Orientation Memories :)

Warning! 

This post is very long! But please read it :)

I just got back from my college orientation which happened throughout the whole of last week. Like every other person, I felt very nervous because you know anything could just go wrong at the most unpredictable time, so I decided to not speak a lot to maintain my image but it turns out that made me unrecognized by people in my orientation group… HAHAHAHA :( but actually it’s because I’m not really good at speaking in Indonesian. I don’t want to embarrass myself, also because I do not have that much confidence.

I’ve lived in Jakarta my whole life but because life likes pulling my leg so I registered to a college that is located at the other side of Jakarta, which forcefully made me have to move because I can’t drive and I do not tolerate traffic jams(I am a very impatient person so yeah). I stayed in the college dorm throughout orientation and will be staying there for my first year in college. The day I moved into the dorm, I got dorm anxiety. I was scared that my roommate might snore, or be a secret drug dealer or whatsoever. I was being so paranoid about it. When I met my roommate we were not DIRECTLY friends because I am not someone who makes friends quickly, so in the beginning it was only small talk. We found out we were in the same major and orientation class, which made it easier for us to plan when we wake up without disturbing one another. I thought everyone was grouped like that until we met another friend in my orientation class who is in the dorm too but her roommate is from a different class. People in my orientation class may see me as a quiet person but my dorm mates know me as an exceptionally (or a very) loud person who laughs like a horse. (My image in front of them is ruined:(.)

I have a friend from high school who entered the same college as I did, so during the first day of orientation I vented my emotional concerns to my friend who was actually sleepy because he goes back and forth from college and his house XD (he lives in the same area as I am so serves you right my friend.:) When it was finally time to go to the class and then introduce ourselves, my body quivered with fear and my body heat rose, I do not know why. But the seniors are very nice! There was one senior that left a deep impression on me and made me question my confidence so much. When he entered he was like: “GOOD MORNING GUYS!!! MOVE TO THE FRONT PLEASE IT’S OKAY WE WON’T BITE!” Because we all sat at the back rows, we just got off high school and as you know high school students dislike sitting on the front row HAHAHA. But seriously, how can he be so confident? Another senior left an impression on me as being the tough one XD. I thought she was strict but she was very nice. I am not mentioning names because if they read this I would be heavily embarrassed. The seniors were all very nice, to the point of me questioning if I am asleep or not because I am so not used to being surrounded by very nice people!  The first day was still quite awkward for the people in my class so I don’t think we got our real personalities out yet.

After orientation, my roommate and a dorm friend waited for the dorm shuttle but it turns out we missed it and if we want to take it we have to wait till 4 p.m. meanwhile we finished at 1. In the end we took a cab back to our dorm XD and we caused a major traffic jam because the road in front of the campus was too smallL. The next day, my roommate and I woke up at 4.30 a.m. because we are apparently very cool people, JK. We had to arrive at campus before 7 and it is not tiring at all. (Sarcasm included) Our dorm canteen was not opened yet so we had to get convenience store food (which was not convenient at all:( the food sucked.) and rush to catch the 6.15 shuttle. I felt so alive until noon after lunch… during a session I fell asleep for a few minutes, I’m sorry seniors, because I can’t help it:(. But I guess the ones in class knew because I sat at the front row and it was not embarrassing at all. (Sarcasm also included) After that session we gathered to make our class theme, which turned out to be unexpectedly cool. I felt really proud of it, and I’m sure my orientation mates are too. Our second day of orientation ended at 4.30 p.m., we had 45 minutes to wait for the shuttle so I got tea and some snacks (I am a tea fiend just so you know.) and then waited for the shuttle. While waiting, a random senior just went up to us and then asked us our names. We just met another nice senior, which is totally driving me crazy. How many nice people are out there?! Where have they been all my life? Why have I only been meeting them now? I might sound this cliché because college hasn’t pulled my socks yet, I apologize.

The third day was really short and relaxing for us. We came at 10 a.m. and went home at 2 p.m. In the morning we practiced our theme, which was so quick because we learned it within 2 days. I was proud but the quiet proud because as I already said in the beginning, I was very quiet throughout orientation. I actually forgot what happened after that because I am kind of forgetful and my brain does not remember important things.  I remember unimportant and embarrassing things only because those things keep me alive *insert evil laugh* Now I remember… we submitted things we needed to donate. Practically it was hard to look for the expiry date on cooking oil that I became an expert at it XD. See now? I remember how to look at cooking oil expiry dates but I can’t remember the basic rules of binomial expansions during high school XD. After we came back to our dorm after the end of orientation activities for the day I asked my roommate if she wants to go to the dorm gym to work out because my mom told me to stop swimming on the bed and exercise…yeah. We went to the gym but when we entered, the treadmill was broken T-T. I ended up dancing at the gym and my roommate lifted weights. It’s totally not embarrassing.

The fourth day of orientation was totally emotional for me because I was too tired to deal with anything. We started the day with a session in an auditorium. After the auditorium session we had another session, where we learned about stuff I actually already forgot, but on the rundown it said it was about the rules and the campus environment. After that session ended, because I was in the dorm, I joined another session about the dorm, and missed the 4 p.m. shuttle. I was very cranky because Mother Nature was visiting me, and is still here when I am writing this post. I bought tea (again) and waited for the shuttle with my dorm mates. The random senior who we met on the second day came up to us and introduced me and my dorm mates to a senior of the same major. My roommate, my dorm friend and I are in the same major, so it helped us a lot. We asked the senior on what supplies we needed because we know she totally knows a lot better than we do, and the supplies list is just too difficult to get by. Thanks to her, we finally know what we should buy.  A dorm friend from another class got an assignment which is writing letters to our seniors to show gratitude. I thought we were not going to get that assignment so I laughed at him.

I was wrong.

On the fifth day of orientation, we started it with distributing our alma mater jackets, and then we were sent to another room for a session called Community Service Camp, where we are assigned to retype a few pages of a book so that it could be converted into Braille. When we were about to get our assigned pages, the seniors wrote the assignment on the board, which is the exact same assignment that I laughed at my friend for. I felt weak all of a sudden because we were going to go back at 5.15 p.m. because of the bus, go out to buy supplies, have dinner, shower and other stuff. I slept at half past midnight, not finished with the assignment, woke up at 4 to finish one letter, and again at 6 to finish the last letter. We had to make 9 letters in total because there were 9 seniors who guided us. It was tiring, but it was worth it. I really enjoyed writing to them and I hope they enjoyed reading the letters too, and please don’t throw them out T-T. I wrote those till my hands quivered HAHAHA.

The last day of orientation has come and we were supposed to choose a club to enter so that we can get student activity points. I entered 2 clubs but I do not know if I can remain active in both or not. The club expo was so loud; I lost all my energy by noon, and unconsciously broke a rule by eating first XD AHAHAHA. I got caught by a senior, I felt so stressed afterwards because I was scared of my points being deducted. (I apologize sincerely to the senior that caught me, please forgive me.) After the club expo we were introduced to the main organization of our respective majors. I am currently in a huge dilemma of joining the organization or not, because I have really no clue of what it’s going to be like in college, are the activities going to stack up against each other or not. After the introduction, we were offered to buy a bunch of merchandise from the organization. I ended up spending my money on a sticker, a pouch and a name tag. The last activity was the closing event, where all classes were gathered in the hall to perform their theme songs. Being the arrogant person I am of course I am going to say that my class was the best, even though most of us lost our voices XD. I was sad that orientation ended, because the scarier phase is coming; actual college life, but I don’t want more orientation because I missed my home XD.

I would like to thank the people of my orientation class for being such nice, fun, happy, and creative people. You guys totally lifted up my spirits indirectly even though I was already sick of not being able to sleep well because of loud motorcycles (Only my roommate knows this) and Mother Nature’s early visit this month. I would also like to thank the seniors that guided us throughout orientation, thank you for sharing your experiences with us so that would not feel as nervous and clueless during actual college life. I will always remember the moments of the orientation for the rest of my life.

Thank you so much for reading! Here are some pictures from my orientation:

1st class photo XD

Last day :(

Lookin' good!

Our beloved seniors :) HEHEHE

no wonder we are like this... our seniors started it XD

One of the seniors made a video of our activities since day one! Here's the link: 

Thank you ko KJ for the video and for sharing the photos of the seniors! :) I'm really sorry to say this but the beginning of the video should be: "What are you waiting for?" not "What do you waiting for?" HEHEHEHE #annoyinggrammarnazi