Don't Judge a Day by Its Beginning

I have a hypothesis, yet to be scientifically proven, that universe is against me getting enough sleep. Last night, I set my lovely alarm to sound at 8:15 AM, since the dining hall’s breakfast hours go from 7:30 AM to 9:30 AM, and I saw no reason to wake up earlier just to get breakfast. Waking up at 8:15 AM would have allowed me to fit in a light, short jog in my schedule after breakfast, and it would have also allowed me to catch up on some much-needed rest. All in all, it was a reasonably simple but well thought-out game plan – but alas, it was not meant to be.

At exactly 6:57 AM, the first dorm door opened and shut with a booming, thundering bang. Within the next hour, all I could hear was the sound of dorm doors opening and closing, and I think I died a little on the inside. I couldn’t go back to sleep again. However, resisting fate, I refused to get out of bed until 8:00 AM, because I do not believe in giving in so easily.

I did have to get out of bed, though, so I eventually made my way to the dining commons and ate breakfast with Lindsay and Jahnvi. Lindsay managed to spill her cereal, but otherwise, breakfast was very uneventful. The only thing worth noting was that breakfast was much better than dinner had been; the eggs I ate today were not cold like the chicken I ate yesterday, which I was grateful for.

My after-breakfast jog/exploration

After breakfast, as I planned, I went on a 15 minutes short jog. Knowing your own weakness is as important as knowing your strength, and knowing myself, who struggle even with the help of Google Maps and any type of map, I kept my light jog in a perfectly straight line – no turns, no detours. Perhaps next week I’ll be able to do something more complex, but I’m not making any promises.

I headed back to my dorm afterwards to get ready for the 10 AM group activities, and upon entering my room, I was greeted by a pleasant surprise: my roommate had arrived! Her name is Michelle, and she came from California, like me. Michelle is very sweet, and she is taking the same course as Jahnvi.

At 10 PM, we decided our own group activities. I went with my RA group, although many other ditched their group and went with friends they already know, and I’m very glad I stayed with my group. I got to know all the girls so much better. We decided to walk down to Lake Michigan for our group activity, which was around a 20 minute walk. Because we were walking, we got time to talk to each other, and my hope to make new friends more than came true.

Leading our way was Cayleigh, our own very Chicago tour guide. Although Cayleigh came from Kentucky, she has family in Chicago and comes to Chicago to visit them every year, so she easily navigated us through the streets.

Karla (leftmost), Xueheng (middle-left), Cayleigh (middle-right), Michelle (right)

Karla, my friend that I met from yesterday, was there, and we walked together for most of the trip. She comes from Miami, and she’s easily becoming my favorite person in Chicago. She and I just click, and it feels really nice to have a friend like that.

Xueheng is an international student from China, and she gave me interesting insights about traffic in Beijing when I mentioned how I would never get used to the aggressiveness of traffic in Chicago. That was our icebreaker, weird as it might be, and I’m glad I made another friend as we somehow moved on to talk about hair cut prices in different countries.

There were more girls in our group, but they were the three I talked to the most, and so, with many conversations going around, the walk to Lake Michigan passed in no time. Soon we were presented with the breathtaking view of Lake Michigan. I have never seen a natural body of water so clear beautiful; it was simply beautiful. We spent almost fifteen minutes admiring the lake before heading back to the university for lunch.

Lake Michigan

Lunch was brief, and before long, it was the Target and CVS trip with our RA, Angela. Although I didn’t need to buy anything, it was nice to know how to get to these stores. On the way there, Angela also pointed out places to eat and other stores nearby, and apparently, there’s even an actual restaurant that sells sushi, sandwiches and pizza, which is a rather strange combination.

Walking back from Target

Back from a shopping trip, our RA group had a bit of time to rest before we headed back down at 4:00 PM to the third floor lounge for the transportation orientation, which was brief and over fairly quickly. I then headed out to scout the building where my course will be, and with the incredible help of Google Maps, I managed to get there. The building was not particularly impressive compared to the other buildings on campus (I promise there will be plenty of pictures of it tomorrow), but it is a less than a ten minute walk from the residential commons, which was nice.

Finally, I walked back to my dorm to call my parents to check in with them and worked on my room description. At 6:00 PM, Karla and I met up and got dinner together. I believe in giving second chances and gave the chicken a second chance. Unfortunately, it was still as cold and rough as ever. However, Karla introduced me to the pork and the sweet potatoes, which were actually hot-ish warm and tasted decent. At the end, we got ice-cream before we left the dining commons and decided to call it a day.

I am extremely happy today with the people I have gotten to know and the friends I have made today, and I am excited for tomorrow to finally meet my fellow course students!