UCL action has started
September 18th, 2008 by boon
I am dead tired from being out the whole day, but I just had to satisfy my curiousity and find out what the big deal ISOP was all about.
I’m glad they separated graduates and undergraduates because otherwise it would have caused a massive traffic jam and people wouldn’t be able to identify their peers.
I was pretty much alone for the most part. I saw a lot of groups of people who seemed to hit it off real fast, and did everything together. Maybe they were from the same halls or something.
Anyway, when I got there in the morning they handed to us blue packs with stuff in them that were quite useful, like a London guide and a UCL Union handbook.
I must say that there’s a lot more going on here than there was at KU, but I guess with a city like London, there are bound to be tons of things to do.
There’s even a Trip to Ikea on the Give it A Go list. What the?
I had a lot of time to waste after the formal introductory speeches by the Provost, Deputy Dean and UCL Union sabbaticals. I found a quiet little corner at Gordon’s Cafe at the Union, got a latte, and proceeded to sift through the stuff from the blue pack for an hour or so.
I thought to myself – one year is going to fly past like it was yesterday. I suppose that’s what a blog is for.
Anyway, it was hardly 12pm when I got done with the pack, and I decided to wander up and down the Union. Then, I decided it was time to check up on Barclays and kick their ass for delaying the opening of my account.
After 15 minutes of utterly pointless conversation with the Barclays rep, my phone credit exhausted, and we got cut off. They still demanded red tape treatment so I gave up. Anyway my credit was nil so I had to get up and go find a T-Mobile store.
I was getting really tired by then.
I tried looking for a free wifi hotspot, but failed. The Tottenham Court McDonald’s did not have free wifi even though there’s a sticker on the entrance that says they do. I wasted £4.90 on a sucky chicken sandwich meal to find that out. I should have just gone with a quarter pounder, but I thought I’d sample one of those “healthy” McD options we don’t get back home.
I even tried to pretend shop at PCWorld, just to google for a list of free wifi hotspots. None of their laptops had an internet connection (unlike Regent St.’s Apple).
So I gave up again and went back to UCL and found a bench to sit on, and after catching a breath, decided to read an ebook and listen to some music. I realized I could only do that for an hour and a half, which is quite long, and then I needed to take a break.
I wandered around the South Cloisters, and then East into some obscure locations, up and down stairs, and then back to the South Cloisters and south onto Malet Place and into the Engineering building to check out where the UCLIC offices were. The door needed ID and I didn’t want to buzz anyone in there, so I left.
The view on the 8th floor was amazing though. It’s got a nice view of the church roof there, and the east parts of London.
I went into Waterstones, found out that Don Norman has written a new book called The Design of Future Things, and found another book on interaction design there which was £24. Geez. As usual, I didn’t buy anything and left.
By then, it was 4.45pm, and I had killed about 2 hours just by wandering around and doing nothing. I decided to walk to Gordon Square and do more nothing, and wait for 5.30pm to come when the ISOP reception would begin.
I sat down on a bench where a young lady was, took out my moleskin and decided I should try and memorize the map of London.
I realized that the Thames starts with a “U” on the west where West Brompton is, and then makes like a step upwards towards Chelsea, and then another towards Covent Garden… where it tapers southwards past Tower Bridge towards Wapping where it tilts northwards into an upside-down “U” where the Limehouse DLR is.
After I had done that I realized I was crazy, and the young lady must have thought that as well because she left.
So I decided to get up again and walk to the South side of the gardens and relax on the grass. For some reason, everyone was hanging out at the corners on benches, but no one was sitting on the grass. I felt that was a bit weird.
Anyway, 5.30pm rolled by in no time, and by then a huge crowd of international students had gathered at the giant tent.
I walked in with the herd and found myself completely solo, amongst pockets of people who were chatting away about random things. I felt really out of place without any friends or acquaintances, and I attempted to gain eye contact with at least one human being in that big crowd.
I managed to creep up in between two Americans’ conversation and introduced myself. We chatted for a bit, and I found out we didn’t have anything in common, took the queue for my empty cup and made my exit.
After I had returned with a new glass of apple juice the Yankees had relocated, so I wandered around again for a fresh pair of eyes. A Chinese professor found me and we made idle chatter for a few minutes. I can’t even remember now what we were talking about. It must’ve been quite insignificant.
Anyway, he too decided the conversation reached its end and decided to walk away. So I went my way, and found this Korean guy who was there by himself.
For some reason we hit it off and we were sharing our stories with each other. Apparently, he married a Spanish woman and has been working in Spain since 2002. He decided to come to UCL to pursue his Masters in globalization, even though he has a background in Unix administration.
We talked a great length, and we were joined by another Masters student, a Japanese, and we exchanged contacts. The Jap majors in urban planning in politically unstable areas like Afghanistan. I told him my wife thought of doing Urban Planning once, but realized she didn’t want to travel too much.
By that time I had one glass of white wine, one of red, and I had sampled all the juices they put out on the table. Somebody came on the microphone and said it was time to leave.
So the Korean guy and I walked to Kings Cross Station where he had to catch a bus and I had to buy National Rail tickets for our trip to Colchester this weekend.
I didn’t think it was a bad night, especially since I wasn’t expecting to meet anyone at the reception.
Tomorrow I might meet with someone else I haven’t met before – a new classmate I might end up working with this year. Strangely enough, we met on Facebook.
Anyway, I hope I can enrol tomorrow. I want that dang student ID card, and the perks that come with it.