By gwblogabroad
A thousand miles away from home, no more warm cooked meals and a size single wooden bed. I knew I was going to start to feel homesick. As I dragged my overweight red suitcase filled with winter and summer clothes I looked around room 113 of Amsterdam Hall. I turned to my clock, it was 5 pm, already past midnight back home. No one to call, nothing to do so I went to sleep.
Now for most exchange students, this feeling of loneliness and homesickness would usually take on for more than just a few days. But with a busy schedule from 9 am to 9 pm and awesome orientation leaders, there was really no time for us to feel alone.
No phone lines, no credit cards and definitely not enough winter clothes; you can bet that the first few days consisted of basic logistics. With over 60 exchange students from various parts of the world, we were divided into groups of 10.
Once the logistics where out of the way we got ready for some exciting activities! Having never seen this much snow before I was extremely excited when the orientation leaders planned a trip for us to Wisp Resort in Maryland. There we got to go snow tubing, and ice-skating!
Next in line was learning a traditional American dance called the “Cotton Eyed Joe”. After practicing it everyday with the orientation leaders, we were confident enough, that we decided to form a flash mob in front of the Lincoln Memorial. It was my first time seeing and doing a flash mob! An awesome experience!
[youtube=http://youtu.be/CHXW9-PAMwg]
Adding on to the American experience, as a group we went to the GW basketball game, where GW beat St. Bonaventure! (btw I won a free t-shirt because of my cheering skills). Having memorized the GW Fight song, I felt like I was part of the colonials, cheering on our team! It was great to see how much school spirit GW student have as there were rows of people dressed in “Buff and Blue” (GW’s colors).
To wrap up such an awesome first week here DC, the orientation leaders threw us a black and white dinner party at Mrs.K’s Tollhouse! (Food was amazing! I totally recommend the chicken with cranberry sauce).
A totally new experience, and many new friends made. If we did all this in one week I
cant even imagine what we are capable of doing in the next 5 months!
GW, I’m a colonial now.
