LETTER FROM THE EDITOR:
Welcome back, Wake Forest! It’s time for another year of getting to know our campus’ sexiest, fun, and CUTEST guys. In honor of being voted the most attractive school in the country, our team here at HC Wake Forest has yet another exciting list of eye-candy prepared for this year. Check back with us every week to see if someone you know is featured as the next Campus Cutie. Don’t forget, we take recommendations; so you can email me personally or vote on our website!
HCXO,
Cassie
Single girls, look out! He’s adventurous, endearing, and wants to be a doctor. Meet this semester’s first Campus Cutie, Ryan Tacon.
NAME: Ryan Tacon
CLASS: Junior
HOMETOWN: Mobile, Alabama by way of Houston, Texas by way of London, England
MAJOR: Biology/Pre-Med with Neuroscience and Spanish minors
RELATIONSHIP STATUS: Single
NICKNAME: “Taco”
HC (HerCampus): So why have you lived in so many places growing up?
RT (Ryan Tacon): Well I was born in Alabama by a freak accident two months premature while my parents were on vacation. Houston is where my family is based; but my dad works for an oil company that moves him around a lot for work. London is what I consider to be my hometown, though. So I lived in Houston the first nine years of my life. Then the rest of the nine years of my life I lived in London; but while I was there we were pretty much shipped around to other European countries.
HC: Getting to move and live in all these places growing up, how was that for you?
RT: It was really interesting. When we first started moving around a lot I was like ten, so I hated the long car rides and the plane trips. Once I got older, I really started to appreciate the experience. It was also just great to see and take in all the new sites and architecture. The best part was the people and getting to see the differences in the way people are from country to country. That experience is probably why I am doing the whole pre-med track and trying to learn Spanish too, it sort-of made me realize that I want a career where I can travel around and also to become a doctor.
HC: How would you describe yourself?
RT: Hardworking. I guess kind of a nerd as well. At the same time I’m really active, I love doing stuff outdoors and just moving around all the time. I can be a bit quiet, but not in the shy sort of way; more in a thoughtful way, I am always thinking. I’m also just a really friendly person.
HC: So you want to be a doctor that travels around. Where would you travel around practicing medicine?
RT: The long-term goal, if this works, is to work with organizations such as Médecins Sans Frontières. That’s why I’m doing a Spanish minor, so I can work mostly in third world countries, mainly South America. When I was in high school I spent two weeks in Jaipur, India with this group called Orbis, a non-profit ophthalmic organization that flies into third world countries and treat people who have blinding eye diseases like cataracts and glaucoma. While I was there I got to sit in on a surgery for the first time and got to see the whole procedure. They picked this four-year-old girl born with congenital cataracts, so she hadn’t been able to see for the first four years of her life. I was there when they took the stitches out and she got to see for the very first time. I can’t describe it, but that moment, right there, I knew that was something I really wanted to do.
HC: I think that’s a moment everyone wants to have – I don’t even know what I want to do in life yet!
RT: Yea, it was unbelievable. I got to give her a teddy bear. She just grabbed it and held it and then started hugging me.
HC: Awww!
RT: I don’t cry; but at that moment I was pretty damn close.
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HC: What are some of your interests?
RT: I’m a huge music fan. It’s pretty much what I have on 24 hours a day. I listen to just about anything. I’m a pretty big bookworm too; I love to read.
HC: What are some of your favorite books?
RT: There are some classics I like reading like the Count of Monte Cristo. Slaughter House Five is definitely one of my favorites, too.
HC: What activities are you involved with on campus?
RT: I’m playing on the rugby team and I’m also the recruitment chair [for the team]. It’s a little boring but other than that I’m pretty much tied up with my pre-med stuff.
HC: How did you get into rugby?
RT: Well when I moved to London there wasn’t any football there. So, when I turned ten, I was trying to play a contact sport and [rugby] was pretty much the only option. I just got into it and loved it and decided to keep doing it in college.
HC: Is rugby something you want to take more seriously, like maybe play for a national team?
RT: If I had the choice I would definitely take it more serious one day. It’s just the way it works in most European countries such as France, New Zealand, and England; they have huge leagues for professional rugby. Here it’s still kind-of growing; no one really knows what rugby is. For the time being, I don’t see it as really something I would do in the future. It’s just something that I love to play.
HC: What is your favorite place on campus?
RT: I’m not sure but it is definitely not the ZSR. I spend way too much time in there, its way too traumatizing. I would say Campus Grounds. I lived in Taylor last year so I spent a lot of time just studying in there and hanging out with friends. Even if you don’t have work it’s just a cool place to hang out and talk.
HC: What’s one thing that people don’t know about you? Like a hidden talent or something.
RT: I have a hidden talent, it’s pretty lame. I don’t know when I figured out I could do it, but I can wiggle my ears. Like, pick an ear, left or right.
HC: Umm…Left.
[Wiggles just left ear]
HC: Laughs. That’s so weird!
RT: I know it’s, like, the worst talent ever.
HC: Describe your most embarrassing moment since being at Wake.
RT: We were playing a rugby game up at Mary Washington. There was a pretty big crowd too. Halfway through the game I went in for a tackle. I didn’t know what some people were looking at afterwards but some guy’s cleats had caught on my shorts and ripped the back part of my shorts and part of my spandex off. So I was practically naked. The worst part was I couldn’t stop playing for like the next three minutes until the play stopped before someone could run out and bring me some shorts.
HC: What is one of your guilty pleasures?
RT: I don’t do it so much anymore but I probably should, I used to write just about the most random stuff in the world. I’d just sit down listen to some music and write. I think I only let three people ever read my writing.
HC: What did you use to write? Did you write poetry or stories?
RT: I actually did use to write poetry. That’s actually another embarrassing story. I got to speak at my eighth grade graduation and instead of doing a normal speech like everybody else I wrote a poem about losing friends and graduating. So I ended up giving that up in front of like a couple hundred people. So that put an end to the whole poetry thing. No, but I just kind of write about what I’m feeling like random thoughts.
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HC: I know you want to be a doctor and travel around South America in the future, but if you could live anywhere in the world where would it be?
RT: New Zealand is definitely on the list and I have never visited any Asian countries so I would definitely visit Japan. I don’t know if I would want to live there though.
HC: What are the top 3 things on your bucket-list?
RT: I would definitely want to go see Machu Pichuu. I want to go back to Africa one more time. Also learn to surf.
HC: So, when it comes to girls, do you have a type?
RT: Looks-wise I definitely don’t think I have a type. I love it when a girl takes care of her body and is in shape. Personality wise, I love a girl who is passionate, outgoing, and a little-bit weird, I guess you can say. She has to be friendly; I can’t stand rude girls. You can tell a lot from a person on how they treat people that they don’t stand to benefit from, like random strangers. Also, I definitely like a nice smile.
HC: Who are your celebrity crushes?
RT: Kate Beckinsale and Mila Kunis.
HC: Who inspires you the most?
RT: There are a couple of people who inspire me in different ways. My brother has always been a huge role model for me. He is two years older than I am and I have always wanted to follow in his footsteps as I was growing up. Another huge inspiration was one of the doctors I met on my trip to India – actually many of the doctors there were a big influence on me. They were all amazing doctors who could have been making millions of dollars in some random suburb; but they were devoting months, if not years, of their time helping out a non-profit organization. Just to see that selflessness kind-of hit home with me.
HC: What is an attitude you live by?
RT: I just like to be honest and friendly and nice to everyone. Everyone has his or her own story to tell but no one really stops to listen.
HC: What is one piece of advice you would give to the incoming freshman class?
RT: The best advice I could give to incoming freshman is not to get locked down into hanging out with the same group of friends and doing the same thing every day from day one. For the first few weeks every freshman is “new” and won’t already have a solid group of friends, so it’s a great time to get to know new people.