Open for Business.

For better or worse, I have survived Opening. Well, almost. Opening doesn't officially end until midnight tonight but with 90% of my residents moved in, I'm celebrating an early victory. So hooray!!! After five weeks of training both myself and student staff and a week of prepping the building, we spent the past week with our doors wide open (literally) welcoming new students to campus for the first time and returning students back for their second or third go-round.

So here are my random thoughts on the past week...

I'm amazed at the number of international students who get on a plane, come to America, and arrive here speaking barely a lick of English. While almost all are living here on campus and 99% of them are enrolled in ESL classes, not all have campus housing and surprisingly, they don't seem to mind that they don't speak the language and don't have anywhere to live. Insert one such conversation that occurred Monday night around 9:30pm after one graduate student from China arrived:

Me: Hi, Welcome! Do you have your banner ID?
Her: Yes.
Me: Ok, it looks like you're a graduate student and aren't living on campus?
Her: I rent house.
Me: Have you already rented a house?
Her: I rent house.
Me: Ok, well let me get you a packet of information about off campus living.
Her: Head nod.
Me: Ok, here you go. Good luck renting a house.
Her: Thank you.

Nevermind that it's 9:30pm and this girl has absolutely nowhere to stay for the evening. But she's determined to rent a house. So off she goes. To where? Beats me...But man, the girl has some kahunas! Can you imagine just showing up in another country and deciding you'll rent a house! Flabbergasted.

Aside from trying to navigate the many, MANY one-sided conversations with the international students in my building (including the need to purchase a shower curtain so water doesn't leak everywhere), I also struggled to find out whether I was living in some delusional state of reality or whether it was the parents who were off in coocoobananacrackers land. Insert another conversation:

Mom: Where can my son get a loft kit to loft his bed?
Me: We don't loft beds in his hall.
Other Mom: WRONG. My son's bed is lofted.
Me: I stand corrected. While some beds were originally lofted, we are no longer lofting any more beds.
Mom: Well then do we get a tuition discount since my son's bed cannot be lofted?
Me: Ummm, I'm not responsible for that but I highly doubt it.
Mom: Well that's not fair.
Me: (in my head): Well, my mother taught me when I was four that life isn't fair. Perhaps you need to learn that lesson! (out loud): Well, I'm sorry that we don't have any more loft kits and your son will just have to make do.
Mom: But he's 6'2 and he just can't fit everything in his room without lofting his bed.
Me: (again, in my head): Well, tell him to take some of his shitake home. (in reality): Well, he'll just have to do the best he can. I'm really sorry.

This was just ONE of MANY conversations I engaged in with parents who wanted to move in early but didn't want to pay to do it, wanted their beds lofted, wanted me to bunk their child's beds, informed me their child needed more room, their own room, a different roommate, and the list goes on and on...

So yes, I'm celebrating the end of a crazy, stressful, and successful Opening Week. I would be treating but I'm on call. Oh job...

Cheers.