Many Emmanuel students take pride in their Twitter game, but after posting screenshots of a conversation with her father, one Saint quickly went viral. While sophomore Stephanie Veerman was away at school, her father took care of her hamster Chester and lost him. His wholesome apologies and tactics for tracking Chester down won over the internet’s heart and garnered 115k retweets and 459k likes. This story has been featured on People Magazine, Buzzfeed and the Doctor Oz show, and merchandise featuring the Tweet is coming! Stephanie spoke with Her Campus Emmanuel about her story and what it’s like to become Twitter famous. Check it out below!
Photo Courtesy of Stephanie Veerman
Her Campus at Emmanuel: So Stephanie, tell us a bit about your hamster, Chester!
Stephanie Veerman: Chester is my hamster that my friend and I bought over the summer. We didn’t quite think it through, and realized neither of us could bring him to college. He was originally staying at my mom’s house, but she has a very busy life and couldn’t take care of him anymore, so my dad stepped in!
Photo via @ stephyj725 on Twitter
HCE: For people who don’t have Twitter, can you explain a bit about what happened? (You can also check out the tweet here).
SV: Basically, while I was at work, I got a phone call followed by multiple text messages from my dad about my hamster escaping. My dad was overly apologetic and clearly very very upset. The text messages went viral because of how pure and sweet they were!!
Photo courtesy of Stephanie Veerman
HCE: Did you expect your dad to be this attached to your hamster?
SV: I did not at all expect my dad to be this attached to Chester.
Photo courtesy of Stephanie Veerman
HCE: What has it been like going viral on Twitter? I know you have been interviewing with places like Buzzfeed!
SV: It has been really cool going viral and interviewing with all these places!! The Buzzfeed reporter, Brianna Sacks, has become really close with our family too! Creating all these relationships with awesome people has probably been the best part of this whole thing.
Photo courtesy of Stephanie Veerman
HCE: Tell us a bit about yourself outside of your Twitter fame!
SV: Outside of being a hamster mom, I am a sophomore studying marketing and communications. I love music, going to concerts, and hanging out with friends!
We thank Stephanie for interviewing with us, and if you would like to keep up with her hamster stories, you can follow her on Twitter at @ stephyj725!