By Brittany Schaefer, Staff Writer
(Top/Bottom) Joey Rotondo, a.k.a. Mr. GDI, lip-syncs to the song “Chandelier” for the Mr. UNH event. This event is Chi Omega’s biggest philantrophy event for the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Rotondo later won the event.
A variety of male students competed for the title of Mr. UNH Monday night. This event is Chi Omega’s biggest philanthropy event for the Make-A-Wish Foundation.
“We have been doing this event for over 10 years,” said Olivia Hammick, Chi Omega’s philanthropy chair. “Mr. UNH is one of the biggest philanthropy events on this campus, and tonight our goal is to reach $5,000.”
Make-A-Wish is “near and dear” to Chi Omega’s heart. The event started off with Libby Giordano, who is a mother deeply involved with the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Her son was 7 years old when he was diagnosed with Mental Glioblastoma, which in simpler words is a brain tumor.
“On Jan. 9, 2013, we learned the hard way that cancer can come any day and at any age,” Giordano said.
She explained that the Make-A-Wish Foundation in New Hampshire hopes to make 112 wishes this year. The average cost of a wish is $10,000. A wish can be four things: to be something, to have something, to meet someone or to go somewhere. The most popular wish that a child has made is to go to Disney World.
On the Make-A-Wish Foundation page it states “Make-A-Wish grants the wish of a child diagnosed with a life-threatening medical condition in the United States and its territories, on average, every 38 minutes. We believe that a wish experience can be a game-changer. This one belief guides us. It inspires us to grant wishes that change the lives of the kids we serve.”
The actual event was a male beauty pageant and consisted of three different stages: the bathing suit, the talent and the suit-and-tie rounds. There were eight contestants: Beta, Soulful, PIKE, Hoops, Patriotic, Notable, GDI and Premed.
“I was just nervous about getting in front of hundreds of people half-naked,” senior Adam Carrington and Mr. Notable said. “I’ve been singing forever so I had a lot of fun up there.”
The bathing suit round ranged in choices from women’s one pieces to men’s speedos.
“Not going to lie, I came to see the guys,” freshman Nicki Govoni said. “But I think it’s also a great cause for their philanthropy.”
The second round was the talent portion, which consisted of singing, dancing, roller blading and archery. The final round was the suit-and-tie portion, when the four judges announced the winner.
The crowd drum-rolled as the two show hosts announced the winner. Mr. GDI, Joey Rotondo, won over the judges and took the crown with his comical women’s one-piece bathing suit and his half-naked parody to the song “Chandelier.” Hundreds of UNH students filled the Granite State Room to support Chi Omega and share some laughs.