A record number of diplomats and Georgetown faculty members joined students this year at the annual Diplomatic Ball. This year the formal event was held at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C.

The black tie event, sponsored by the School of Foreign Service Academic Council, was held April 19 from 8:30 p.m. until midnight. A Georgetown tradition for over 50 years, the gala drew about 1,400 people on Friday – 1,000 students, 100 faculty members and their spouses and 100 diplomats and their spouses, Diplomatic Ball Committee Chairman Cory Tull (SFS ’04) said. About five times as many diplomats and faculty attended Diplomatic Ball this year as had attended in previous years, Tull added.

“This year’s ball was the most successful in terms of the number of diplomats attending and the smoothest in terms of a lack of problems at the ball,” Tull said.

Tickets for the event, which typically run in high demand, went on sale March 16 in a process Tull said was unusually well-ordered. A new regulation this year prohibited students from lining up before 10 p.m. on Friday before the Saturday morning distribution was scheduled to begin.

The changes in the ticket distribution process mirror changes in distribution processes for tickets to other coveted concerts and campus events that have taken place this year, eliminating the traditional hassle of camping out. Additional tickets for the Diplomatic Ball, which sold for $40 per person, were released the following week because of the unprecedented number of diplomats who confirmed and the in creased capacity of this year’s ball site.

The ball featured a live orchestra, catered refreshments and an area with a drink bar. With the sea of tuxedos and ballgowns punctuated occasionally by colorful ensembles from different countries, groups of students, professors and diplomats stood chatting about everything from politics to the size of the ballroom. Commented one faculty member, looking around at the marble columns and tiered floors above: “You can almost imagine it’s the Coliseum.” The spacious environs at the National Building Museum included a “beer garden” area, a large open center space and a dance floor. Many diplomats and faculty members mingled with students over 21 in the beer garden and the center area, to a lesser extent. As the evening wore on, the dance floor grew increasingly crowded with couples dancing to waltzes, foxtrots and salsas.

“It was a good opportunity to have fun with friends and to see that important people are people too,” John Turpin (SFS ’05) said. He added that the impressiveness of the building contributed to an “exquisite” atmosphere.

“I really enjoyed going with friends, talking with people and dancing,” Katie Einspanier (SFS ’05) said. “It was a good experience, but I’m not sure I need to go every year.” She added that it was often difficult to approach the diplomats since many of them gathered in the area with the alcoholic drinks that was closed off to underage students. “It was a little bit too segregated,” she said.

Tull said that this year’s Committee attempted to address this problem by assigning Committee members to invite more members of the faculty and diplomatic community into the main ballroom area.

“This has been a problem previously,” Tull said. “This year, I think we did a pretty good job of [drawing] the diplomats out.”

Members of the diplomatic community in attendance Friday included ambassadors from Bangladesh, Benin, Bosnia, Burundi, Cameroon, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Costa Rica, Djibouti, Ecuador, Eritrea, Gambia, Ghana, Grenada, Guatemala, the Kyrgyz Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Malawi, Malta, the Marshall Islands, Morocco, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Pakistan, Peru, the Philippines, Romania, Russia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Senegal, South Africa, Syria, Tunisia, Vietnam, Yemen and Zambia. Other dignitaries included the U.S. Undersecretary of State for Global Affairs, the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Economic and Business Affairs and the Chiefs of Staff for Senators Joseph Biden (D-Del.) and Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.).