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Students search for love at Kuumba Dating Game

OK, so maybe it's been done many times in the past. A group of wild and crazy college students get together and recreate some well-known game show from yesteryear, then invite actual college students to participate and put on a show that involves a great deal of audience participation. The idea may not be groundbreaking, but the result can be fun.

Take the Kuumba Dating Game: A spoof of the old-school game show where three hopefuls vie for a date with some unknown person, who then eliminates two of the contestants with a series of questions. With a specifically African American flair, the Kuumba Dating Game was guaranteed to garner some outright guffaws, which explains why a standing-room-only audience of some 300 to 400 black University students crowded the U-Club.

Questions and answers ranged from the goofy and frivolous to the interesting and serious. Of the four women who vied for senior football player Thomas Guynas' love, it was first-year student Velisha Thomas whose answers sparked his interest.

"If I had a trapeze over my bed, what kind of tricks would you perform for me?" Guynas asked.

Thomas responded, "I'd tumble, roll and flip right into your arms."

Such a beautiful answer deserved the "awwww" the crowd crooned.

Not all was romantic, however, when University students Joe Griffen, André Hewitt and Daniel West tried for the hand of the very lovely first-year student, Chandan Morris.

Everyone could tell these guys were about to clown when Morris asked West for his idea of a perfect evening, and he began, "I'd take you to the Oasis motel."

Hewitt got even raunchier. When Morris stated her favorite slogan was Nike's "Just Do It," he gave his favorite, homemade slogan: "Just Hit It."

In the end, it was sophomore Joe Griffin who got Morris' vote. No wonder. When asked what he would do to earn her approval he responded, "I probably wouldn't do nothin'." How romantic.

Sophomore Kiera Fernandez had a better batch of men to choose from -- not that that's saying much. When she asked them to name what kind of exotic animal they'd be, she got such well thought out answers as "kangaroo" and "chipmunk." Junior Keith Moton's answer definitely got her attention: "I'd be a black panther, 'cause one night with me, you'll realize how wild the shit can really get!"

Fernandez retorted, "One night with me, you'll be too tame to talk like that."

"That's what I'm talkin' about, baby," was Moton's clever answer.

Khary Hornsby was able to get a little freak out when Fernandez asked if she were a Tootsie Pop, how many licks it would take him to get to her center. His response: "Fifteen. One for every time you call out my name."

In the end, however, it was a psychology major, Brandon Guinn, who won the date.

Signs of African American female strength were apparent throughout the contest. When asked for her view of the perfect man, Brittanie Chin responded: "He has to realize that chivalry is not dead. He must respect me like the queen I am." Jaavon Kuykindall has a lot to live up to as he chose her as his mystery date.

When asked by Marcus Ray what he could do to make her the happiest woman in the world, Lakeisha Hamilton stated, "The only thing you have to do is be yourself and show me you're doing everything to achieve your dreams."

It should come as no surprise that Ray chose Hamilton as his date. He certainly wouldn't have chosen the freak-like Jasmine Guy whose response to a question to compare her skills with that of an NBA player was cut out by an audience heckler who shouted, "Magic!" The jury's still out over whether the pun was or wasn't intended.

The game show's intermission was filled by "Images of Identity," a live soap opera with an all-African American cast. Containing a few interesting insights on male-female relationships punctuated with farcical humor, the story centered on two different areas of a barber shop with women and men talking amongst their respective gender group about the quirks of the other. This was very reminiscent of the gender dialogues brought to life in last year's controversial movie "Kids."

Humor was certainly the backbone of "Images of Identity," much like the popular '70s television sitcom "Soap." Such plots as a catfight between two sorority women while the rest of the cast chanted, "Let the ho's fight," a drunk country girl and the largest group member's anguish that women only want him for his body drew much laughter.