Week One
My first week in Philly was a lot of fun. I had come down to New Jersey after my exams ended, so coming to Philly was just a short drive. I met my roommates Zeel, Veena and Ankita on Sunday, and spent the next couple of hours unpacking. Later in the evening, I got in touch with Liz, the other DREU student coming to Drexel, and we explored the city (and got lost a couple times). Philly was very different from Duluth, being a much bigger and diverse city, and much warmer climate than Minnesota (thankfully!) Tuesday night, I visited Penn's landing with my roommate Zeel and her friends, Harsh and Ojas. Liz, Zeel and I went sightseeing over the weekend, but landed up shopping(not surprising with three girls out :P)
Week Two
I hung out with my roomates, and got to know their friends. We went out for ice cream at midnight, and they showed me some of the important buildings in Philly( like the Amtrak and Comcast building) and the Bridge over the Schyukull river..
Week Three
My roommate Zeel and her friend Ojas took me to their temple Dehrasur, about a half hour away from Philly. In celebration of the Temple's anniversary, they were going to present a play to all the temple visitors. We helped organize the lunch and the play, had a lot of fun, and met a lot of new people!
Week Four
This was graduation week! My roommate Ankita, and my friend Ojas were both graduating. the whole week we had a lot of fun, throwing them treats, having dinner together, and deciding what to wear to the ceremonies. On Monday, Ankita cooked us all a traditional Indian dinner and we gave her graduation gifts. We attended Drexel's Bio-medical engineering graduation dinner on Thursday, and attending the graduation walk on Saturday. Saturday night, we all got together to watch movies and a friend Anup, made us the yummiest strawberry tarts with whipped cream ever!
Week Five
We went to Atlantic city this weekend, and had a ton of fun on the beach...From getting soaked in the water, building sand castles, having a picnic lunch, playing volleyball, we did it all! Also, I gave Ojas a dinner treat, in honor of his graduation :) One of the days, after work, Zeel and I went for a walk along the Schuylkull river, and I discovered my favorite place in Philly...the Fairmont Park along the waterfall and lighthouses on the river, was very beautiful, and Zeel and i hope to come back to it one day for a picnic..
Week Six
Liz, Zeel and I visited the Baltimore national aquarium on Saturday! I was very excited about visiting Baltimore, since one of my favorite novels from a long time ago, was set near the harbor of Cheasapeake Bay. Zeel and I both wore our new white dresses for the occasion, and we all had a lot of fun looking at multitudes of jelly fish and dolphins..On Sunday, although we were exhausted from the previous day's trip, the three of us went shopping at Franklinn Mills, located about twenty minutes from University City. It has a lot of outlets, and we were pleased with the great deals we found!
Week Seven
This weekend we visited the Hershey's Chocolate World on Friday, and went to New York to see the July 4th Fireworks. We took a tour in Hershey's that showed us how chocolate is made, and the attended a chocolate tasting seminar, leaving with a Master's Degree in Chocolate Tastign from Hershey's University! Saturday was great, as we started the day by visiting the Statue of Liberty, followed by Times Square, the Empire State Building, Rockefeller Center, Central Park and finally the FDR drive, where we saw the most spectacular fireworks ever!
Week Eight
I finally visited the Philadelphia Art Museum with my roommate Zeel this Sunday! (Something I've been wanting to do since a long long time)..It was as wonderful as expected :) We later met up with some friends in New Jersey for dinner, played games and made a lot of noise in general. Since one of our friends, Monali, was leaving for India on Monday, we wanted to make the most of our time with her, and decided to stay up all night. We sat in the Buckley field (Drexel's football ground) and played truth or dare until 6 am, and had the most fun but yet embarrasing night ever :P
Week Nine & Ten
I spent most of these weeks saying good bye to my friends at lunches and dinners..I've had a great time in Philly, but now I can't wait to go back home to India for a month, since I'm going to be meeting my family and friends there after 8 long months :D