International student orientation

Ok, I guess I haven't been up-to-date again. But I was so tired yesterday (probably due to jetlag), I wanted to take a nap at 7pm, but ended up sleeping till 6am in the morning. Right, the past few days have been a series of orientations. Let's start off with Wednesday - the international student orientation.

But I think the exhaustion is also contributed by the series of unfortunate events...

The day started off with the international student orientation at SSS Hall (Sterling Sheffield Strathcona), which was rather uplifting I guess. We actually did a Yale Fight Song (we did the "Bulldogs"), which was fun but kind of over our age, given that all of us are graduate students. Something, though, I felt was that they made me feel at ease and that they are really keen on helping us. This, IMO, is extremely appreciated and something definitely required by international students. The actual song with the band and cheers and craziness, that they let us watch was this; I think we were about 3/10 if this is 10/10 LOLX:

Ra, W and I decided to head down to the "Cityseed Farmers' Market" outside City Hall at Downtown to take a look at the groceries that they have. The tomatoes are huge!! Ra decided to buy some, although later he commented they are rather tasteless. Looks are deceiving indeed! That's when I realise HGS rooms do not have fridge and a common kitchen seems nonexistent too. Then we went for lunch at Au Bon Pain. There, we were joined with Elizabeth, an exchange doctoral student from UK (I think from one of Oxbridge), who will be with Yale until end of the year. I then left the company for an appointment at the Tax Office, who told me that I do not need to be there actually; the documents just arrived, showing that I do not need to be there... The lady was nice enough to explain to me that I need to pay 14% tax (federal and state taxes), of which part of it might be returned to me when I file for tax next year... Then I walked again, down to the Green to try to take a bus M3/M4 to DMV for my state ID... I waited ONE hour, and ended up not going because DMV would have closed by the time I reached there...

Take home message: inefficient transportation and bureacracy are both something I have to get used to...

Something perked me up though, just because it reminded me of XL: