Tag Archives: night

The Night Marchers

Nationality: USA
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: USC
Performance Date: April 28, 2015
Primary Language: English

“The legend of the Night Marchers takes place on the west coast of Oahu, on a beach called Keawa-Ula Bay. Basically, a few days of the year the spirits of dead Native Hawaiians march from the mountains to the ocean in order to somehow reach the afterlife. They pound their drums and carry torches, and anyone who gets in the way of their march is never seen again, so people are supposed to stay inside if they ever hear the marching. My parents told this one to me when I was a kid, and they taught about it in elementary school too. I think it’s mostly used by parents to warn their kids from going outside at night, at least that’s how it was for me.”

 

The person I got this from is one of my 19-year-old friends at USC. He’s lived all of his live in Hawaii, and even though he isn’t racially Hawaiian (half Japanese, half Guatemalan), he and his family are very immersed in Hawaiian culture. To him, this legend evokes memories of his home and childhood, and it reminds him of his cultural

background.

Overnight Resident in Campus Shack

Nationality: Colombian, Argentinian
Age: 21
Occupation: Game Designer
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 4.12.2014
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

Item:

“There was no way we were going to see what made the sound, we were way to scared.”

The informant went to an elementary school that had a wooden structure in the middle of the playground that held all of the playground equipment. The structure was a bit ominous looking, with a pointed roof and fencing over the windows when it was closed down. The kids would sign up for shift to man the shack, and it was their job to hand out things like balls or jump ropes when other kids would request them. At the end of the day, it was the child’s job to get everything back and put things where they should be. The shack was then closed by fences being pulled over the windows and the door being shut.

There was a rumor among the students that someone would break into the shack and live in it overnight. This was reinforced by their own reports of things being moved around by the next morning after closing it up. The person who supposedly lived in the shack was homeless and came and went when nobody was around. On one occasion, when the informant stayed late for daycare, he and his friends apparently heard a crash sound come from the shack, although they opted to not investigate.

 

Context:

According to the informant, the rumor of the man in the playground hut originated some time around when he was there, so it wasn’t terribly old. But it lasted through his entire time there and didn’t really lose believability among children, even into middle school. The instance of him hearing a noise come from it at night was, he admitted, likely just something falling over, but it was more than enough confirmation as a child for him.

 

Analysis:

The most interesting part of this story is the fact that the rumor didn’t fade as the children got older. Perhaps this can be attributed to the fact that the story itself isn’t so farfetched that middle schoolers would rule it out as impossible. Something like an axe murderer or magical being living in the shack would lose realism as children got older and rationalized things, but the possibility of someone sneaking onto campus and taking up temporary residence in an unlocked hut is there. It’s easy to say the stuff got moved around just naturally, or someone cleans up the shack at night from the school, but the fact that nothing in the story is “out of this world” makes it even more haunting to a certain extent.

Monday Night Dinner

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Ohio/California
Performance Date: April 18, 2012
Primary Language: English
Language: French

My informant told me about the tradition of “Monday Night Dinner” at sororities at USC

“Every Monday all the girls come to the sorority house for dinner. They all dress in fancy attire and arrive at the houses around 4:45pm. The new members make “deliveries”, which is when before dinner they bring gifts and notes to the different frats that are having Monday Night Dinner too. After they finish they come in and sit down to dinner. As they eat, boys from different frats come in and make deliveries to the house. The girls clap as they come in and each gift is delivered to the specific girl. They can be anything from a romantic bouquet to a funny card from a friend. It is also a way for frats and sororities to strengthen their relationships with each other by sending deliveries to certain houses.”

My informant told me that she enjoys the tradition, and she likes to take advantage of it for flirting with boys. If you like someone, you can send them a delivery.

I am in a sorority on campus and I enjoy the tradition of Monday Night Dinner as well. I have utilized it to ask certain boys to our House Invites and also to send funny notes to friends. I’ve also noticed that boys who are usually very shy will use this as a way to communicate with girls that they like. I’ve also noticed that if girls “hook up” with boys over the weekend it is often customary for the boy to send the girl a delivery on monday, such as chocolates or flowers, as (although it seems ridiculous) a “thank you, I’d like to kiss you again some time” kind of delivery.

I also talked to my friends who are in sororities in other schools and none of them were familiar with the tradition of “Monday Night Dinner”. It seems to be a unique tradition to the Greek System at USC. It has been happening for as long as many of my friends can remember, so I assume that it is something that the Greek life likes to keep alive to pride itself on its heritage.