Flyby's California Student Field Identification Guide

This is Part I of Flyby’s two-part From Cali to Cambridge mini-series. Check back for Part II!

The Harvard Class of 2017 hails from dozens of countries and 49 states (sorry, Wyoming). Faced with this bewildering geographical diversity, the untrained eye may find it difficult to classify freshman passerby into their places of origin. With a little practice and help from handy this Flyby field guide, you will soon be able to spot the Californicus studentus, one of Harvard’s more exotic species of students to migrate east this fall.

Whether they hail from Pasadena or Petaluma, California students tend to exhibit one or more of the following traits, making them identifiable to the attentive observer:

Strained Relationship with Weather
The second thing people said to California students after learning of their Harvard acceptance—the first being “How did you get in there?”—was “Good luck with the weather.” In California, a magical place without seasons, one can reliably step outside to find the temperature between a cloudy 60°F or a toasty 90°F, in which case one can simply cool off with a trip to Water World. To a species that has never survived worse cold than a day’s skiing at Lake Tahoe, the anticipated chilliness of a Boston winter elicits two responses: desperation or denial. For many, any dip below 70°F is a catastrophic flux requiring the immediate recourse to a North Face jacket and Ugg boots. Those in denial may still be wearing Bermuda shorts and flip flops when December rolls around.

Inability to Pronounce Anglo-Saxon Place Names
Although the language barrier is by no means a localized difficulty, those from the West Coast have particular trouble with words containing excess consonants. Seventeenth-century Spanish missionaries left in California a legacy of easily-vocalized phonetics, where the biggest difficulty may lie in remembering to make a ‘j’ sound like and ‘h.’ Some examples: “San Diego” = “SAN dee-AY-go;” “Mendocino” = “men-doe-SEE-no.” New England names, with their inscrutably English spellings, pose special difficulty to even Harvard students (especially those who used Hooked on Phonics). For illustration: “Worcester” /= “WAR-chest-her;” “Greenough” /= “GREE-noff,” “Hingham” /= “hing-HAM.” Darn you, Puritans!

Tell-tale Slang
Use of the word “hella” in any context is a sure sign you’ve spotted someone from California, and likely the San Francisco Bay Area, from which the term originates. Some sample phrases in the most common adjective/adverb usages: “The Moroccan carrot and raisin salad in the d-hall was hella sketch yesterday.” “I better pass this calc midterm; I studied hella for it.” Within the Golden State itself, the merits of “hella” are widely contested, contributing to a recent decrease in its usage. At Harvard, young males may wish to avoid the laughter elicited by misplaced “hella” (which does not fit the preppy East Coast stereotype), and thus it may be difficult to spot a Westerner from this word alone. Keep your ears open for “clutch,” “dank,” “gnar,” or “tight.” If all else fails, wait around next to the Sunday Sundaes table in Annenberg this weekend and listen for the first person to remark, “Oo, rainbow sprinkles!”. Be altruistic and let them know that here in Cambridge those colorful sugary pellets are actually called jimmies.

Slow Habituation to Clothing Norms
Incoming Harvard freshmen from the Golden State probably spent their summer interning at a Silicon Valley startup fetching coffee for twenty-two year old computer science grads who are trying to launch the world’s next most relevant social media site ever. Startup—and even some corporate—culture in the West is characterized by tee-shirts, jeans, flip flops, and fantastic break rooms stocked with unlimited candy and Red Bull to keep coders happy, satisfied, and working at all times of the night. Institutions of education have similar presentability standards: California students will no doubt hear of from their friends at Stanford about how great it is to wake up and go to class in pajamas. As anyone who has been to Harvard’s campus will surely realize, bro tanks and sweatpants are unacceptable in dining halls, much less classrooms. Next time you spot one of these unfortunate but unintentional breaches of etiquette, be a good Samaritan and lend your Californian friend a nice blazer and pair of loafers.

With these tips in mind, spend a few hours lounging in the Science Center plaza with eyes and ears open and you are sure to identify a few new friends from the West Coast.