Enloe Excursion
Okay, now this actually happened on Thursday, but I haven't gotten around to writing this up until today. Now, school starts on Tuesday, which is the day after tomorrow, and I have mixed feelings about that, but I'll talk about that later. This is the open house that I went to Thursday, to walk around my school and figure out my travel route, as it's more complicated that one might think.
The open house starts at 6:00 so we decide to leave the house at 5:20. Eventually we get there and we see lots of people parked on the side of the road. We then pull up to some guy, a volunteer dude who is helping to keep the parking lot in order, he tells us all the parking spots are full here, so we can either park on the side of the road, or go down to the west campus parking lot. Well the beginning in the open house is in the west campus auditorium, so we go down and park on the side of the road next to the west campus. We go in and lots of people are already there, but more people are coming in. After fighting our way through the crowd, we reach the auditorium at last. As we entered, some student volunteer person told us to fill in the front row first, but naturally mom wants to sit in the back, and NATURALLY she didn't see the OTHER student volunteer standing right next to her, who then tells us to fill in the front. Mom, however, wants to make a quick get away, so we decide to stand in the back and wait.
Eventually the head principle of the school comes up and starts talking, as we find some nice seats in the very back to sit in, and without the stupid student volunteers getting onto us. The guy starts talking about "You should be proud to be an eagle" and "enloe is the best" ya know, standard principle stuff. Mom however wants to go with 15 minutes left of the presentation, and go to the homeroom ahead of time. So we bail out, I tell a bunch of people to get out of the way or else... okay, I just say, "excuse me" and pushed through. We walk halfway across the west campus, then go out the back doors by the caffeteria, it turns out there are lots of people bailing out of that presentation. So we trudge down the slope, there was construction going on near by, so lots of debris, and we go down to those portable buildings (pods) where my homeroom is located.
I actually have two homeroom teachers (don't have my shedule at the moment, so I forget their names) one primary one, and one assistant one. We write our names down, and we start talking. Turns out there are about 2,400 students at the school, and mom tells them I come from a school of 35. They're pretty surprised about that. Eventually, some more people start coming in, so mom and I sit down. We look around, and mom says that she had to elbow somebody out of the way to get out of the auditorium. I ask her what she means, and she tells me I told some kid to move, and apparently he had this bewildered look on his face because of my deep voice, then mom comes by and says, "excuse me!" then pushes him out of the way. She says just enough to push him but not enough to remember her. Then I remind her that he could just as well pull a knife on me!!! Oh well, after a short briefing about the school and some questions, he lets us go, much to the student council representative's dismay, as he wanted to play some Enloe Bingo or something...
Okay, now this is where we spent most of our time, walking around. My first class, honors geometry, is in east campus, we are on the far side of the west campus, so time to walk. Because of her bad sense of direction, mom had put me in charge of the map and navigation, as she always had it turned the wrong. So, after walking for about five minutes, stopping periodically, we end up out of that building, walk down the rather long path, then end up in the east campus building. Found my geometry room, now onto chemistry, on the other side of the school. We start walking at about a normal pace, weaving in and out of the crowds, and end up near the chemistry room in almost 2-3 minutes. Mom asks me what my next class is, I tell her healthful living/gym, and it's all the way in the far end of the west campus, we're far end of the east one. Mom gives a sigh, and tells me to find my next class, Magnet Debate: intro to forensics. We soon find that way, but I mention I don't know if I can make it from chemistry to the WEST CAMPUS GYM in 7 minutes. So a teacher walks up to us, we were standing right outside his door.
This teacher turns out to be the chemistry teacher, and old black man, but still seems like a pretty cool guy. He traces his finger around a back way, through a large bunch of blank space on the map, which is behind the school. He says there's a back door near the chemistry hall, which I can take, down near the parking lot, then cut across the back of the campus via a small path, then around the west campus to the gym, then I can backtrack to that hall again for debate. Mom wants to go check it out, as do I, so we both go. We exit the east wing from the side, then walk down to the parking lot. We then see if we can locate the back door. We walk around, then we see a door, we go up to it, and it's really an entrance to some back room. Not our door. Then we continue walking until all we see before us are some pods and a bunch of trees. There's another door which we take, but it's the wrong door AGAIN, but closer, we need to continue. Past the pods was a small sidewalk, which led up to the back door of the chemistry hall, that's the door I'll need to go out for 3rd period and into for 4th period.
Now, time to trace my trail, we beging to go back down the hill, followed by two girls on cell phones who left the back door. As we get to the parking lot at the bottom of the hill, we see two or three people emerging from the trees. We go up closer, to see a small dirt trail, covered with stones (as gravel). A man comes out off the trail, looks at the map, and speaks to his daughter saying, "yup, this will shave a lot of time off." It turns out I'm not the only one who needs to cut across the back way. We go down the rather steep and loose path, almost slipping from the rocks, then up some stairs, to some new pods on the west building. It's easier to see the trail from the west building than from the east building, so no wonder other people found it more easily.
As we orient ourself, this pretty big man, about 6'4" or something, walks up to us and asks if we need help. He then tells us there are two ways to get to the gym from there: I can go inside, loop around then go into the gym, or I can go around the outside of that building with the loop, then come around to the gym. We decide to go around the outside, we continue on through the back of the west building to the gym. Next we go around the inside route to see the times; the outside route is much faster. So, I'll be cutting around the back of the two campi to get from 2nd to 3rd and from 3rd to 4th. That's nice, I'll be going along the trail where people hang out in the back and sell drugs and all that pleasant stuff -_- joy.
We then go to see my Japanese classroom, and I meet my teacher, she's glad I know over half the hiragana chart already, and I know the full katakana chart. Though as I suspected, we'll be doing the hiragana first, so we can also read and write sentences we learn, which is still fine with me, I'm very excited about that. Then we leave that room, and we find out from yet another student volunteer (they're EVERYWHERE, litterally, bugging you about whether you need help or not) and she tells us you can either eat lunch in the caffeteria, all the way in the west wing (my god, my classes after lunch are in the east, another hike) OR I can eat on the breezeway, that path (not the hidden one) between the two buildings. So I'll probably bring my lunch the first couple of days. Then we forget about my last two classes, I'll have to find them on my own I guess, somewhere in the east wing, and leave.
In the car on the way back, mom suddently exclaims, "Oh my gosh, I totally forgot about rain. Well, if it rains you're just going to have to go the inside route to get to gym, who cares if you're late?" She obvioulsy didn't see the part in the little booklet "... tardyness in class can result in detention." I guess since school gets out at 2:15 they'd probably keep me until 4... that's how long I stayed after school last year... then again that may NOT be as long they keep you. Oh well, we'll see... we'll see...
Okay, now just last night, I was talking to a friend of mine by the name of Scott, whom I met at a video game design class last summer (like, last year) and we just talk online sometimes. Well last night, he sent me an IM that said, "hey, when do you have lunch?" I told him, and he said, "yeah, me too I think." Then I said, "you're going to Enloe?!" He said he was, and we should meet for lunch or something. We set up a rendezvous point (I only know how to spell it by pronouncing it phoenetically) and I said if he was lying I'd kill him. Well not really, but I wouldn't feel too great. And that wraps up my Enloe Excusion.
The open house starts at 6:00 so we decide to leave the house at 5:20. Eventually we get there and we see lots of people parked on the side of the road. We then pull up to some guy, a volunteer dude who is helping to keep the parking lot in order, he tells us all the parking spots are full here, so we can either park on the side of the road, or go down to the west campus parking lot. Well the beginning in the open house is in the west campus auditorium, so we go down and park on the side of the road next to the west campus. We go in and lots of people are already there, but more people are coming in. After fighting our way through the crowd, we reach the auditorium at last. As we entered, some student volunteer person told us to fill in the front row first, but naturally mom wants to sit in the back, and NATURALLY she didn't see the OTHER student volunteer standing right next to her, who then tells us to fill in the front. Mom, however, wants to make a quick get away, so we decide to stand in the back and wait.
Eventually the head principle of the school comes up and starts talking, as we find some nice seats in the very back to sit in, and without the stupid student volunteers getting onto us. The guy starts talking about "You should be proud to be an eagle" and "enloe is the best" ya know, standard principle stuff. Mom however wants to go with 15 minutes left of the presentation, and go to the homeroom ahead of time. So we bail out, I tell a bunch of people to get out of the way or else... okay, I just say, "excuse me" and pushed through. We walk halfway across the west campus, then go out the back doors by the caffeteria, it turns out there are lots of people bailing out of that presentation. So we trudge down the slope, there was construction going on near by, so lots of debris, and we go down to those portable buildings (pods) where my homeroom is located.
I actually have two homeroom teachers (don't have my shedule at the moment, so I forget their names) one primary one, and one assistant one. We write our names down, and we start talking. Turns out there are about 2,400 students at the school, and mom tells them I come from a school of 35. They're pretty surprised about that. Eventually, some more people start coming in, so mom and I sit down. We look around, and mom says that she had to elbow somebody out of the way to get out of the auditorium. I ask her what she means, and she tells me I told some kid to move, and apparently he had this bewildered look on his face because of my deep voice, then mom comes by and says, "excuse me!" then pushes him out of the way. She says just enough to push him but not enough to remember her. Then I remind her that he could just as well pull a knife on me!!! Oh well, after a short briefing about the school and some questions, he lets us go, much to the student council representative's dismay, as he wanted to play some Enloe Bingo or something...
Okay, now this is where we spent most of our time, walking around. My first class, honors geometry, is in east campus, we are on the far side of the west campus, so time to walk. Because of her bad sense of direction, mom had put me in charge of the map and navigation, as she always had it turned the wrong. So, after walking for about five minutes, stopping periodically, we end up out of that building, walk down the rather long path, then end up in the east campus building. Found my geometry room, now onto chemistry, on the other side of the school. We start walking at about a normal pace, weaving in and out of the crowds, and end up near the chemistry room in almost 2-3 minutes. Mom asks me what my next class is, I tell her healthful living/gym, and it's all the way in the far end of the west campus, we're far end of the east one. Mom gives a sigh, and tells me to find my next class, Magnet Debate: intro to forensics. We soon find that way, but I mention I don't know if I can make it from chemistry to the WEST CAMPUS GYM in 7 minutes. So a teacher walks up to us, we were standing right outside his door.
This teacher turns out to be the chemistry teacher, and old black man, but still seems like a pretty cool guy. He traces his finger around a back way, through a large bunch of blank space on the map, which is behind the school. He says there's a back door near the chemistry hall, which I can take, down near the parking lot, then cut across the back of the campus via a small path, then around the west campus to the gym, then I can backtrack to that hall again for debate. Mom wants to go check it out, as do I, so we both go. We exit the east wing from the side, then walk down to the parking lot. We then see if we can locate the back door. We walk around, then we see a door, we go up to it, and it's really an entrance to some back room. Not our door. Then we continue walking until all we see before us are some pods and a bunch of trees. There's another door which we take, but it's the wrong door AGAIN, but closer, we need to continue. Past the pods was a small sidewalk, which led up to the back door of the chemistry hall, that's the door I'll need to go out for 3rd period and into for 4th period.
Now, time to trace my trail, we beging to go back down the hill, followed by two girls on cell phones who left the back door. As we get to the parking lot at the bottom of the hill, we see two or three people emerging from the trees. We go up closer, to see a small dirt trail, covered with stones (as gravel). A man comes out off the trail, looks at the map, and speaks to his daughter saying, "yup, this will shave a lot of time off." It turns out I'm not the only one who needs to cut across the back way. We go down the rather steep and loose path, almost slipping from the rocks, then up some stairs, to some new pods on the west building. It's easier to see the trail from the west building than from the east building, so no wonder other people found it more easily.
As we orient ourself, this pretty big man, about 6'4" or something, walks up to us and asks if we need help. He then tells us there are two ways to get to the gym from there: I can go inside, loop around then go into the gym, or I can go around the outside of that building with the loop, then come around to the gym. We decide to go around the outside, we continue on through the back of the west building to the gym. Next we go around the inside route to see the times; the outside route is much faster. So, I'll be cutting around the back of the two campi to get from 2nd to 3rd and from 3rd to 4th. That's nice, I'll be going along the trail where people hang out in the back and sell drugs and all that pleasant stuff -_- joy.
We then go to see my Japanese classroom, and I meet my teacher, she's glad I know over half the hiragana chart already, and I know the full katakana chart. Though as I suspected, we'll be doing the hiragana first, so we can also read and write sentences we learn, which is still fine with me, I'm very excited about that. Then we leave that room, and we find out from yet another student volunteer (they're EVERYWHERE, litterally, bugging you about whether you need help or not) and she tells us you can either eat lunch in the caffeteria, all the way in the west wing (my god, my classes after lunch are in the east, another hike) OR I can eat on the breezeway, that path (not the hidden one) between the two buildings. So I'll probably bring my lunch the first couple of days. Then we forget about my last two classes, I'll have to find them on my own I guess, somewhere in the east wing, and leave.
In the car on the way back, mom suddently exclaims, "Oh my gosh, I totally forgot about rain. Well, if it rains you're just going to have to go the inside route to get to gym, who cares if you're late?" She obvioulsy didn't see the part in the little booklet "... tardyness in class can result in detention." I guess since school gets out at 2:15 they'd probably keep me until 4... that's how long I stayed after school last year... then again that may NOT be as long they keep you. Oh well, we'll see... we'll see...
Okay, now just last night, I was talking to a friend of mine by the name of Scott, whom I met at a video game design class last summer (like, last year) and we just talk online sometimes. Well last night, he sent me an IM that said, "hey, when do you have lunch?" I told him, and he said, "yeah, me too I think." Then I said, "you're going to Enloe?!" He said he was, and we should meet for lunch or something. We set up a rendezvous point (I only know how to spell it by pronouncing it phoenetically) and I said if he was lying I'd kill him. Well not really, but I wouldn't feel too great. And that wraps up my Enloe Excusion.
posted by JustAGuy @ 6:50 PM
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