The Welcome Party

Hello! It has been almost a month since school started, and I am sure many of you are still trying to catch up with classes; don't worry, I won't accuse you for submitting assignments at the last moment or being last to courses because you want to sleep just a little tiny more in the morning. In fact, I am here to share some fun that you might miss-- the Welcome Party that was held on Friday the 12th on campus. This event was organized by the International Office and Peer Leaders, and sponsored by the Associated Student Government, who all worked very hard to ensure that the party went well, and it really did!

It was a bright afternoon with nice breezes outside the pavilion. A huge number of 105 international students joined us for the celebration, which was a new record compared to the last couple years. There was lot of energy in the air. Not only did we introduce each of ourselves to others, we also experienced the combination of different cultures mixed together at once. With welcoming posters, lovely musics, delicious hamburgers and hotdogs, and of course, super exciting games and the hard works of our International peer leaders and ASG representatives, everyone seemed to have a positive feedback for the experience at the party.

One of my favorite parts of the Welcome Party was the game section. We had many native speakers and some professors participated in the games along with the International groups, therefore, it was a lot of fun to see how everyone was trying to be competitive and at the same time being polite to each other to show respects. The rising action, or what I call the "warm up", was when we played the Musical Chair. Players asked to stand in front of the chairs that were set up to be one less than the number of total participants; and as the music started, players would have to go around the chairs with dance movements or poses. As the music suddenly stopped, the players go as fast as they could to grab the chair closet to them.  Whoever didn't get a seat had to walk away with a sad face. With less or no intention of caring about their own appearances, people in the game were pushing or dragging each other off the seats to ensure that they can get to the next round, and some of them would stop at the seats that they were passing by for couple seconds as if the music stopped in the next moment, so they can hold on to their spots. Here are some pictures during the Musical Chair.