(Written subjectively by a first-year engineering student, who, after reading The Book 2024, decided to faithfully follow the 5th of the Ten Commandments, repeatedly putting off until the next day writing this article … until he couldn’t.)
My family and I drove from my hometown of Ottawa to Waterloo on August 30th, right before the big move-in day of August 31st. New place to live, new people, new school … new everything! Though I was not feeling it yet that night, I was actually terrified …
All that fear and anxiousness came to the surface on the morning of move-in day, on our way to St. Jerome’s University, where I would be living for the next 4 months while completing my first term of Chemical Engineering. As much as I could blab on and on about every single detail of what happened once I got there, I think it’s best to cut to the point: Orientation Week was AWESOME! This may sound cliché, but I would not be writing this if I did not get something invaluable from my first week at Waterloo: a good time. From Saturday to Friday, I had fun, and that’s something worth praising the organizers for.
St. Jerome’s (SJ), right from Saturday afternoon, had its own set of Orientation events, which were all really good. I got to meet my floormates, listened to inspirational speeches from SJ staff, had to wake up at 7:45AM to learn about how meals worked at the cafeteria (yeah, that one was as fun), had dance-offs and sing-offs, and played a bunch of fun games at a carnival. To be honest, while I did have much fun during that weekend, there was something missing, and it’s that I was not meeting many engineers, especially not other Chemical Engineers. Luckily, as if planned to perfection (and it kind of is), O-Week rectified this concern throughout the next 5 days.
Monday to Friday were the Engineering Orientation events. I particularly loved the theme of villains per colour, and they were a great way to spend the week. Especially on Monday and Thursday, I learned a bunch of new things about services at the university, Engineering at Waterloo, clubs, and got some really good advice from upper-year students in my program. Furthermore, I got finally got to meet other first-years in my program (who are now my classmates)! I was really happy to finally meet other Chemical Engineers, AND go see the To Be Honest musical. That musical was amazing! I loved it! I LOVED IT! I LOVED IT!!! And being a theater guy myself, after seeing it, I knew I had to get involved in a play this term!
The best two days in my opinion were Tuesday and Friday. Tuesday at 6 AM (oh boy…) was purpling, and though getting purple early in the morning was fun and watching other people get all purple was funny, waking up early and almost freezing to death in the cold air morning was … not as great. The best part of Tuesday was definitely the Earn Your Hard Hat events, where I impressed EdCom and Media to get some stickers for my Hard Hat. After getting through water balloon fights, crawling through mud, and going through an obstacle course ending in a slide that dirtied my shirt (I still haven’t washed it by the way, and I don’t think I ever will, just to keep it as a souvenir), I was super happy to get my Hard Hat and felt welcome into the Engineering community when going through the Bigs and Huges tunnel. By the time of Junkyard Wars though, I was EXHAUSTED, but it was still fun to work on all the projects, especially the sculpture and the catapult. As for Friday, there was ScavEng, which was hyper-fun simply because I got to interact with EdCom a lot more than the other days, and it was nice seeing them somewhat enjoy the things my team and other teams brought/showed them, and afterwards the Engineering Concert, a great event to cap off the week.
However, the real highlight of O-Week, for me, was (Boss) EdCom (Boss) (gotta be respectful, I’ve made the mistake of forgetting the Boss(es) and I promised I would never make it again!). The first time I saw them was right in the middle of a presentation during Intro to Eng, and I have to say … it was love at first sight. If they were trying to be scary when they took over the presentation room … they succeeded (I was scared). Of course, they were also SUPER COOL! From the outfit, to the voices, to their commanding presence and their elite vibes … and on top of that, when I learned that they were the top 2% of Engineering at Waterloo, handpicked by the Dean herself … I decided right then that I would work my butt off to one day be an EdCom! (Also, I just realized while writing this that if I get chosen to be an EdCom, I get to sleep for a whole year, which would probably be great since as an Engineering student, I probably won’t get much sleep during my academic terms…)
To conclude, I want to reiterate that I loved O-Week. The people I met, the events, (Boss) EdCom (Boss) … it was good. Really good. I keep those memories of early September close: in my heart, on my desk … and in my closet!
Since then? Well, I joined a bunch of clubs (perhaps too many), I keep up with my classes (which are surprisingly not so bad … 70% of the time), and I now have a goal I want to reach more than anything: becoming an EdCom!
Hopefully, I can start by surviving my first term (by the way, I’m in Stream 4).
EXZ, 1A CHE, signing out!
Leave a Reply