Mr. RUSVM—7th Semester

Normally, Mr. RUSVM is held at the Royal St. Kitts Hotel & Casino, but this year, Green Semester hosted the pageant and chose a different location. It was held at a place that we call The Dome, but I'm not sure if that's the official name. Actually, I just looked it up. The Facebook event page called it the St. Kitts Marriott Resort Golf Course Pavilion. Wow, what a mouth full. I'm going to stick with The Dome, mostly because it's easier to say and the building was shaped somewhat like a dome.

The brave contestants were:

1st Sem: Casey Bohn
2nd Sem: Jon Smith
3rd Sem: Diego Recinos
4th Sem: Nam Kim
5th Sem: Robert Rishwain
6th Sem: Tyler Caron
7th Sem: Greg Daggett

And the categories were:

Biggest Pet Peeve
Favorite Musical
Talent
Bring out Your Inner Superhero

Sharon's husband, Tyler Caron, from 6th Semester won Mr. RUSVM. He put on a great performance, and it was very entertaining. Greg, from Matthew's semester, earned second place. Congratulations to all of the guys who competed. Oh. Oh! I just remembered something funny. The opening performance was the 'Raining Men' scene from Magic Mike. Hahahaha. Unfortunately, I do not have any photos of this to share. So sad, I know. But I still had to mention it. Perhaps I will try to find a video of this nonsense...

And side note: I'm not sure if any of you have heard of GangNam, but Nam Kim used it for one of his performances. I thought to include the link to the ever-popular video. I don't know who came up with the idea to have Nam use it, but it was pretty clever.

Tyler and Sharon. :)

Semester Olympics—7th Semester

This was our very last Semester Olympics. Le cray cray. Soccer,  kickball, flag football, and beach volleyball were the sports we competed in...as usual. What was interesting though, was that Black Semester (7th semester students) won the soccer tournament. They're terrible at soccer so it was quite the upset.

Let's see, what else? Oh. Blue Semester and Black Semester got into a fight during flag football. Classy.

And the VIPs were knocked out of both soccer and flag football in the first round. Ouch!

Matty was the pitcher for his semester. Yes, he's in jeans...

Sophia and her boyfriend.

Seventh Semester

Tomorrow means back-to-school for Rossies, and it's Matthew's first day as a 7th semester student. I cannot believe that we only have about three months until we leave St. Kitts. As I've said countless times before, time has just flown by so incredibly fast. I still can't wrap my mind around the fact that it's already September! I think I blinked and August disappeared. In hopes of slowing time down a little, I tried to convince myself that the month of September would be a slow one. I even voiced this to Matthew the other day. His reply?

M: Hmmm...
C: What?
M: I think September is going to be busy.
C: Really? You think so?
M: Well, think about it. We submit our clinical placements next week. We find out the following week where we'll be going. Then you'll probably start selling the stuff we accumulated while here. And you'll need to start looking for a place for us to live. I know you'll want to start searching as soon as you find out where we're going. Not to mention that we also have Semester Olympics and Mr. RUSVM the first week...
C: Oh...oh right.

There goes that idea...

6th*Semester

As with all other semesters, we began the first week back to school with Semester Olympics, a Beginning-of-the-Semester Party (BOSP), and Mr. RUSVM.

BOSP's theme: 'Trashy is Classy.' There were a lot of white ribbed tank tops, women with pregnant bellies and keg beer, cigarette packs under bra straps, too much make up, fried hair, 'trucker' mustaches, etc. 

Me and Tiff. 

Me and Rhiannon.

Matty and Jovan at Mr. RUSVM. 

Me and Sara on her sweet scooter. We left Matty and Jovan behind. Heh heh. 

Rhiannon, me, and Ashley at Bamboo for the Mr. RUSVM after party.

Twins, Matty and Rhiannon. :)

Beginning of 5th Semester & Mr. RUSVM

At the beginning of each semester, the classes compete in Semester Olympics. The sports this time were soccer, kickball, and flag football. And per usual, the Mr. RUSVM event, was held at the end of the week. Since we hadn't been to a Mr. Ross since last January, Matthew and I decided to go this time so that we could support our friend, Stephanie and her husband, Rob. Stephanie is a VIP like me, and Rob is in 2nd Semester. Of course, we were also cheering on Matthew's fellow classmate, Joey, because he was the contestant for 5th. The winner of this semester's Mr. RUSVM turned out to be the contestant from 7th...but I think Michael from 4th semester did the best. Rob did a great job too!

I didn't get to take a lot of fun photos because my camera, for whatever reason, is inept at taking pictures at night, but do feel free to click here to read Stephanie's blog post. It's hilarious!

Here's the stage...excuse the Kittitian in the bottom corner of this photo. That's Slicky Ricky.

Kind of dark, but there are a few contestants in here along with Chad Nishi, the crowned winner from last semester's Mr. RUSVM pageant. 

There's Rob in the bathing suit! One of his skits was the "Single Ladies" parody from SNL. HILARIOUS!

Mateo, Rhiannon, and me

Tony and Mateo

Original Penguin!

Rob and Mateo at Bamboo Lounge for the After Partay.

Semester Olympics

Ross University hosts an event titled, "Semester Olympics," during the first week of each semester. Classes one through seven compete in Ultimate Frisbee, Soccer, Flag Football, Volleyball, and Mr. RUSVM. The winning class earns $1000 towards their seventh semester banquet. Luckily for we VIPs, we're included in these events too. (The VIP team isn't included in winning any money. We just play for fun.) Our color is yellow and our teams are comprised of spouses/significant others as well as Ross faculty and staff.

I participated in every sport, surprisingly. Playing soccer was an obvious choice because A) I love it and B) I play intramural each semester. Since I had played volleyball on Fridays during the last few months, I figured I'd play that as well. However, taking part in ultimate frisbee and flag football was not expected. To be eligible to play, each team has to have at least one girl playing at all times. There aren't many female VIPs who find sports to be fun, so it was up to Kori, Hope, and me to participate. I'm happy to report that ultimate frisbee and flag football were a lot of fun! Matthew was especially happy that I joined in on the football because I've never understood the game, nor cared much about it. What can I say? I prefer soccer. But it was pretty cool to get a player's perspective of the game.

Okay, that's enough boring chatter about sports. Here are some photos:

Cool glasses huh?

Black (3rd Semester) VS. Pink (4th Semester)

Little Sophie is cheering on Green (2nd Semester).

Doggie Line-up. 

Island Lights

Matty and Taylor. Congrats to 3rd Semester for winning flag football!

Here's 3rd Semester playing 5th Semester (Blue). 

First Weekend on the Rock

Milo, Trooper, and I arrived on-island January 15th, 2011, which was a Saturday. After Mateo and I unpacked and did some quick organizing, we met some of his fellow classmates/friends at Cathy's—a restaurant on The Strip at Timothy's Beach. Since we were running behind, his friends ordered ahead for us and we had a Red Snapper for dinner. It was pretty delicious. Unfortunately, I didn't get to take a picture of the googly-eyed fish.

After dinner, we headed to Royal St. Kitts Hotel & Casino for Mr. RUSVM. At the beginning of each term, 'Semester Olympics' are held, and students from their respective classes compete in various events. Money is awarded to whatever semester wins. Mr. RUSVM is one of the events, along with sporting activities like flag football, ultimate frisbee, soccer, etc.
Anywho, Mr. RUSVM is similar to a male pageant, I suppose. One male from each semester is nominated to compete. The event held three segments.

1. Which Disney Princess Are You?
2. Your Favorite Movie in 30 seconds or less.
3. What would you be doing to make money if you weren't at Ross?

A lot of the students attend Mr. RUSVM, and I ran into a few friends (Michaelene and Tony), that I had met in April 2010.

On Sunday, we got out the dog hair clippers and gave Trooper a haircut inspired by the Chinese Crested dog breed. Super Trooper was just too hot, and we really didn't have a choice. He had panted all Saturday night, and just didn't seem to find a way to cool down. So...chop chop went his hair.

The rest of the day was spent taking a trip to Port Zante for some ice cream at a cute little parlor called 'Scoops.' We also enjoyed a leisurely walk around Basseterre. A point of interest here, is the 'The Circus.' It is situated in the center of a round-a-bout and features a historic clock tower/water fountain known as the Berkley Memorical Clock. Supposedly it is modeled after Piccadilly in London.

That last few photos are of me in an old British telephone booth and of Matthew at 'Pizza Boys' where we had lunch.

This is the venue that held Mr. RUSVM (Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine).

3rd Semester's skit of Beauty and the Beast.

Michaelene playing The Beast. Check out that hair!

3rd Semester again. Happy Gilmore skit, featuring Tony.

Inside an old British phone booth.

Matty at Pizza Boys.