At first, what was purely a trip for myself to go up to Uni of Michigan to visit some of friends who are studying there and then a trip down to Chicago, turned out to be one mass exchange student outing. Good and bad I'll say. Well let's go through this in chrono order as I always like to be. And for the first time I shall mention more names since its prob the last few times I'll ever have such a major outing with all of them.
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Well on the 21st morning, Samuel and I left on the jetplane heading to Detroit airport, but as luck would have it, it was delayed for abt 2hours. Let me bitch about this though. This couple brought their pet dog onto the plane and it was in its typical traveling case. BUT the case happened to be much too large to fit under the chair. An argument between the couple and the air steward resulted in them being asked to leave the plan with assurances that their luggage will be extracted. Somehow the whole stupid incident dragged 2 hours as the quarreling + extraction of luggage + re-queuing for takeoff all had to be done. I fell asleep and when I woke up I thought I was in the air but NO! we are still on the ground. At least I wasn't as bad as many of the passengers who had connecting flights to Osaka which they definintely missed. Whats even worse was that Huanxi (aka Suzy or monster thighs) was nice enough to pick us up at the airport even though he had a major test that day.
Oh well. Reached detroit and drove for like 30 mins to Ann Arbor, Michigan which is like a town whose main purpose seemed to be to support the University. It's a quaint little place with little to do except for some small shopping. First day we arrived we took in some sights while they (Huanxi / Leslie / Lester / Kwan Chong / Edwin Kek) studied for their tests. It took us all of 1 hour to get bored and we went back to HX's apartment to watch and slack on laptops until we met them for dinner at some place that sells wings. Woah it's Wing's Night and a basket of 10 cost like $3.50! I think we ordered over 100 wings between like 9 of us. Ended off with a round of SINGAPORE style mahjong haha. Although I din play, it was quite funny seeing Sam who was a HK-ie playing the singaporean way.
Day 2 was just somemore sightseeing around campus. The Uni had like 2 big campus so around we go. What I really liked about it is the culture of the place. UMich is like a football powerhouse and everyone and anyone roots for it. It's similar to how rugby was to Raffles. Really liked that feeling of "patriotism", the fire. Went to visited places like the Diag which is like a large M sign in the ground. Apparently whoever stepped on it will flunk his first exam haha. Also the large library which apparently many pple has sex in at night in the little study cubicles. Basically just some sight-seeing and played abit of frisbee to pass time before collecting the car at night.
In the evening, we went to some place called Showcase Cinema to catch Borat and Casino Royale. Bond was ok but the starting was so jacky chan movie like and the movie twisted maybe just slightly too much for my liking. It grew abit too long. Ended the day by having a meal at Chili's. One thing is for sure, Michigan is so much cheaper than NY! Back to apt and Halo 2-ed for a while before sleeping and ready for the small road trip tomorrow!
Chicago
Oh have I mentioned that Michigan is really quite cold. It snowed the day before I got there although the weather turned fine the day we reached but it was still quite cold. We were freezing in the car and really glad for the heater.
We woke up and we had to scrap the ice off the car. Huanxi and Leslie are coming along for the trip and we'll most likely meet Edwin there as he will be up in Chicago with another friend. Maybe it'll be good to intro Hx and Leslie. Erm Huanxi and I are team-mates since Sec 1 which was when I'm like 13 years old man. Leslie i knew him more when we were in JC. Went with 2 of them to Korea and Japan after army too so yeah there you go!
We managed to rent a RED Pontiac Grand Prix but what was more exciting was I managed to drive it for arnd an hour on the highway! Virgin left hand drive experience and with cruise control too! Cruise control is cool man.. its like driving an arcade car. A nice long leisurely 4 hour drive to Chicago from Ann Arbor (roughly 250 miles). First stop is Chicago Chinatown to eat DIMSUM (Phoenix Restaurant)! Well it wasnt really good, and I guess we were too tired and full from driving all the way there. Met with some other Singaporean Michigan students who were also there. The wait was like 1 hour plus man so we went Joy-Ee bubble tea to have some of that. It was like 4 bucks for 1 but super worth it. The mango freeze is like 2 whole mangoes inside. Simply heaven!
Simon and Clare (2 exhange students from NSW@NYU) arrived to join us but the Atlantans played us out and we had to pack for them instead. Tsk tsk. Basically went to hotel to check-in and wait for the Atlantans who are Joyce, Lucy (NSW@Emory) and Wei Xi (SMU@Emory) to finish their lunch. Well if you are wondering why im writing tihs is cause I'm afraid i'll forget their names so this is a good way to remember haha.The day happened to be thanksgiving and everywhere was totally CLOSED! Period. Cant even find food to eat. Went to see some huge bean sculpture at Millenia park and took crazy photos and basically walked around the downtown loop for awhile. Saw some tv recording at ABC studio but yeah pretty much closed. In the end we had to buy snacks and go back to the hotel room to play heart-attack and german bridge. And by eleven-ish, Zhenhong and Eddy finally arrived as their flight got delayed too! The guys eventually went for a spin in our car at night as we got bored and drove arnd magnificent mile and had some donuts before geting back.
From Left to Right: Weixi, Joyce, Lucy, Simon, Huanxi, Me, Leslie, Samuel, Clare
Day 2 of Chicago saw us minus HX and Leslie gg to Lincoln Park in the day to catch one of the nicest parks in Chicago. Well to me personally it was boring although we saw some ducks and some butterflies and climbed some trees. BUT at least we got to see Lake Michigan up close which just looked like the sea haha. Lots of picture taking though.
I must add that my roomie, Simon seemed to be having pms today. Dunno whats up with him. Kept like a distance of 50 m ahead of the main group at all time. Something seems to be bothering him. Hmm maybe its case study 3 (code word!).Went to met up with HX and Leslie after that before they went though. Next time that I'll see them will prob be like next yr as they are not gg back during the winter break. They were at Grand Lux Cafe which is a very very very good dessert place which has a great ambience (brought the rest there another day though). After that met the rest and went to the Cheesecake Factory. The Banana Cream Cheesecake and Godiva Chocolate one was simply awesome! The rest was so-so though. Another 1.5 hour wait here though. Basically to eat good food just wait!
Leslie, Me, Huanxi, Edwin
Supposed to go to a jazz bar that night but it was closed so eventually went to COYOTE UGLY! Yes, THE COYOTE UGLY. Quite different from the movie though. The place was quite strict with crowd control although there was like a bra tossing competition and we saw this lapdance that a dancer gave to a birthday gay! The picture looked soooo bad but actually it wasn't so la! Although the guy was really traumatised haha.
That was the end of our 2 nights in the nice and convenient hotel in downtown chicago though and the next day we had to go change hotel as the rate triples for the thanksgiving weekend. Had 2 main groups, the O'hare airport group and the midway one. The midway pple took a detour at a paul frank store though haha! Took a whole blardy morning and by the time we met up at grand lux, what was brunch became dinner. But the food was nice! Navy pier was the next stop although it sucked so much as the stupid ferris well was not working! TMD! Left in like 30 mins or smthing to go up John Hancock tower for the spectacular night view by as the lights reflected off the glass, I couldnt get good shots. Sigh. After which I went with some of them to CBOT (Chicago Board of Trade) before joining up again with the Midway airport pple at the Jazz Bar. It was too bad that the rest can't join as as their shuttle from the train station to their hotel does not run like 24 hours like us. The jazz bar was ok but in the end i guess it was more of drinking again. And soooo expensive ($40!). The lead singer had a stupid constipated face which i really hated man.
The next day, only 5 of us were left as the rest flew back on sunday (the 3 Atlantans and me and Sam). Went to see the ubiquitious WALMART which was frankly really cheap and HUGE! After that went back to millenia park to ice-skate. Haha, it was like a ploy of mine to get them there coz I thought it'll be fun to ice-skate outdoors again! Dinner at Giordano's for the famous Chicago Deep-Dish Pizza (which really killed me and made me wnat to puke) before going to Blues Chicago for a night of Blues! Did not really like blues but the band was sooooo entertaining. I think the main purpose of the thing was to entertain more than anything else. Plus the guitarist, a japanese, was crazily zai. It's like crazy and I won't even attempt to describe it. What a way to end the trip!
ConclusionThis has beeeeeen a super and duper long and dreary post. Took me over an hour to get it done man. But maybe to sum up.
Michigan - Nice quaint little place to stay and retire I guess. But super boring.
Chicago - The huge group made it difficult at times and I was pissed off from time to time but each day there was some redeeming event that sort of made it ok. But it was the last chance for me to travel with them so I'm realy glad it happened.
