New Friends and Baseball

No alarm clock needed for todays morning wake-up; sadly, I believe my body is adjusting to this no sleep schedule -.- In news writing, after finishing our first articles and publishing them here, we were told to walk outside around campus and interview people for a potential new story. Although we only talked to a few people, there was an incredibly sweet man on the corner of one of the streets that was handing out flowers, for free! He gave each one us a rose to take home - he said he was in it for the smiles on people’s faces. There need to be more people like him everywhere - he instantly became our friend.

                  

The second encounter of the day with the opportunity to make new friends was an activity we had to participate in called Dyadic Encounter. This was when each one of us was paired up with a member of another TA group, and we were told to ask each other a series of 26 questions and discuss our answers. The questions progressively got harder and ranged from topics such as “I’m happiest when…” to “I feel anxious when…” and so on. At first, I think it was natural to feel a little reserved and hesitant - this was a new person you just met and here you were supposed to reveal your personal thoughts and feelings with them. However, as the activity progressed farther on, my partner and I started getting the hang of it, we started relating more to each, and we ultimately felt  comfortable in sharing our personal opinions and thoughts with each other. I believe that the purpose of the activity was to demonstrate to all of us that meeting new people and making new friends isn’t meant to be difficult and shouldn’t hold us back from forming meaningful relationships. The girl I was paired up with, I had seen her around campus and had actually been intimidated by the idea of talking to her because she seemed so cool. That’s one personal thing I struggle: self-confidence. But, when we started talking, we realized we actually got along quite nicely and felt almost the same about almost all of the topics we discussed. She has also moved to three different countries and is European, just like I am! Speaking for myself, I believe this activity was proactive in that it demonstrated to us that with a little effort and faith in your abilities, a person can do well and overcome personal hurdles that hinder progress and growth.

The rest of the day was fun - our TA group took a trip into town and we first stopped to get ice cream in this shop called Cream, where you build your own ice cream sandwich. First you choose 2 cookies (making them different is even more fun!) and then you choose your ice cream filling. They even warm your cookies for you! It’s super messy, and super fun:) Afterwards, we hit up a local t-shirt shop called T-shirt Orgy, a name worthy of the city it is located in.

                                         

Next and final stop: AT&T Park to watch the SF Giants vs. the Brewers! This was my first ever baseball game and I was worried I was going to hate it. But, I was lucky enough to sit next to Carly who explained everything to me and before I knew it, I knew everything that was going on and was cheering and boo-ing with the best of them. I understand how innings work, strikes and outs, relieve pitchers, and so many other things I never thought I would understand. Much less enjoy learning about! I’ve never been a sports fan but baseball, I think I could get into it. Carly put it perfectly - “with any other sport, if you look away to chat, you miss so many things, but with baseball, that just doesn’t happen.” And it’s true that the game at first was disappointing, but towards the end, when they were neck in neck, I was on the edge of my seat. Although the Giants didn’t win, they played hard, and I had a great experience at my first ever baseball game.