Greek Life Goes to the Movies to Celebrate Homecoming

Abbie Klein

When the stress of midterms and assignments piling up becomes too much, Homecoming serves as the perfect break for UWG students to enjoy the week full of festivities. One of the events planned was the popular homecoming tradition of Greek Grind, which took place on Oct. 16 in The Coliseum.
  Greek Grind has been a beloved tradition for years that encourages students to interact and support Greek life through a fun and healthy competition. For students already in Greek life, it gives them the opportunity to get to know other members more.
  “I didn’t know what Greek Grind was at first,” said Penelope Sierra, a new member of Alpha Xi Delta. “I had joined as a COB and missed rush and recruitment. So when they were doing tryouts for Greek Grind I just came to the house and tried trying out not even knowing I’d make the team, it was just for fun for me and to meet more of the girls.”
  The basis of the event is a themed dance competition between teams made up of fraternities and sororities. This year’s theme was “Greek Grind Goes to the Movies” with each team paying homage to a popular movie in their routine. The chosen movies and teams were High School Musical (Chi Omega and Sigma Nu), Pitch Perfect (Alpha Xi Delta and Pi Kappa Alpha), Footloose (Sigma Kappa, Phi Delta Theta and Sigma Chi), Top Gun (Phi Mu and Kappa Alpha Order), Teen Beach Movie (Delta Zeta and Kappa Sigma) and Step Up (Kappa Delta and Tau Kappa Epsilon).
  “I definitely was a fan of the Top Gun and Footloose dance,” said Sierra. “But those were also the only dances I was able to watch and they were really good.”
  Every team did extremely well. The hard work and creativity was clearly shown in each routine, but only one team could win. Step Up placed first, followed by Pitch Perfect at second and Top Gun at third. 
  “In my personal opinion, our team practiced a lot and I’m extremely happy with the place we made,” said Sierra. “I’m glad we were able to show everyone the routine we worked so hard on.”
  With the level of entertainment and talent that was showcased you would think that everyone that participated had previous experience. While that may be true for some, a lot of participants were completely out of their comfort zone.
  “I’ve never danced or performed ever until Greek Grind, so this was definitely a new experience for me,” said Sierra.
  It not only takes a lot of courage to get on stage and perform in front of your peers, but it also takes a lot of courage to work with new people. While getting to form new friendships is always fun, it can be nerve wracking to form good connections under the stress of something like Greek Grind. Fortunately, a lot of the paired sororities and fraternities were able to let loose and have fun while collaborating together.
  “Working with the boys was fun,” said Sierra. “Everyone was getting hyped and excited for the big day and no one ever made it feel like it was boring. It was honestly such a fun experience and all the boys were nice and trying to keep the energy up.”
  Greek Grind is a tradition that I hope will continue in the future. When school can seem so stressful and serious, events like these are important to remind us of the community we have supporting us.
  “I really enjoyed performing, and getting all dressed up, and having all our girls there to support us and cheer us on.” said Sierra. “It was a fun experience for me and I would definitely think about doing it again next year.”