The majority of these past few days has been chaotic, at best. Wednesday was spent primarily on the road, for a four state drive that got dull soon after hitting the three hour mark. I attempted to catch up on sleep, having gotten merely four hours the night before, but it's rather difficult to do so when you're in a car that's bursting at the seams with one's belongings. There were bags everywhere. But we finally made it, tired and disheveled, and probably a little cranky.
Thursday was the big day, and we arrived on campus bright and early to finally rid the car of everything we'd been carrying around. On the way to Target (for the odds and ends it's impossible not to forget), we got a bit lost, which I see somewhat as a rite of passage when you're in a new environment. Luckily, we had my father's Blackberry to bail us out. My parents abandoned me on Friday morning, which could have been an excellent time to share details of my trip here, if I hadn't been exhausted to the point of being relatively unable to form cohesive statements. This is apt to happen when you spend hours in a car one day, and then hours another day either walking the same three hallways of a dorm, or walking a mile the wrong way because your dad gave you incorrect directions to get to the car that was actually only 75 yards away.
But enough about the uninteresting aspects of the trip, I'm more concerned with sharing the parts of Ann Arbor that I've been able to explore, as well as the little things I've picked up in my few days here.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with Ann Arbor, let me provide some information:
Ann Arbor is a quintessential college town, and is essentially built around the campus of the University of Michigan. Because of this, the presence of the University can be felt everywhere: restaurants host banners welcoming students back to campus, while yellow and blue streamers and balloons adorn the checkout lines at Meijer (a supercenter chain of the Midwest).
My family has now been here a few times, whereas I have never even been to this part of the country before, so I've forced everyone to comply with my desire to explore the area, even if it's just within the campus. As would be expected, there are trees all over the University's sprawling campus, so I'm sure the air quality in this area is pretty fantastic. The abundance of greenery in Ann Arbor also makes for a gorgeous campus. I'm pleased to see my brother won't be spending the next four years surrounded by ugliness.
The University is comprised of three separate campuses. This place is just gigantic, and I spent the first day or two being completely overwhelmed by its size. With so many campuses and streets, driving had a tendency to get very confusing, very quickly. My dad navigated the roads with a tattered map he picked up on move-in day. It didn't always help. I still can't imagine walking around this place on a daily basis.
That said, from what I've seen, Ann Arbor is a great place both to live and to go to school. I have a lot to share from this trip, from the ever-important food findings, to the transportation, to the photographs. I'll write more about all of this once I'm home, and once I've got my mind functioning in its full capacity.
Until then, I'm off to go watch the town as they bask in the glow of Michigan's first win of the season.
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