[Gravitee] Southern Hospitalitee

So, one of the benefits of going greek is that no matter where you go there's always someone to show you around.

Earlier this summer, Cadence and I took a trip to Orlando, FL. Originally, we were going to Tampa, but then beach house plans fell through at the last minute. That was a Tuesday, and we'd already taken off of work for Thursday and Friday. We made a phone call/fb chat (I don't remember which), and it went a little something like:

"Hey! We're coming to Orlando in two days....is that cool?"
"DUH! We'll have tons of fun! Can't wait for you to get here!"

.... and that was it!

We hopped in the car that Thursday morning, and went straight to Orlando. Celeste (one of my UCF DPhiL syands) housed us, and was our official guide to FL. She and other sisters took time out of their weekend to take us to the beach, feed us, go out in the city, and more! They also introduced us to members of their council at a club party, too. I mean, it was so great to meet up with and to be shown such love from Sisters at another chapter. I highly recommend traveling to other chapters for any who haven't done so. <3>

What I didn't expect from my trip was there to also be such a huge outpouring of Pi Delta Psi brothers from both UCF and UF --- there also happed to be a couple of brothers from Maryland who were in town visiting, too. The PDPsi brothers very nearly hosted us just as equally as our sisters did. For whatever reason they were really excited to meet sisters from GT Chapter; maybe because we're such a rarity :P That's why, when a group of them came up to Atlanta this past weekend, Cadence and I made it a personal initiative (in conjunction with one of their in town brothers) to make sure they had as great of a time here as we did when we were in Orlando.

The recipe for success: lots of activities, lots of food, random movies, and very little sleep.

Oh, and guess where I'm heading this weekend! It's like playing city-tag :D

[Gravitee] The Atlanta Greek Picnic 2010

I joined the OneGreekStore or OGS crew for a weekend (June 18th-19th) as vendors at the Atlanta Greek Picnic 2010. It's a annual gathering of the NPHC organizations in Atlanta.

My official duty for the weekend: tiki mistress. That's right, I was in charge of the hundreds of tikis the OGS crew brought to sell. We had standard tikis, number tikis (a HUGE hit), and wooden-beaded tikis. OGS also had a huge selection of other accessories, tshirts, and line jackets. Overall, a pretty successful weekend. Did I mention that it was HOT in Atlanta that weekend?

Working with the OGS guys was really fun; it hardly seemed like work. The best part of the weekend though was seeing such a large gathering of NPHC greeks. There were hundreds (maybe 1000+ at just the picnic) of people and you could see 3 generations of greeks there (old grandmas and grandpas, parent alums, and their kids the neos). As a MGC greek, I hope to see our annual Unity Mixer, or another event like it, grow to be something just like this in the years to come.