This Halloween, We Rocked

Fresher’s week has come and gone, but the energy and excitement of that fresh start still lingers in the Petrean air. This year, Peterhouse is blessed with an especially high intake of keen graduate students. Hailing mostly from the US and Germany, new graduate students are coming from all corners of the world to study in the oldest college in Cambridge. Best of all, they are taken by the archaic traditions and social events of Peterhouse, e.g. in the latest sign-up for Grad Hall, not only did all the spots fill-up within a day, the list continued to splash into a sizable wait-list. 

There was a time when the MCR Committee was fearful of events being undersubscribed. This year, we need not fear for any shortage of enthusiasm from our galvanized MCR. 

On the eve of All Hallow’s Eve, we held our Halloween Cocktail Hour. We celebrated a day early so as to provide members with another day to recover from the rigors of rocking out in fancy costume. I, for one, dressed as the king of the god’s, Zeus, where my crown of laurels was made from a ring of golden Christmas tinsel and golden leaves from Poundland (think the British equivalent of a cheapo dollar store), where Vicki, my partner, meticulously trimmed off the tinsel, leaving only the leaves behind for my crown, as I wielded a divine weapon, a thunderbolt made of cardboard and yellow construction paper (and in the absence of glue, I used staples to keep it together). I wore a toga, comprised of a white twin-sized flat sheet that I bought from Primark, with safety pins securing it in place. The pièce de résistance were my leather sandals, styled after those seen in biblical movies. The costume was so awesome that one can only assume that it was confusing to most people as to whether they were running into me in a costume or experiencing a theophany of cosmic proportions.

This punch's an eyeful.

Our MCR was decked out in full Halloween regalia, with an inflatable cauldron sitting in the middle of the room, filled with many beers. One of our members carved a Jack O’Lantern, which was illuminated next to a  portrait of a sassy dancing skeleton. For cocktails, we had an abundance of creative ones, ranging from Voodoo Juice (a rosy coloured drink made from grenadine, armaretto, and pineapple) with “eyeballs” (lychees stuffed with blueberries), Peterhouse Puss (a disturbingly green cocktail made with Chambord, rum and a mishmash of other spirits), and the Grateful Dead (a drink that was dark blue made with tequila, gin, and blue food colouring).

In our midst was Carmen San Diego, The Mummy, a Wisconsin fanatic, a phantom, an alien with a bulbous head, a ghost, a vampire, a medieval princess, a few cats, a dog, and most importantly, a bunch of merry Petreans and Cantabrigians. To the sound of The Monster Mash, Lady Gaga, the Ghostbusters, and a wide array of other tunes, we rocked the night away, ending well after midnight. Throughout the evening, the party became the envy of the JCR*, with some successful undergrads smuggling themselves into the MCR amidst the merriment that unfolded in our home base. Never mind that – it was heartening to see that the MCR became a place to be envied, desired, to look forward to going to.

Other fantastic things we have done since the start of Michaelmas include a Guys and Dolls Cocktail Event (think mobsters form the Dick Tracy Era, with jazz flooding our hallowed MCR -- I dressed as a banker, decked out in a bowler hat and britches, what Americans call suspenders), a fancy dress party themed after "the letter P" (I was pacman, while others dressed as Pocahontas, pirates, portraits, policemen and even P Diddy), formal hall followed by a ghost tour of Cambridge, a black-tie Grad Hall, and countless cups of espresso, tea, biscuits, and continuous good conversation. 

The challenge now is to balance my research, work (I'm running supervisions for 1st year medics), and life. With my responsibilities as the Secretary of the Kelvin Club, the scientific society of Peterhouse, and president of the Cambridge University Public Health and Epidemiology Society, I've plenty more time-juggling to do. Of course, with all this activity, the PhD has slightly gone down the drain. But, I have to admit, I'm having the time of my life.  

With so many things to do, and people coming/dying to come to the MCR, I am confident that it will be a very good year.

*The "JCR" is the Junior Combination Room, which is also known as the Sexcentenary Club, or the Sex Club for short. This is the common room, i.e. lounge, available for all members of Peterhouse to enjoy, including graduate students, though it is dominated by the undergrads and very much their institution. Funny thing about the Sex Club is that it has been celebrating it's 600 years of existence for more than a century...which really dates it as an even more ancient club than it actually sounds, and framing American establishments, such as the Tercentenary Theatre in Harvard Yard, as relatively new places.