Philings October 2009

issue 1
philings
alpha phi omega
o c t o b e r
2 0 0 9
s u
&
e s f
a p o p h i . o r g
to the bros:
this is lucas here...your pr chair this semester! i am so super stoked to be in
this position and really want to do an amazing job! last year, i pretty much
shadowed frankie mer win (my big) the entire semester and figured out that
this position was for me. i was so excited to do philings since i love apo and
also wanted to do a better job than my big! anyways, i am really proud of my
first official issue ever! i hope that all of you enjoy it as much as i do. i tried to
get suggestions from a lot of bros and let everyone have a chance to help me.
Thanks so much to everyone that wrote for this issue...you have no idea how
much i appreciate all of your time and effort. Lastly, if you have any suggestions, comments, or anything in general...let me know!
peace, love and phi,
lucas taccardi
read philings to find...
-some words from the ginger
-information on ser vice
-frankies thoughts
-apo roommates
-and so much more!
the
Around mid-August I always get
antsy to get back to school. To
see friends, get a fresh start
with new classes, and to get
involved on campus and do the
things I love to do. This semester I had the added excitement
of anticipating being APO Fall
2009 President. I am so excited to be working
with so many great brothers this semester and
to help to continue to shape APO into a force to
be reckoned with on campus. This semester we
have already achieved so much! 100+ Brotherhood, 96 new pledges, and already 300+ hours
of community service, that’s quite impressive
for only being back for a little over a month. It
just shows how dedicated our chapter is to truly
promoting leadership, friendship, and service at
SU and SUNY ESF. I’m so proud to be the President of such an amazing group. I know we are
going to achieve so much more this semester
with our APO Day of Service in November and all
the fun will have while serving and being with
one another. We really have spread out and
started serving in all areas on campus and off.
From serving food at Rescue Mission to quilting
at Hendrick’s Chapel, from Adopt-a-Street to tutoring Somalian refugees, we really are making a
difference in the community and it’s exciting to
be a part of it all. So while the leaves are slowly
falling from the trees and the weather gets a bit
brisker, I know Phi Chapter is just gearing up for
another incredible semester!
Katherine Pease
APPLES+BELLY DANCERS =
FANTASTIC TIME!
10 a.m. rolls around, cars are frantically rushing around to pick up
Ithaca-bound travelers.
Their destination? APPLE FESTIVAL!
With tummies hungry for apples, these anxious travelers arrived to Ithaca around 11
a.m., ready for fun. These travelers were none other than brothers of Alpha Phi Omega Phi Chapter.
There were belly dancers, an Iron Chef competition, a ferris wheel, a gigantic slide,
cider, donuts, apples, and so much more! Recording Secretary Matt Luciano, an Ithaca
native was sad to have missed the blessed event this year “I missed the apples and the
A&W root beer, not to mention the Ithaca Hemp company.”
The wind was the only predator that fine day. Knocking over chairs and uplifting umbrellas, the wind caused a few of the brothers to see their lives flash before their eyes as
they dodged these monstrous obstacles.
A mandatory pit stop was made at A&W on the way back from the festival. Some root
beer floats were in high demand. Unfortunately, the rain had caught up with the bros at
the restaurant, and they were forced to turn down an epic putt-putt battle.
What a day it was!
Jessica Redisch enjoying a delicious
chili cheese dog at A&W.
Bros hoped for the rain to stop, so they could
take part in an epic putt-putt battle.
Meredith Nackely
SERVICE
IN YOUR
NEIGHBORHOOD!
how many sevice opportunities are within a 15 minute walk from campus?
Meet Tia.
Tia likes to ride her bike.
Tia likes to ride her bike everywhere.
Tia is the Vice President of Service this semester.
Guess what these two things have to do with you?!?!?!
Service opportunities in your backyard that’s what!
tia giermek (left), hannah dean-wood (right)
So far Alpha Phi Omega - Phi Chapter has done 338.5 hours of service this
semester most of which have been completed right under our noses.
-Sunday October 4th brought about a successful day of trash pickup
on the 900 block of Lancaster with Adopt-A-Street and for all of you
who didn’t know there was apple crisp and tea served ahead of
time! Yum! If you happened to miss this one, look out for another
Adopt-A-Street in November!
-Melissa Haacker, along with doing an excellent job as pledge master, has again chaired the Somali Bantu Childcare program located
at the Syracuse boys and girl club on East Fayette street. There brothers watch over young Somalian children, while their mother study
English.
-The Ronald McDonald House located on East Genesee street has
been a service project that has grown rapidly. Brothers are always
excited to sign up and help out people in need.
-You will all know where Yana lives, if you decide to join us for Knitting
For Need on Sundays at 3:30. We provide the yarn and the knitting
lessons, if you are willing to put in the time!
-Shack-a-Thon was on the quad and took place from October 6th
to the 8th. Everyone did a fantastic job raising mucho cash for Habitat for Humanity...tie dyeing random articles of clothing is worth it!!!
-Crop Walk is coming up and starting at 11:30 AM in front of Hendricks Chapel there will be about 60 APO brother and pledges, who
will march to raise hunger awareness. Come join out in the fine Syracuse weather, meet some people and get your exercise and hours
out of the way!
With so many different service opportunities this semester, it may
seem difficult for you to choose which service projects to participate
in. Hoever, whatever ones you decide upon, the brothers of Alpha
Phi Omega are working incredibly hard to reach out to other Syracuse organizations and people of the community .
Hannah De an-Wood
THIS MAP SHOWS WHERE THE
DIFFERENT SERVICE PROJECTS
ARE LOCATED.
DON’T FORGET TO SIGN-UP FOR PROJECTS
AND LOG ALL YOUR HOURS ON PHI PORTAL
Frankie Likes
This
(by Franke)
Let’s be honest.
Before you leave your house in the morning,
the last thought that you have before you go
to sleep, that one nagging thought: “I wonder
what Frankie is thinking right now.” No? Okay,
well in my perfect world, maybe that is how
it goes. And unfortunately just because you all
don’t want to hear my thoughts doesn’t mean I
am going to shut up. Sorry.
Anyways, here is what Frankie likes.
1. Chris Ostrom. In General. He
must work out.
My top honors go to the man, the myth, the legend. Chris
Ostrom is so APO dedicated it is kind of getting ridiculous. He spent
a grand total of 6.2 million hours in our Shack during Shack-a-Thon
(he got a mattress in there- not even kidding), he’s organizing an
awesome trip for Sectionals and is sucking up every hour he can on
Phi Portal. This guy bleeds blue and gold and his most played song
on iTunes is the Toast Song.
2. Chris and Kelly Tying
the Knot
Someone had to mention it. This is a romance
that started somewhere in Pennsylvania, but really
blossomed in the romantic confines of HL 500. At the
end of this month, the two will be married, and the
reception will shockingly not be in Nifkin. Congratulations you two!
3. Service
Yeah yeah, we’re service based. But 300 hours? In
half a semester? That is just impressive. Tia and Hannah
have been “serving” up opportunities (Ha-ha pun!) left and
right. Like babies? There is something for you. Like older
people? Bingo’s a popular choice. Like something in the
middle? Well I am sure they’re working on that too. Just log
those projects early- because that site fills up quick (See #1).
4. Assassin’s
Because I have always wanted to knife all of you in the
back, but have never really had a good reason to until now.
Watch out, Frankie is taking this game a little too seriously.
But let me just gripe for one second: I got a botched kill. NOW
THEY KNOW! What the heck do I do now? Watch out everyone…
5. 96 Pledges…
Not to toot my horn or anything, but WOAH! Not only do the bros get to laugh as we
watch them scramble around to get the required interviews, but we also have a whole new group
of people to let Meredith Nackley creep upon. APO is becoming so recognized around our campus that we barely have to self promote anymore. Lucas barely even has to put out Philings any-
The Dumpee and the Shoes:
An Unusal Story About Service
Ever since I was a chubby little girl in kindergarden, I have always been involved in community service through
the Girl Scouts. However, it wasn’t until December 2004 that I realized how much I loved doing service. Let me
start by telling you a story…
In 10th grade I was dating this “much older guy” (a.k.a. Senior in high school) who was friends of my sister.
He used to belong to a community service group that traveled to different parts of South America to help poor
communities by building houses, providing them clothes, organizing activities, and much more. I was completely
crazy (not in a creepy way) for him! What can I say…I was young and ignorant. But, I was also very interested in
the community service work he did. Sadly for me there were no couples
allowed in this group. However on December 22, 2004 he dumped me
through…yes…an online chat. After ruining Christmas for me and making
several weeks of my life miserable, I realized that the best thing had happened. I could now be part of this group and make him miserable by going to these trips as well! (Just kidding, I went for the community service
of course!) I signed up for the summer trip in 2004 and haven’t stopped
helping others ever since!
With this group, during Christmas and New Years, we travel to a community called Puerto Mado in Argentina. It’s located near the Iguazu Falls
and close to Paraguay. Not a lot of people know about this small poor
community. This is one of my favorite trips so I’ve been there a total of
4 times! I know this place like the cheek of my face (palm of my hand
is overused!). So…the other day for my advertising class, I was looking
for non-profit commercials on YouTube and found one for TOMS shoes.
I love TOMES shoes and the company’s ethics! But as I was watching
the video (Current TV-TOMS shoes segment) I stopped the video on
second 22. My mouth dropped. I searched my computer and looked at
my Argentina photos and yes, I was right. TOMS shoes went to the exact same place I’ve been going to since
Christmas 2004-05. EXACT SAME PLACE! No wonder I saw all the kids wearing the same shoe style as those
sold by TOMS. I kept looking at the video and then started to see children I actually knew from going so many
times to Puerto Mado. It was the strangest coincidence ever and it was extremely weird that from one second I
could have noticed that. I believe it is a signal that I should now
work for TOMS.
Story short, because I was dumped I should now go
work for TOMS. It’s a small world after all.
P.S. I went to Puerto Mado before TOMS did. Ha!
Diana Hernández
BROTHERS
WHO LIVE
TOGETHER,
STAY
TOGETHER
The brothers of Alpha Phi Omega are a unique bunch. We hear all about
their endeavors around campus and the community; we see them cleaning
up streets and dancing with the elderly, but do we really know these
brothers? So what if we know they stand for friendship, leadership
and service? It’s my goal to bring the real brothers, people behind
the ‘APO Brother’ title, to the world.
This article is an in depth
study of brothers that live together, eat together and bunk together. Who knows you better than your own brother or roommate? Now let’s
combine the two and explore my findings on APO roommates...
what is the weirdest thing you ever walked in on your roommate doing?
Krystie Yandoli: “The weirdest thing I ever walked in on [Hayley] doing was cuddling with two of our
suitemates and three of our neighbors in a twin size bed. Oh wait, I took part in that too. Just kidding.”
Royce Russell: “The weirdest thing I have seen Frankie do is wear slippers, sweatpants, shorts, a long
sleeve shirt, a sweatshirt, a coat and a robe inside... in July.”
Dave Enden: When Alex was “playing the guitar in nothing but his boxers… but its a usual occurrence.”
Whitney Lincoln: I walked in on Alyssa “making pasta and sauce at like two in the morning!”
Lucas Taccardi: “The weirdest thing I have ever walked in on Ben doing is Facebook stalking the love
of his life…Frankie Merwin.”
Mel Zajac & Liz Congdon: “We know better than to walk in. We made up this little saying: If you hear a
little squeakin’, don’t come a knockin’. The bed is rockin’; you best be walkin’!!!”
any sleep talkers/walkers? Pull any funny pranks on a sleeping brother?
Whitney: “I talk in my sleep about random stuff, and Alyssa sleep walks, but I haven’t seen that yet.”
Dave: “My favorite thing to do after a night of partying is to wake him up by jumping onto his bed from
on top of a chair.”
Lucas: “I like to draw all over Ben with sharpie when he is asleep, even though I know he will murder
me for doing it.”
who wears the pants in the housing situation?
Krystie: “We’re socially progressive and therefore are we’re both firm believers in equality between
partners, so we BOTH wear the pants.”
Frankie Merwin: “. I wear the pants- or so I like to think. He completely decorated our apartment and
does all that sort of stuff. I just say, ‘Whatever you want honey.’”
Alex Bishop: “Neither [me nor Dave] because we are constantly cleaning the floors with bleach in just
our underwear.”
Mel & Liz: “Technically not Liz, but really she does. She does the cookin’, the cleanin’ and the birthin’…
wait wouldn’t that make her the woman? Actually she does a lot, I just follow orders.”
Hannah Dean-Wood: “Tia [and Lindsey] wear the pants and the boots and the waist belts and the big
earrings and the scarves. It’s an outfit.”
Ben Vescera: “Me.”
would you recommend living with a brother?
Krystie: “Yes! We were actually friends before we became brothers, but it’s really great to always have
someone to sign up for volunteer hours with on PhiPortal, someone to walk back and forth to chapter
and pledge class with, and someone to laugh about APO moments with when no one else is around.”
Whitney: “Depends who it is. Being a brother in APO doesn’t automatically mean they’ll be good to live
with. You have to know each other well enough to know that you’ll know, when you move in, that it will
(or will most likely) work.”
Lucas: “It depends. Joining APO is a great way to meet potential roommates. Ben and I met through
APO and it has worked out well so far. However, being a brother doesn’t necessarily mean you will get
along well as roomies.”
Hannah: “Absolutely! It’s especially great when we have to work so closely together on so many projects as VPS and Service Secretary. Communication is easy.”
Rebecca Levy
(aka. Ral...or Rachel)
R
O
O
M
M
A
T
E
S
Adventures of Melizabeth: An Aesop’s Fable.
Not quite as cool as Blucas…but we’re working on it.
Greetings friends from the house of MeLizabeth. Wth does that mean
anyway. MeLizabeth??? It doesn’t flow; it doesn’t have the ring; its just
there. Together its MeLizabeth seperatly its Mel and Liz….get it now bros?
So today Liz’s parents came up for the football game. Of course our apartment looked
like a pile of a shitate…. So we had some major work to do. We cant look be lookin like some
dirtbags can we now. So what did we do? We vacuumed!
And of course, we don’t own a vacuum. Or a car to go get one. So we walked across the
way to Winding Ridge building 130 and asked some friends to borrow one. But low and behold,
the vacuum had suction power of a flea. Ugg. (not a shoe Ugg either).
We failed at cleaning the rug. So we moved on to the next item of that needed a taste of
cleanliness. The poo sheet! What is a poo sheet? Well it’s an old bed sheet that our disgusting
neighbors threw in our backyard. There was
some questionable brown markings on it…
thus poo sheet! We grabbed a huge garbage
bag, and picked up the sheet (much like you
use a grocery bag to pick up dog shitate).
Yay. One item cleaned.
Next, we had to deal with the items
that the parents couldn’t see. Use your imagination. First, we considered placing them
in the closet space. But of course, parents
have coats. We also thought of the kitchen
cabinet. But parents need dishes. So much
so that they helped wash them after breakfast and happened to help put them away,
right next our 1.5 oz. glasses. So Liz ended
up putting these unmentionables away in a
secret black ottoman, in the corner of her room. Melanie of course came home and needed an
unmentionable for her boyfriend, Andy and could not find the small, wrapped unmentionables
and got pissed at Liz.
Then, we washed the bathroom. Liz’s hair was EVERYWHERE. She is shedding like a
dog in the spring. Seriously, don’t come in our apartment unless you want a new fur parka.
Have you noticed her hair thinning lately?!
Okay, so back to the cleaning. We turned on some music to get us pumpin, and Shewolf
in the Yard came on (Yes, I know that’s not the name of the song, but screw you!). Shewolf in
disguise…. We danced like crazy kittens. (I’m a cat, I’m a kitty-cat, and I dance dance dance,
and I dance dance dance).
And low and behold, we had not finished cleaning when Liz’s parents showed up. Moral
of the story: There’s a shewolf in the closet- don’t let it out or it will make a mess, and you will
have clean it (and there will be a poo sheet, let me tell you!!).
Liz Congdon
Melanie Zajac
“SAY WHAT?”
best of the talk and tweets from phi’s alumni!
Fall 2009 has been a great semester as we’ve increased contact with many alumni, through a
new Twitter account, a blog, and through alumni answers to fun questions every week that are
then presented to chapter! Here are just some of the best responses.
Visit http://phikids.blogspot.com and http://www.twitter.com/PhiTweets for more!
What are you most likely to be doing Sunday at 5 p.m.?
Pete Mason: “Watching football, writing and recovering”
Stacy Snyder: “…I may be eating dinner or playing student to my cat (Pain In
The Ass--PITA for short, yes that is her
real name) as she tries teach me who
the boss really is in our little household.”
Nominate for an Emmy?
Stacey Foster: “Fellow brother
Stephanie Eckelkamp, for making fun of
me in a loving way.”
Favorite theme party?
Anthony Fatta: “Dress like a bear or
barely dress”
Your favorite part about APO?
Christopher Robin Luczkowiak:
“My Monty Phithon Pledge Class/Ben
Vescera’s hair.”
The oddest unique fact you heard while doing your
pledge interviews?
PhiTweets With 1 rush meeting to go &
undecided still to decide, we’re at approx.
77 definite pledges. Now accepting alumni
apps to babysit our herd.
10:01 PM Sept 16th from Web
janabarnello @PhiTweets Send some to
ga I’ll raise them :)
10:22 PM Sep 16th from Tweetie in reply to PhiTweets
anthony_fatta @PhiTweets Yes, @janabarnello and I will raise them SOUTHERN
STYLE. Get ready for your bojangles
chicken and biscuit!
10:26 PM Sep 16th from web in reply to PhiTweets
JKacz @phitweets what did everyone in
korea decide to pledge this semester?
damn that’s a lot of pledges.
Michael Ressler: The most unique
fact I heard was that a girl ate a whole light brite set as a child.
Thank you everyone who has sent in responses to me- each and every answer has been read at chapter!
Continue sending them in!
Janae DeRusso
WELCOME
FA L L 2 0 0 9
PLEDGE CLASS
phi in the mirror
Inductions
The date was September 25, 2009. I stood in the hallway of Grant and was in awe. I remember my inductions…the excitement, the anticipation, the thoughts
of, “why in the h@%& am I wearing a blindfold??? I
thought this frat didn’t haze!” But there was something very different about this day. Maybe it was the
weather, or the lighting? Or maybe it had something
to do with the fact that there were dozens of eyes on
me, and dozens, and dozens, and dozens. In front of
me stood what was the great majority of 97 pledges.
What had I gotten myself into?? ? After a few short
breathing exercises, some bittersweet feelings toward
Frankie’s great job with rush, and some personal mantras I realized that before me was the beginning of
what will prove to be the greatest pledge class that Phi
has ever known. Phi in the Mirror was born.
I am so proud to say that I am the pledgemaster
nicole laurin with her
this semester. I have a great, no, an incredible group
little in-hye erstling
of people that will all be good additions to our Phi family. While I was a bit amazed at first when Frankie and
I completed rush week, counted up all of those pledge
forms, and matched all of the bigs and littles, I was
also really excited. Yes the pledge class is twice the
size as usual, but I view this as twice the amount of
service being done. It is so exciting for me to have so
many people that want to do good and help those in
need. I can’t wait to help all of our new friends have a
great time with pledging and joining the brotherhood.
Inductions were exciting and fun. The new pledges are animated and seemed to fit right in to this crazy
bunch of people we call Phi. I can’t wait to get to know
each and every one of them. Despite the amount of
people, everything went smoothly. We avoided all major catastrophes; in fact, nobody fell down the stairs, at
least no pledges that is. All in all the ceremony went
julia byron with her
well. Chris Ostrom didn’t burn himself with the candle,
little lauren devine
State University of New York College of Environmental
Science and Forestry was pronounced correctly, I only fell on the stairs twice,
and we almost all fit into one fellowship circle for the toast song….well, almost.
Melissa Haacker
THE END
t h a n k s
f o r
r e a d i n g