Dartmouth's Homecoming Weekend~

Hi people..it's all over the news that there's going to be a storm tomorrow..called 'hurricane sandy'..i sure hope everything will be fine..On a more happier note, this weekend is Dartmouth's Homecoming weekend. All the alumni's come back to see each other, march in the parade and also experience the homecoming bonfire.

This event is one of Dartmouth's traditions, and I felt really lucky to watch the whole scene...don't think I can get this experience anywhere else...

The night stated with a parade..Some people might think it was boring, but to me it was amazing because it was sweet to see all the classes (right from 1942) hold hands and walk together with every body else in their class..So here in Dartmouth, you'll be grouped into which year you graduate..most of the undergraduate courses here take 4 years to finish, hence every freshman entering Dartmouth this year is a 2016...

Just to be clear, I'm in the class of 2014..even though I'll finish my master's in November 2013 (insyaALLAH), but my graduation ceremony is in June 2014. Yeah sorry I know it's confusing. Here's some of the pictures from the parade, sorry the pics aren't so clear because I obviously do not know how to operate my camera at night:

After the parade was over, we went to the big green (thats what we call our park situated in between the town and the college). It was so lively, so many people were there. You could feel the Dartmouth bond in the atmosphere, every one there clearly loved Dartmouth & I bet most of the alumni came from across the country and perhaps all over the world.

Something was happening at the building below, a speech by someone..we had no idea who..haha..

I really just wanted to see the bonfire. Think of the event as the seniors passing down the torch to the freshmen of class 2016. The tradition of freshmen running around the bonfire began in 1904 when the Sixth Earl of Dartmouth visited the College to lay the cornerstone for the new Dartmouth Hall, which had been destroyed by fire that February. Students built an enormous bonfire to celebrate the earl's visit. And the tradition has continued till today, but perhaps the reason for the bonfire has evolved into welcoming the new students.

So once the bonfire has been lit up, student's from class 2016 will start running around the fire. I'm not sure how many rounds they have to complete...Here's what the bonfire looked like during construction:

And just before it was lit up:

Finally after about a 30 minute wait,we saw all the freshman of 2016 getting ready to run. And owh my god, the fire was awesome and massive! It was increadible to look at. I think the flames got up to like 50 feet from the ground. You can see the look of amazement in people's faces as they watched the whole event. Well, some were busy swearing at the 16's, I guess they thought that was more fun.

And I don't have any good pictures of the freshmen running because they were going pretty fast so all the pictures came out blurry. And can you see how bright the fire was:

I stayed to watched for about 20 minutes. Pranjali, Dhruv & Madhurya wanted me to come along with them to join the 16's run around the fire..and I was like 'Uhhh..it's ok...i'm too old to do things like that'..haha..i know I'm so lame..Malas okay nak berpeluh2 and lari dengan kanak2.

And group photos are a must in my blog..=)