Well this post is going to be quick and pictureless, as we're in the midst of getting our place set up. (And yes, watching the Super Bowl.) I will post pictures soon, I swear!
We arrived yesterday at about 1pm after the drive in from Culburra (I spelled it wrong in previous posts, thanks Mom and Les for pointing that out!), and made it into our apartment/dorm thing pretty quick after. There seem to be an abundance of shopping carts around (oh, campus life, how I've missed thee) so we used one to move our stuff up.
We're on the 5th floor of the Laurus Wing, which is this building of pre-fabricated apartments that essentially are refurbished storage containers. Check out this link for more info. That makes it sound ugly and it's not, it's actually quite nice, just small. Fortunately not suffocatingly small though. We got the room format that we wanted, there was one where the bedroom was off of the front, and one where the bedroom is towards the back allowing for 2 balconies, which is what we scored. We're immediately overlooking a pond that has a racket of frogs living in it, then farther in the background you can see Black Mountain, the tallest elevation around. It loosely reminds me of an undeveloped Mount Royal.
Arriving on a Sunday was maybe not the smartest idea, as we didn't get the best impression of the place. Pretty much nothing was open, and we had to sign up for internet which we couldn't do until this morning, so we spent the night without a phone, or internet, or maps, or anyone around to consult. Oh, we have a phone number now but I think skype is the best way to contact us if you're international. Send me your skype info if you want to chat!
Anyway, we ventured to one of the small IGA markets that was actually open on campus to get the essentials. It doesn't appear that there is a market or large grocery shop on campus, which may be a problem. One thing we're going to try to get by the end of today is bikes, it doesn't seem like survival here is possible without them!
We brought the essentials back and hung out for most of the night. I tried to take a self-timed picture of us having our first glass of wine in the apartment but they weren't the best pictures, so I'll try again with our second glass. We've put everything away and are now focused on decoration, which we can't do too much of given how clean they want these places kept. There is a corkboard where the calendar Aunt Cindy made me is up, and I think a Canucks pennant will be going up as well as a small Canada flag that I brought.
This morning we got the internet and phone sorted, as well as bank accounts, so it's all starting to come together. One setback is that there isn't wireless so Simon and I for now have to share internet time, which needless to say is going to be a problem. The international students orientation is for the next few days with tomorrow being the major day to attend, so we'll be doing that. Post Super Bowl we're going to try to venture into town and get more of the things we need, which isn't too much thanks to the generosity of Les and Janet!
Will try to post again later or tomorrow, with photos this time. Hope everyone is well, thanks again for all of the positive feedback!
I'm a little curious about the lack of wireless. You'd think that would be a staple for university life! I guess it is here, although that took a while to get off the ground, too.
ReplyDeletelooking forward to your photos of the dorm room because that photo on the site you linked to made it all look VERY narrow.