Hey Readers!

The Spring 2007 semester is officially rolling, and believe me, I am just trying to stay with it. Time is flying this semester, and Speedweeks is again upon Daytona Beach. I have to say, the second time around is a lot easier than last year. Though I no longer have my beloved view of the speedway from my room, it still has its excitement factor.

Speaking of excitement, Embry-Riddle’s delegate of RAs rocked this year’s Florida Resident Advisor Seminar! The theme was the FRAScar’s (think Academy Awards) and we were well prepared and represented our school very well. Though we didn’t take home the Spirit Cup, (congratulations go out to the University of West Florida) we did bring home the “Most Punctual” award. (oh… joy) We had an amazing time though, and I cannot wait for next year’s seminar, in nice, sunny, Miami! I am counting the days from now.

A picture of us delegates. Yes I am the tallest person in the back. I am defined as that person in group pictures.

OK, classes are picking up and going really well. I had tests in four of my five classes this past week, and didn’t do badly on any of them. I didn’t expect to do badly, but when you have four tests in five school days, it is easy to neglect studying for one, and do a bit worse on it than on the others. I have my last of the first tests next week, and it is a milestone, because it is my first college full essay test. I am so pumped, but since it is in Air Cargo Management, it is a LOT of information. Studying will be done on this upcoming 3 day weekend.

I have also done quite a few more larger assignments than normal this semester. Most of them have been in my Business Information Systems class, because we research a lot of terms and theories, along with newer technology. I have gotten used to it, and it so refreshing not to have daily homework assignments. (I have always had a homework issue, mainly questioning the necessity of it.)

On the SGA front, we are transitioning to a new chairperson of the Student Representative Board. Our former Vice President had to resign for personal reasons, and we internally elected Shawn Storey, who ironically is one of my residents, and former Residence Life Representative, to take the position. We are becoming organized and beginning to grow into a team. Lots of good things are being done everyone, such as continuing the new shuttle service to Orlando International, which more students use than Daytona International. Personally, I am working on creating an umbrella organization for all of our cultural clubs on campus, in order for them to pool their resources and put on a great display of the diversity our campus holds. Additionally, I am working on finding a women’s speaker to bring to campus, along with talking to our new Women’s center, to find ways to make the gender differences on campus, not so much of a difference.

Another thing the SGA did was put on a faculty and staff appreciation dinner to thank everyone for the work they did putting our school back together after the tornado. It was well attended, and I can honestly say, students are extremely grateful to be back in class, having only lost three class days. ERAU has to have one of the hardest working and dedicated faculty and staff in the country.

One of the cooler things I recently did was interview prospective RA candidates for next year. It was a really great experience and the 15 candidates I met were all interesting and great in very different ways. Though all of them could not move on to another interview, I hope it was still a fulfilling experience for all of them too.

My life as an RA has taken over everything. Besides all those duties, I now am a part of the Spring Housing Banquet Committee, helping to plan, you guessed it, our Spring Banquet. It is going to be at a banquet hall in the airport, and should be amazing. Pictures will come in my last entry of this year. I promise.

Well, to wrap things up, I hope all of you are ready for Embry-Riddle, whether it be in the fall, next spring, or 5 years from now. It is a great place to be. Work hard now, the fun and even harder work begins later!

Always loading you up with the info,
Carlos

Happy 2007 Readers!!!!

Wow, what an end to last semester/beginning to this semester! There’s so much that has happened to the school. By now, you all know of the tornado that did quite a lot of damage to the school on Christmas Day. I guess I have to start with that.

I got home Christmas night after dinner with my family to the questions from friends, “Did you hear what happened at school?” I hadn’t and was stunned to hear that a tornado tore up the buildings and the planes on campus that afternoon. It is truly a testament to the information age that this information and hundreds of pictures had traveled global in the small number of hours since the disaster. But what could be deemed a disaster area, quickly turned into a recovery area. Within days, a large amount of debris had been cleaned up, and the school was posting daily updates on erau.edu, and Associate Dean of Students Paul Bell was keeping the students updated with more detail on the social network Facebook.com.

Classes were pushed back to January 16, 2007, and students were encouraged not to return to campus for as long as possible. Though classes were delayed, the residence halls reopened as scheduled, meaning that I, as an RA, came back to Daytona Beach as scheduled for spring training.

I must digress to the end of the fall semester. Classes ended wonderfully, and my grades were ok. I’m gonna try and put forth that extra effort in some of the more boring classes this semester, but I don’t really have many boring classes this spring. Last semester, I got so much accomplished as an RA, and I’m beginning to work on a huge project for student government. EagleBay stalled, and I am going to choose to let our IT department focus on other important aspects this semester, because things are definitely hectic over there while they are helping with the relocation of many offices that were in the now defunct Spruance Hall. So I’m formulating a project this semester to make our newly adopted Honor Code into something tangible. That’s going to be a lot of work, and a lot of typing at my computer.

Just a quick mention of this year’s Task Force One. They did an amazing job at their fall event, Winterpalooza. They have the manpower to do amazing things this year, and their event was very well attended and I had a ton of fun. Hopefully you will join TFO in your first year here. They do great things.

Ok, let’s move to the present. My classes this semester are, Microeconomics (EC210), Business Information Systems (BA320), Managerial Accounting (BA312), Air Cargo Management (BA410) and continuing my Aviation Safety minor with Human Factors in Aviation (SF320). The Air Cargo Management class really excites me because it is the first course in my area of concentration, Airline Management. I’m finally going to be learning something that I’m not just going to use the skills in the future, but everything that I learn will be directly applicable to my career. Classes may be tough this semester, but I am going to thrive on them.

My life as a resident advisor is going well. I had quite a number of residents graduate last semester, and some left for other reasons, so about a fifth of my residents are new to the hall. One thing I tried to do a lot last semester was go crazy on decorations for my hall. Our holiday light display was amazing according to other halls. This semester, one of my residents, Corinne, helped me come up with a theme for the hallway, along with a crazy, extravagant, design. Though I have been keeping the theme a secret from other halls, I trust that none of you will tell them, so the theme is “Under the Sea.” Pictures will come. I guarantee it. I can do that because I have a nice new 10 mega pixel camera that I got over break. It is amazing. The only drawback is that each picture is about 3 megabytes. That makes them very hard to email.

I took a lot of pictures and video over winter break and pretty soon, I am going to make a video of all the pictures and footage and post it on YouTube. I think that site is a really good sign of where our world is going and how much it’s changed in recent years. When Time Magazine’s person of the year is “You” you know how much technology, mainly uploading, has helped to flatten the world for our generation (Read The World Is Flat, by Thomas Friedman, especially all the future Aviation Business Majors.)

To close out winter break, I want to say hi to all my friends from home who made this the best break ever. I know some of them read this, and I like to acknowledge people in these journals (free of charge, shoot me an email.) so thanks to all of them for being so supportive of me and caring so much about the state of my school.

As we preview my next entry, there are things I am looking forward to. In less than two weeks, I will be attending the Florida Resident Advisor Seminar, on the campus of the University of Central Florida. It is going to be so cool to represent Embry-Riddle’s RA staff, and I really hope that above all the cheering that will be done that weekend, our cheers are the loudest, and our school spirit shows through. I mean, we had a tornado hit our school, and we only sacrificed three class days. Embry-Riddle is an amazing place to be.

In closing, I want to note something I learned from Dr. Thomas Connolly, chancellor of the Daytona Beach Campus. Through all the turmoil and destruction that occurred during the 60 seconds of the tornado’s trip across campus, and the minutes, hours, days and weeks following in the cleanup, no one has been hurt. I think we are all thankful for that.

Until Next Time Guys and Gals,
Carlos

P.S. If you emailed me in December and I didn’t get back to you, I’m really sorry. I was so busy with projects and papers, and if you email me again, I will be more than happy to send you a reply!

Hey Readers,

It has been such a long while, and I apologize, so many things have buried me in Microsoft Word and Excel, I have been tons of places around campus, and I have been working on things for my residents. The upside to this is, you now get to read about all the things that I have done!

I’m going to categorized this and then sort it in chronological order, so you’ll be going back to three weeks ago after you read about something that happened yesterday, so also forgive me for that.

Student Government has been absolutely amazing the past few weeks. Representing the College of Business is a really tough job, but compared to the representatives of the other colleges, I know most of the people I represent and I am beginning to see the effects on them personally. During the week of Homecoming, (October 23-28) big things were happening with the COB. First and foremost, the administration hosted a huge groundbreaking ceremony for the new academic building that will house the College of Business. It will be a two floor complex, having lots of space for the offices of all my professors, who are now spread around what we call alphabet soup, but more officially know as the Lindbergh Academic Complex. It is a bunch of buildings with letters as their names, hence the soup analogy. Anyways, the new building is coming along well; the foundation is pretty much starting to be laid. I will keep you updated, and when there is something to take a picture of, you will be the first to see it.

The College of Business Industry Advisory Board was also around during the week of homecoming, the highlight of which was a panel discussion in which 90 students attended. They offered great insight on where the industry is headed, if companies are hiring and how the growing economy is benefiting the aerospace industry. I also got to spend some time with them at a dinner for them, the staff, COB administration and selected students at Daytona USA. It was an amazing experience, getting to know them and building contacts with all of them.

More recently, along with my partner in crime (fellow COB rep) Evan, we hosted the fall COB social, a lunch for all the students in the COB, to get out and meet the professors, and for business focused clubs to show off. We got about 54 students to show up, a huge accomplishment! Free food drew them out, but the social was so successful and the spring social should be even bigger.

Moving on to my 24/7 position, residence life is going great. I have really gotten to know my residents over the past couple weeks, and we’ve been having fun and getting through this semester. We have been doing lots of things, such as decorating the hall, going to events on campus. Just this past Sunday, I hosted an early Thanksgiving pizza dinner, in which to get a slice of pizza you had to say what you were thankful for. I heard a plethora of responses, from being thankful for Pizza, to being thankful for a fiance, and even thankful for such a great RA. As much I appreciated that, I still have Health and Safety Inspections this week. (Some of my residents read this consider yourself informed).

A really fun thing I did during Homecoming was being a student host for Open House. I hope some of you made it down here for it, because from what I saw and heard, some great information was given out and people were drawn to the school. Of course, I had my speech, and of course I blundered when I left out a crucial word. Please if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to stop me. (Kinda left out the hesitate part) It was really fun though giving tours and answering questions and I got to be on a COB student panel.

Classes are wrapping up and I’m doing really well! I have been really happy about the classes I chose, most especially Corporate Finance. It is such a cool thing to learn how to value stocks and bonds, and what everything on Wall Street actually means. I got a 97 on my most recent test, which surprised me, but a group study session the day before really helped me and everyone in the group. Decision Math, my last ever math class is really cool. It is the reason I have been buried in Excel forever. Figuring multiple linear regressions by hand isn’t really my idea of a good time. Excel handles it for you, but you still have to enter tons of data, and run the programs, and then my very excited professor makes you interpret all the output and formulate tests to see if the things Excel gave you are useful.

Thanksgiving approaches and that means there are lots of things coming up. This weekend, I will be attending my second Independent Colleges and Universities of Florida Student Alliance (ICUF SA) Conference. It is composed of most of the student governments of the private colleges and universities in Florida. It takes place in Orlando, and should be really beneficial for everyone involved. I will get you update in my next entry.

The next thing after that is I will begin announcing the ERAU Hockey Team’s home games. This is a work in process and the first game I do will be after Thanksgiving, so excitement is building for it.

Ok so finish your college apps, and hope to see you all soon. Don’t HESITATE to Email me at Carlos.Williams@erau.edu, and I will respond to you ASAP.

Aim High,
Carlos

Hey Readers,

Surprisingly, I’m back! I was so excited when I found out I would be back for yet another year as a journal writer. So much has happened since the last time I wrote an entry, such as summer, RA training, and the first month of school. I’ll just jump right into it.

Summer was full of old friends, my own apartment in Harlem, working at a restaurant, and just having a huge vacation. It was a great experience, and I needed a break from college stresses, so although some of you may be tempted to take classes in the summer, it has its benefits (reduced rate per credit hour) but nothing beats going home after 9 months away from home.

I was back in Daytona on August 12th, the earliest I have ever been in a school setting. I had come back this early for Resident Advisor (RA) training. I was here for two weeks preparing for the arrival of all our residents, new and returning. It was a really good week and a half, filled with ups and downs. Getting to interact with the full RA and RD staff really built a sense of community, and we became a really big, slightly dysfunctional, but loving family. The culmination of this was RA Camp up in Ocala National Forest, where we spent 3 days playing games, getting to know each other further, canoeing, competing and overall team building.

RA life has been good to me thus far. I live in O’Connor Hall, a hall comprised mostly of upperclassmen, but surprised as I was, 10 first-year students were assigned to my wing this year. RA’s at this school are not the stereotypical RAs you see in movies, as we are not out to get you. We’re there for a lot more educational and social development purposes, but in order to get to that, safety is the primary concern. This campus is one of the safest in Florida, so we do not have too many issues with that.

The next aspect of coming back was interviewing to be on the Student Representative Board in our Student Government Association. Well, the interview must have gone pretty well, because I was named the newest Student Rep for the College Of Business. It has been an amazing experience so far, and I’m doing so much. I sit on the Progress Committee and the Environmental Awareness Committee. On both, we are accomplishing many things and I look forward to telling you about them all year.

One of the projects I am currently working on is EagleBay (temporary name). It would be an EBay type website for the Daytona Campus. I am currently trying to work out all the business aspects of it, such as finding a partner to accept payments and getting it up and running through the school’s system, so our student money accounts (Eagle Dollars) may be accepted. This is very much in its beginning stages, so you’ll be along for the ride all year long.

I shall now get to the reason we are all here. Classes this year have been so amazing, because now I get to learning things that are more specific to my major, Aviation Business Administration and my newly declared minor, Aviation Safety. My classes this semester are Organizational Behavior (BA 317), Corporate Finance (BA 332), Business Communication (COM 222), Decision Math (MA 320) and Intro to Aviation Safety (SF 210). My favorite class is by far Corporate Finance. My instructor is amazing in taking what could be a relatively boring subject and captivating us all, and really making us think about money in a new light, especially for the students who are looking to get into upper management of a corporation. Intro to Aviation Safety is my most interesting class. Learning the beginnings of how safety is evaluated, regulated and preserved is quite fun and I really like the things I am learning.

Finally, for this first entry, I want to tell you about our open house this year. It is October 27th, during Homecoming weekend. It will be a really fun time with tours, information and speeches. One of those speakers will be me, but that shouldn’t be the only reason you come. I hope to see you all here in a couple weeks, and keep your grades up!

Until Next Time,

Carlos

Hey Readers!!!!!!

Preview weekend. This weekend. Be here!!! I can’t wait. Spring Splash and the Block Party are going to be amazing. Let me give you a bit of a schedule. The big splash begins at 12pm on Saturday. You can get food and information on what you can involve yourself in during your time at Embry-Riddle. We will have a belly-flop contest at 1pm, hosted by yours truly. At 2pm, we will have a dive contest, and at 3pm we have the bathing suit contest. You are absolutely eligible to win any of these contests and the prizes that come along with them! Bring your swim attire! I bet you will have the time of your life on Saturday and it truly gives you an idea of what Riddle is like. Also, this is our last chance to get into our pool until Spring ’07 because in a couple weeks it will be closed so that the building next to it can be torn down and rebuilt as a new fitness center.

Construction will be the theme of the next few years on the Daytona Beach Campus. As our university expands, so will our buildings. The College of Business is getting a building built for them starting this fall. This makes me extremely happy, because as our program gets to be nationally recognized, we will have a huge state of the art building to go along with it and that can only make the program stronger! The flight line is also getting some reconstruction along with some of our buildings in the academic complex (you will come to know it as alphabet soup).

Tomorrow is a huge day for the future of Task Force One. The proposed amendment of the SGA constitution including TFO as a member will be voted upon. I’m really excited about that, because the work we put in this year will hopefully pay off for you guys and gals, the future members of TFO. Just to paraphrase something in our constitution, every first year student is a member of Task Force One, whether they attend meetings or not. Task Force One serves the first year student body, so take advantage of it!!!

Classes are going great, I think. My grades are still on the rise, but I still have some projects to do, and once those are completed, I can let you know my standing a whole lot better! I’m only really worried about one class, Managerial Accounting, because it is just really, really hard to focus in a class which I have no interest in using beyond the class. But I suppose I will use it, otherwise I wouldn’t have to take it. We’ll see.

In closing this journal, I must acknowledge the fact that I have either one or two entries left. I hope this year has been as amazing for you as it has been for me. I will begin to wrap the year up in my next entry, and if I have another after that, it will be a sad, sad entry as I cry my way out of the most interesting thing I have ever had to do.

Well, Hopefully I’ll see you Saturday,

Let me know if you read my journals,
Carlos

Hey Readers!

It’s been a while (oops) and I have sooo much to catch you guys and gals up on. First, we shall talk about something I hope you are all interested in. Spring Splash ’06 has gotten blown way, way up! April 8th, all of you incoming students should be here for your open house, and part of that is the 2nd Annual Spring Splash presented by Task Force One, AND The Spring Block Party, presented by the Embry-Riddle Resident Students Association (ERRSA), which all of you will be mandated to be a part of your first year at ERAU, by virtue of living in the residence halls. So after you get through reading the long names on the signs, you can check out all of the fun activities and contests going on, grab some food (we have BBQ and catered subs.) We also will have some tables with people who can explain some of the activities for you to do here at ERAU. Of course Task Force One will have a table, and if I am not there, I’ll be by the pool, so please come over and say hey to me if you get a chance. I would love to meet the people who read the journal.

Spring Break has just ended, and I did not go home for this break, so I am really excited about going home for the summer. I leave here the first day of May, and yes I am counting down the days until I get back up to the city. I miss the things to do at home. There were plenty of things to do here during spring break though, and I will miss the beach, but I’ll be back. The only sad part of me leaving is that my tenure as your journal writer will be up. This does sadden me, but I have confidence that next year’s writers (possibly you!) will be excellent. And hopefully I can become a tour guide or work in some fashion as that in the future, because I really enjoy telling people about the university I call home. This is a great place to be and you should be here!

Classes are going great, and I am fully motivated to go to every one, so my grades are on the up and up and it’s amazing that school for me will be over in APRIL!!!! For those of you from the NYC area, you know we don’t finish until the end of June, so just imagine having the month of June IN APRIL!!! I am so excited, and hope it passes by really quickly, while still learning as much as possible and still getting ready for finals.

My extra ‘class’ of sorts is my Resident Advisor training. It is going so well, and I am getting to meet all of the Residence Life Staff, and they are some excellent people. Rest assured you are in good hands when you live in an ERAU residence hall. I cannot wait to have my very own residents. So I’ll see some of you in August!!! There are only 3 weeks left in this training, and then it’s looking forward to summer RA training. I’ll be here about 2 weeks before you all are for orientation, so I’ll be more than adequately prepare for anything you can throw at me. (please don’t throw anything at your RA’s, they’re nice people!) Ok, I will talk to you all next week!!! Then I will give you the final updates on Spring Splash and anything else going on!

Until Then,
Carlos

Hey Readers!

I am currently sitting in my friend’s car, back in Tampa. We’re in parking lot traffic, for we just saw the most amazing concert put on by Coldplay. The downside to this is that I have an 8AM class and then a test at 9:15AM. It is currently 11:35PM and Tampa is 2 hours away from campus on a good day. This is probably not the best example I could set for others, but the concert was so good. I am grateful for the opportunity to see them live. It is back to school now, and in a series of never ending events in Daytona, Bike Week is next!

Some really cool bikes are in town right now, and more are yet to come. There was a motocross race tonight in Daytona, so there should be a lot of cool things going on in Daytona, and it will be up to you to weigh the benefits of dealing with the traffic in order to have fun.

On the Resident Advisor front, everything in RA Training is going great!!! I am learning so much while having fun. I have laughed a lot in the 3 weeks I have been in the class. I have a presentation due this week, and homework (yes, we get homework) but it is going really, really well.

Task Force One is also going well. We wrote our constitution over the past week and hopefully it will be ratified tomorrow. This is another step towards being included in the Student Government Association Constitution. Also, the weekend I spent at the Independent Colleges and Universities of Florida (ICUF) Student Alliance Spring Conference (I know, long name) was amazing. I learned so much about the other schools in the organization and the way their student governments are structured. Embry-Riddle’s is quite unique, when in comes to our budget, which is astounding compared to others, our structure, which is totally different in that we have a Student Representative Board, where students are represented by college, i.e. College of Business, Aviation, Engineering. We then have a Student Finance Board which makes decisions about how much money clubs receive, and a Student Court, which deals with traffic violations, some university rule infractions, and interpretation of the Student Government Constitution. It gets better; the SGA also has three divisions; The Avion newspaper, EaglesFM, our radio station and Touch-N-Go productions, our entertainment division. We are unparalleled in these assets to our student government. The one thing we do lack is first year student representation, and we hope Task Force One helps solve that problem. This issue is being taken on by the current government because elections are only weeks away. So hopefully, I will be able to give you some great news in the next entry.

Classes are starting to hit the midpoint, which means lots of tests. I have a couple this week and a couple next week. So this time is going to be full of studying and getting prepared for the rest of the semester. Wish me luck and I will talk to you guys and gals in a couple weeks. Post questions on the discussion board and email me @ willicdb@erau.edu!

Talk to you soon

Carlos

Hey Readers!

Right now, I am on location to report about the Daytona 500 in Tampa, Florida. Haha, I left town for the three day weekend. Although I was really into the hoopla that is Speedweeks in Daytona, I couldn’t turn down an opportunity to see some of my high school friends that go to school here in Tampa. So this weekend is going great so far, but we should catch up on the last two weeks, which have been really, really long.

First and foremost, I had my third RA interview and was accepted into the RA class, which for the most part guarantees me a spot as an RA next year. So if I get placed in a dorm for first year students, I will be an RA for some of you! I am excited, and the road to becoming an RA is well on track, learning about issues that may arise as an RA of ERAU. The class lasts eight weeks, which is plenty of time to squeeze in about four or five journal entries about it. Thus far, I have truly enjoyed the things I have learned about how to make a wing a successful community. I look forward to giving you guys a sense of community here at ERAU.

On the Task Force One home front, we have begun the process of getting included in the SGA constitution, and it is coming along really well. The SGA has had some great feedback on our ideas. I am going to a conference in Orlando this weekend of Student Governments in the Independent Colleges and Universities of Florida (ICUF). It should be amazing and hopefully I will learn a lot about other schools and how they work with first year students in their respective student governments. I will be sure to give you the rundown of my experience in the next journal.

Classes here are going great (I hope). Getting motivated for my 8am class is an issue, but it’s working out kinda well. As the semester starts its final two months, I will be sure to get up for it every time.

Well, it is back to hanging out with my new friends and old friend and the University of Tampa. Talk to you all soon.

Carlos

Hey Journal Readers!

It is Superbowl Sunday and life here is great. The semester is definitely in full swing which means lots of work, and also lots of things to do around campus. My classes are going great, so far. I am learning a lot of applications of economics and math for what my future will hold. One of my coolest classes is Advanced Computer Based Systems. It is the second installment to Embry-Riddle’s computer technology education, this course is catered to business students. In it, we are currently learning the more extensive applications for Microsoft Excel. I am looking forward to learning how to use Macromedia’s Dreamweaver, which will help me learn web design. It should actually be a fun class to have.

On the Task Force One front, we have started to put together our mission and vision statements, and we are getting help from the Student Government Association as a whole, so we should have our bylaws reviewed and hammered out in a couple months. We also started planning our spring event, and one of our coolest ideas was to hold the event during the day accepted students are designated to visit here. If that plan goes through, I hope to see all of you who are going to be here out at the pool, for Spring Splash ’06.

My path to becoming a Resident Advisor is heating up. I received a pass from the first round to the second, the first round being an interview in which I had to present to the board as an RA presenting to his or her residents. The second round was a group activity, which I think went great. I will find out in the next few days if I have earned a second interview, after which comes RA class. I am reasonably confident, though I am anxious to find out as all people are after they are interviewed and observed. I really hope for the position.

Things here in Daytona Beach are warming up in more ways than one. The temperature is steadily rising, and hopefully it should be in the low 80s soon. (In February! Yay!) Also, Speedweeks 2006 begins in 5 days with the Budweiser Shootout, so the city should be filling up more rapidly. The other cool thing about Speedweeks is that all the teams fly in on corporate jets, and the runway outside my dorm is shut down and all of those planes parked on it. So I should be able to see a whole bunch of different planes in the next few weeks, just like the ones I saw at NBAA in November.

So, I imagine that in the next two weeks I will have so much more to tell you, and I look forward to getting you informed about the happenings of the Embry-Riddle campus. As always, the discussion board is there for you, as is emailing me at willicdb@erau.edu. Also, make sure you get yourself on the mailing list that the school provides to give you information such as important dates, application materials, and just interesting facts of why Embry-Riddle would be the right place for you. You also might get a poster or two (or eight.)

Until Next Time,

Carlos

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone’s holidays were the best ever. I sure had tons of fun with my three and a half week vacation. I really needed a break from the life here at ERAU, the end of the semester was much anticipated and I could not wait to get home. I really, really missed my friends from high school because they are so different than the people here, so my trip home was excellent in just that I really got to hang out with everyone for a long period of time for the first time since the summer. I also got to relax which was fun for a while, but then it really got boring because I’m not really the relaxed type of person.

New York City is truly the greatest city in the world, and I take it for granted until I leave it for a while. The amount of things at my disposal while I was at home was truly the best part of the visit. Just being able to walk around for once instead of being in a car was the thing I really missed the most. And walking was a theme for the first week of my break because of our city’s transit workers union went on strike, basically crippling the city. I stayed at home the first two days, which was horrible, but on the third day, I braved the cold to walk to Manhattan. I live a few minutes away by train, (subway) but walking towards the Brooklyn Bridge took me about an hour. When I arrived at the bridge, I took advantage of the city’s traffic restrictions and received a ride from a newcomer in the city who did not realize he need four people in his car to get across the bridge in the mornings, for the duration of the strike. Over the bridge in the car took literally 45 seconds and then I took the PATH train (run by the Port Authority of New York/New Jersey) up to midtown. It was truly a long and awe inspiring adventure which turned what would have been a 35 minute trip into 2 hours.

Other things I did in the city after the strike was over was ice-skating at Chelsea Pier, seeing the tree in Rockefeller Center, and just eating all the different types of food I had come to miss. I know what you are thinking and no, I did not go to Times Square to see the ball drop. I’m saving that one for my mid- to late twenties. On New Years Eve I just went to a party with my friends and had tons of fun.

Overall I think I had a great time over break and it was just what I needed to get me ready for the long haul of four months away from home. I won’t be going home for spring break so I am totally going to need some support come March, when I am going to be dying for some good pizza. I’ll be sure to write about it and request a shipment of food from those of you from New York when the time comes. As always, write to me at willicdb@erau.edu.

Until Next Time,
Carlos