Orientation

Today was our first day of orientation! It was really nice to meet some of the other students in our group. However, there is one small problem... It's all girls! It's like being at St. Kate's again! It's not that big of a deal though... Caroline and I were discussing earlier that it would be nice to have some guys in our group so when we would go out at night we would have some extra "protection" at bars and clubs.

Orientation was a little boring though. We basically discussed expectations, rules, and safety. However, the safety part really freaked out me and Caroline! The director of our program talked to us about going out with a group of people at night (night just two) and that it's important to take the bus or a taxi once it gets really late into the night. He told us a story of how a young man and his girlfriend were exchange students and they were coming out of the metro station and the girl got robbed! The boyfriend chased after the thief and started to beat him. However, the thief had about 4 other "thief friends" in the metro station and the boyfriend got stabbed! (He ended up being okay though). I know our professor was just trying to tell us it's all about common sense... but it really did scare us!
After orientation, Caroline and I had lunch with two of the girls in our group. They were really nice. We spent most of lunch getting to know each other and talking about our families and our hometowns. We all really want to go to Paris so we are going to try to plan a weekend when we can all go together!

After lunch, Caroline and I walked around more then we returned home for dinner. We talked about safety with hour host mom too and she gave us tips on what to do and what neighborhoods to stay away from once it gets dark out.

Caroline and I went to that Irish pub again for drinks tonight after dinner. The pub is only about a block and a half away from our apartment... and after our "safety talk" today at orientation we did not want to venture out further! It was a lot of fun though, we stayed for a few hours and got to know each other even more.
Tomorrow is our second day of orientation and our director is going to take us around the city. Goodnight and I miss you all very, very much!!