I thought I would take this term off so I could perhaps escape the cold, depressing New England winter and maybe get some sun. As luck would have it, I am shacked up in Binghamton, N.Y., which as a handy reference is not really much further south than Hanover, but only further west. Binghamton's snow makes Hanover's look like flurries.
The city has its interesting facets. Aside from being the home of IBM, it is also the home of the State University of New York at Binghamton. It is purported to be one of the best state schools in the land. In fact, its propaganda bills it as "a different breed of Ivy."
In keeping with the wanna-be Ivy League tradition, the school, by the decree of its president, decided to have its first ever Winter Carnival. I was skeptical. If we can't even have a really good Winter Carnival ourselves, what kind of carnival could we expect from a public university with pretensions of greatness?
In any event, they had some ice sculptures that looked really silly, but we can't blame them, because they haven't been doing it for decades and decades. Besides, a floating penguin and some guy escaping from books is a far cry from the monumental sculptures of yesteryear anyhow.
They had no widespread drinking to speak of. Instead there were lots of musical events, some sporting events and some get-togethers. I didn't see anyone vomit from too many jello shots and I didn't see anyone go unconscious from drink on an ice-sculpture and be rescued by her friends, as I have seen at Dartmouth. They just didn't understand.
The bottom line is that I don't understand why Binghamton had its first Winter Carnival. Perhaps this is because I don't understand why we have one these days. It was useful when women had to be lured up from Smith, when there was nothing but men and trees at Dartmouth.
It would also be more legitimate if it was more than a four-day drunken fraternity festival with some skiing and a statue thrown in. We have a long way to go until the Carnival achieves its past glory again. Reports from the front tell me that this year not much is different.
Despite how non-politically correct the whole concept of the Ivy League institution is, there are schools out there that are trying to be just like the Ivies, and some of them just like Dartmouth. I fear, however, they are picking the wrong things to emulate.
