The Ritual Dance of the Brave

I attended college in a state university, effectively cutting off my 12 years worth of private schooling. The diversity astonished me - everyone was so liberated that I felt overwhelmed. There were kids with blue, red, green, and even rainbow-colored hair. There were those that didn't look like they even took a shower; they were wearing pajamas, for goodness' sake!

I didn't think I would get used to the environment, even when I was finally a junior student...

I thought it was an ordinary day. It wasn't.

I remember one day during my junior year being particularly bad. It started with me having only an hour of sleep, reviewing for some long exam in my chemistry course. Despite the long hours of review, the exam proved to be difficult, and I remember telling to myself, "Wow, what a merciless professor."

In hindsight, it was very well-known throughout the campus that Prof. X was a terror - both in terms of lecture and exams. I should have expected this level of slavery in the first place. In the end, I was still the sleepy, frustrated, and dead college student that my other classmates were.

I was on my way to the office where I worked as a student assistant when I heard a very loud BANG! - which was weird, because it was exactly 12 noon. During this time, the university police force would ring a loud alarm, not a gunshot.

A gunshot. 

It didn't really register in me, and I remember thinking, "What was that?"

I was literally a zombie then and could very well care less about the whole situation, but the students around me began creating a commotion and running past me. 

They were all squealing. Squealing. So I looked around, trying to find what the commotion was all about.

I wished for the earth to open up and swallow me whole.

"Shocked" was definitely an understatement. I was beyond flabbergasted. 

My friends tell me that I'm an open book because I turn red really easily; so I bet I was very, very red the moment I turned around to see what the commotion was about. 

Running just past me were boys. Naked boys. They were each holding up placards of political protests and a couple of roses in their otherwise free hands. 

In my dead state, I had completely forgotten that it was the day. The Oblation Run. The so-called "ritual dance of the brave." 

HAH. Very brave indeed. And embarrassing. I didn't even spend a single millisecond looking at them and immediately turned around to blindly run toward the building I was heading at.

Since then, I made sure to take note of the date for the Oblation always (it changes annually). 😂 That is, to prepare me in case of situations like this. Anyway, that was the first and last time I ever witnessed the run.

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