epsilon
Sigma Chi
Sigma Nu

3rd Round was an hour long and unlike the other rounds in that it finished relatively early, at around 9 pm so that all of the houses had time to decide who they wanted to cut or keep as well as take down the setup of 3rd round and prepare for bidnight parties.

The night started at Braves. 3rd Round was definitely more serious than 1st or 2nd round had been, as there wasn’t any joking when I entered the house, just a bunch of serious looks on people’s faces. We were led into the dining room where there were personalized place settings. Everything on the table was in the house’s colors, and draped over each chair was a shirt with the house’s letters on it in the house’s colors. Seating alternated brother/rushee/brother/rushee down long tables; each brother talked primarily to one rushee. As dinner was being served, the president with horrible public speaking skills gave a speech about how we had lots on our plate tonight :rolleyes: . What he said next surprised me; he said that Braves had already made their cuts and that we should just relax and take it easy and get to know who we talk to. The dinner was one of the best I’ve ever had as it started out with salad and then led to very tender steak followed up with a dessert of grasshopper pie. The dinner conversation was for the most part small talk with the brothers asking rushees how they were doing and just general chit chat about this and that, nothing too serious. After the dinner was the conversations. Mine ended up being a 1 on 2, as it was one brother and another rushee aside from myself. I was paired with a brother I had never met before and another rushee who I knew was going to join Braves.

What followed was one of the worst and most awkward conversations I ever had.

The brother started asking questions non-stop, and not giving any feedback to my answers, just moving on to the next presumably pre-scripted question. The questions themselves had the tone of assuming that I was going to join Braves, there were questions such as “What leadership roles do you plan on taking in Braves?” and “What do you see as your biggest impact on this house being?” I only got ask one question – What is the strongest aspect of Braves.

I got the worst answer possible.

The brother told me that the strongest aspect of Braves was its academics. I had done some research previously during the day and found out the Braves had the worst greek gpa on campus, well below both the all mens and all greek averages. At this point I had decided that Cardinals would really have to screw up for me to not join their house because there was no chance I was joining Braves. However, the conversation at Braves wasn’t over yet. What made the whole conversation even worse was that the other rushee with me was never asked any questions at all – the only thing he ever said was “Robrun, I know that you would fit in here at Braves and would be a big asset to the house” – the rushee was playing the part of rusher, which just made things worse than they already were.

Luckily, the round ended soon after that, with a short ending speech by the president about how Braves would be very happy to see us later in the evening.

On the way to Cardinals during the 10 minute break inbetween houses, me and some other rushees talked to each other and realized that 7 different rushees were down to Braves and Cardinals. (5 of the 7 in thie group ended up joining the same house as me) Even while walking into Cardinals, the rushee who I was with at Braves who was just coming to Cardinals “for the heck of it” told me that I should join Braves with him and that I could do much better than Cardinals.

The opening at Cardinals was much like the opening at Braves, with the president giving us a speech to try and help us relax and that he had been in our shoes before and knew what it was like and that we should just take it easy and enjoy ourselves in the meantime. The dining hall at Cardinals was much like Braves, with personalized place settings and a similar seating arrangement, this time at round tables instead of at long tables. As it just so happened, Cardinals served a steak dinner too. I barely touched my food, as I had eaten way too much at Braves. Even though the steak at Cardinals wasn’t as good as the steak at Braves, it didn’t really matter. I was sold on this house and something very bad would have to happen for me not to join Cardinals. After some alumni speaker who talked about how his experiences in Cardinals helped him throughout his whole life, it was time for conversations.

This time, conversations were 2-on-2’s, with two brothers and two rushees in the same room. I was definitely more comfortable here was one of the brothers was the person who had introduced me to Cardinals in the first place and I knew the other rushee and the other brother fairly well. The talk here was not tense at all, it was very laid back and like it was four old friends who had known each other forever were just hanging out, which made me feel really at ease.

There was then a final speaker, a former president of Cardinals, who talked about how the ball was in our court now and that even though he would be happy to see us all back at Cardinals in an hour or so, we should do what was best for us. The speaker said some other stuff too, but I wasn’t really paying attention because I was only thinking about coming back to Cardinals later that night – I knew I had found my home for the rest of my college career.

Once I got back to my dorm, Greg was there even though he lived in a different dorm to peer pressure me and tell me I should join Braves with him. Greg did not want to take no for an answer which was very frustrating – it took quite a while before I got him to lay off.

Mark, on the other hand, was in a completely different boat. He could not pick between Braves and Marlins. What ended up happening was that Greg and one guy from the dorm who had suicided Marlins went back and forth trying to convince Mark to join them and not the other. It got bad enough that Mark eventually decided which house he was going to join by a coinflip…he joined Braves.

For the first time since rush started, I knew exactly what I was doing. I had no trouble making my rankings – my rho gammas even asked me If I was okay since they remembered how much trouble I had deciding what to do after 2nd round.

At this point, it was about an hour until we found out which houses we got into. Being tired from rush week, I decided to take a short nap before I ran to my new house.

As it turns out, I overslept and the rho gammas came knocking to my door to tell me to go run to my new house...








...Cardinals!

Bidnight at Cardinals was one of the most fun nights I ever had and it will definitely stick out in my mind for a long time. It turned out that most of my friends had also joined Cardinals which made the experience that much more fun. From that night, I have definitely been











Proud to be a Fiji!

YAY! Great thread! Congrats to you :)

Really good thread, Robrun! Thanks for sharing.

Great story! I'm glad you ended up at the house that was best for you (and not for your friend:rolleyes:).

My son is getting quite a bit of that from his hs friends right now! I'm glad that he seems to be sticking to his gut feelings as well instead of the peer pressure!!! He still has a bit to go though, so we'll see.

I'll do a fraternity recruitment story when it is all said and done.

Who were the Braves?