Engineering rituals are a part of Ryerson's frosh week that has most of campus mystified. Staff and faculty largely ignore the raucous chants coming from the bluecoverall- clad mass. Students ogle the purple-skinned bodies travelling the Quad like massive smurfs. But why purple? Stephen Schauer, president of the Ryerson Engineering Student Society (RESS), knows only a few legends explaining how the national engineering colour came to be.