If you’ve been on Facebook in the past few days, you’ve probably noticed a new event that’s been getting a lot of attention on campus. This event was called Green Day and was hosted by Hannah Brooks ’16, Alex Brenner ’15, Ryan Kacani ’15 and Nicholas Galinski ’15. The event page has a picture of the band Green Day in front of a green background.
The event description reads, “This is the day when September ends. When it comes around, celebrate by wearing green, tweeting at John and Hank Green, petting your frogs, supporting the environment, making money, eating salad, mowing the lawn, and listening to Green Day. Basically just do anything and everything you can that can be described as ‘green.’ We want the world painted green. No matter where you are, you can get in on the fun! This isn’t just for Americans, idiot! Help us by participating in this completely random, unofficial spirit day – don’t make us walk alone. At one twenty-one (1:21) guys, throw up your arms into the sky. This is the dawning of the rest of our lives, on this holiday. So know your enemy, give me Novocain, and have the tiiiiime of your life, everybody.”
I had the chance to interview Brooks and Brenner on Monday evening to talk about their witty and creative spirit day. When I first asked Brooks for an interview, she responded “It’s all a joke. I just made a Facebook event for [fun] and giggles.” I reassured her I knew it was a joke, and we set up a time to meet. The answers I got from them were equally as hilarious and random as the spirit day itself.
Brooks and Brenner first came up with the idea last year when Brooks had tried to start a pajama day event on April 2nd—only 10 people participated. That’s when they decided to do a spirit day that they would give an absurd amount of notice for, so that more people would participate. Brooks wanted to do a color spirit day, but according to Brooks “red is an angry color” and “blue looks sad,” so she decided on green. The group made a Facebook event immediately. After this point, Green Day references and hilarious misunderstandings started to flood the group.
Facebook friends were confused about the event being called Green Day, so Brooks and Brenner decided to make the day related to the band Green Day. They decided to make the event on Oct. 1 because “that’s when September ends,” just like the Green Day song. The official Facebook time of the event, 1:21 pm, was chosen because of the song “21 Guns.”
I also asked them about the impressive guest count on their event, which was over 500 by Tuesday night. They both laughed and explained to me that most of the attendees were their friends, but some of them were people from other countries that thought that the event was a Green Day concert. They said that people from Spain, India and Myanmar had messaged them about tickets. “I don’t know how they found it,” Brooks commented, “but they’re really happy about it!”
Brooks never expected the event to get so much publicity, she said. “We wanted to see how many people we could get to dress up for us!” Brenner said he hopes it will happen next year.
“It’ll be in your assignment notebooks!” Brooks joked.
On the actual day of the event I was pleasantly surprised to see a large number of students walking around in green. Some people even went all out with neon green accessories and leggings. Many participants posted their Green Day selfies on the Facebook event wall, showcasing their spirit. Overall, I would say that Green Day was a pretty good success. It’s great to know that a couple of students can make something like this happen at Brandeis.
“If you missed out this year,” said Brenner, “make sure you confirm for next year’s event!”
