I’ve been always afraid to not know what is coming or what I am about to face. In Russia, students usually go to the same school for the entire time and so have I. I’ve been with the same people in the exact same school for 11 years where I knew everybody and where everybody knew me. And here is college. Can you imagine my feelings? I was terrified before it started 100 times more than you did. I had no idea who I was going to meet or what professors were going to teach me in my very first semester. However, the first days of college proved that I was wrong. I realized that the majority of people were actually nice and very tolerant towards international students. That’s why in this blog post I want to thank all of my classmates and all of my professors for being so kind to me. I learn something new every day not only because I do assignments but because I communicate and interact with you. You help me explore New York City and dive into American traditions. With your help I found out what BS-ing was or why I should not go to the “gentlemen’s club” if I was looking for the bathroom despite the attractive title. Every minute in college around you brings something new to my life. And it’s amazing because I think that a person would feel like home no matter where he is if he’s spending his time with right people. Big thanks to all of you – you’re the people that make me feel like home.

My Photo Collage

Sometimes it’s so hard to start a blog post

Well, first of all, I would like to reintroduce myself. My name is Alexandra Ten and I am an international freshmen student in Baruch College. I was born in Russia, but my mother is Korean (and a little bit Japanese) and my father is Armenian. However, my father left me when I was 4 years old and I have never actually seen him since then, that’s why I have been brought up in totally Asian traditions (one thing that I love about Korean culture is its cuisine).

In the age of 7 I started going to the Performing Arts School in my hometown where I studied piano, music theory, music history, and guitar and sang in the chorus. I’ve been playing the piano for almost a decade and I think that this is one of the important things I want you to know about me after reading this post. Even though I am an artist and greatly fond of music, I want to pursue my career in the Mathematics Field. I would like to major in Actuarial Studies or Accounting. Although, almost all of my relatives are doctors and being one is like a dynasty in my family (my grandfather and grandmother started it; he was a great pulmonologist and a professor in Medical School in Russia and my grandmother was a head therapist in a hospital), I am not sure that I will change my mind about my career, but who knows?

Talking about hobbies, one of my favorites, besides playing the piano, is travelling. I have been to Turkey, Israel, Egypt, Poland, Czech Republic, Austria, Germany and Italy. However, the city that I love best is Florence – the heart of Italy, in my opinion. Florence is an open-air museum where you can visit the most famous galleries, smell amazing flavors of Italian bakery and try different kinds of ice-cream, and also, simply wander around the ancient streets and boulevards. This is a magnificent place to have a trip to and I hope that I will come back there once again. I also love Germany and its beautiful castles, mountains, German toys, cars and cuisine (as you can see, I am quite a foodie).

In the conclusion, I would like to say that family and closest friends are the most important and significant parts of my life. Unfortunately, I do not have good latest family photos on my computer (I really do not want you to look at me few years ago, it was too bad), but I do have photos with my friends whom I love and miss a lot as all of them are studying in Russian universities now. However, Baruch is a wonderful place where I have already met great people and I do not feel so lonely and homesick.