UPDATE!

Big news, everybody (and by everybody I mean the 8 people that might ever read this). My a'capella group (Pitch, Please!) won the competition on Saturday. It was unexpected and wonderful and we were all crying and now we're moving on to Semifinals. The competition was an all-day event. Our MD (musical director) Shams told us to be there at 3PM... and then didn't show up 'till after 4 (when we were apparently supposed to arrive). Anyway, we hung around for a while and then went through the process of drawing numbers to determine the order of the performances. We drew 4th out of 9..a fairly safe spot, but not ideal. Everybody wants to be in the last half so the judges remember you, or at least in spot 5 right before intermission, but 4 wasn't bad. At least it wasn't first. Anyway, because we are an all female group, we spent years beautifying. Of course, everybody who has naturally curly hair straightened it, and everybody with straight hair curled theirs. Looking back, we could've achieved the same ratio with a lot less work, but it was worth it. Once we were actually on stage, it was unreal. The auditorium was huge, and I could see a few members from NEU's other a'capella group "The Nor'easters" in the front row. I spent half the set singing straight to them. My sister and her boyf (and his friend) were there too, but they were in the 2nd balcony and there was no way I could see them (but I'm sure I could hear them). Anyway, there were a few minor errors, but everything went as planned. My dance partner almost face planted but caught herself just in time. She was sure she was about to ruin the whole set but disaster never came. We hit that last pose after the Destiny's Child classic "Survivor" and could've stayed there forever. So many hours of rehearsal all went to those 12 minutes, and we killed it. Half of us were holding back tears. We heard the groups in the 2nd group were really good (we couldn't watch from the audience because the show was sold out) and were worried we wouldn't advance. The top two teams move on, so we were just hoping for 2nd, and would've been happy with 3rd. While everybody waited for the judges to deliberate, all 9 groups gathered in our dressing room area and sang a few impromptu songs, did the harlem shake a couple times, and had rap battles. It was straight out of a movie. Eventually we all made it back up onstage, and the judges started by announcing 3rd. We were a little relieved it wasn't us, but more nervous. Then they announced second.. and we were starting to panic. We were REAL worried we wouldn't place. When they finally got around to announcing first place, I didn't even know how to contain myself or express what it felt like. I tried to be gracious, but everybody was so genuinely excited that it was hard to hold back from crying and hugging everybody... so we did. We cried our way through an encore, and finished off the night with a huge group harlem shake. It was a night I'll never forget. Now, we're preparing for semifinals. If we don't advance again, so be it. I'll work hard again 'till that night, but for right now, I'm still riding the euphoria.