It’s 27 degrees on a Friday night. I hear the faint sounds of sobs and the pumping base of Kendrick Lamar’s “Humble,” except I’m not sure that’s a word I would use to describe the average student here. Maybe they’re practicing? I think to myself as the smell of beer breath and daddy’s money drift into my nostrils. Then the meaning of their mascot finally hits me — I’ve arrived at the icy pits of Hell.
The Daily Tar Heel tasked me with going undercover in the Duke tenting grounds to learn more about their rich cultural tradition. Tonight was the first of five nights that I would study their schemes before the rivalry game. While most of them were away boogieing wit da Hoodie, I was renting their tenting, breaking into tents to see what I could find. It wasn’t exactly how I pictured the living conditions of students who pay over $65,000 in tuition a year.
The first thing I saw was the sign reading Krzyzewskiville, an accidental keyboard smash that they ended up leaving because of the common Duke rhetoric: “That looks like a big word.” I was disguised in my best preppy boy garb, including a man’s balding wig I found on Amazon, a hand-stitched sheepskin winter coat from Italy, a Rolex and an insufferable personality. I even used some eyeshadow to create some deep purple eye bags under my lifeless, soulless eyes that I’d been training for weeks.
The first tent I quietly unzipped was quite creative. This tenting team named themselves “The Duke RED Devils.” You very rarely see that level of wit and genius at UNC. Only one student slept soundly inside, snuggled up in their silk sleeping bag stuffed with goose feathers, yearning for the warmth of the fireplace in their New York mansion.
I passed by another tent full of students working on quantitative economics, while a neighboring tent was bumping “Hotline Bling” by Drake, enhanced by sounds of clanking liquor bottles that I probably can’t afford. The duality astounds — one man’s tent is another man’s frat basement.
I then overheard two students in one tent discussing how they paid their college coaches from high school to help them with their tenting exams. They proceeded to argue over whether a 35 on the ACT is better than a 1580 on the SAT. Then they argued over whose resume was cleaner. Then they argued over who had a bigger pinky toe. Then I walked away.
Some people in another tent were hoping the temperature would drop below 26 degrees so that they could leave the tents for the night, kind of like how Daddy drops a couple hundred bucks into their account when it starts to dip below $5,000. The next tent I investigated had Cooper flag(g)s pasted to the sides. There was a makeshift shrine with candles and a giant picture of his face in the other corner of the tent with some offerings from their dining halls, including some half-eaten acai bowls, peach and burrata salads, hand-rolled sushi and a slab of filet mignon.
All of a sudden, I heard what I thought was the blaring alarm for tent checks. But when I peered out of the tent, I realized it was just the shrill, excruciating sound of the Cameron Crazies. The tribe of Avatars marched into the tenting grounds Camp Rock style, ready to practice covering themselves in blue. Instead of using paint, they actually use distilled boysenberry juice from Europe. They screamed things like “UNC freaking sucks!” and they bounced around a little bit. Wow, so crazy — you can’t take them anywhere!
I almost couldn’t bring myself to leave this exciting adventure, but it was getting late. So I closed my eyes and pretended that it was 2022 and I was Coach K, and that I had just lost to UNC in the Final Four. Then I ran away from campus faster than a Duke student could say “not to play devil's advocate...”