The Iron Curtain

My good friend K was apparently bored or distracted during finals week one year and decided to print out and anonymously put up on our door embarrassing Facebook posts from my and my roommate’s middle school years. Or it would have been anonymous if I hadn’t opened the door and nearly tripped on him during the act. 

Like any good friends would, my roommate and I decided to repay the favor. K is a hardcore Russophile, so we bought a boatload of paperclips online and spent several months of the next semester linking them together into chains. Right before finals week, we snuck into his room and strung them across the ceiling to make an “iron curtain” separating his side from his roommate’s. We then posted Cold War-era anti-communist propaganda across the walls and ceiling on his side. The Soviet flag that K used as a closet curtain was artfully thrown into the trash, and we hung up the Stars and Stripes instead.

2,000 paperclips cost about seven bucks on the internet. Seeing my friend’s face when he walked into the room was utterly priceless.

Amal Dadi ’17
Potomac, Md.
Issue: 
Prompt: 
Send memories of your favorite pranks — including photos, if you’ve got them.