Among being a senior philosophy and psychology major at Cal State Long Beach, and a member of the Taiwanese Student Association, Japan Club and International Student Association, Kyle Durich may be better known as the student who wanders around campus in a loincloth, dancing to his oversized boom box.
“It all started with comic spirit with Raymond Lacoste,” Durich said. “That class taught us how to be the fool and go with the flow. I applied it to all of my classes.”
The motivation to dance around campus came in the form of an assignment from a social psychology class.
“We had to do two experientials,” Durich said. “One is to train yourself to act the fool in society. The second is to act outside of society.”
In order to accomplish this assignment, Durich fashioned a loincloth out of an old Tarzan Halloween costume and completed his look by adding a boom box to the mix.
“The boom box was the best buy of my life,” Durich said.
The concept for his paper was that Durich would walk and dance around the campus and a friend would record the reactions.
“I was a little nervous,” Durich admits.
Durich recalls mostly positive reactions from students as he passed by.
“People smiled, laughed; some looked confused and a lot of people did double-takes,” Durich said. “A lot of people asked for pictures with me.”
The assignment even lent itself to benefit Asian Culture Night, where Durich danced and ended up co-hosting.
“Some people thought it was bizarre,” said Joshua Sensabaugh, president of the International Student Association. “Some people laughed, a few made some rude jokes, but he was pretty well-received by the people there.”
Durich’s involvement was actually a plan to attract people to the event, according to Saruul Purevkhuu, president of the Japan Club.
“It’s fun to see someone do that,” Purevkhuu said. “It’s not inappropriate and he’s entertaining people.”
Theories behind Durich’s dancing were wide and varied.
“I thought he was going out for a fraternity,” said Afram Chukro, a junior philosophy major. “It takes a lot of guts to do that.”
Still, most students support Durich in his attempt to have fun outside of the society’s norms.
“I think it’s hilarious,” said Alexandra Merrell, a senior fashion design major who filmed Durich with her camera-phone. “It grabbed my attention — a naked man dancing to music.”
Friends turned out in support of Durich when he was dancing, some even joined in with Durich.
“I saw [a dancing guy] and went ‘Oh it’s Kyle,’ ” said Alex Edlefsen, a junior business management major, who is a member of Japan Club with Durich. “He’s always doing wacky stuff like this.”
However, not everyone responded kindly to Durich’s experiment.
“The bookstore called the University Police on me,” Durich said. “I explained what was going on and the people [at the bookstore] were supportive of me, so the issue got cleared up.”
Since then, the University Police’s only message to Durich was to watch the volume on his boom box.
Durich remembers the various names he was referenced by while conducting his experiment.
“There was ‘boom box guy,’ ‘Tarzan,’ ‘loincloth guy,’ ‘naked guy,’ seriously,” Durich said. “My favorite is ‘boom box guy.’ It’s pretty good.”
The strangest moment, recalls Durich, was when he was recognized without his loincloth.
“I wore the loincloth Monday and Tuesday, but wore my regular clothes and just carried around the boom box on a Wednesday,” Durich said. “People actually asked me, ‘Where’s the loincloth?’ “
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