116 Columbia Traditions

1. Enter the 116th Street gates and sing “Roar, Lion, Roar” on the first night of orientation.

2. Think your OL is an OG. Realize later she was only OK.

3. Make a spare key with an old credit card and an X-Acto knife (VingCard dorms only).

4. Pull an all-nighter with the rest of your floor studying for the Lit Hum final.

5. Eat a slice of Koronet pizza after a long night drinking. Return another day to discover it’s inedible sober.

6. Go to Orgo Night.

7. Go to a World Leaders Forum event and shake hands with a foreign president, preferably a brutal autocrat.

8. Go to a fireside chat. Eat mini-burgers and chocolate chip cookies in PrezBo’s living room.

9. Explore the tunnels.

10. Watch a sunrise over (not in) Morningside Park after pulling an all-nighter.

11. Pretend to be interested in a club to get free swag. Get spammed for the next four years.

12. Get sexiled. Sleep in the lounge.

13. Watch the Varsity Show all four years. Notice repetition of tired Barnard jokes. Also GS jokes. And SEAS jokes.

14. Take a class in Hamilton. Miss the first 15 minutes of every meeting waiting for the elevator.

15. Go to the campus tree-lighting and Yule Log Ceremony.

16. Take the Staten Island Ferry at night.

17. Lock yourself out of your room while in a towel and flip-flops. Proceed to Hartley or the security desk (normal people only).

18. Lock yourself out of your room while dressed. Borrow towel from floormate, undress in his/her room, and put on towel. Borrow cell phone and call Hartley or the security desk to say you are locked out and in a towel (lazy bums only).

19. Protest something.

20. Counter-protest something.

21. Get stuck on the shaft. Make lame “shaft” jokes 10 times a day for the rest of the year.

22. Sled down Low Steps on a tray from Hewitt.

23. Forget to transfer at 96th Street and end up at Central Park North.

24. Actually explore Manhattanville and Harlem.

25. Find the owl on Alma Mater.

26. Rock the glass house.

27. Go to a campus group’s concert.

28. Go to Midnight Breakfast.

29. Catch someone moving your laundry.

30. Make friends with the people in maintenance and with your security guards (and buy their CDs).

31. Join PrezBo’s 5K run.

32. Attend a Columbia sporting event.

33. Go to your friend’s a cappella show. Never go again.

34. Drink on Low Steps.

35. Read a text from every author on Butler. Find out who Demosthenes is and let us know.

36. Participate in a walk of shame.

37. Study abroad. Trust us.

38. Change your major. Twice.

39. Go to services at Riverside Church or the “Blessing of the Animals” at St. John the Divine.

40. Take part in 40s on 40. If it still exists. If not, pour out a 40 for another casualty of the War on Fun.

41. Enroll in a 9 a.m. or Friday class. Never go.

42. Volunteer with Community Impact.

43. See a movie filming on campus. When the movie comes out, go to see it and obnoxiously point out Columbia scenes to your friends.

44. Go to a frat party. Just one.

45. Sneak onto the roof of Mudd, SIPA, or Sulz for a picnic.

46. Take a class on something you know absolutely nothing about.

47. Take a walk across the Brooklyn Bridge. Eat at Grimaldi’s.

48. Order the Spicy Special at Crack Del. Never actually find out its ingredients.

49. Get your parents to pay for dinner at Pisticci.

50. Get a Broadway shake at Tom’s.

51. Find a study spot in Butler. Sleep there to keep it during finals week.

52. Go to the Hungarian Pastry Shop. Realize Artopolis and Café Amrita are better.

53. Spend a vacation on campus while it’s empty.

54. Go to Postcrypt in St. Paul’s Chapel.

55. Find the best pizza joint in New York, then openly mock anyone who hasn’t been there.

56. Learn the Columbia fight song.

57. Get a fake ID. Still get rejected from Havana Central.

58. Quote a Core text outside of class.

59. Take a class that meets in 309 Havemeyer Hall. Even if the class is awful, you won’t regret it.

60. Ignore the red flags on South Lawn.

61. Go to the Organization of Pakistani Students’ Hangama.

62. High-five Roar-ee. Don’t get kicked by the visitors’ mascot.

63. Make a pilgrimage to Barack Obama’s old apartment. Try to find the alley he slept in once.

64. Call CAVA for a friend.

65. Avoid getting CAVA-ed.

66. Be “that guy” or “that girl” in a class.

67. Set foot in all five boroughs. Alternatively, set foot in four and look at Staten Island on the subway map.

68. Check out the view of campus from Butler’s roof, preferably at night.

69. Explore Governors Island.

70. Start using Flex because it’s just like free money. Feel the wrath from your parents when it shows up on your tuition bill.

71. Get into museums free using your CUID.

72. Get into museums free using senior citizens’ discount (GS only).

73. Stay up for 48 hours straight.

74. Write a term paper in 12 hours.

75. Hang out in Williamsburg. Hate it (non-hipsters only). Ironically hate it (hipsters only).

76. Regret wearing heels after falling on College Walk.

77. Walk all the way up Lerner using the ramps only. Wonder why it’s built like that.

78. Lose friends in Senior Regroup.

79. Sample the various local supermarkets. Pledge your heart to Westside.

80. Pass without ever scoring above 60 on a test (SEAS only).

81. Get an A without ever doing the reading (CC only).

82. Host a prefrosh.

83. Walk from the Battery to campus or vice versa.

84. Get a sandwich at 212. Don’t pay for it.

85. Eagerly await the announcement of Bacchanal artists. Then complain that they suck.

86. Take science or lab requirement. Almost fail out (non-science majors only).

87. Put off the swim test until second semester senior year (CC only). Consider inventing a water phobia to get out of it (slackers only).

88. Take Principles of Economics with Sunil Gulati. Become an econ major.

89. Discover econ majors have to take Econometrics. Become an English major.

90. Try to go to a party in EC. Spend your whole night waiting to get signed in (Barnard/GS only).

91. Explore New York City (NSOP only). Explore the area between West 96th and 120th streets (rest of college only).

92. Participate in Barnard Spirit Day.

93. Attend Homecoming once—the year you get free beer (seniors only).

94. Seriously consider dropping out. All the cool Columbians have.

95. Pledge to cook more. End up starting a line of credit at HamDel (cool kids only) or Milano (gourmet eaters only). Or Morton Williams (imbeciles only).

96. Attend a ceremonial religious meal, but not for your religion.

97. Have a drunken hookup. Awkwardly bump into said hookup everywhere.

98. Go to Health Services with a cold. Leave with condoms.

99. Take the M60 to LaGuardia. Foot the taxi bill for JFK.

100. Join a campus tour and ask the tour guide awkward questions.

101. Get dragged out of bed at 4 a.m. for a fire alarm—three times in one week (Carman/McBain only). Swear to savagely beat the person who set off the alarm.

102. Attend a WBAR-B-Q.

103. Go for a run in Riverside Park.

104. Fall over after Dance Marathon.

105. Spend one summer living and working in the city.

106. Make friends with a General Studies student who is 10 years older than you.

107. Hear Jeffrey Sachs speak. Experience liberal guilt.

108. Eat brunch terribly hung over at Community Food & Juice. Experience an even worse hangover when you see your bank statement and realize you spent 25 bucks on a plate of eggs.

109. Write a paper based entirely on Wikipedia. Earn a B.

110. Realize the value of research librarians.

111. Check out Citi Field and the new Yankee Stadium.

112. Work an off-campus internship during the year. Don’t spill the hot coffee on yourself.

113. Figure out the Barnard/Columbia relationship.

114. Hook up in the Butler stacks.

115. Remember that thesis you were supposed to write. Leave the stacks.

116. Graduate!