Author: Crystal T.
WARNING: This blog post is much longer than a baguette
So, I’m sitting here at my desk wondering how I could possibly bear the responsibility of writing a blog post on such an eventful day like this… and I thought to myself, why not go all out? While trying to capture the eccentric aspects of every act, I realized what SSP really stands for – Super Supportive People. It’s 4:14 am right now and I’m not even going to lie when I say that I’m slightly teary-eyed thinking about how much my SSPeers and the faculty mean to me and the journey we’ve been on together. With that being said, here’s how today went…
Act 1: A Beautiful Instrumental Rendition of I Am a Parallelogram
Grant and Jenny set the bar high with a stunning instrumental cover of our one and only NMT SSP theme song. While I’m not quite sure if I’ll ever be able to get the I Am a Parallelogram 
Mission #1: Get Katie to sing her favorite song in front of all of NMT.
Act 2: An Emotional Tribute to THE Parallelogram
Just when we thought it was over, Clara captured the emotions of the most misunderstood shape: the parallelogram
Act 3: The 6’4 Tree Hugger🌲 🌲 Makes His Appearance
Seeing that I waited an entire week to see Chenault climb trees, I can say with full confidence that he did not disappoint. At 6’4, Chenault climbed with speed and agility, proving that height does come into assistance at times. However, at 5’2, I’d argue that there’s nothing better than being able to win at Limbo. But anyways, moral of the story: trees need lots of love, so go hug a tree sometime.
Act 4: Gerry’s Medical Emergency 🚑
With his seemingly innocent story about how he came to do hand contortion, Gerry shocked us all with his slightly concerning talent. The question that remains is, was it hand contortion or a medical emergency?
Act 5: The Pian-yo-yo Duo That Was Ducking Amazing
After Gerry’s act left my jaw dropped, I didn’t have much time to recover until my jaw dropped to the floor yet again. I made sure to heed Katrina’s warning to duck 🦆 in case Alice’s talent flies off screen. Jonathan’s piano playing and Alice’s crazy Chinese Yo-yo tricks complemented each other perfectly… and let’s be honest, we all wish we were Alice’s neighbors.
Act 6: The Turkish Eminem Triple Threat
Turns out, our very own Turkish Eminem is a triple threat: she can sing, she can act, and she can DANCE. Not only can she wipe the floor with biochem with her diss track, Umran can work it on the dance floor. Thinking about it now, should we have a SSP dance party??
Act 7: Drum Roll Please…
Three words. JUWAN CAN DRUM 🥁. His act left me inspired to start learning how to drum in the very near future. And…here’s a nerdy joke for anyone who cares to appreciate it: I saw someone drumming on a math textbook with two wooden sticks. I think he was studying log rhythms.
Act 8: Texas Heat Strikes Again
While I don’t quite understand how Joaquin managed to turn kernels to popcorn, I do relate to how the Texas heat does wonders. As Joaquin puts it, Texas is a “magical place”, where everythings of course BIGGER and BETTER.
Act 9: Ping Pong 🏓 Shrug 🤷
Michael left us stunned at his precision and the ICONIC shrug. After that act, Dude Perfect better watch out because Michael is coming for their career. I mean, unlike Michael, Dude Perfect can’t do their trick shots in one take.
Act 10: An Electric-rye-ing Performance 🎸
Lizzie made everyone hysteric as soon as she hit the first chord of Hysteria. With the bread making montage in the background, her performance was just *chef’s kiss*. I don’t know about you, but I was definitely rocking along.
Act 11: Do The Colors Feel Different?
Tanay shocked us all when he proceeded to solve a Rubik’s cube
Act 12: Broadway Who?? 🎵
I don’t know if it was just me, but I can’t believe Aaron was hiding such a beautiful voice from us. If we were in-person, he would’ve gotten an all-around standing ovation and an extremely loud “Bravo!!” from me. Hey, if you’re reading this Aaron, I hope you remember me when you end up on Broadway or something.
Act 13: A Series of Very Unfortunate Events
So, here’s the story of how my talent show video submission went. While I had planned to submit a video of some new choreography, fate had other plans for me. A pulled hamstring and a swollen foot after getting bitten by an anonymous animal forced me to submit a video that was secretly (kinda illegally) taken.
Act 14: An Oscar Worthy Performance
As we all know, McLucy McChicken is one of many talents, a jack-of-all-trades. She took us on an adventure across the world with her Oscar-worthy accents, ranging from British to the stereotypical Valley girl. While her Southern accent was questionably British, Lucy made a very memorable intermission.
Act 15: Conspiracy Series with Franklin
Just when I thought things couldn’t get more interesting, Franklin shocked us all with a new discovery – Squidward plays the oboe, not the clarinet *gasp*. Not only does Franklin have a talent of “using quantum mechanics to prove that Squidward plays the oboe”, he has a true talent of playing the oboe (or is it a clarinet, who knows?)
Act 16: A Big Thanks to McKatrina McChicken and McLucy McChicken
Can we just appreciate Katrina and Lucy for going all out for the talent show?? I’m so grateful that they gave it all to make today so unbelievably fun. True MVPs of SSP 🙌
Act 17: A Reminder to Never Skip Leg Day
Juji put us all to shame with his athleticism by threading the needle not one, but about 15 times in a row. 😲😲😲 Lesson from Juji: Never EVER skip leg day.
Act 18: How to Squash Your Opponents
If we weren’t already shocked with all the athleticism of our SSPeers, we definitely were after watching Sophia play squash. With her flawless hand-eye-coordination and speedy footwork, Sophia proves to be an unstoppable force in the squash arena.
Act 19: Take Me Homeee, Country Roadssss
Jeremy got everyone singing on the top of their lungs (well virtually) with his recorder rendition of Take Me Home, Country Roads – something even John Denver would agree to be beautiful. All I’ve gotta say is TAKE ME HOMEEEE, COUNTRY ROADSSSS, TO THE PLACEEE WHERE I BELONGGGGGGGGGGGG
Act 20: Plot Twist, It’s Actually an Oboe
After Franklin exposed the truth about Squidward, I was left questioning whether or not Jenny was playing the oboe or clarinet. Jenny’s lung capacity posed a threat to COVID, a worthy talent in and of itself. Her stunning performance of Crusell Clarinet Concerto No. 2 had me smiling from ear to ear 🙃
Act 21: You Can Count on Me Like Oneee, Twooo, Three
Ethan’s words of wisdom: you can really always count on your friends to be there for you.
Ethan’s second words of wisdom: Count on Me is the best Bruno Mars song
Act 22: A Jaw-Dropping Act By None Other Than the Mag-Kristin Herself
With her incredible card and Rubik’s cube skills, Kristin didn’t fail to impress. I still am not able to comprehend how the things she does are possible, but I guess that’s the magic of it all. As if it could get any better, Kristin revealed a spitting image of Abby using Rubik’s cubes.
Act 23: The Taylor Series That No One Saw Coming
When Emma said that she was a Taylor fan, I don’t think anyone saw what was in store. With an average of 0.5 seconds per song, Emma managed to identify almost every Taylor Swift song, which I had no idea was possible.
Mission #2: Spam Taylor and her record producer with a recording until Emma gets recognized.
Act 24: On My Own
Our very own MC struck again with her AMAZING voice and emotion as she serenaded us with On My Own from Les Mis. Just remember though Lucy, you aren’t on your own.
Act 25: Ling Ling Has Left the Chat
Hyun brought us a Superb String Performance that would make TwoSetViolin proud. With this end of the talent show approaching, her violin 🎻performance brought us comfort as we swayed to the beauty of it all.
Act 26: The Sexiest Star People of SSP
With about ⅓ of NMT, our second to last act was the Sexy Star People (SSP) performing their parodies Finding Stars and SSPiano Man. The Discord screenshot says it all for all the hard work that they put in, and I couldn’t be prouder.
Act 27: Best for Last
Even though we didn’t get a full on kazoo quartet, we got an amazing performance from our TAs nonetheless. Abby blew us away with her harmonica skills, Katie was so good that she WAS the background, Michael held Mocha (or is it Macchiato?), and Tristan absolutely destroyed the piece of bread.
Oh, and don’t think I forgot Dr. R’s emotional spoken word poetry…
Mission #3: Make Dr. R a world-famous spoken word poet
Exposing Elane 😂:
After the talent show, we played way too many games of Werewolf, Garticphone, and Deception (the latter exposing Elane’s incompetence at not revealing her identity). In the middle of our efforts to narrow down potential murder weapons and evidence, Elane burst out in celebration, claiming that she was the accomplice. Lesson 1: Don’t celebrate too early. But we weren’t ready for what was to come next… Elane had made a deadly mistake.
Lesson 2: Don’t say that you were the accomplice WHEN YOU WEREN’T THE ACCOMPLICE. Lesson 3: Don’t tell the murderer that you were the witness of the crime! Y’all heard it from here first, don’t repeat the same mistakes. After all, it may cost your life. As we moved on to Garticphone, it seemed like we all had the same thing in mind…
I’d like to end this ridiculously long blog post with a few words (or maybe not just a few). SSP started off with me feeling MAJOR Imposter Syndrome, and while that might still be the case, I have learned so much that I can’t even begin to comprehend. In between working on psets and struggling to understand any of the learning block material, we have truly become a family – something even COVID can’t take away. From listening to Matt impersonating Kermit the Frog (Exhibit A below) to debating about what cold weather means. From endless rounds of Castlefall (shoutout to Katie’s friend!), Garticphone, and Deception to being traumatized by Dr. A. From staying up to finish Michael’s insanely hard QODs to worshipping Matt’s cat Flora and her cute little mitten paws, we have truly made so many unforgettable memories. While we only have one week left of SSP, there’s one thing I know for certain – I will never baguette the 36 SSPeers and 7 faculty members that represent NMT.
Exhibit A
Extended appreciation to my teammates of Rye Ascension:
Ever since the day Matt blessed us with his knowledge of Jewish bread and Bronwyn mispronounced challah, Team Rye Ascension has been ascending, together. We just so happen to complement each other perfectly, and I’m forever thankful to have Matt and Bronwyn as my teammates. 🥰🥰🥰
Drawings of us as animated characters:
One last thing, even though y’all are reading this the day after… Happy National Yellow Pig Day!!! This is for all the number 17 supporters out there 😊 Also, if you happen to be wondering why there are so many emojis… Happy National Emoji Day! Congrats if you’ve gotten this far into the blog! Have a beautiful weekend and thank you for reading :))
Hey y’all! I’m Crystal Tang and I’m from Houston, Texas. I’m a dancer, pianist, and full-time adrenaline junkie! I love camping, paddleboarding, and playing any outdoor sport (mainly football, ultimate frisbee, and Spikeball). My favorite music genre is country, but I’m open to anything! I love y’all and let’s end this last week of SSP with a bang! 💙
