Nykerk is a competition between freshmen and sophomore girls in oration, song, and play. It's a girl's version of the Pull. I participated in Song. We had about 116 girls and 12 Morale guys.
Understand that Nykerk is a huge tradition at Hope College. It would take a lot to change the tradition. This tradition has been going on since the 1920s or 30s. All the girls in Song, Odd and Even Year, has to wear a navy skirt, navy sweater, white turtleneck, nude pantyhose, black shoes, and white gloves. Now, I know that doesn't sound like the best combination, but when you put 116 girls all dressed like that together, it looks really good. The other things in this tradition are things such as hand motions. Odd and Even Year both have different motions that they have to have in their songs. It's what makes Odd and Even Year unique.
The Morale Guys came in after every practice to do hilarious skits, songs, and cheers for us. I really enjoyed it when they came to practice. Sometimes the skits didn't make the least bit of sense, and sometimes they would be so funny that they made me cry. Making them shake their booties was quite entertaining, and I know they enjoyed it because they would make us do it right back. The other things that the Morale Guys did for us was make us posters. Each of the guys was assigned 11 or 12 girls who they got to spoil for a whole month. They all chose code names (which were movie titles this year) so we wouldn't figure out who they were until the night before Nykerk. My Morale Guy was "Addicted to Love." He had to be the most creative of all the guys. I think he was more excited about Nykerk than I was! He sent his girls an e-mail almost every day. It always made my day to hear from Addicted to Love. I e-mailed him personally sometimes, and he would respond on the same day.
Enough about the Morale Guys for awhile. Allow me to talk about the song part of '05 Song. We were coached by two junior girls, who were obviously in '03 Song. Erryn was the directing coach, and Courtney was the assisting coach. The song we sang was "My Guy." It's a song from the 60s and it's really cute.
The week of Nykerk had to be the longest week of my life. We all had so much to do before the week was over. Between getting pictures taken, finishing up our song, and of course school work, the week nearly killed me. I got less sleep during that week than when I was in Winterguard. In fact, I think I got about 8 hours of sleep all of Nykerk weekend.
On Friday we had practice till 9:00 p.m. Then after that we had an Odd Year Candle Light. The Morale Guys did one of their last skits and songs for us, and even shook their booties for us one last time. Erryn and Courtney gave us their words of wisdom in the form of a poem. Then came the moment we were all waiting for. The moment when we finally got to meet the guy who was crazy about us for a whole month. The guys all had their code names on the backs of their t-shirts. That's how we figured out who they were. They met us in different parts of the room to give us a rose and a hug. Might I add that my Morale Guy is a very good hugger! |
