First Tourist Experience.

     We just got to the dorms a little bit ago and they seem very nice.  They are suite-style/dorm-style apartments.  Each apartment building has about three floors with two suites on each.  Each suite has 6 single rooms which are typical dorm rooms, there are 3 of us in my suite, with two other grad students I have yet to meet, and the 5 others are in the suite next door.  We also have a kitchen/living area with a fridge, stove, sink, and table.  There is also a shower room and small bathroom.  Everything seems very comfortable and I think that I will get used to it very fast.  They also have maids that come in once a week to clean.  My room has a lot of windows which is nice, so I think I’ll get a lot of sunlight hopefully.

     It is a little odd having to go get our own food, especially when we are still a little unsure one where to get it, but I’m sure in one or two days we will be pros.  We went to Riverwalk today to get groceries and have a ladies night at Linga Longa.  The cocktails were good and were only about the equivalent of 2 USD.  The food was okay, but apparently they have the best ribs for cheap on Tuesdays.  Grocery shopping was not what we had hoped and ended up being much more confusing than we had thought.  We attempted to share everything and divide the cost, which turned out to be a very long process.  The store didn’t have sandwich meat which was a little odd.

     Taxis were a disaster.  After I attempted to call for two taxis twice, and was hung up on twice, we finally were able to get through and have two meet us outside of Linga Longa in what we thought would be 20-40 minutes.  We got a call 20 minutes later saying to go outside, no taxis in sight.  A group of men asked us if we were getting a taxi, so thinking that was ours we said yes and went towards them.  They tried to help us with all of our bags and seemed a bit off.  Finally we realized that they were scamming us, so we asked them to drive their cars up so we didn’t have to walk.  Turns out they were pirating and didn’t have real licenses, which is illegal.  Finally our cabs showed up and for some reason they were in a huge hurry so we just had to jump in.  We were told it would be 20 Pula…it was 40 and 30.

     So, now we know to look out for scams and to not trust people so readily.  And to probably not get groceries at 9pm.  Nothing like feeling like a true tourist.

     Other than that, I am excited to cook big dinners together and have roommates, I think it will go well.

A full 6 hour day of class starts tomorrow, so we will see how it goes.