Saturday 6/13:
After a REALLY long day I have finally made it to DC...well, Maryland at least. My day started off with the typical tearful goodbyes and stupid Steph anxiety. I arrived at the airport only to discover that my suitcase was 3 pounds too heavy and was left, once again, to reorganize in front of the MSP crowd. Things started to look up from there as I successfully made it through security and boarded my plane at 12:30, right on time. I started reading my book and got lost in a world of charming vampires until the captain came over the intercom to announce that there were mechanical difficulties with the breaks, and that we would have to take a different plane. By this time it was about 1:15. We all exit the plane only to discover that there is no ‘new plane’ for us to board. I once again take my seat at the gate and proceed to wait another 45 minutes to board the new plane. I find my window seat and begin reading again only to realize that 45 minutes later, we were still on the ground. After several apologies and ‘thank you for your patience’s, it turns out that the concessions cart was running late and that we would have to leave without it = no pop or snacks. We finally took off around three, landing us in DC nearly two hours late. I missed my shuttle to the university, but was luckily able to catch a later one.
Sunday 6/14:
The university is further outside of the district than I expected. It’s settled between DC and Baltimore, so to get downtown you have to first take a shuttle to the metro. The campus is HUGE. It’s secluded, so seems safe, but apparently because of its proximity to DC, Baltimore, and the metro, you have to be really careful…they don’t even recommend guys walking alone. I’m living in a 4 bedroom, 6 person apartment. I share a room on the upstairs level with another Pickering fellow. The upstairs is stuffy during the day, but thank goodness we have air conditioning! There are 47 students here at MLI (Maryland Leadership Institute) this summer; 15 Pickering fellows and 32 IIPP fellows. Unfortunately, we Pickerings are still strangers even amongst ourselves, but the IIPP students have already spent last summer together. It’s fun watching them reunite like one big family, but also a little bit isolating. Hopefully I’ll get to know everyone better when classes start on Tuesday. My short time here so far has been extremely humbling. The students here are incredible, and at any given time there are conversations taking place in Arabic, German, Spanish, Russian, French, etc. It’s definitely an intimidating environment, but I’m trying my best to muster up my confidence and keep afloat.
Our day started off with a diagnostic test in statistics and economics…not exactly my strong suits, as most of you know. I discovered that the three hour test only takes about an hour if half of your answers are question marks….oops. The test was frustrating, but in reality, I have no quantitative background and really do belong in introductory level courses. After the test, we took a LONG tour of the GIANT campus. To give you an idea of how big it is 1) There are seven libraries on this campus 2) It houses the 2nd largest grassy mall area in the nation, second to only the national mall in DC 3) I have to take a shuttle bus to get from where my apartment is, to where the campus fitness center is. I’ve quickly realized that I really am a small campus kind of girl, which is an important thing to know before applying to graduate schools. After the tour, we sat through an incredibly intimidating orientation session. I’ll give you all more details of the program when classes start…let’s just say, it’s going to be a rough, but probably a painfully valuable seven weeks. A quick trip to target to pick up everything we were unable to pack (like pillows) concluded our 12 hour day. Whew…
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