"I have in mind the perfect man. What makes you the perfect man for me?"

"If you were an amusement park ride, how fast would you be?"

"It's Friday night. How do you get me in the mood?"

These are questions one rarely hears at Harvard, where ice cream socials pass for parties and any undergraduates hidden in the Widener stacks late at night are probably...studying for their midterms.

But this fall, several House committees have risen to the challenge, struggling to energize Harvard's anemic dating scene. Taking their cues from game show classics like "The Dating Game" and "Singled Out," the Yard and three Houses have organized their own games for lucky residents so far this year.

But have Harvard's bachelors and bachelorettes made the love connection? Several lucky contestants from Pforzheimer, Winthrop, Quincy and the Yard say that while they had fun, their true loves are still somewhere out in the audience.

Silent Nights

Most of the participants agreed that the Harvard dating scene is notorious for its lack of activity, although they insisted their participation was just for fun.

"There's a large amount of people here who don't go out very much," says Adam D. Checchi '99 of Winthrop. "It's like high school...`The Dating Game' made me think I should be helping fix the problem."

Checchi also proposes more constructive solutions.

"If you want you can print my phone number in the article," he adds helpfully.

His date, Sinead B. Walsh '00, says after transferring to Harvard from Texas Christian, she was astonished by the lack of social activity.

Helping improve the scene "is kind of a mission of mine--I'm a very socially oriented person," she says. "Don't underestimate the number of people who are ready to party."

Valerie A. Edmondson '00 of Quincy says romantic involvement at Harvard is sharply divided into two camps.

"It seems to be either relationships or random hook-ups which don't lead anywhere," says Edmondson, who is also a Crimson executive.