If you were anywhere in downtown Boston on September 27 or 28, you must have seen the crowds of college students littering the streets. And while that may not be an uncommon occurance in Boston - the city does, after all, house over 60 colleges in its streets and surrounding suburbs - that weekend served to attract many more than normal. The occassion that drew hundreds upon hundreds of these students out of their small and slightly smelly dorm rooms was Collegefest, a convention that exists solely to get students to join groups, enter prizes and win free stuff.Collegefest 2003 took place in the Hynes Convention center, taking up an entire floor with booths representing a myriad of companies and products. The entire spectrum of student interest was involved. On one side of the convention room, five consecutive tables were set up that dealt with technologies. If you started at the Samsung table and continued on through Windows, Toshiba and the rest of the booths, you could collect stamps on a card that would enter you in the Ultimate Dorm Room contest. The winner of this contest got their dorm room completely redecorated by these companies, including a brand-new large flat screen television, a new cell phone, Windows updates... the whole nine yards.

Across from this technological wet dream was a huge stage with a DJ spinning hip hop and R&B. Next to the stage was easily the most popular booth in the entire Collegefest space: the Playboy booth. The line snaked around half the room, over the stage's designated audience area, and almost to the door. And before you start thinking it was a mad crush of overly hormonal college boys, think again: I saw nearly as many girls in line as boys, giggling and blushing and laughing as they collected their free Playmate calendars and Mardi Gras beads. I only stopped for a plastic bag, much to the disappointment of my male friends.

Everything you could imaginably want was at Collegefest, conveniently laid out in single-serving packaging, just waiting for greedy hands to scoop it up. There were piles of samples of J. Lo's new perfume, "Glow," as well as samples of the new unisex FCUK fragrance, "scent to bed." Starbucks and Dunkin' Donuts set up opposite each other, battling to give students coffee. Starbucks offered a new frappucino flavor and Dunkin' Donuts pushed its Dunkacino, much to my delight. If you got hungry, a local ice cream store had samples of their new low-fat yogurt. If you were sick of carrying plastic bags around, you could head over to the FHM Magazine table and pick up a huge mesh bag by "Guess?" Spin Magazine was especially kind when thinking about what its table could offer: beyond the magazines themselves, they thoughtfully handed out hair gel, L'Oreal hair cupons, and soap.

If you were feeling a little shabby - and you were a girl - L'Oreal makeup had also set up a booth for makeovers. Six professional L'Oreal makeup artists were ready and waiting to slap the most garish shade of pink ever created onto the lips of young women including myself. Usually, the L'Oreal visit was quickly followed by a visit to the bathroom.

And if you started thinking that this event, despite all of its cool stuff, was a little low key and low profile. The Collegefest organizers understood a student's desire for a brush with fame. They invited Chris (or CT) and Mallory frm the "Real World: Paris" to sign autographs. The line for their table was even longer than the line for Playboy, and the two seemed genuinely happy to be there. When I asked him how he was feeling, CT said, "I feel great. This is great. Lots of fun." He was also actively inviting all the pretty girls he saw to the bar he was planning to go to that night. Who knows how many showed up, but the guy definitely has more charm than his television show made it seem.

After a couple hours of being crammed into a room with hundreds of students, I found myself physically exhausted. As I hauled my now-70 lbs. bag back to my car, I thought about all the free perfume and soap and hair gel and magazines that I had acquired, and I smiled. Collegefest provides exactly what a student needs most: free things that are essential to college life.