The first thing that came into me as soon as I stepped out of that airplane was the cold air and the gentle breeze that was beardy there, it was two-degree celsius. After a 14 hour flight, I’m blessed to feel the solid ground again. After about an hour of waiting and lining, we finally got through the customs and stepped on American soil. That’s when the journey begins.
Well, we didn’t book any hotel or places to stay overnight, so it isn’t hard to imagine us stocked in an airport. Umm…I mean who hasn’t been stocked in an airport before, right? But on second thought this is not the way to start the journey, we went to the information desk for help and we decided to find ourselves a place to sleep. It was a rough night, but hey we found a place to settle down and got rest.
The next day we got on the bus to Champaign and found our way to the school and the way to our apartments. So, buses are definitely the main transportation for all students, and it’s a dollar for each ride but if you show your student ID to the driver then it’s free. Well, I won’t say it’s free, all the transportation fee is all included in our tuition so we still have to pay.
Once we were told about this information we decided to get our student ID done. Unlike in Taiwan, student ID’s are all made by the school and are sent to students all at once. Here we have to go to the student ID center to get it by ourselves, which in our case is located in our bookstore, all we have to do is to show the staff our identity documents and take a photo wait for three minutes and you get your student ID fresh. When I say “fresh” I really mean it, I was waiting and saw my ID printed in front of me, it was pretty cool I must say.
The other cool stuff has to wait for the semester begins……
當我踏出機艙門時，迎面而來的是陣陣微風和沁涼的空氣，當晚只有攝氏兩度。經過14個小時的長途飛行，我很珍惜再次踏上陸地的感覺。當晚飛機班次多，我們大概等了一個多小時過了海關，終於正式的踏進了美國領土。
我們出發前沒有訂任何飯店或住宿，所以我們飛到美國的第一個晚上就被困在機場了哈哈哈。但經我討論後我們決定去問問看附近有沒有飯店，經過一番坡折我們還是找了一間離機場蠻近的一間飯店住下。隔天我們做了開往香檳市的巴士前往校區。雖賢誒是經過了一翻坡折，但我們還是找到了我們住宿處順利入住。
公車在這邊絕對是學生黨的主要交通工具，坐一趟公車是一塊美金但是如果出示學生證是不用錢的。雖然說是不用錢，但其實這類的交通費是有包含在我們繳的學雜費裡所以嚴格縮起來也不是完全免費。後來經過一番詢問，我們決定是把自己的學生證搞到首位自己省點錢。不像在台灣，學生證是學校統一發放。在這邊學生證是要自己去申請的，在我們學校的書店裡面有一個專門辦理學生證的中心，只要人去出示身分證件並且拍張照再等個三分鐘你就可以獲得一張新鮮剛出爐多學生證。當我說新鮮剛出爐是真的只字面上的意思，我在等的時候是看著我的學生證被印出來的，我必須說這個體驗還是蠻酷的。
其他趣事還有待分享....