The Ballad of Hijacked Fun

At approximately 18:15 on the 10th of June, I overheard the following conversation between two microscopic pests. They were sitting by the fourth hairpin bend in my small intestines, historically a lucrative spot for roadside begging:

Max: Alright Rob? How's life in the fast lane?
Rob: (chuckles, resulting in a rumble) Pretty slow at the moment. Haven't seen much action since the bellum intestinum of Africa 2006/7. Made great inroads there. But it was a short-lived victory - bloody homeostatic forces came back and slaughtered the lot of us. Never trust the armies of an embattled body. I only survived by putting on a yellowy white dress and posing as a Yakult bacterium. That got me a bit of work actually - everyone loves Yakult. But however hard you try, you can never get rid of the stigma of foreignness. Nothing much changes in this part of the world. You get trodden on just for being different. But you're young. You need to work all this out for yourself.
Max: C'mon Rob, it's not all that bad. We get a sniff of an upset from time to time. And Johnno was just saying that Cliff told him that there are some big winnings just around the corner. Lots of parties coming up, immune system low, you know. And the machine's getting older. We'll get something soon. I can feel it.
Rob: I'll believe it when I see it.

Two weeks later, lying in bed between my half-hourly trips to the toilet, I felt Rob give Max a big hug. The optimism of youth had trumped father Jaded in a touching success for the little guy, an unlikely win for the underdog over the imperial power of normative bodily functions. It was a beautiful moment, and I had diarrhoea.

It was by no means a unique capitulation. Several of my friends here, keyed into the same Cambridge rhythms that prescribe periods of sickness and health, were attacked simultaneously by flus, colds, infections. Where did our wellbeing go? The south of France? See you in October?

The answer lies in the Cambridge anomaly I briefly sketched out at this time last year: May Week. My cursory remarks were to be found right at the bottom of that post, so many of you wouldn't have made it (I barely make it, and I write the thing). In which case, let's refresh or insert the memory. May Week is the semi-confusingly titled (it is a week, it's not in May) period of concentrated licence at the end of every academic year. After the Undergrads work their hinds off for two months in preparation for the final exams, which in turn follow a good six months of working far harder than any self-respecting undergraduate at most other self-respecting universities, they are rewarded with an expensive and intensive one week course in fun studies. No classes and marks here though: it's pass-fail, the only strict criterion being one non-examinable regurgitation. The relative social quietude of Cambridge in the months leading up to exams really makes this one of the best week-long raves in the world. I can't be a card-carrying misanthrope just yet, for the spectacle of two young lovers passed out on the grass after a sunrise dip in the river, bowties skewed and dress straps akimbo, near-empty bottles of champagne in one hand, each other in the other, still brings an indy tear to my eye. Smart people rarely permit themselves human overindulgence; when they do, what to do but warmly indulge them?

The end of June last year saw the first fruits of a shrivelled income: I simply couldn't afford to buy into May Week in any substantial way, so I did what I always do, made a virtue of necessity, and wrote sulkily 'I didn't want to participate anyway.' I claimed that the King's Affair, one of the cheaper events of the week, was inherently superior. 'Don't bother with Trinity or John's balls' I said, 'they're overpriced wankfests tailor-made for black-tied champagne-swilling Tories. King's, on the other hand, provides left-wing booze at the radical price of sixty pounds. I know which one I'm going for.'

This year I bought a dinner suit and promptly attended both Trinity and St John's may balls on consecutive nights. My party ideologies are easily neutralised with a bit of spare cash. Unfortunately, I didn't start the week in the right zone to play the long game and survive: Monday's Trinity ball chased right at the heels of a bicycle jaunt to Brittany which featured various forces for fatigue, such as long-distance cycling, drinking, lack of sleep, and a nine hour drive on the return. As I sat in the euro chunnel covered in baguette debris, performing my hungover ritual of reading the most difficult unintelligible book conceivable (Deleuze's 'Difference and Repetition', which I like to re-title (but not) 'Repetition and Difference', because I didn't understand a word, and so the only satisfying thing I can do with it is make jokes about the title), I trembled at the monstrous levels of fun to be had in the week ahead. I feared I would not make it. And ten pages of Deleuze did not offer anything, not even a footnote, on the dread of excessive bourgeois recreation.

There was nothing to be done but slip into some evening wear and think of mum. Despite my longer term anxieties, Trinity, the first bender, was confidently set in motion. Much as it pains me to hand it to them, it does merit a bit of a purple patch. Luckily I was ticketed on the back of a musician playing at the ball, which meant jumping the lengthy queue and heading in the side entrance. Yep, ordinarily you have to brave an hour long queue for an event that costs 140 pounds. Welcome to the good life. Anyway, I circumvented it with some agile ducking and weaving under the wing of my musical partner. I got in not long after the official start, dived straight in for a G+T, then let my more seasoned colleague drive me straight to the oysters. Apparently these guys - though they arrive in tons - go very quickly. I suggested that this was because people like him eat thirty in quick succession, buckling under paranoid greed. He didn't hear me though; he was too busy breaking his consumption record. I captured the feat on memory card and sucked a few down myself. In the frantic initial rush to eat and drink, slamming Pimms and pigging out on Hog burgers, it took me a while to absorb the surroundings, which were, cynicism aside, beyond special. The usual manicured and empty grounds of Trinity were transformed into something that could be described as a third way between Glastonbury and Outdoor Cocktail Party. Er, much further toward the latter of course. But what struck me as bizarre was the unique mix of sweaty makeshift and haute couture: portable toilets and food tents, fairy floss stands and dodgem cars, doughnuts and strength-testers formed the backdrop to thousands of youths immaculate in their formal dress. Of course there were higher class entertainments on offer as well: string-group dancing in hall that would have seemed equally delightful a hundred years ago, sophisticated toffy comedians, and in the realm of ingestibles, premium quality champagne and a dedicated port and cheese room all night long. But I found the unconvincing veneer of 'classiness' the most charming part of the evening: the space was symbolically arranged so that as you moved from the old buildings to the open air on the other side of the river, the old-fashioned elegance of the entertainment declined: from formal dancing and Moet, past the cheese, over to the jazz tent, past the chocolate fountain and electronica tent, through to the unashamedly carnival world of rides and ice creams. I ended my own night in this region, as I think did most people; it was a lovely, progressive stripping away of affectation as people boozed further and further into animalistic oblivion. It was a synchronised kebab trip after a stuffy dinner of lobster mornay with your posh in-laws. Eventually the common denominator of youth glared garishly through: drinking and driving (small electric cars) in a controlled environment.

The next night was more legitimately punk, but only if the night before it was disavowed. I'm happy with the contradiction if you are. Every year the anti-ball crew flexes their collective middle fingers and decides not to endorse these events by paying for them, but rather to play the latter day Robin Hood and break in for free. The security is tight, particularly at the biguns like John's; at the same time, the 'security' is always a crack team of intimidating Cambridge students. This means that you're likely to know someone, anyone, on the inside. And if you know them well, it doesn't even smell like the stench of corruption - merely the collaboration of prisoner and guard against the man. John's ball this year happened to be saturated with King's men and women working security, so my friend and I thought we'd have a go. The only barrier was the castle-like fortification: we still had to get over the piranha-infested moat and scale the guarded walls before having a remote chance of even whispering to our insiders. But the crash stars were smiling. After some interviews with experienced crashers, we ascertained that the best way to breach was via disguise rather than flashy action-man techniques: posing as garbage collectors was the tested method. So we threw on some understated black, picked up some black bags from the dumpster, and walked straight in the back entrance while the guard had his hands tied with someone else. Unintentionally, the timing was perfect: we made the breach during the fireworks, when all eyes temporarily left their duties to gawk at vast amounts of money exploding into pretty, perishable colours. I realised that this was the chief reason, too, for the superabundance of love on NYE: everyone is staring at the sky and not at each other.

So we made it past the first hurdle; but a crash is a series of them. As soon as we reached the light of the back court, we began to pick up rubbish - not so zealously as to be conspicuous, but trying to keep up a pace comparable to the other cleaners around us. Half an hour in and we were running out of ideas/bin space; the approach had to be modified. Move or die. The problem was that we weren't dressed in evening wear, so couldn't just blend into the crowd of legitimate guests. The smart road would have been to put our suits in the bin bags and change immediately upon entrance; but our success had taken us by surprise, and we hadn't planned this far ahead. Now was the time to call in backup. A King's friend (bless her) came to the rescue, convincing us to dump our bags and follow her - of course, in the presence of another worker, we just looked like run-of-the-mill workers ourselves, having our two hourly break and a much-needed chat. The final major snag was movement between courts: each passageway had several wristband checkers stationed to catch out any undesirables. My friend created a distraction, we fudged our way through, and we were properly into a world of unlimited free booze. Unfortunately we were jammed in the court which specialised in alco-pops. Fortunately the same court specialised in drum and bass. A loss, a win, but we were still up in the lifetime accounts.

At this point, the story becomes a guaranteed favourite of ancient authors who love a bit of vicissitude with their breakfast cereal. Beware good fortune: it will inevitably turn bad. Giddy with success and premixed vodka concoctions, we became a little cocky. We felt the niggling urge to explore the next main court, so we scoped the passageway situation, observed that it was temporarily unguarded - and went for it. We made it through. Anti-climax? No, just a prelude to the real thing. We sipped a few cocktails. I even saw another Kingsperson working at the bar, she knew the situation, she asked me in front of the others how long I had been on my break for, we were building the charade, we were meshing, we were riffing, it all felt so good. And then we decided to return to the godforsaken vodka womb whence we came. Largely - and my friend admits this - the calamity to come was his fault: he spied some cleaners whom he suspected were also involved in the crashing game, and with liquored impetuosity thought it a good idea to confront them and pretend we were security. He leapt up and bounded towards the passageway before I could reason with him. The wristband-checker asked him where his wristband was. 'I lost it', he replied dishonestly, but not quite dishonestly enough. I was trailing behind him, so I had a split second to think. Shit. Shit. What to say? The checker turned to me and asked 'do you have a wristband?' Shit.

'Um, yeah I do.'

My Australian friends will be pleased to know I still merit the nickname 'Toady'. And a moment of stunning betrayal it was. For some reason, the checker believed me without checking. But my friend, he was escorted to the back entrance to prove he was a cleaner, and if not...flick. Yep, he was flicked. My conscience pounced, I tried every security staff member I knew; but no one could help. I mourned for my friend and my own understanding of the concept of friendship. But, as after all funerals, I had a drink. And then another. And then, slowly, predictably, the guilt passed through the bladder. I plundered the security friend's wrist and hung a tattered band precariously under my sleeve. She managed with her security ID alone. The rest, as they say, was history without memory. The proof is in the survivor's photo (in which the naked guy, unfortunately, is not me).

The remainder of May week dribbled away in various lobotomising pursuits; never have I been so tired of fun. I ended the days with a trip to Oxford for an exchange formal with our sister college. After falling asleep on the couch in their graduate common room, still dressed to impress, I woke up at 6am to a friend covering me with my dinner jacket. I had been shivering, but not with cold; my body was anticipating the immensely painful withdrawal from fun. Did I deserve this fun? No, not in the way an undergraduate deserves their fun. Graduate existence feels like this a lot of the time: no medicated courses of work and play, no alignment of cycles with peers, no banked up tension and prepaid release. The intense good times must be parasitic. The fun must be hijacked.

Resignedly, I faced the firing squat. It was worth it.