Passionfruit
Passionfruit is an early morning ritual involving fruit juice, and making toasts to things at CTY that are... toastworthy.
Carlisle
Passionfruit originated at Carlisle.
It is usually held on a Sunday. At the end of the Saturday dance the night before, the Empress and Emperor (and their buddies) will shout the time and place of Passionfruit for the following morning.
Passionfruit involves sitting outside in a circle and toasting with some sort of juice. The Empress and Emperor of Passionfruit lead the ceremonies.
Quite a while ago, the Empress and Emperor were referred to as the "juice coordinator", who would traditionally purchase a large amount of passionfruit juice for the whole circle. Then people realized the ineffectiveness of this and started to bring their own juice, soda, water, etc. to Passionfruit.
Edit: This actually had to do with the departure of Gary Noritz, who facilitated finding & purchasing cases of passionfruit juice. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find cases of the stuff in Carlisle? (...keep in mind that this was long before Wal-Mart.)
Passionfruit is now always supervised by RAs at Carlisle. You actually cannot be anywhere without being supervised, so if you are not going to Passionfruit, you cannot be outside, and you can only go to the HUB at 7:00, and only because it becomes supervised by RAs at 7:00. This means there can be no risque devirginizations, toasts, or speeches.
Lancaster
Passionfruit first came to Lancaster in 1994, brought there by Andromeda Yelton.
At Lancaster, juice is still purchased for the entire group by the Alcove. People donate money to help purchase the juice, though it is not mandatory.
What happens is that at 6 am on Hartman Green, a circle is formed with many drinks in the middle. The Emperor says his speech, customarily ending with "I love CTY and I love the Passionfruit," takes a drink, and passes it onward to the next nomore/nevermore. Then after all the nomores have gone, everyone else can say their speech with onemores having priority.
It is also here that the position of Jester, the 42 duct tape bathrobe, the caution tape cape, the duct tape suit, and the bottle of Fruitopia are passed on during second session, though there is a first session Jester as well.
Electric Tree
The Electric Tree is a tree on Hartman Green that has an electrical outlet installed at the base of its trunk. This tree is used to play They Might Be Giants songs on the last day of each session, after the Passionfruit. This last traditional event is always bittersweet, and lasts until the second before class starts. It always ends with the song The End of the Tour.
Saratoga Springs (Skidmore)
In Saratoga Springs Passionfruit is a continued part of Sunrise, a tradition where everyone gets up at 5:00 AM ish and watches the sun rise together on the last morning. (Often however people fall asleep from a busy last night and miss sunrise.) Once the sun has risen sufficiently all nevermores, nomores and anyone who wants to join go to the duck pond or in the event of rain Case Center
The actual Passionfruit Juice is a secret mix of juices only known by the RA's at this point, and the RA's coordinate the purchace of the drink.
At Skidmore we have both Emperors and Empresses and Passionfruit begins with a speech from the Empress about her experience at CTY and ends with a speech from the Emperor. Inbetween their speeches are speeches from any nevermore who wishes to speak about their experience. (Nomores are allowed to speak but it is mostly frowned upon, exempting certain people) After each Speech everyone in the circle says "I love CTY and I love the passionfruit" and takes a sip of their drink.
Once the ceremony is finished the nevermores gather the oneyears (typically called thirdyears at Saratoga regardless of their actual number of returning times) and vote on a Primary Emperor and Empress and a Secondary Emperor and Empress in the event that a primary Emperor or Empress is unable to return or just doesn't show up.
Los Angeles
Passionfruit at LMU is on the last morning and is only for nevermores, where they share stories that cannot be repeated unless stated otherwise. It's rumored that coveted black lanyards are handed out at the end of the event. I am not a nevermore myself so I don't know any more than that.
