Pirate flags, plastic palm trees, stuffed parrots and a skeleton dressed in a captain’s uniform festooned Eastway Café Wednesday night at the Pirates of the Cuyahoga event.

Zane Powell, student marketing manager of Dining Services, dressed up as Captain Jack Sparrow and posed for pictures with students.

“Usually this event is held in October,” Powell said, “but because of scheduling purposes we had to push it back this year.”

The event has been running for at least five years, hosted by Dining Services.

“It was an idea from one of our old managers in Eastway,” Powell said. “Pirates was one of the things he was crazy about and even though he retired three years ago we still keep the tradition going.”

Pirate music filled the café as students dined on buccaneer grub. The tasty treats Dining Services planned for the event included a Caribbean jerk chicken wrap, Neptune’s grilled vegetable ravioli, Big Bob’s belly buster planks of cod, Captain Hawk’s blackened rib-eye steak, the cursed ruby Cajun shrimp with fettuccini and Davey Jones’ locker fried Twinkies.

Dining Services staff members handed out free eye patches and washable pirate tattoos to students eating dinner in the Café.

Lisa Hummel, who works for Dinning Services marketing, took pictures of the contestants as Captain Jack asked walk the plank trivia questions from the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movies.

“We only have enough questions for five contestants,” Hummel said, “but there are some questions we have in reserve just in case there’s a tie. Each contestant will be asked a question and if they get it wrong they have to walk the plank. The last man standing will get a treasure chest piñata filled with candy!”

Megan Barnett, sophomore French major, ended up winning the ill-gotten gains in a sudden death match against another student.

“It was a lot of fun, and I can’t wait to crack open my booty,” Barnett said. “I really don’t participate in on-campus events, but I’m happy that I did.”

Thomas Sullivan, senior business management major, had a smile on his face as he talked with other students about the event.

“I think its cool,” Sullivan said. “It’s just too bad there couldn’t be more prizes and more interaction with the microphone to get more people involved and into the theme.”

var so = new SWFObject(‘http://www.staterinteractive.com/player.swf’,’mpl’,’305′,’195′,’9′);

so.addParam(‘allowscriptaccess’,’always’);

so.addParam(‘allowfullscreen’,’true’);

so.addParam(‘flashvars’,’&file=Cuyohuga.flv&image=http://www.staterinteractive.com/pirates_1.jpg&frontcolor=6666FF&lightcolor=EEEEEE&skin=http://www.staterinteractive.com/snel.swf&streamer=rtmp://flashmedia.kent.edu/fms-jmc/kentWired’);

so.write(‘Cuyohuga.flv’);

Tia Protopapa, marketing specialist for Dining Services, set up a dry erase board for the pirate pick-line contest.

“Each student has to write their best pirate pick-up line on the board,” Protopapa said. “Then we are going to take their picture and post it on the Web with their quote.”

The winner will receive a $25 Dining Services gift card to use on campus.

“The pirate pick-up line contest is running through next Thursday on Facebook,” Protopapa said. “On Friday they will announce the winner on Facebook, Twitter and Dining Services’ website.”

Students who would like to check out the pirate pick-up line contestants and vote for their favorite can go to http://www.facebook.com/kentstatedining.

Contact Katie Moore at [email protected].