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Winter quarter is turning out nicely, with the exception of Tuesdays and Thursdays. I start class at 9am and go straight through until 1:30pm, with my longest break between BIS103 (Biochemistry) and SOC141 (Industrialization and Social Change). It’s only twenty minutes but it gives me an opportunity to get a cup of coffee, read the paper and occassionally run into John Nakhla.

On this particular day, I was walking out of the Silo, talking with John and making my way past the usual assortment of ethnic pre-med organizations and fraternity recruitment tables. One of the fraternities that was out in force, flagging down anyone who walked by and asking “are you an engineering major?” Being so close to the Silo, you can bet that a fair number of people walking by were indeed engineers but I found one tactic particularly interesting. One fraternity brother would survey the people walking by, and walk up to what seemed like randomly selected people and ask if they were interested in joining his organization. Pretty typical really. Then he did something amazing.

Frat guy: “Hey, you’re an engineer, right?” (how did he know?)

Nerdy-looking guy with shirt tucked into his jeans: “Yeah, I am.” (Clearly not disturbed that he just got called out on his appearance alone)

Frat guy: “Good, so I’m part of this…” (and he continues with his speil)

Moral of the story: engineers all too frequently look like engineers and better yet, when approached and asked if they are engineers, they don’t even stop to ask why someone might make this assumption.