Students learn to find the funny side of having their own personal doppelgà¤nger on campus

Long bleached blonde hair, approximately 5 feet and 4 inches, and occasionally wears black-rimmed glasses; this description accurately fits sophomore Sarah Heller. Or is it actually one for Katie Boatright?

Some Trinity students claim they have doppelgà¤ngers walking around on campus. While a doppelgà¤nger was originally an indicator of bad luck and seen as an evil twin, today it is commonly understood as any person who physically or behaviorally resembles another person. On a small campus like Trinity’s, there’s an even greater chance you’ll eventually cross paths with someone who bears a similar appearance to yours.

Some of the Trinity doppelgà¤ngers are good friends, while others have never met each other before. Heller, a sophomore environmental policy major, finds the confusion somewhat irritating. Although Heller and Boatright have never spoken to each other, their respective friend groups are keen to point out their many physical similarities.

“It actually makes me feel weird because I don’t think about it myself and I don’t personally think that we really look that alike,” Heller said. She also mentioned that no one had confused her with Boatright up until the last week.

On the other hand, Boatright is more entertained by the possibility of having a “fake twin” on the same campus.

“The other day I woke up from a nap and I walked out from my dorm and I saw Sarah. We were both wearing black leggings, a purple shirt and our hair was up in a bun. I was like, “˜This is too weird, that’s me!'” Boatright said.

Trinity students who look alike, whether they are actual twins or not, sometimes enjoy playing tricks on people they know.

“One of our cross country coaches got us mixed up for almost a month and so we liked to call each other by the wrong name because she could never get it right,” said Jason Nania, a sophomore finance major.

Nania’s “twin” is Elliot Blake, a sophomore geoscience and environmental studies major who has the same dark brown, fluffy beard and lanky height as he does. The two met while running cross country their first year at Trinity and are still good friends to this day.

Sidney Hopkins occasionally gets confused with someone on campus as well “” but in her case, it’s her actual twin sister.

Sidney and her sister Destiny are both juniors, but besides nearly identical appearances, the two have fairly different personalities and behaviors that distinguish them.

“Destiny is definitely more outgoing than I am “” she’s really great at being around people and I’m often more reserved. However, in situations where we both don’t know anyone, we can both come off as reserved because we don’t feel the need to make friends with other people “” having a twin is like having a built-in best friend that can stunt your social skills, but in a good way,” said Sidney Hopkins, a music and communication double major.

“Destiny’s studying sociology and wants to be a teacher, and I’m double majoring in music and communication and have no idea what I really want to do. We have overlapping friend groups, but aren’t often hanging out with the same people at the same time,” Hopkins said.

Sidney also enjoys taking advantage of the multiple opportunities she’s presented with to confuse  other people with her and Destiny’s similar appearances.

“My favorite thing to do is run up to Destiny while she’s giving tours and confuse the visitors. Usually I will run up, hug her and say hi to her really loudly and the people on the tour just look really confused until she says, “˜This is my twin sister.’ Destiny then gets lots of questions about going to school with her twin,” Hopkins said.

Despite acknowledging these lookalikes,  and even going through significant periods of time where their appearances weren’t all that similar, the students all believe the confusion among peers will persist.

“Even when I had hot pink hair for a semester, like it was highlighter pink, almost neon hair, a lot of people still called me Sarah and confused me for her,” Boatright said.