9 a.m.: Registration. Traditionally one of the most harrowing experiences of freshman week. Everybody must brave the long lines, only to get inside Memorial Hall and be accosted by what seems like thousands of student groups, eachgrabbing anybody who comes by. Avoid the Bahai's, Trotskyite factions, Harvard Student Agencies (buy and wash your own sheets--it's cheaper and more reliable), the rifle club and those obsequious class ring salesmen.

4 p.m.: Introductory freshman crew meeting. If you were one of the "select few" that received notes this summer imploring you to join the crew team because of your superior athletic prowess, don't be deluded. Crew coach Harry Parker sends these notices to almost all freshman except those who weigh over 400 pounds or have no arms. Expect to see half the class there.

8:30 p.m.: Lecture: "The Continuing Darwinian Revolution." One of a series of educational encounters that the freshman dean's office provides for you. Beware: there are always a large number of freshmen in the class who use these lectures strictly to out-psyche you. Particularly avoid those who claim they have heard of the lecturer, or understand the subject matter. If you are still in the old high school habit of attending every class, this could be a good time to break it.

TUESDAY, September 16:

9 a.m.: If you have decided that you are unhappy with your room or roommate, now is the time to start your complaining if you expect to get anywhere. When you complain loud and long enough about anything around here, you eventually get your way. If you run into a recalcitrant administrator, call him at home at 4 a.m. Harvard is a can-do place. Never take no for an answer.

10:45--12:30 p.m.: Reading Test. The misconceptions about this test really abound. Some think it decides what track you'll be in for the next four years. Others, through upper classman hearsay, will spend hours practicing by reading books, baseball cards, milk cartons, anything they can find. Actually, this is about the only pleasant exam you'll take in the next several years, so enjoy it. A basic reading knowledge of English, however, is required.

2--3:45 p.m.: The first of a long series of tests that must be taken if you placed out of the language requirement. The cool thing to do is plead you have dyslexia--a convenient reading disability created specifically to get you out of taking the French exam.

3:45-5 p.m.: Required meeting of Harvard and Radcliffe freshmen who have been notified that they are eligible for sophomore standing. Advanced placement is a real sore spot among freshmen--some people who never even had advanced placement courses in their high schools, now come here and find that a third of the class is eligible. Don't let it worry you, but if it really does, keep up your image and attend the meeting even if you didn't amass a lot of "fives." It's especially boss to say that you go a couple of fives on the A.P. even though you hadn't taken any A.P. courses.

4 p.m.: Soccer and track introductory meetings. Track, a sparsely attended sport in high school, often withers to extinction at college now that mothers and girlfriends can't even attend the meets. Soccer draws a fairly large crowd for title matches, and the team is not so awesome that you need to be an all-something-or-other from high school to land a spot on the starting freshman squad.

5 p.m.: Coffee hour with Joel Porte, professor of English. A caveat--along with the free coffee may be an unprecedented amount of brown-nosing. Porte is an expert on Emerson and Thoreau so expect the ubiquitous ego-deflating frosh to be in attendance, mouthing quotes from The American Scholar or Civil Disobedience.

7:45 p.m.: First of many proctor-sponsored Yard beer parties. There will be plenty of Budweiser and Almaden on hand, but you can't drink and run. Proctors are required to recite selected gems from the Rules Relating to Harvard--it's all very blase. Also--this may be your first encounter with the game of Concentration. In this painful ordeal, students sit around in a circle and tick off their names and perspective areas of study. Maybe you should show up late.

WEDNESDAY, September 17:

9--10 a.m.: Required meeting with Harvard officials. In a week filled with tradition, this meeting is a classic. Of course, the coolest people usually choose to sleep through it. But others will crowd into Memorial Hall in search of order in an otherwise chaotic first few days. Rather than inner peace, most freshmen come back shell-shocked. While you're busy wiping sleep out of your eyes, the go-getters are already at work, frantically waving hands, ready to ask questions of the guest lecturer that were prepared months ago. You'll stumble out firm in the belief that you need a year off or that it's time to transfer.

11 a.m.: There is still time in the week to put off the mandatory swimming test that a Harvard heiress required of all freshmen when she bequesthed her fortune to the University.

2 p.m.-4:30 p.m.: Loeb Drama Center introductory meeting. The freshman avant garde will turn out en masse for this meeting. Because of a lack of interest and a general overproduction of shows freshmen can advance fast in Harvard dramatic circles. But most likely half the group that is kneeling on the theater rug in this jam-packed meeting is there simply to sign up to be ushers and get into the productions for free.