Songs, drinks and water guns

It sounded as if a big swarm of grasshoppers had descended upon the campus yesterday evening when some eight hundred first year students drummed up a deafening noise by hitting their glasses against wooden benches. They were being given a crash course in biercantus (drinking songs) singing from half past eight. Participants in this traditional student event alternate between singing and beer drinking (water was also served in this case) and are bound by strict rules. Those who ignored assignments yesterday such as ad sedes (sit) and silentium (silence) ended up soaked to the skin, thanks to supervisors wielding giant water pistols. The event took place peacefully this year. Last year, the biercantus ended abruptly when a pail of water was splashed all over the sound equipment. Afterwards, the cover band did not want to go on playing. The culprit was a party-crasher, a senior student who had failed in his attempt to make the organizers wet. Except for keeping an eye on the water pails, no other safety measures were taken yesterday, says Flyn den Hollander from the AID committee. ‘That was a one-off thoughtless act, and we don’t expect people to repeat it.’ While the cantus was going on, the Comedy Crawl was taking place in the Wageningen city centre. Cabaret artists, such as Tim Ward and Martijn Oosterhuis, gave performances on seven locations. Earlier that day, student organizations presented themselves to the AID participants at an info-mart in a sweltering Belmonte Arboretum. Today is the last day of the AID, with the grand finale being a musical festival.