Inside the walls of Gamma Phi Beta, colorful and loud characters act out scenes from Dr. Seuss books. Hannah looked on as recruitment chair, directing the skit, said Gamma Phi member and friend Jessie Buck.
After one round of girls had come through the house and before another round came to experience the skit for themselves, Hannah would provide her sisters with advice, encouragement and support: this could be fixed, that was done well. She never missed a chance to congratulate a sister on a job well-done.
“Those are long days,” Jessie said. “She was always the one picking up the morale for the house. She was so amazing and helpful.”
In Gamma Phi, Hannah was the sister to always keep a positive outlook. Before she died earlier this week, Hannah was a senior studying psychology and set to graduate ?this May.
Her hope was to become a sex therapist, Jessie said.
Hannah took steps toward her goal, seeking out the advice of graduate student Jasmine Utterback. She was unsure of exactly what she wanted to do in the field of sexual health, and Jasmine shared with her her own story and suggested she help organize the event Cupcakes and Condoms.
“She was so happy to be helping out and to be a part of it,” she said.
Just last week, Hannah and Jasmine were making plans for sexual health events Hannah could do with her sorority next year. She may have been graduating, but she still wanted to come back to help Gamma Phi, Jasmine said.
“There were so many opportunities that were ahead for her,” Jasmine said. “I was looking forward to staying in contact with her after graduation ... To see what she was ?planning to do next.”
Before Hannah went to graduate school and before she became a counselor, she wanted to take a year off and work in her hometown as the junior varsity cheer coach at Fishers High School in Fishers, Ind.
“She would have been an amazing coach,” Jessie said.
Hannah’s ability to pick up people when they were down, to cheer for other people and have a smile for anyone who needed it is well known by people who knew her.
Jessie met Hannah for the first time at bid night for Gamma Phi. Her laugh, she said, took over the whole room.
“That’s what I’ll remember most about Hannah, her ability to just light up the entire room,” she said. “She could cheer up everyone’s mood, no matter how bad of a day you were ?having.”
Matt Molewyk, resident DJ at Kilroy’s Dunkirk and close friend of Hannah’s, said in a Facebook post that he was proud to call her one of his best friends.
“She’s the rare type of person that really makes an impact on you,” he said in the post. “She was so loving and down to earth.”
Hannah was just one of those people that everybody liked and who didn’t put ?anyone down, he said.
“She was never judgemental,” he said. “She was never prejudiced against anybody.”
Matt played his show Friday night because he felt that’s what she would have wanted him to do. But he played in his pajamas, a tribute to a running joke between him, Hannah and her roommates.
“I am so lucky to have had all the time that I did with you,” Matt said at the end of his post. “Thank you for being my friend and putting up with me. I love you so much, Hoon.”
Hannah Alani ?contributed reporting ?to this story.
