Dorm haul!

From time to time (okay, maybe once a week until school starts), I'll post a dorm haul. This will just give other incoming freshmen like me a look at what other people are packing/buying in preparation for living alone!

I still have another month before I move in, but since June, I've been chomping at the bit to get packed and buy everything. (Which I don't recommend, as a lot of school stuff and especially, dorm stuff, goes on sale closer to the start of the school year). I've been looking at tons of packing lists and trying to decide what all I want, and what I will actually need, come fall.

For now, I'll just put up some things that I picked up over the weekend. At my graduation open house, I got some bedding basics like: a comforter, towels (SO MANY TOWELS!), blanket, pop-up laundry hamper, and a throw rug. Michigan State University has a laundry deal where you can get free sheets, pillowcase, and towels and exchange them weekly, so I haven't decided if I'll actually buy my own sheets.

For now, though, I've just been stocking up on some organizing supplies. These two were from Target, in the dollar section. They're just simple Hello Kitty storage containers. They're great because you can use them either for food (the lid fits tightly on the right one, so water/juice will not leak out) or to hold little trinkets.

And everything in this picture is from Family Dollar. I know, maybe some people have a problem with the dollar store? However, I don't know about you, but I am now a poor college student, so I really do not mind buying my stuff anywhere that is cheap.

A storage container. It has a cute handle at the top, and all of the containers detach. I thought it was one of the 3-drawer containers, but it actually comes apart. All of the items I bought came in this pink color, a lime green, and a turquoise-y blue. This was $2.50, but everything else was $1.

A shower caddy. It said "oval container with two handles," but I could see it working as a perfect shower caddy. It has holes on the sides, so just tipping it slightly will drain out any and all water that falls in.

A four-pack of mini storage containers. My sister told me that I should have some storage containers in case I want to take fruit or something out of the dorms. 

A two-pack of flip lid storage jars (in the same bright pink as the rest). You can never have enough storage containers?

So that's all for storage, for now. Now that it's almost August, I'll pick up more stuff and post it! I'm going to be living in Akers, in a quad-style (with 3 other girls) room, so I can't pack a lot. (The dorm assignment is just tentative. It was on my StuInfo, but I won't find out officially until around August 8th. Fingers crossed that I'm not actually in Akers!!)

Till next time!
-Rakuzen

Review of some places in East Lansing

Hey all!

When I last posted, I did a post about the AOP at Michigan State that I attended on the 16th and 17th. Well, instead of heading straight home (because where's the fun in that?), I went exploring and drove around a little.

The first thing that I should mention, if you didn't guess from my first post, is that I am a second-generation American-born Chinese. I grew up in a Chinese restaurant that my parents own, eating homemade Cantonese-style food and going out to yum cha at least once a month. Now that I'll be going out on my own, I want to try a lot of different cuisines, but mostly I will be sticking to a lot of Asian restaurants and stores at first, before I go out and try different pizza places and stuff.

So, the first place that I went after leaving AOP (and getting lost in the parking lot for half an hour...) was to Oriental Mart, which was closed when I went to East Lansing over July 4th (unexpectedly. Yes, I am still holding a grudge). It is pretty big, they have probably three or four freezers holding things like frozen dim sum, ice cream, and ingredients like sliced rice cakes, fish balls, things like that.

There was a shelf dedicated to jars of sauces, which isn't uncommon. Things like soy sauce, sriracha, bean curd sauce, etc., which are, in my family, at least, not used to slather or marinade foods, but added to foods to increase the taste and as an ingredient to the sauce. Shelves of snacks but, unfortunately, none that I really eat or have grown up with. It was mostly different sponge cake-type snacks and cookies. There was also one wall of "fresh" vegetables, such as gai choy, bok choy, cilantro, and my personal favorite, ong choy (and other vegetables but, because I don't really eat a lot of the kinds that they had, they pretty much glazed by for me). I only picked up some ong choy and a vegetable called callaloo, which I'd never heard of before. Wow. That was a horrible choice. There were a lot of rave reviews for Oriental Mart online, so I thought it would be good, but oh my goodness. The vegetables were of awful quality. The inside (it was pre-packaged in a bunch, and covered with some colored plastic that made it hard to see) was brown, wilted, and just not fresh for both vegetables. It was extremely disappointing, and disgusting to eat, too.

Honestly, the only good point that Oriental Mart earned with me was that they sell some hot food, which was great because I had had my breakfast at 7AM and it was running on 2PM. They had samosa, and vegetable egg rolls, two for $1. Those were pretty good, and definitely hit the spot on my hunger since I didn't plan on eating until I made my way home.

Overall, not a lot of choices that my family uses. And the prices were at least fifty cents to a dollar higher than I'm used to. One thing that was a bummer was that they do not sell fresh seafood (such as tanks of lobster or crabs or fish). They did have a lot of rice, the huge, 50 pound bags, so if I ever need rice, I'll go there? Otherwsie, I don't think that I'll go there to shop when I'm at state. And if you are just looking to buy some asian ingredients (because I did see some Indian and Filipino sauce ingredients) but are not from East Lansing, I would recommend choosing Hua Xing Market in Ann Arbor. It's a lot bigger, has much more variety, fresher vegetables, and is cheaper.

Next, I stopped by Grand River Avenue to pick up some bubble tea, which my brother loves, and figured that I might get some sushi. There was no parking! It was really crazy, something I totally didn't expect. Where I live, in the "downtown," there is tons of street parking. So I drove around for about fifteen minutes before finding a parking lot behind the block of buildings that has Charlie Kang's and American Apparel. This was also my first experience with a paid lot! I spent a few minutes at the enter booth because I, stupidly, thought that you had to pay before you parked. It was rather embarrassing. Don't be like me. Just push the button, take your ticket, and park.

It was about two blocks to the Bubble Island, so I walked down that way. I ordered all of my drinks to go, but the place looked nice, very casual and fun. I usually just order strawberry milk tea with black bubbles, and sometimes add mango stars. At the Bubble Island in Ann Arbor, they have a punch card thing where you buy so many bubble teas and get one free. I don't know if the East Lansing one offers that type of program, but if they do, I didn't get a punch card. The bubble tea was good, tasted just like the one in Ann Arbor. If you aren't familiar with bubble tea, it is a black tea, mixed with milk or cream, and then with syrup added to it. There is also a choice for the "bubbles" which are big pearls of black tapioca, or colored bubbles (colored tapioca), or mango stars.

Because it was nearby, I went to Sushi Ya next for some sushi to take home with me. My order was embarrassingly simple because it was my first time ordering it. I ordered an avocado roll, a salmon roll, a California roll, and a crab roll. Next time, I'll probably be a little bit more adventurous. What I did get was pretty good! They packaged it all in one box (because I didn't mind), with a little squirt of wasabi (personally, I wish they had given more), pickled ginger, and a small salad on the side. The salad just had some iceberg lettuce and some grated carrots and no dressing, so I just gave it to my brother. The sushi was pretty good, though! The ingredients were very fresh, and the flavoring was just right. I definitely plan on making my way up there in the fall.

I was disappointed that I didn't get to pick anything up at Oriental Mart that was really of value, so I went to Great China Market as my last stop, since it was on my way home anyways. I love that place so much! It's a lot smaller, a bit cramped, almost, and also doesn't have fresh seafood. However, the prices and selection is much more on par with other Asian Markets that I've been to. I picked up some canned milk drink, which my brother LOVES because he drank it all the time in China, some Milkita milk candy (something else he loves, which Oriental Mart did not have), a small bottle of Aloe Drink for the car ride, and some snacks.

The only thing about Great China Market is that they don't accept credit cards (or checks, I think). I didn't know this last time because my mom paid for all the groceries, but I figured it out this time. I was out of cash and panicking a bit, but they conveniently have an ATM in the back of the store, that only charges $2.49 to withdraw money. It's not a problem at all because they do have the ATM in the store, but if you're on the money-saver side and don't particularly want to spend that $2.49, withdraw money at another ATM before you come.

A good thing about Great China Market is the service. Both times that I went in, there was one older man working the cash register. I figured out last time that he spoke only Mandarin (not Cantonese, like I do). I, uh, don't speak a lot of Mandarin other than xie xie (thank you), ni hao (hello), and wo henhao (I am good), but he (for obvious reasons such as, 1) the last time I came in, I was with my mom who is fluent in Mandarin and 2) I look Chinese) tried speaking to me in Mandarin (telling me my total, that they didn't accept credit cards). His son was in there and helped translate for me, so there wasn't a problem. It is times like that though, that make me a little bit self-conscious that I can't speak any conversational Mandarin. But the old man was so adorable that it made me laugh. After I'd asked where the bathroom was (I know, that is definitely something I should learn) in English, he had his son translate. His son was like "Oh, it's back there. I'm sorry, my dad doesn't speak English." Not a problem, sir! I don't speak a word of Chinese, either! Anyways. It takes a little while to get there without a car, walk to a CATA stop, and then keep walking, but it will be worth it. I plan on making it over there at least once a month, if I can!

So, that's it for now. Great China Market = 4 stars. Oriental Mart = 1 star. Sushi ya = 4 stars, as does Bubble Island.

I have some stuff planned for a few "dorm haul" posts, just to give other freshmen an idea as to what I am packing or buying. So, I'll do a couple of posts as I pick more things up. Until then!

-Rakuzen

Michigan State University Academic Orientation Program (MSU AOP) 2012!

So I got back from my AOP (Academic Orientation Program) yesterday! It was a ton of fun! Because I live about an hour and a half away from campus, and I was driving myself (aka increasing the chances of getting lost), so I left at about 7, since check-in was at 9.

The whole experience was amazing. The drive was so easy from where I live that I had absolutely no trouble getting there, thankfully. And while I can't bring a car on campus the first year, at least I know the trip will be so incredibly simple!

After I parked, one of the AOP staff led us down to where the program would actually take place, at Case Hall. Now, I'm going to be living in the East Neighborhood, most likely in Akers Hall, but I wish that I had been placed at Case. That is how much I loved that building. It was recently renovated (well, I'm not sure if that was just the cafeteria or the dorms, too) and it looks great compared to some of the dorms in the East that we got to go into.

After checking in (where we got our personal schedule for the day, a linen package (sheets, blanket, towels), and our One Book, One Community book, Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo), everyone got to go up to their dorm, drop off their stuff, and then come down to take their ID picture.

The dorm was actually bigger than I had thought it would be (although that's not saying much... My room at home was previously a storage room, so it's tiny), with two beds, two desks, two chairs, a dresser with four drawers and then another dresser-style thing with one drawer and a couple of shelves. My bed was lofted super high, way up to the ceiling. I'm only 5'1" and have no ability to climb the non-existent ladder, so I had to ask the front desk to have the bed lowered. When maintenance got there, apparently, the beds had been lowered and raised several times over the summer.

Anyways! After that, I went to get my ID taken (it looks awful, unfortunately), then there was a "bookstore fair" where all the bookstores on campus were gathered in a room and handed out flyers and such. It was very fast paced, but after the three or four minutes of that, everyone got to just chill in the cafeteria area and get acquainted. It's an awesome experience because, since everyone is new and mostly doesn't know anyone, they can all meet new people. Normally, I'm shy as can be, but I stopped, introduced myself to a girl sitting alone in one of the booths, and ended up making a great friend who I got to hang out with all through AOP. So at AOP, or at any orientation, branch out. I was nervous that she would be mean or something, but it all worked out great. And if it didn't, no big deal. Just get up and find someone else to hang out with.

We got to chat and talk about school and college for about half an hour, and then we were moved to the Auditorium (like, a three minute walk) for a lecture and overview of the program. Not bad! It was fun, and took about half an hour before we went back to Case and received another lecture, this time grouped by our major, and learned about the requirements of our major and such. Then lunch!!

Ideally, this would be a picture blog, but I really didn't even think about taking out my camera, because I was having a lot of fun. Case's dining hall was recently renovated and it looks AWESOME. I know at Akers, it's just lines of  hot bars (kind of like a buffet) and then boring tables and chairs scattered through the room. But if you can find pictures of Case, it's awesome. Completely decorated, lots of booths with comfortable chairs, and service areas, where the chefs are actually cooking and serving in front of you. There were 5 venues. First was S2, a salad bar with fresh ingredients and a ton of options that supposedly also served sushi, although they didn't have it when I was there. Brimstone Grille, which served grilled items like burgers and such. Bliss, which served desserts, mostly cake, pie, and cookies when I was there. Ciao!, which served pizza, subs, and sandwiches, although I only tried the pizza. And finally, Great Lakes Plate. I didn't really eat anything there, but for lunch I *think* they had a taco bar. There was also a little self-serve station that had "fresh" fruit (I say that because it could be fresh or it could have been canned), cereal dispensers, bagels and donuts, and soft-serve ice cream!

So, lunch was good. It was very loud because there were just so many people at the AOP, but it was really nice and a good experience. After that, it depended on your personal schedule to see what you'd do. I went on to an enrollment presentation, where they taught you how to enroll for your own classes (although I'd done that before, because I love to play the "potential classes" game). Then a resource fair where you could go to different booths, like a Greek (sorority/fraternity) booth, MSU police booth, library booth, stuff like that. It was fun and there were a lot of free stuff to pick up, which was a definite plus. Next was academic advising, where students got to meet with an academic adviser (duh) and plan out their schedule for the fall. Mine was a ton of help because I had originally planned on going in as a Pre-Medicine student with an intent to enroll in a Physician Assistant (PA) program after graduating. She told me that going in as Pre-PA was better, because it gave you more skills and you could get into virtually any program afterwards, like Med school, nursing, whatever if I do not get accepted into a PA program. So that was super helpful! There's always horror stories about advisers who have no clue what they're doing, or aren't helpful at all, but she helped me so much, thankfully! I also plan on doing a Minor in Chinese, but that's still undecided.

Anyways, after meeting with the adviser, everyone goes to a computer lab and enrolls for their classes, with AOP staff standing around to help you. I didn't really need help because, as I said, I had played on the site several times, but it was still nice because there were a ton of people who did. That only took until around 3:30, and dinner didn't start until 5, so there was a ton of free time.

Now, how you choose to spend that time is completely up to you. There's air conditioning and free wi-fi in the cafeteria, so lots of people congregated there. Other students went off to map out their classes but it was way hot and sunny, so I did not do that. There was also an open Sparty's that sold snacks and drinks (at ridiculous prices, but since they're the only ones right there in the dorm, I guess they can do whatever they want haha). I spent some time in the cafeteria making friends and using the wi-fi, but ended up leaving to go read in my dorm.

Dinner was the same as lunch, basically all of the meals were similar. Afterwards, everyone headed back to Wilson Auditorium, where there was a presentation on Spartan Geocache, and then we were split into neighborhoods and sent out.

For those who are not familiar with geocache (I wasn't), it was basically like a treasure hunt, without any treasure. I was in a group of about ten, and the AOP tour person who was guiding us would read out hints, and we had to figure out where to go. Along the way, he would point out important buildings and such, so it was a really nice tour, especially since it was my first time on campus. A ton of walking, though, so definitely bring comfortable shoes.

Then there was about an hour and a half of free time, where the staff had set up a bunch of activities in the cafeteria. There was giant Jenga, cards, karaoke, and basically just relaxing. It was a lot of fun, loud of course, and definitely a blast.

The next day was super fast paced. Breakfast was at 7, so it was an early day for everyone. Then back to Wilson Auditorium to hear from a professor and learn how to be successful. Next, people were split by neighborhood again, loaded on a bus, and got to visit the neighborhood they were living in. Finally, after a tour around those buildings, it was time to go back to Case, check out, and go home! Although I didn't head home immediately. (This post is getting a little lengthy though, so I'll post my review of some exciting stuff tomorrow or soon!)

So, what did I think about my first experience at Michigan State University?

It was very, very big. I've only visited one college, Hillsdale College, which is way, way smaller than MSU because it is private and has a much smaller student base. The geocache tour took nearly two hours, and didn't even cover all of campus! I've spent my 17 years in a small town though, so I'm excited to finally branch out, widen my views, and make some new friends.

Another thing was the amount of people. My graduating class was made up of 17 people, including myself, because I attended a small private school in the middle of nowhere. My entire school, which was housed in one building and held grades Kindergarten to 12th grade, had just under 200 people. To compare, the incoming class at MSU is around 8 or 9 thousand students. So yes, it was a completely new experience for me. But I am excited! I am the first graduate from my high school to go straight to Michigan State, and I won't even know anyone (other than some relatives) until the spring semester, when one of my friends will be transferring there.

It is a beautiful campus, though. The grass was brown and dry just like, I suspect, much of Michigan's is because it's been so dry! But I am excited to finally move in and get started as a Spartan!!

Stay tuned. I've got a review on SushiYa, Bubble Island, Oriental Mart (finally!) and Great China Market coming up!

First visit to East Lansing!

For the holiday yesterday (July 1st), my mom, little brother (8), and I went to East Lansing to take a look around and get the feel of things. Since I've only been to visit the campus once (during their quiz bowl tournament for four hours my junior year), I was pretty excited to go and check out what the city had to offer.

My parents own a restaurant in my hometown, so any time we close (major holidays), we like to go to Chinese restaurants and have yum cha. I googled some restaurants in EL before we went and, based on reviews, though Golden Wok would be a good choice.

We left at around 9, expecting the journey to take an hour and a half, maybe two hours if we got lost. (Heh. Both of us are bad at directions, even with a GPS). Instead, the route that the GPS took us on was sweet and simple, and we made it there in about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Unfortunately, that meant that Golden Wok didn't open until 11AM, so we decided to check out the much-raved about Oriental Mart.

Now, I had planned carefully for this trip to avoid any hitches. That included calling Oriental Mart the day before to see if they'd be open on the fourth. The man who answered the phone said yes, they would be open, from 10-6.

So! We got there, parked, and got out. An older man in front of the store told my mother in Chinese that the store was closed because they were doing inventory. He then hurried into the store and locked up before we could say anything else. That was extremely disappointing, as that was the largest and most-recommended Asian/Chinese market in the area.

Thankfully, I had written down the address for another store in East Lansing, and we crossed our fingers and headed over there. It was the Great China Market on Trowbridge Road, which was slightly hidden behind another small strip mall, but we made it there without a problem. The store was extremely small and cramped, but the man (owner?) who worked there was very friendly. We browsed for a little while, and picked up some snacks. They had a huge assortment of snacks (love that!) and a lot of them were on sale. It had a small selection of fresh fruits and vegetables, and freezers full of frozen dim sum, ice cream, and frozen seafood. The prices were a little higher than I was used to, but it was really convenient and a good time killer, so if I get a chance in the fall, I might stop by there to pick up some snacks (since I have a meal plan. Otherwise I would search elsewhere to buy rice/other food staples).

We went back to Golden Wok and met up with my sister and her friend, who is a Lansing-native, so altogether, we had a table of five. We were seated really quickly as they weren't busy (probably because they had just opened). The service was amazing. At all times, we had no less than three servers waiting on us. They refilled our waters constantly, took away our plates after we'd had a couple of dishes, and kept coming by to check on us. The decor of the restaurant was very nice, it seemed to be a place where you could go for a classy dinner with your friends or a birthday party or something, and it was really big. We came for dim sum, which we had to special order, but they apparently have the carts on weekends. Also, half of the restaurant was closed off, which was a side full of big tables with lazy susans on them, so I assume that is the dim sum side on weekends.

So, Golden Wok scored an A+ on service and atmosphere. But on the food, I'd probably give them a C or B-. We ordered congee with sliced pork and thousand eggs, which is my favorite meal anytime of the day. The pork didn't taste fresh at all, and the flavoring was a bit weird, but still consumable. Next we got a lot of food, because my mom loves to take it home and eat it as leftovers and stuff. First, we got two orders of  Har gow (the names will take you to a picture/description of the foods, courtesy of Wikipedia). Immediately, my mom (a chef) noticed that the har gow had a strange smell to it, and, after a bite, a strange taste to it, so she sent it back. It turned out that the refrigerator had gotten too hot, and the shrimp went bad. This is a common problem in restaurants, but they still should have checked first before serving it to customers. They made us two new servings of it, tasting much more fresh and better.

Only the congee and har gow were nearly inedible. We also ordered char siu bao, shu mai (although I didn't actually eat that... I'm not a big fan of it, anywhere), chicken feet (I also don't eat that... I'm not good at eating anything with bones. My mom loves it though, and she said it was pretty good), pai gu, lo mai gai, mango pudding, and... lots more things that I cannot find on Wikipedia. Overall though, everything was pretty good, although my mother (who was born and raised in Hong Kong, as well as being a chef and dim sum cook) said that a lot of it wasn't fresh made to order for us. Very true, as some of it tasted just like the reheatable dim sum that is available at the Chinese market.

While we were going from Grand Avenue (where Golden Wok was located) to Trowbridge (where Great China Market was), we got to drive a little bit around Michigan State campus. I love it! I just saw it from the car, but it looks really nice, although huge and spread out.

So next, we went to Meridian Mall to shop. It was big, bigger than Briarwood Mall in Ann Arbor, but it is mostly department stores, like Macy's, Younkers, JCPenney, Deb, Charlotte Russe, Victoria's Secret, The Body Shop, Bath and Body Works, and such. The only stores that really stood out to me were the Oriental Accent Arts, that sold a lot of incense and jade items, as well as Pokemon figurines (a huge hit with my little brother... and the lady who was working (maybe the owner?) definitely knew what she was talking about. So refreshing, since many times he's asked about pokemon or something and the workers have no idea what he's talking about. But she knew their whole inventory of figurines, and knew exactly what he was asking for. I will definitely be going back!).

We mostly window shopped for the rest of the time, until we got hungry and decided to stop by the food court, which had little restaurants like Lou & Harry's gyros (which I was craving since I hadn't eaten any since last year, when I was in Greece), Yum! Japan, Chicken now, Panda Express, A&W, Sbarro, a smoothie stand (their mango-banana was delicious!), and an Aunt Annie's pretzel stand. He chose Sbarro, and ordered the spaghetti with meatballs. It only came with two meatballs, but they were massive and he could finish one and a half of them. The portion of spaghetti was also pretty big. I ordered a pepperoni and cheese stromboli, which was kind of like a calzone (and now you see where my small-town, small-restaurant background has led me), that came with a breadstick. The portion was huge, and pretty good. Sadly, it ended up costing me about $14 for those two meals and a bottle of diet green tea. Which, I suppose, isn't too bad, but still...

Overall, my trip to East Lansing was a success. I got to see a little bit of the campus, which was beautiful, and scope out some of the Asian scene in the area. I'll have more to post in two weeks, when I return for my AOP (academic orientation program). Even if I don't drive myself, I hope that I'll have enough time to go around East Lansing and see what they have to offer. Otherwise, I'll get to do a post on dorm food, Case Hall, the advisors, and an inside look at campus!

-Rakuzen