In Continuum.

Greetings, lovely people of Singapore. Your local time right now is approximately five minutes after nine in the morning, and I do hope that you will have a great day ahead. On my side of the world, things have been going well so far, and I suppose I have been living quite comfortably if I do say so myself. But before I go into details about that, let's try to catch up on how things have been so far. It has been a while since this blog has been updated, and it has been mainly due to the fact that the orientation has been taking up quite a bit of time. In between orientation sessions, I'd be trying to find food around campus or out of campus, or trying to get my bank and phone accounts set up. The word "hectic" would probably be a fitting word for my first week here in Buffalo these days, though that has been a direct reason as to why I've been sleeping like a baby every night. I do consider myself on the lucky side, since some of my friends have been suffering from the effects of jet lag, even though they've been here for a little more than a week. Anyway, amidst all the preparations and the orientation, the only way in which I've been able to document the journey has been through photographs, since writing a blog entry takes up too much time. Though, that is not to say that I prefer one over the other at this point. Writing, I still love you with so much passion.

So, in the last entry, I've been describing how the flight has been throughout the journey. It has been quite a bit of time since then, and I do admit that I have been neglecting things quite a bit. I do apologize for my absence, and here is the more condensed version of things. To begin, we reached the Buffalo airport at about ten at night, local time, and we were all worn out by then. You could tell by the faces of my friends that they could have fallen asleep on a bed for a month before wanting to do anything else. Breathing looked tiring to all of them, and the fact that our transport took forever to come due to the traffic did not help either. Anyway, our good friend Travis arrived in his SUV, a transport which was supposed to be a truck when I first heard of it. The tricky part was to fit all the luggage (there were ten of them, excluding carry-on) into the car, plus a driver and four other passengers. As the luggage were being loaded into the car, we soon realized that it was not possible to fit any more human beings into the vehicle other than the driver, who was essential. So, we decided to fit ourselves into a cab while our luggage followed behind, and that cab ride took us from the airport and all the way to a motel next to our school close to midnight. I must say, though, that cab drivers earn a hell lot in the United States even though they cannot spell the word "motel" properly on their GPS machines. That driver that took us spelled it as "Motil", and no wonder he couldn't find anything on the highway.

If you shudder at the thought of a motel, let me just assure you that motels, or at least the one that I stayed at, was pretty damn awesome. It was probably equivalent to a three star hotel, and everything was in quite a pristine condition. Or, let me put it this way. I was willing to sleep on the floor in between two beds, and people should know how much I demand hygiene in the place that I eat or sleep. Anyway, that was where we spent the night, the Red Roof Inn, and I had to sleep on the floor in between two beds because none of the girls wanted to sleep with the guy. Though, that is not to say that I, in any way, wanted to share my bed with them either. I was comfortable on the floor, and the only person that I wanted (and want) to sleep with is Neptina. Anyway, Travis hung around a little bit that night before going back, and we each took turns to take the long awaited shower and to Skype with our loved ones. I must say that I probably had the best quality sleep that night, and I slept like a baby with my in-ear headphones on, which canceled out all the noise. In the morning, Travis was nice enough to drive by again to give us a ride to IHOP, or International House of Pancakes. I must say, that I understand Ahmad's love for that place finally. That place is just so full of win, and you cannot beat four different syrups for your pancakes, you just can't.

That was also our first interaction with the service industry in the United States, and I must say that I am thoroughly blown away by it. I mean, this is the kind of services we should be getting with the amount of money that we are paying, not to mention the fact that we are being forced to pay tips disguised as service charge. At least here, they tell you that they want tips, and they don't subtly collect it from you by embedding it into the bill. With the amount that I am paying back home, I should really be getting the kind of service that I get here. Waitresses would constantly make rounds back to your table just see if you are doing fine, and it is even more awesome when you are having breakfast in a place with waitresses like that. It starts your day off well, and it doesn't beat a breakfast with awesome pancakes and nice waitresses. I still hate giving tips though, and it really was much easier to just pay it as part of the bill. Yet, I must say that most of the waitresses I have met so far deserved the tips that we have been giving together as a table. This practice extends far beyond just restaurants and diners, because people around Buffalo have been generally really nice. They are not quite as nice as the people from Thailand just yet (it's difficult to beat a country which is also known as the "land of smiles"), but they come close. Even the cashier at TOPS asked me if I was having a cold, because apparently I sounded that way.

After that breakfast, the moving in part came along, and I must say that that was quite a bitch by itself. We got our hands on the necessary documents and the keys, and we just went to our respective apartments around the South Lake Village. I was admittedly somewhat nervous when I got to my apartment, and the lock to my front door was really difficult to open. I had a hard time trying to get it opened, and I had to enlist the help of Fang Xun and Cassie (who are both really badass women). They got me through the front door and my bedroom door, and actually helped me to shift the furniture around a little bit. My room mate wasn't at home back then, and it would remain like that for the next day or two, despite the fact that he left bread on the kitchen counter and ham in the fridge. I was somewhat nervous that he'd come back at any moment, and yet he never showed up for the next two days. For the most part of the first day, I bought a lot of things from the Dollar Tree, Walmart, and TOPS. I think grocery shopping is fun, but it isn't so when you are supposed to be moving into a completely new place, and that you have to buy all the daily necessities. I'm not exactly sure how much I actually spent on those things, but let's just say that I've been as budget as possible. I mean, my lamp costs a mere ten dollars - a steal!

At this time, everything has been pretty much done up. I don't really want to compare to my room mate, or any other room mates, who are planning to stay here for a long time, or have been living here for the past year or two. I mean, if you take a peek into their rooms, you'd realize how much work they have put into these rooms to make it their own, and it is naturally this way after all. These students do intend to stay for a long period of time, whereas I will only be here for a couple of months. I don't see the need for me to doll this place up any more than my minimal standard of comfort, and I suppose I have reached that point as of this point. Anyway, it is a simple room with a bed, a table, a closet, cupboards for my clothes, and that is as far as basic necessities go. I had to fill up everything else in this room, everything from light, to bed sheets, to pillow cases, to internet cables. But since it has been a week, I suppose I've already gotten all that I need, and I suppose we'd just add more to the room as we go on in the semester. After all, I cannot buy too many things, since I'd have to find a way to get rid of these things when I do eventually leave. The only effort in decorating my room is probably the corkboard that I have pasted on my wall, which has been decorated with the feather of a crow that I found and Neptina's polaroid of herself and I.

Here's the thing about living in the United States: you need a car. I will be here for just one semester, so there really isn't a point for me to buy or rent a car. Even those of us who has gotten a car can only manage for two weeks, because it isn't very cheap to get one here at all. Anyway, the public transport system isn't nearly as developed as Singapore, and naturally so because Singapore is still a really small place. You need a car to get to everywhere, and that made grocery shopping really difficult for the most part. From my place, I need to take two buses all the way to South Campus, and then take a walk through a giant parking lot to TOPS across the street. I must say that shopping here, especially at supermarkets, can be quite a hassle. You can never find anybody to talk to when you need to ask for something, and everything is in this great big mess. TOPS is not even half as bad as Walmart, where everything is everywhere. I disliked those places immensely, but Wegman's is probably the best supermarket ever. Anyway, I am still trying to figure out the money system here, with all their dimes and their quarters and their cents. It takes me a while to come up with the exact change for $7.33, but I am getting there.

After an episode of getting lost in the neighborhood while trying to find a restaurant (damn you, LeBros!), we ended up being picked up by Lance (yes, that Lance) by the side of the road near Newman Chapel. He replied to my e-mail about arriving in Buffalo a couple of days late, and he explained that he has been in Michigan all along. So, the first thing that we did when we got lost was to give him a call, and he actually agreed to pick us up in the middle of nowhere. After about ten to fifteen minutes of waiting, Lance showed up in his old beat up car, and I must say that it was probably the most awful looking car that I have ever seen. I mean, I was really glad that he came down to pick us up, and that he bothered to help us out from our predicament. But I must say, that his car is a dump, both from the outside and on the inside. The door on the driver's side is dented because of an accident, and he never bothered to fix it at all. I am not kidding when I say this, but Lance has sand and rocks inside his car just laying around everywhere. Aside from all of those, he has loose change laying around on the seats, under the seats, on the floors, in the trunk, and just about everywhere that you can think of. In fact, I was telling him that if he picked up all the loose change from inside his car, he'd actually be really rich.

He appeared out of his beat up car in a torn up cap and a t-shirt covered in soil. He looked like he just crawled through a bush just to get to us, but he was so happy to see us. He brought us to IHOP (oh yes!) to have our brunch, and then he offered to take us to his place for a visit. I swear, his house is a giant leap from his car, because his house is beautiful. I must be honest with you, but I don't think that I have been in a more beautiful house before. Admittedly, though, the age of the house (it was built in the 1920s) does creep me out just a little bit, especially the creaking floor boards and stuff like that. But everything right down to the decor, to the lovely dog, to the bath tubs - everything worked. It was like one of those showroom model houses, or like some kind of postcard picture that came to life right in front of us. I swear, Lance may not know how to maintain his car in a proper condition, but he sure knows how to take good care of his house. The front lawn was properly done up, with flowers in bloom and the grass carefully trimmed. It's really a house that you have to witness for yourself, though it isn't exactly a place I want to live in. I mean, I have a thing against old houses I suppose, and I've grown up in concrete houses with bricks in the walls.

So, the campus, it is huge. After being in SIM for this long, you start to forget that schools can be much bigger than what it is for me back home. SIM is like a building with the bare essentials in it. You have the canteen, the canteen's alternative, the bookstore, the classrooms, the bathrooms, and all that stuff. Here in UB, you have twenty times all of those, plus awesome scenery, giant parking lots, and a whole lot of other stuff. In fact, if you haven't already seen pictures of this place, there is this structure down by the lake of this greek column, thing, that doesn't mean much of anything at all. It doesn't make sense, but it is a beautiful sight nonetheless. There are a lot of bees around here, and you don't get mosquitoes or flies very much in this weather anyway. If you have trash just laying around, you get crows, seagulls and bees flying around it all the time. I swear, the bees here are vicious, and all they want to do is to bury their insect faces into your food, and it can get really annoying to say the least. Anyway, this place is huge, and it really becomes a hassle to get from one place to the other, especially when buses are not very frequent when the school hasn't commenced for the next semester. Walking here, however, is surprisingly enjoyable. I think I have done more walking here in a week than I do in a month back at home. The weather is conducive for walking, and everything is just so beautiful to look at on the way anyway.

The weather has been generally great, with light storms coming in and out every once in a while. In fact, the forecast predicts that it is going to rain today, again, which means that the people at the Darien Lake theme park will have quite a good time on their hands. I haven't felt the need to put on anything thick just yet, but I do suppose that day will come when the snow starts to fall. Oh yeah, the snow, it's been a while since I've seen and felt them. I still think that I am going to love it in the first five days, and then hate it for the rest of the month. At any rate, I suppose I am, and always have been, a person who prefers the cold rather than the warm. Or rather, a hot day is fine as long as the humidity is low, and Singapore happens to have that in abundance. Blended with the cold chilly air, the smell of freshly shaved grass really makes this place come alive, if I do say so myself. I have went flower picking a couple of times, and I have brought home some really beautiful flowers that I intend to bring home with me. I am still looking out for a test tube of sorts to fit the first snow in though, and I do wonder how that is going to be like when it first comes down, and what I'd be doing when it happens.

If any of you do intend to come over to UB for the spring semester, I highly recommend either South Lake or Hadley to be your home of choice. I swear, these two places are probably the best places that you are going to be living in for a couple of months straight. South Lake is right next to the lake, and you can't beat us in terms of the scenery. It has wide open spaces, which really makes it a whole lot safer if you ask me. It is a tad far away from the academic buildings, but it is also the closest to the convenience stores and the places that sell food - awesome! Hadley is further away from those, but it is relatively close to the academic buildings, not to mention the fact that it looks like a really nice chalet. Flint is fine, but the fact that it is the oldest student village around here isn't giving it a good reputation. It is really close to the academic buildings, for one, but the hallways are really narrow and somewhat creepy. But any of those would be miles better than Governor's, which is where the dorms are. The hallways are narrow and dark, and you don't even get air-conditioning in the rooms. Hell, one side of the room gets Wifi while the other side doesn't. In the words of Liz, the bathroom looks like something right out of a Thai horror movie. So, you be the judge.

Anyway, things have been relatively comfortable so far, but I suppose a bulk of it is due to the fact that school hasn't started yet. I am surprised at how well I have adapted to this place actually, but I do suppose it will be another phase of getting used to thinks when the cold really comes. Either way, I've been doing grocery shopping, cooking, laundry, and a whole lot of other things that I, admittedly, don't normally do. I actually enjoy doing such things now that I think about it, though that is not to say that I want to remain in this place for a longer period of time than I should. There are reasons for me to want to go home, though I think I am resisting the homesick aspect of this journey rather well. If only I could bring people along with me for this trip, if only I could come home to someone other than my room mate. That'd make it so much more perfect than it already is.