The atmosphere was one of laughter and sincerity as a surprisingly small crowd gathered in Jarman’s Auditorium to listen to two of the four young men from MTV’s ‘The Buried Life,’ Dave Lingwood and Duncan Penn, speak on Nov. 12.
After opening with banter between the two regarding Lingwood’s casual appearance,he was wearing sweatpants, the crowd already felt engaged with the famous, yet normal Canadian boys.
Their presentation began with giving the background on all four of them, going through their childhood to college years. Each story was different, each person had different motivations, but they all finished the same.
“He needed to make a change,” Penn and Lingwood said at the end of each story.
For Penn’s younger brother, Jonnie Penn, his realization came after living so poorly freshman year. He actually had to live in a friend’s laundry room between the machines, instead of a dorm. After an encounter in the store with a yam, the younger Penn felt his life needed to go in a different direction.
For fellow friend, Ben Nemtin, he was an athlete his whole life and ended up playing for the National Canadian Rugby team while in college. One day, however, he met an old high school friend on a bus. This friend told him about how he’d dropped out of college to start his own clothing, inspiring Nemtin with his unusual path to success.
For Lingwood, he gained weight in college, calling it the “Freshman 45.”
“Most people went into school hungry to learn,” said Lingwood. “I just went to school hungry.” After a near death experience with a wetsuit he failed to fit in when he got home, Lingwood decided he needed a new lifestyle—and that he needed to lose weight.
Older Penn’s change in perspective came in a more tragic way. While having a lot of fun in college, but questioning whether he was ready to make the jump into the real world, Penn went on a camping trip that changed his life. He headed out with a few of his friends who all had a great time, however, on the last night, one of his friends drowned in the lake near their campsite.
Each of these four longtime friends came together after experiencing the notion that something in their lives was missing.
The younger Penn presented the group a passage in Matthew Arnold’s book, “The Buried Life” that both inspired their name and their decision to begin a project.
What began as a two week adventure, became much more as they decided they wanted to continue crossing items off their own bucket list, along with things from random strangers’ lists.
Their project existed before their TV show with MTV which was just another stop along the way.
They showed how they became successful through their own determination. The group was their own publicist, calling the media to bring them to their events, getting on the front page and gaining attention with their own ingenuity.
Lingwood and Penn told stories and showed clips from their show, stressing how with everything they did and accomplished they wanted to stay true to the concept of their project. The stories included things like crashing the Playboy Mansion or walking down the red carpet, as well as other stories like reuniting a man with his son or helping a girl receive a bionic hand.
Penn noted that all the stories, all their encounters with strangers in need of some help, had a common theme.
“This idea of going after things now, rather than waiting until you’re older, is reinforced to us over and over again in all the stories we’ve been privileged enough to be a part of and all the people we’ve been privileged enough to meet,” said Penn.
Once they finished retelling how “The Buried Life” project came to be and what it’s doing now, Pen and Lingwood opened it up to the audience asking them what a thing was on their bucket list.
Responses appeared in all forms, many to do with traveling.
One girl who answered was adopted from a Russian orphanage as an infant and explained how she wished she could return to Russia and find it.
Another girl told about her desire to form a support group or organization along with her siblings to support families who have been stricken by a member’s suicide.
Along with list items like these, another young woman from the audience spoke up. She told Lingwood and Penn how she had always wanted to meet the people from “The Buried Life” who had inspired her so much. Therefore, the two members invited her up to the stage for a hug.
All of this occurred just because they asked themselves the simple question, “What do you want to do before you die?”
Duncan and Dave from MTV’s The Buried Life pose with sisters of Delta Zeta during the meet and greet following their presentation. At that time, students were able to take pictures and chat with the men. Some could say Duncan was struggling to keep up with all of the hand signs.
