Navigating the collegiate sea

These days, there seems to be a far more diverse bunch of “kids” attending Portland State. With the current financial climate and an increasing amount of social services allowing more and more people to pursue higher education, we have a greater range of people coming to our fair college. I transplanted here about two years ago, pursuing a career in law enforcement. After a year of going through the hiring process, the Sheriff’s Department lost all of their funding and laid me off before my first official day. This gave me the perfect opportunity to get my lazy butt back to college and finish the education I had started years before. I applied, got accepted and was ready for my first day. However, I quickly learned that my college experience was going to be considerably harder the second time around.

After applying to the college, I wanted to get my financial situation settled as promptly as possible since I was unemployed and quickly becoming desperate for money. I contacted the financial aid office and set up an appointment to get my money in order, filled out all the necessary paperwork and submitted it as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of assuming that the summer term was part of 2009 and filled out the wrong paperwork.

By the time I filled out the financial aid paperwork for the correct term and year, I was told that I would learn my award amount just days before school started. I therefore would have a mere matter of days to buy books, find a place to live, move in and get everything settled before my first day of class. But I got my money, found an amazing place to live in a fraternity house just off campus and was eager to begin my semester of Japanese.

Everything started off swimmingly: the class was great, separated into two smaller classes, which made the learning experience far more accessible and made me much happier. About a week into class, we discovered that there would be some construction occurring in our little corner of Neuberger Hall. This meant that we would be temporarily displaced while they worked on the floor. I had no clue that they would be spread out between three buildings, in different parts of the city!

Since the class was divided into three separate hours, they had to get a bit creative in where they would stick us while the construction was occurring. My first class hour was in Cramer Hall, my second being back in Neuberger Hall—in the Foreign Language Conference Room—and my final class hour switched between the Clay Building and Cramer Hall, alternating daily. After a week or so I got the rhythm down, until they changed it all over again. An update was posted on PSU’s Blackboard System, which I had never checked at that point, and I ended up sitting in Cramer Hall wondering where the hell everyone was. Classes had been temporarily moved back into Neuberger while they were doing some light construction in Cramer.

Aside from the brisk walk every day, trying to remember which building I was going to at a given hour, I was now enrolled in tutoring which was in the hour between classes, in the Clay Building. After a week of this, I really got to learn the layout of the school.

After being lost in school for five hours, having a class conducted entirely in Japanese, and having instructors staring blankly at me as I stare blankly back—not knowing what on earth they’re saying to me—playing guitar as loud and fast as I can was a great way to get that tension out. I have never been a fan of metal, but after running around like a rat in a maze, I learned to love angry music. To make things better, I ordered a new guitar pickup that would increase my “metal” output by 100 percent. It was ordered, paid for and shipped to arrive in two days. A week later, still no pickup. Ten days later, I embarked on an excursion to discover the location of my missing item.

A roommate told me that it was a common occurrence for mail sent to the fraternity to be sent randomly about the housing system since we were, in a sense, within the realm of campus housing. My first stop was the office of University Housing. I was then sent to the Ondine building just around the corner. Somehow I ended up at the Sixth Avenue Building, wandered in and was received with stoic stares of indifference. I wandered into Hot Lips Pizza and grabbed a bite to eat and asked the cashier where the Ondine building was. The cashier pointed at the building across the street. I could have sworn that it was the building I just walked out of. Frustrated, I left and stared at the building for a moment before tilting my head slightly up and seeing the gigantic “Ondine” sign at the top of the steps.

I entered the building, talked to the adorable receptionist, collected my once-lost item, and headed home. How it ended at a building with a completely different address is totally beyond me, but I am quite thankful that they kept it safe for a week before I discovered its location.

What did I learn through my ordeal? Aside from the fact this was the most interesting first impression I’ve ever had, I did reaffirm my love of Portland and its people. While I was adjusting to my classes and traversing the labyrinth of buildings and streets to get to my classes and track down my mail, every person I encountered along the way was more than obliging. I am glad to be in a place where I feel comfortable asking for assistance. I still need to bring the doom on my guitar once in a while, but it’s becoming more infrequent.