Through the Eyes of College Students
By Andy Brown and Frank Panzer
St. Patrick’s Day is a religious holiday that everyone likes. College students just happen to love it. St. Patrick’s Day is celebrated internationally on the 17th of March every year. The day is celebrated by attending church services, wearing green, and eating and drinking alcohol all day. You don’t have to be from Ireland to celebrate this holiday. St. Patrick’s Day was a holiday I looked forward to celebrating in school the most during my middle school and high school days.
St. Patrick’s Day is more than just another holiday for college students. It’s a time student’s mark on their calendar to go out and have fun with their friends and family. Wearing green and drinking alcohol is the way most students celebrate it and it’s not a time to just go out and get blackout drunk, but to enjoy yourselves whether you are Irish or not. I was curious to see what students at Bemidji State University thought of St. Patrick’s Day and got some interesting answers. BSU Junior John Karp, a Biology major, said,” St. Patrick’s Day is 100% my favorite holiday. It even beats out Christmas. I have a little Irish in me and there is nothing better than going out wearing green and drinking green beer. It’s not about getting drunk. It’s about celebrating a tradition that has been around for hundreds of years.”
Another student I talked to was BSU Senior Luke Barthel and he said” he never really celebrated St. Patrick’s Day until he got to Bemidji. I never really saw the big deal in wearing green and this whole holiday because I am not Irish. Ever since I was a freshman here I have celebrated St. Patrick’s Day every year. It’s really a blast to wear green, laugh, and drink some beers with some good friends.” It seems the best part about St. Patrick’s Day is you don’t have to be Irish to celebrate it. Everyone is Irish on St. Patrick’s Day!
St. Patrick’s Day wasn’t made an official holiday until the 17th Century but was celebrated long before then. The color green actually wasn’t associated with St. Patrick’s Day when it first was being celebrated. It was actually Blue which is strange to picture. Over the years and as St. Patrick’s Day grew the color was changed to green. The actual wearing of the green originated from a song name. The phrase means to wear a shamrock on one’s clothing (which is green.) The first St. Patrick’s festival was held in 1996 in Ireland. It was a three-day event and by 2000 it became a four-day event. It just keeps growing and growing and by 2006 it was a five-day event. In 2009 around 700,000 people attended the parade in Ireland. The festivities included concerts, fireworks, and theatre performances where close to one million people attended. The people that attended this parade were bigger than the population of Vermont, Wyoming, North Dakota, and South Dakota.
Photo taken by Frank Panzer: Supporting St. Patrick’s Day with the Green!
St. Patrick’s Day is a great holiday to learn about and celebrate for people of all ages. One of my greatest memories during my childhood was wearing green during school and pinching everyone who didn’t have green on that day. I hope it will continue to be celebrated for centuries and centuries and passed on to my grandkids and to their grandkids. St. Patrick’s Day is one of my favorite holidays and it’s a blast to celebrate with the people closest in your life.
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