Ariane de Gennaro
Yale is a place of wisdom, sure. Some advice can be life-changing — and some can make you reconsider your life choices.
It’s the kind of place where a world-renowned professor might drop a piece of wisdom in a lecture titled “Capitalism & Crisis,” but then ten minutes later, your roommate is giving you a drunken TED Talk about the socioeconomic implications of GHeav. It’s where one person tells you to “never stop asking questions,” and another tells you to “never, under any circumstances, date someone on the Fizz leaderboard.”
Some of this advice will guide you through your toughest moments. Some of it will haunt you forever. And some of it will be yelled at you by a stranger outside of Woad’s. Whether it’s about life, love or the best place to cry in Sterling, one thing is for certain: Yale wisdom isn’t optional, it’s absolutely essential for surviving your bright college years.
“Dating at Yale is like course registration. If you don’t get your first choice, there’s always Add/Drop.”
Does this apply to both relationships and actual classes? Absolutely.
Think about it. You start with high hopes, meticulously crafting your ideal schedule — or, in this case, an ideal gameplan. You tell yourself this is the one. You refresh your registration page, or your texts, obsessively. You send out a hopeful permission request — an Instagram DM, perhaps. And then? You get the dreaded “Denied” email — or worse, ghosted.
But, here’s the beauty of Yale: there’s always a shopping period. Didn’t get into Love and Desire in the 19th Century? There’s always Game Theory. Crush doesn’t feel the same way? Time to re-evaluate your choices and see who else has “availability.” And just like with classes, sometimes you settle for what’s convenient, only to realize three weeks in that it was a terrible mistake.
Of course, there’s always that one person who claims to have secured their top choice from day one — a rare and mythical being who somehow landed both a spot in U.S. Colonial Empire and a stable relationship in the first round. We hate them, but we have to respect them.
“If you don’t know where to sit, just find people who look like they did the readings.”
This piece of insight was strategically offered up on day one of Game Theory, when we all nodded like we understood what Nash equilibrium was. Lecture halls are a battlefield, and where you sit could mean the difference between cruising through the semester or scrambling for notes from a guy who swears he’ll start paying attention after break.
So, how do you choose? Look for the signs. The people with their laptops already open to the syllabus, not Instagram. The ones flipping through real books, not just pretending to read the latest on The Atlantic. The ones who, before class even starts, are nodding thoughtfully and typing like they already know what’s important.
Of course, there are also seats you must avoid at all costs. The back row philosophers debating why we should even attend lectures? No — we both know you are not rewatching the recordings. The finance bro refreshing The Economist mid-lecture, despite being in American Environmental History? No. He’s not here to learn, he’s pregaming for recruiting season. And whatever you do, do not go near the person balancing two trays of BowWow sushi in one hand and two cans of Celsius in the other — they are fighting battles you cannot help them win.
Pick your seat like your GPA depends on it. Because, at Yale, it very well might.
“Before you make a bad decision, ask yourself: Would you want this to be Fizzed?”
Oh, Fizz — the sacred grounds of campus gossip, public spectacles and the occasional questionable decision that somehow manages to make its way into every conversation for the next two weeks.
Pledges dressed as dogs on Cross Campus? Posted three minutes later. A screenshot of your crush rejecting you through DMs? 1.2k upvotes and way too many reposts.
So, next time you feel the urge to do something that someone could easily snap a photo of, take a deep breath and ask yourself: Is this Fizz-worthy? If the answer is “Yes, and I think my mother would be ashamed of me,” then maybe, just maybe, it’s time to make better choices.
“If you’re going to cry in Bass, cry on the upper level. The lower level is for people who still have hope.”
It’s a rite of passage, a temple of stress and a graveyard of empty Celsius cans, where the air smells like desperation and the lights are dimmed just enough to make you question every life choice that led you to this moment. And, somewhere between memorizing every phosphate group in existence and wondering if you’ve made it through four straight hours of reading without a single coherent thought, every Yalie comes to understand: There are two floors for a reason.
The upper floor is for lost souls — those who’ve accepted their fate. Maybe you’re working on an essay about medieval European history that you forgot about two weeks ago, or just staring blankly at your laptop while your brain slowly dissolves. The upper floor is where you cry freely — but with a dignity that only comes when you’ve reached the “I’m just here for my degree” phase of midterms.
The lower level, though? That’s where the hopefuls go. That’s where you’ll find the students who still believe in the power of outlines, the people who somehow haven’t cracked under the pressure yet. It’s where the fluorescent lights shine just a little too brightly, and the air smells a bit too fresh despite being underground — a place somehow still filled with possibilities. These are the students who, at 2 a.m. as Bass is closing, are still quietly humming to themselves, praying for a miracle in the form of an accidental p-set epiphany.
But, let’s be real: once you’ve reached that lower level, it’s too late. You’ve pretty much given up any delusions of getting a full night’s sleep. So, when the Sunday Scaries hit and you inevitably break down in Bass, please make your way to the upper floor, so as not to distract the few still clinging to hope.