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I woke up at six today (despite not being able to sleep until like 1:30am lol) for Orientation! (8 We left the house really early, maybe seven-ish, because Mom said freeway traffic's pretty insane. And it was, but we still got there half an hour early.

When we got there, Mom just dumped me off by this building and I was pretty much on my own. |: There were these guys in matching yellow shirts, and I asked them where to check in, and they pointed me in the right direction, so I went over there and Mom drove off lol.

I got my room key and that Bruin Card form (that I already sent in a few weeks ago), since they asked if I had my Bruin Card and I didn't. Basically I need to turn this in and get my Bruin Card today (although I already sent my picture in, so I should be able to just pick it up).

I headed over to my room in Rieber Terrace, and naturally I was the first one in the room since I was so early (and so I claimed the bottom bunk 8D). I headed back out after a while, since my roommates hadn't arrived and I was bored just sitting around. I headed over to the elevator, and there was this other girl with bright magenta hair, and I just kind of walked with her out, since I guess neither of us really knew where to go. Also around this time, she just suddenly pulls out a cigarette and lights it, which totally threw me off, since I don't really know any smokers, and I've never known anyone to just light up in the middle of a school campus (but I guess I'll be seeing that more this year). I headed over to this area just outside Covel Commons and there was this mass of other students. Around this point I was starting to notice that everyone knew someone, and was clustered with their little groups of friends, and I was pretty sure no one from North was there. In fact, I had deliberately decided to go this route so I would be a little more out of my comfort zone, but I was definitely starting to feel a little lonely now that I was actually on my own.

Anyhow, after I had filled out some papers and gotten a free backpack, UCLA Student Handbook, and an orientation schedule, I headed over to the Bruin Card Center (which was conveniently just twenty feet or so away lol) and got in line. I ended up standing there for about an hour (at which point the line had actually gotten quite long), with there being very little movement in the line. Apparently the camera broke. While I was in line I saw Natsha! I was really surprised since I totally didn't think she had the same session as me, but it was definitely nice to see a familiar face. Apparently she's there for this FSP thing, which starts next week, but they're making the people who haven't gone to orientation yet go to this session.

I was actually still standing there when all the Orientation Counselors (OCs) came out. I was really surprised to see how young they were; most of them were seniors, or had just graduated, and I was totally expecting older adults, like the counselors we had back at North. Anyhow, they came out and all held up these signs with names on them, and we quickly figured those were the OCs' names (five minutes later they finally told us to just go to our counselors and just get our Bruin Cards later). My counselor's name was Ruben, and I literally circled the whole area looking for his sign; I finally decided to just ask one of the counselors, and he pointed him out for me (turns out he was right next to the guy I was asking lol). And no wonder I didn't see him too; unlike the other counselors who were standing on tables and stuff with their signs up, his was kind of slumped over towards the ground (also, it was another student holding it cuhs Ruben was writing down stuff for his roster lol).

In any case, I felt much better immediately, since I realized here that this is where everyone was split up, and this is where we would meet people. Amber and Alex introduced themselves to me right off the bat. Once everyone arrived, we all sat around a circle and said our names, where we came from, and the last song we'd heard; there was Amber, Alex, Ryan, Garrett, Alan (who looks oddly like Thang, but with a narrower face), Jackie, Adrian, Becky (who barely talked at all during the whole orientation session), Marcos (who arrived like ten minutes after everyone lol), and finally Ruben our counselor (for the last song he listened to he cited Sephiroth's theme from VII, and I was like OMG FINAL FANTASY ♥). It was so weird; I looked at all of them and thought to myself that I knew exactly what kind of stereotype/character they fit into. It hasn't quite hit me that this isn't high school anymore, and that everyone here is smart and has worked hard to get here; as Kent put it later, I'm "so used to being surrounded by dumbasses," hahah.

Anyhow, around this time Ruben tells us we have to come up with a team name and chant. It's supposed to be like, if he wants to get our attention, he'll say something and we'll respond with something. He gave us this example that another group thought of in one of the previous sessions where he said "Autobots transform!" and everyone scattered out like airplanes hahah. And there was another one where he just shouted out "Power rangers!" and the people replied "It's morphin' time!" Basically, we have to come up with something like that in the next two hours.

Afterwards we headed over to the Ackerman Grand Ballroom to listen to a few people talk to us. Jackie talked to me a bit on the way over, so I pretty much just stuck with her. Anyhow, the speakers pretty much gave us a little intro to life at UCLA and addressed some of the issues and anxieties we may be having (definitely not the most exciting topic, but all the speakers were really funny and kept our interest pretty well). At one point he had us all stand up and shake hands and introduce ourselves to the people sitting around us. I met this girl named Cathy who was sitting in front of me, and he noticed the North jacket I was wearing.

Her: Oh you go to North! I think I know someone you know.
Me: Oh really? Who?
Her: Frank.
Me: Jimenez?
Her: Yeah.
Me: ... Wait, your name is Cathy right?
Her: Yeah.
Me: Are you --
Her: Yeeeeeeah.

Slightly awkward moment there hahaha. So basically I met his ex before Julie lolll. So random!

Afterwards, Ruben led us to this place with all these fast food places (this was kind of cool for me, cuhs I've only ever seen the dining hall buffets). Ruben gave me, Jackie, and Alan some food coupons (worth up to $7) since none of us had our Bruin Cards yet, and we needed them to get lunch. Jackie and I grabbed some Carl's Jr, and headed outside to sit with our group. Our group was sitting next to another counselor (Thomas, I think?)'s group. Anyhow, the counselors were giving us a lot of information about work and stuff, and Thomas was telling us all these stories about Ruben. Apparently Ruben used to work for one of these restaurants, and the employees would get these free food coupons. Anyhow, at some point Ruben stopped working at this restaurant for one reason or another, but he would still go in and grab some food coupons. And then one day he went over to get some food, tried to use the coupon, and the guy at the register stares at him and says that they can't serve him. And then he sees like, this literal WANTED poster of him posted on the wall LOL. Apparently they had started to catch on from the cameras or something, and they stole his picture off facebook ("They actually wrote 'WANTED' over my head, and to make it worse it was this picture where I had this creepy Mexican mustache!"), and actually made a poster hahaha. So anyway, he talked to his old manager, and they made this deal where we can still eat at all these restaurants, but he can never work for ASUCLA ever hahaha.

Afterwards, we went back to the Ballroom and listened to some more presentations. When we came out, Ruben forced us all to give an idea lol. I pretty much came up with something on the spot: Yugioh, hahaha.

Me: You could say "It's time to ..." and we'll be like "D-D-D-D, D-D-D-Duel!" (Yes, I felt like an idiot saying that out loud, but I actually said that, and frankly I was pretty proud of myself hahaha)

And then they all cracked up, and that became our chant hahaha.

After that, we went out onto the grass with our counselors (this time we paired with this counselor named Doug) to talk about graduation requirements and GE's and stuff. When we were through with that, some people (Jackie & Becky) had to take Math/Music placement tests, so Ruben sent them off, and then he pointed me and Alan to a second Bruin Card Center. I was able to get my card pretty quickly since they had my picture.

When we got out, I asked Alan what he was gonna do now, since we had two hours of free time, and everyone else in our group was already gone, and he said "I dunno," and then we just kind of split up. And then I got lost. Like, really lost. I probably should've just followed Alan, since I'm sure he knew where he was going more than I did; anyhow, I was trying to get back to my dorm, and I'm pretty sure I ended up going in the completely wrong direction. I was literally just wandering around for an hour! There were no directories anywhere, and I hate asking people for help so I didn't. At one point, I was finally so lost that I stopped and asked these two people in nurse-like jackets, and they hadn't even heard of Rieber Terrace (they asked "... Weyward Terrace?"), so at this point I was just like 'oh shit, if they haven't even heard of it then I must be really far away!' So I tried retracing my steps, and I eventually found a few girls from the orientation, and I pretty much just followed them back to Rieber. And then I went up to my room and just collapsed onto my bed lol.

Then around 5:20-ish, I met up with Jackie, and we tried (with little success) to find our way back to the Ackerman Terrace for dinner. We saw all these orientation people on Bruin Walk (plus this pretty awesome band), but even with a map, we just could not find our way back! After a while, she called Adrian, and he came down and found us and helped us get to dinner lol.

On our way over we had to walk through this conveniently placed Activities Far, and I saw Michelle Kaito!

Dinner was Mexican food; not quite my cup of tea. The only Mexican food I really like is Chipotle (even though it's not really real Mexican food lol).

After that, we went back to the Ballroom, and four of the counselors went onstage and shared their personal experiences with us, leading up to how UCLA helped them grow as a person. One counselor shared stories of how she was bullied and called 'whitewashed' as a child, the second talked about her experience with acquaintance rape, the third talked about this disease she had that made her whole body hairless, and the last talked about society's expectations for a guy to be manly. Each talked about their insecurities and how their time at UCLA helped them come to terms with their respective situation. Afterwards, Ruben took us back into the food court area and we all discussed what he just heard.

And then finally there was the Cabaret performances put on by all of our Orientation Counselors!

These two told various punny jokes involving popular media and our UCLA-USC rivalry (it was really funny).

This other guy sung a song, ending with "A Trojan's only good once, but a Bruin is forever," hahaha.

And then another counselor came out dressed like a nerd. She started out saying that she was nervous, and then called out the boys and said, "You know what to do," and then all the guys took off their shirts hahaha. Then they all sung; I didn't think to record this one but I'm sure it's on youtube somewhere.

In between the performances, they showed a slideshow of the counselors in a Glee-like pose! (x That's Ruben; they were moving around the equipment onstage, so it's a little blocked lol.






I missed the beginning, but the guy starts out "I'm really nervous. John! You know what to do." And then he pretends to take his shirt off hahaha.



Damn Bea for showing us this video back in Physics. -__-;

They also did this Lady Gaga dance and it was awesome. There was this guy (he was clearly a Theater major haha) who came out in some very Lady Gaga-esque wear and heels, and he was al dancing in them hahaha.

Afterwards they directed us downstairs where they were playing Transformers 2 in the lounge, and there was a game room, and "Club Jamba." I had no idea what Club Jamba was, and apparently they take the Jamba Juice store and turn it into a club hahaha. I thought it was funny cuhs you have this tiny box of a room, it's pitch black, and all these people are cramming in there and jumping around. Not really my scene haha.

I went over to the game room, and it was awesome; they had all these computers and all these games like Warcraft and others, so I was pretty psyched.

I started playing Brawl with some guys (I got 3rd twice and tied for 2nd once hahah); Natsha came in a bit later and I handed my control over to her. A little later they set up Rock Band and started playing that. It's weird, cuhs Natsha's tone-deaf like crazy hahah. I sung vocals after her, and did Panic!'s Nine in the Afternoon. Anyhow, around 11:30-ish, Jackie and I headed back to the dorms. I totally would've stayed longer, but my left eye had been watering all day as if I'd been peeling onions or something, and I couldn't stare into the light at all, so I really had to get that fixed.

When I got back to my room, one of my roommates was there. Her name was Rita and I had actually met her earlier when I met Frank's Cathy girl lol. An hour or so later, the other roommate came back, and her name was Tina. They were both pretty cool.

Tina: Does your last name start with C?
Me: Yeah.
Tina: Oh okay that makes sense. I think they alphabetized us. My last name's Chen.
Me: Oh me too!
Rita: Me too!
Me: LOL.