A question for Neapol1s, Lizzardfire, etc...

zoogies
Mon, 09 Oct 2006 20:42:35 +0000

Given that:

1) I spent the last two years of high school living away from my parents.
2) By the second day of classes I already had two ex-girlfriends here.
3) I was here over the summer.
4) Another reason I don’t feel like sharing.

I doubt any of my experiences will relate to anyone else.



Extraordinary circumstances, to be sure. May I ask what your real name is? (PM is fine).

Well, I’ll bite. Three things:

a) The Caltech campus is awesome. There are palm trees (incredible from the pov of a MA resident), birds-of-paradise plants, turtles, and at least two praying mantis. So in short, it’s pretty cool. The trade-off is, apparently trees don’t change color in the autumn, and snow does not fall during the winter. But the weather is wonderful, and not too hot, actually. It gets chilly at night due to the humidity. Packing jackets and long pants is a really, really good idea. Also a good idea: pack early. You will find that stuff takes up an INCREDIBLE amount of space. Plan accordingly, and plan ahead.

b) The people are really cool. Mostly. Some, who I don’t know very well, have a very … peculiar, in my view, sense of humor. But it’s actually like high school, almost. Except everyone around you will be ridiculously brilliant. From my observations, there are in fact some cocky types with inflated egos and such…although I haven’t noticed this in upperclassmen. I think that sort of sentiment gets beaten out of you before you’re through with freshman year, but I can’t be sure. Caltech, I’ve heard, is a great equalizer. One thing that I don’t really like however, is how often upperclassmen say they don’t hold up the friendships they’ve made during frosh camp after we all get separated into our permanent housing assignments. I would like it better if there was a greater feeling of community among all of Caltech, as opposed to _____ House is superior to all the other houses, and whatnot.

c) The workload is such that, after frosh camp, one’s happiness level is supposed to decrease exponentially. Or at least that’s what upperclassmen have said. They probably enjoy saying that, so I don’t know if it’s true or not. But it’s definitely not light. My high school was not particularly competitive; this is a mind-blowing experience. If I came in here with the same attitude towards grades that I had at high school, I would not be holding up very well. Part of this is due to pass/fail, which is also good. I haven’t been getting grades nearly as good as the kind I got at high school, but it’s all relative, because I’m being exposed to much more and learning much more…I think. I also think I’m going to fail the chemistry quiz that was handed out today. we’ll see.

4) The Honor Code is great. They give us so much trust, trust that is basically unmerited. In other words, it’s ours to lose. Unlike the attitudes that a few of my friends at other colleges have taken to “honor codes,” everyone is very serious about here. Possibly because of the ninjas.

5) Two things you should all be aware of: the food is not great. And the beds…they’re up in the sky! That shocked me a little when I first checked in. But you get used to it.

So that was five things. For what it’s worth.