The idea struck the authors as the sun shimmered off the translucent plastic of that Taj Mahal of a tent that Ducky-Bob’s(SMU’s favorite event specialist) was asked to set up on the Dallas Hall Lawn for the past week’s Library festivities.
If in fact the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) is struggling with increasing population and terrible tent/housing conditions at refugee camp sites the world over, SMU may be able to contribute, if not a full solution, then at least a step towards fulfilling that one burning wish of every Miss America: world peace. Why, for Pete’s sake, should the UNHCR count on independent, under-funded engineers and bleeding-hearted NGOs to organize crisis infrastructure when it could instead offer Ducky-Bob’s a chance to reinvent itself and SMU the opportunity of a lifetime to get its name on the map?
Our suggestion, if you haven’t guessed it already, is for the organizations working at the world’s worst refugee camp sites (e.g. Ali-Addeh, Djibouti and Zaatari, Northern Jordan) to pick up on the many lessons in event planning that were learned this past week and to reconsider its strategic partnerships.
1) The Block Party in honor of George Bush, though it ended up attracting a good 8,000 souls, was designed and ready for a gargantuan influx of 14,000 within a 24 hour period. That’s nearly seven times the number of Syrian refugees crossing the Jordanian border every day to reach the Zaatari camp — don’t do the math, we’ve done it for you. To that we should add that, concerning issues of proper daily nourishment at the refugee camps, it would be advisable for the UNHCR to invest, as SMU did, in an armada of food trucks.
The authors would particularly recommend ssahms Korean BBQ and Nammi’s Vietnamese Fusion for their cheap prices and general deliciousness; they would not, however, recommend Ruthie’s whose service is far too slow for crisis situations and whose grilled cheeses leave much to be desired.
2) A critical study led by one of the authors suggests that about 300 persons could be housed under the Taj Mahal that Ducky-Bob’s managed to erect in a matter of days (38 hours, according to the latest estimates). Admittedly, conditions are nicer in Dallas than, say, in the middle-of-nowheres where refugee camp sites tend to be situated — but consider the many terrain difficulties that Ducky-Bob’s was ingeniously able to manuever around for the Bush festivities, namely that characteristically deceptive slope of our beloved hilltop; the important ground variations from überplush lawn to unforgiving cement; and finally a few considerable obstacles like a circular fountain and the campus’ most distinctive building, Dallas Hall (which the tent managed to only modestly overshadow). Most impressively, the event specialist (and here it merits its name and a Nobel Peace Prize to boot) managed to construct the behemoth without bringing to any point higher than a simmer the notorious wrath of the natives, whose path to class was forcibly rerouted. Now imagine the triumphs Ducky-Bob’s could bring the under-developed world – the possibilities are virtually endless.
3) Lastly, whoever it is headed the party-making details gave SMU’s Program Council (PC) the perfect shot to show itself roundly capable of footing massive bills and handling the unexpected with what some drunk bro at the Block Party called “gnarly cat-like reflexes” — which we’re going to interpret as meaning “excellent response time.”
Hurdling forth from what may well have been the best-executed Sing Song and from a pretty well-attended, if still lyrically questionable, 30H!3 Concert, PC was beaming with pride as it, along with several other student associations, provided the couple remaining thousand bucks the Bush Library opening needed to put SMU on the world stage with razzle.
But really, if there is a serious moment in all 850 words of this article, it is here – that we wish the administration would have let PC do more and with more time. Truly it has shown it’s made of sterner stuff, and we look forward to seeing it rise to even greater acclaim in the coming semesters. In the meantime, the UNHCR knows whose door it really needs to knock on if it ever needs some quick cash (hint: it ain’t the EU).
We close by admitting that, unlike the solutions developed by the Lyle Engineering School’s Biomimicry Competition, ours is not an environmentally-friendly suggestion. It is, however, a president-friendly one and we hope, with much audacity and with our tongues only so much in our cheeks, that President Obama will take the refugee camp site in Dadaab, Kenya into consideration as he begins designing the floor-plans and fancy exhibits of his own library. A permanent institution of higher learning, a great source of jobs and tourism for Kenya, a sleek crisis-housing solution courtesy of Ducky-Bob’s and a state-of-the-art, hygienic water source, that is if Obama chooses, as Bush did, to add a fountain — really though, who could ask for better PR?
Zimmern is a junior majoring in pure math, French and English. Kendrick is a sophomore majoring in electrical engineering. Doucette is a senior majoring in history.
