I survived. As I mentioned at the end of my last post, I was about to head out on one of the pre-orientation trips that UCLA's Anderson School of Management offers. I chose to go to Sequoia Forest for some rock climbing and hiking. All in all, the two nights (plus change) in the wilderness were fantastic.
Our group of about 12 split into two vans and left on a five-hour drive early on Friday morning. I must've lucked out because everyone in my car was into the same movies and television shows as me and we had a blast sharing our favorite lines and scenes. It definitely boded well for the trip, and school in general, I hope. After a lunch stop at a Mexican restaurant owned by an Anderson alum's family, we completed the last leg of the drive and reached Sequoia (side note: if you believe Wikipedia, which you clearly must, because anyone can write almost anything on it, refried beans are not, in fact, fried twice. It's an unfortunate mistranslation, especially since I love all fried foods and something fried twice must be heavenly. I had the chicken chimichangas, which is, of course, fried).
Anyway, once we got the campsite set up, we drove to a lookout to watch what we could of the sunset. As many of you probably know, nature in California seems inclined to burn from time to time (though I believe arson is to blame in this instance), and the smoke from the current wildfire obscured the view somewhat, or so I have been led to believe. Coming from Florida and New York, I'm not used to all the forms of natural disaster out here. Now that I am here, I realize, for instance, that I took for granted that the ground never moves back East. We'll see how I react when there's a tremble, which inevitably there will be. All I had to deal with was the occasional hurricane, and while I know such an event can be disastrous, the irony is I never missed a day of school in Florida due to one. However, classes were postponed during the first week of my freshman year at Columbia as a result of a storm. Go figure.
Moving on. On the first full day of the trip, we headed to our rock for some rappelling and climbing. I think if I participated in those activities everyday for the rest of my life, I still would be terrified each time. But, I'm a big believer in science, so I trusted the ropes and managed to contain my internal horror. That doesn't mean, though, that I didn't want to get my two feet back on the ground as soon as humanly possible. The next day, we took a short walk to see some ginormous Sequoias and had a dip at a swimming hole before heading back to LA. Like I wrote earlier, it was a great time full of adventure and more important, introductions to some of my future classmates. I highly recommend going on such a trip to all incoming first years in the future.
The only other somewhat official school related activity I partook in was a one-on-one counseling session at the Parker Career Management Center. I figured I should try and get an early start on tweaking my resume and utilizing the school's resources, and my meeting was incredibly helpful. I have faith that Anderson has many devoted and knowledgeable people working their tails off for us, and that definitely gives me a warm feeling in my cockles regions.
The day after I returned from the trip, though, my parents arrived, as they were kind enough to visit from Florida and help out with any last minute details I had to take care of before starting school. Tops on that list: finding an automobile. Car hunting must be the most frustrating activity on the face of the Earth. The whole, "Let me go talk to my manager" thing is insane. Let's just cut to the chase, buddy. I don't think anyone truly feels good about the experience when it's over, and I certainly don't. You see, while the Cash for Clunkers program appears to have been a huge success, it made finding a deal for me impossible. The dealerships had virtually nil inventory and were unwilling to negotiate. Who pays sticker price for a car, I asked? According to the salesman, I do, apparently. These guys did not care that in a couple months, they'd have a glut of cars that no one would want to buy, because right then, they had the upper hand. I guess I can't blame them, and I suppose it's a good lesson for business school: timing is everything. Never in a million years, during one of the worst recessions in history, when car companies are hemorrhaging money, did I think I'd get such a crummy deal. But hey, as I wrote in a previous post, it's LA and you need a car, so I sucked it up.
Speaking of cars in LA... I know we are all aware of it already, but it must be reiterated: the traffic in LA is awful. Truly horrific. Driving more than five minutes from my apartment in this city makes me want to pull a Biff and steal Doc Brown's DeLorean and travel back in time to slap Henry Ford around. Though, if I prevent the mass production of the Model T in the past, who knows if there'd be a DeLorean for me to steal in the future and then we hit one of those time paradoxes worthy of Lost. Point is, if you're moving out here from somewhere like New York City or just don't like crazy traffic, be prepared.
While the traffic can drive you insane, I did fight through it to Manhattan Beach, which was incredibly nice. It's just that I had to navigate the other motorists on the road to get there. Nevertheless, I somewhat understand why people love the area so much. We'll see if I become one of them over the course of the next two years. And that fun officially begins in a couple days with Orientation. More on that as the adventure ensues...