Cornell University Student Reviews

Big Picture

Every year, the Cornell Daily Sun sends all incoming freshman, a pseudo-guide to Cornell. Included in this "guide" is Big Red Ambition: 161 things every Cornellian Should Do. These range from the normal to the supernatural to the kinky. (Each year, more and more things are added, this version is from my year i.e. 2005) Big Red Ambition: 161 Things Every Cornellian Should Do (taken from The Cornell Daily Sun, Monday, February 28, 2005. Page 9.) 1. Make the library into your bedroom, find a buddy. 2. Finally meet the dazzling Denice Cassaro. 3. Camp out overnight (re: freeze to death) for hockey tickets. 4. Go to the Cornell-Harvard men's hockey game and throw fish on the ice. 5. Sing along to "We didn't go to Harvard" with Cayuga's Waiters. 6. Illegally slide down Libe Slope on a tray from Okenshield's. 7. Take H ADM 430: Introduction to Wines. 8. Streak across the Arts Quad. 9. Take Psych 101. 10. Test out Olin Library's musically calibrated steps by throwing stones on them. 11. Go sake bombing in Collegetown (for the over-21 crowd only!). 12. Order ice cream at the Dairy Bar. 13. Climb the rock wall in Bartels Hall. 14. Listen to a full chimes concert from the clock tower and guess the songs played. 15. Go on a blind Facebook date. 16. Wear flip-flops to class in January. 17. Go to the Fuertes Observatory on North Campus and gaze at meteor showers. 18. Have a snowball fight in May. 19. Milk a cow. 20. Play frisbee on the Arts Quad. 21. Pick apples at the Cornell Orchards. 22. Attend the Apple Festival on the Commons. 23. Wait in line for half an hour for a salad at the Terrace. 24. Flirt with your professor. 25. Bomb a prelim. 26. Live through an Ithaca blizzard and tell your friends how you survived frostbite. 27. Attend the hotelie prom. 28. Meet Happy Dave from Okenshield's. 29. Make your face turn blue by screaming at midnight before the first finals. 30. Get hearburn at the Chili Cook-off on the Commons. 31. Enjoy Ithaca's two months of warm weather by spending a summer here. 32. Go to a Shabbat dinner at 104 West! (CornellCard it). 33. Watch the AAP students parade down East Avenue on Dragon Day. 34. Enjoy corn nuggets at the Nines. 35. Build a snow penis, or count how many you see around campus. 36. Dress up and view the Rocky Horror Picture Show at Risley. 37. Take a class you think is impossible just for fun. 38. Go on a wine tour. 39. Kiss on the suspension bridge at midnight. 40. Sleep through your alarm for a 1:25 class. 41. Shop at the Friends of the Library book sale. 42. Get out of a C.U. parking ticket. 43. Buy an Ithaca is Gorges t-shirt, then get sick of wearing it and buy a variation (Ithaca is Gangsta, Vaginas are Gorges, Ithaca is Long Island...) 44. Learn the "Alma mater," "Evening Song," and "Give my regards to Davy." 45. Attend an opening at the Johnson Museum of Art. 46. Smuggle food from the dining hall and run for your life as they try to get back your stolen cookies. 47. Do the Walk of Shame. 48. Have dinner at a professor's house. 49. Get wasted at a professor's house. 50. Have lunch with President Skorton in the Ivy Room; ask if he's done with that Dijon Burger. 51. Play a game of tag in the Kroch Library stacks. 52. See a play in the Schwartz Center. 53. Rush the field at the last home football game of the season. 54. Attend a Cornell Night. 55. Gamble at Turning Stone (try not to lose money). 56. Watch dancers fly through the air at a Bhangra show. 57. Have a midnight picnic in the Cornell Plantations. 58. Play croquet on the Arts Quad (wear your collar up). 59. Ignore any and all "No Winter Maintenance" signs.. slip and fall down the icy stairs. 60. Sit in Libe Cafe when you have no work to do and watch the worried studiers down gallons of coffee. 61. Write an angry letter to the editor of The Sun. 62. Go to Wegmans on a Friday or Saturday night. 63. Pull an all-nighter in the ***tail Lounge of Uris Library and crash the next day. 64. Go to a fraternity party as a senior; convince yourself you were never one of them. 65. Pretend you're Harry Potter and study in the Law School library (looks like Hogwarts). 66. See the brain collection in Uris Hall. 67. Eat at Banfi's and charge it to CornellCard. 68. Buy beer at Jason's in Collegetown and charge it to City Bucks. 69. Take part in a psychology experiment. 70. Take over a building. 71. Drive your car up and down Libe Slope or Ho Plaza. 72. According to legend, watch a virgin cross the Arts Quad at midnight and watch A.D. White and Ezra Cornell shake hands. 73. Ace a prelim. 74. Throw a flaming pumpkin into the gorge. 75. Play co-ed intramural innertube water polo. 76. Eat in the Risley dining hall. 77. Play at least one game of Texas hold-'em. 78. Hook up with your T.A. 79. Order a PMP at the Hot Truck. 80. Go to karaoke night at Rulloff's on Mondays. 81. 80's Night on Tuesdays at Johnny O's. 82. Go to Group Therapy on Wednesdays at Dunbar's. 83. Take PA PL 201: Magical Muchrooms, Mischievous Molds. 84. Go bowling at Helen Newman Lanes. 85. Hand out quartercards on Ho Plaza. 86. Take an unplanned nap in the library. 87. Have a friend's parents take you out to eat at John Thomas Steakhouse or Boatyard Grill. 88. Eat a chicken parm sandwhich from Louie's Lunch. 89. Eat breakfast at 2 a.m. at the State Diner. 90. Boys: Get thrown out of Balch Hall. 91. Hook up with a freshman. 92. Go skinny dipping in a gorge. 93. Walk to the Commons and back. 94. Go to an a cappella concert. 95. Play trivia at Dino's on Sunday nights. 96. Eat pizza at the Nines. 97. Sell back your books; use money to buy a book of stamps. 98. Drink bubble tea. 99. Eat a Pinesburger. 100. Walk to a fraternity party with your entire freshman floor. 101. See the library's Rare Book Collection. 102. Get lost in Collegetown during Orientation Week. 103. As a freshman, get negged at a bar because the bouncer is actually friends with the person whose I.D. you are using. 104. See a foreign film at Cinemapolis. 105. Get drunk on Slope Day and run into Vice President Susan H. Murphy '73. 106. See a concert at Barton Hall. 107. Gain the freshman 15, pay $300 for a gym membership and don't go. 108. Eat brunch on North Campus. 109. Do your Freshman Reading Project before you graduate. 110. Fail your swim test, just for kicks. 111. Tailgate for Homecoming. 112. Go ice skating at Lynah Rink. 113. Host a prefrosh. 114. Request a song to be played on the clock tower. 115. Get guilt-tripped into giving blood. 116. Boys and girls: Get asked if you are pregnant at Gannett. 117. Drink with your R.A. 118. Make a chalking; weep when it rains that night. 119. Sing drunk on the Blue Light bus. 120. Meet Bill Nye '77, "The Science Guy," and give him a hug. 121. See how long you can go without doing laundry. 122. Go on a road trip to Canada, flirt with the border patrol, smuggle booze back. 123. Try to order pizza from a Blue Light phone. 124. Go to the adult shop on the Commons. 125. Cross-country ski to class. 126. Get tapped for a secret society. 127. Go to the Pyramid Mall, realize it is severel