Solving Caltech’s Ditch Day puzzle

Courtney Chen rappelled down the side of a building on the Caltech campus Friday morning, trading her helmet for a black mask when she was safe on the ground.

Everywhere on campus there were teams participating in activities of wit and strength.

As part of an annual tradition, seniors at the small science and engineering university sent underclassmen off to unravel elaborate puzzles, mazes and other activities, called “stacks.” Classes were canceled. Seniors were not allowed on campus — if caught, the victims were duct-taped to trees.

This was Ditch Day.

The tradition began in the 1920s, usually occurs in May and is intended to be a surprise — students find out the morning of the event. Still, the event doesn’t typically catch a university full of inquisitive students completely off guard.

“There’s many signs pointing toward it,” said 22-year-old mechanical engineering senior Sebastian Rojas Mata. “It’s not something you set up in an hour.”

Rojas Mata, like other seniors, said he didn’t sleep much in the days leading up to Friday’s festivities.

Caltech has eight houses, or dorm rooms, that students belong to. Each house is divided into five different teams on Ditch Day. The seniors make matching T-shirts for the students at a screen-printing facility on campus, each set based on the team’s theme.

Chen, the 18-year-old who rappelled down a campus building, was part of a team wearing red T-shirts and black masks like the characters in the film “The Incredibles.”

Rojas Mata’s house, Ricketts, woke up undergrads by playing “The Price is Right” theme song, a sign for students to meet in the house’s courtyard.

Then the seniors pounded on doors and yelled, “Wake up frosh, it’s ditch day!” he said.

The group ended on Lake Avenue in Pasadena and was instructed to take photos “biting” residents with fake fangs, a play on the book, “Dracula.”

Still other students were seen diving underwater for treasure chests, running through mazes, and competing in shopping-cart races on campus. Other Caltech teams traveled as far as Las Vegas and Yosemite.

At a room near the Ruddock House, a team based on “The Legend of Zelda” video game wore fairy wings and green hats in reference to the main character, Link. There were plans to slingshot handmade vases and track down chickens on campus.

Kirit Karkare, who graduated with a degree in physics from Caltech in 2011, acted as a shopkeeper in “Zelda” for the challenge.

The 24-year-old said alumni often come back to the school to help seniors with Ditch Day.

“It’s really our favorite day of the year,” Karkare said. “Better than Christmas, by far.”

Calli Meyer, a freshman studying electrical engineering, said the activities are also a way for undergraduates to blow off steam.

“Caltech is a lot of work,” said the 19-year-old. “It’s pretty hard. Events like this are just a great way to spend some time away from academic work while doing something interesting that’s still kind of challenging.”

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Follow Tiffany Kelly on Google+ and on Twitter: @LATiffanyKelly.