The past week has been a whirlwind of packing, airports, goodbyes, packing, driving, moving-in, unpacking, cleaning, classes, meeting new people, learning about contracts, talks by partners of Sonnenschein, almost fainting in 100+ weather, and stealing internet from neighbors and Starbucks. As you can see, I haven’t had much free time until now.

The apartment I moved in is in a beautiful, quiet, suburban community called Clayton. It’s purported to be the safest place in this area, roughly two miles away from the campus. The surrounding is laced with big, gorgeous houses that are mostly a combination of apartments and condos – something I have never seen before now. It’s not quite the same as the suburbs I’m used to, identical houses, perfectly manicured lawns, none of that. The old houses are curiously laced with spanking new corporate buildings – it’s a place of upper middle class WASPs, and Asians who are always obsessed with living in the safest and most reputable residential communities. Getting around without a car is a bit of a hassle, especially since I can’t get my Metro U pass which will give me free access to public transportation. That should, however, change once orientation rolls around in a couple of weeks.

Classes at Sonnenschein has been excellent. It’s a small seminar with exactly 20 students. We gather around a large conference table (in reality, several tables put together) on the 31st floor of the building – whose name I still cannot remember – with floor length windows overlooking the famous arch. There has already been a couple of mentions of jumping into the Mississippi from those windows. Classes ran for 4 hours, with one hour of dinner combined with speakers in between. The food has been good thus far, nothing to complain about especially since it’s free and they do a good job at avoiding repeats. Our instructor, Mr. Snell, is commendable for his humour and miraculously keeping all of us awake from 5 to 10pm every day. We just finished our week of contracts; the final was fun and slightly mind-boggling. I wish I had allowed myself a bit more time.

I still have yet to unpack my clothes, partly because I’ve been busy and partly because there not yet much room for me to unpack them to. But I should still go unpack some at least, I suppose.