There is agreement that a 1 a.m. curfew will be put into effect. An exception will be made for those attending the "Rocky Horror Picture Show." Norchi senses the futility and grows angrier: "If you think there should be a curfew and kids should be in bed at 1 o'clock, then, dammit, put them in bed." One local school, Belmont Hill, has come without a faculty chaperone. They threw a toga party on the 25th floor the night before. One of the members of their delegation posed as a teacher and signed them in. Chuck's problems have just begun. A staff member quietly turns away -- "The shit has really hit the fan."

* * * *

"This is my first experience with any IRC function, and I must say I was impressed by the organizational and overall efficiency of the conference," Joseph Z. Cortes '81, secretary of the Disarmaments Committee said.

The IRC spends just over $10,000 on the four-day event and hauls in $18,000 in return revenues and delegate fees, Russel Baris '81, chairman of the IRC Board of Auditors, estimates. These profits are plowed into IRC activities.

The delegates pay for their own travel and room expenses. They come to Boston every year for the HMUN, armed with Roberts' Rules, the latest jokes in international relations, and inexhaustible quantities of alcohol and marijuana. A bellboy stops me in the lobby and smiles -- "they must have ten pushers working overtime," he says. The delegate from Guyana sends a glass of Kool-Aid to the chairman of the Disarmament Committee. Love notes, disguised as cogent policy discussions among delegations and neighboring nations, roam through the committee.

The debate is lively in the Independence Room East on the second floor. Jon Shifren, president of the World Affairs Club and Long Island's Wheatley School, is a high school senior and a model U.N. veteran. His committee has been good to his country -- the People's Republic of China -- thus far. "It's been completely dominated by the Third World," he says. How did his school earn the honor of representing the PRC? "Our former president," Shiffen says, "knew Emil Yappert, but maybe we were just lucky." He waves his card in the air -- a signal that he wants to speak. He won an award last year at Yale, while representing Spain.

Law of the Sea is meeting next door. Andrew Power, the delegate from Kenya and the Dalton School of New York City, says he is having a pretty good time "but I'm trying to win" the award for best delegate in his committee. Power loosens his navy tie and rumples his white shirt some more. "Right now," he says, motioning at the pile of debris which surrounds his chair, "you have to sweat it out, but if you win, that's the fun part."

Power's comments are cut short. Martha Finnemore '81, corporate member of the IRC, has grabbed the microphone away from the Law of the Sea to read the statement on the 1 a.m. curfew. It is a thankless task. "The situation must be corrected if there is to be an HMUN next year." She is greeted by expletives and boos, and loses her cool: "You brought this upon yourself -- you're being a big pain in the ass and we don't like it any better than you do. This was not our idea."

At a staff meeting later that afternoon, assignments for patrolling the hotel halls are handed out. Harvard students will work two-hour shifts. Secretariat personnel spot flaming toilet paper flying from the hotel later that Saturday night. They are busily partying in suite #113, but will take time out to investigate. Security director Hatch confronts the sheepish perpetrators and they deny it. It doesn't really matter -- it is a relatively calm night. No more bottles and metal objects.

* * * *

At a meeting on Sunday, after the convention has closed, IRC representatives and Sheraton sales people talk over the weekend. The IRC will pay for the damage to the woman's car, a spokesman for Sheraton says. HMUN can hold their '79 conference, as planned. "We were no worse than the drunk old men from the Clover Club," Finnemore says. Things worked out okay, says Norchi. "I think they need us as much as we need them," he surmises, -- "the Shriners and the AMA cause more trouble than we do."