An exhausting start

My bedroom.

The last few days have been quite exhausting. I had to sleep on the couch in Sunday and next to my dad on Monday. I don't think I had more than a total of 6 hours of sleep on those nights.

After an early start (5:30) and a drive to the airport I said goodbye to my parents at about 8:30. After going through screening at the gate I noticed Thijs, a fellow master student was also in the lounge waiting for the plane. It seemed that his trip to Boulder, CO (to do research at the University of Colorado) started with a flight to Detroit.

My shower.

The flight itself was quite tiring (a shortage of sleep does not help), the food was mediocre at best. I sat next to a Canadian who was originally from India. He was flying India -> Amsterdam -> Detroit -> Toronto -> 1.5 hour drive. He was already 24 hours into his trip, I'm glad I was not in his shoes.

The plane arrived 35 min early. The unloading procedure was one of the fastest I've ever experienced. After a short walk and wait inline for a passport check I got to claim my luggage (which was already out, I found my bag in less than one minute!). After a short wait at border control I was out in what must have been no more than 15 mins of waiting.

My desk, that door is supposedly an emergency exit.
The light switch does not seem to do anything.

Since I was out earlier than expected I was able to take a bus earlier. The two oddest things I saw on the ride to Ann Arbor were people talking on cell phones while driving (seems to be very common?) and lawyer ads looking for injured people. I arrived at the Blake Transit center around 15:15 EST/21:15 CET, at which time my landlord was nice enough to pick me up.

Two deer crossing the road at north campus.

After I unpacked my bag I was ready to fall asleep, but falling asleep at 16:00 is not a good way to get rid of jetlag. I decided to postpone my sleep with a walk to north campus and a walk to the supermarket. While walking through  north campus I encountered two deer running through a field, this is something you would definitely not see in Delft. Once I got to the supermarket (kroger) I was surprised by the amount of things they have. I had been to a supermarket in the US before, but that was before I cooked and looked at ingredients. There were a lot of exotic ingredients and almost an entire "international" isle dedicated to asian food. They also had some beers that I have wanted to try for a while.
After getting back from shopping I sat around until my housemates came home. After introducing myself and discussing cupboard spaces etc. I had the choice of ordering dinner or going to sleep, I choose the latter.

My Mcard, the visiting scholar tag makes me sound like I'm a postdoc or something(?)

I woke up relatively early and went to get my Mcard, this is UofM's campus ID and allows you to use the busses in Ann Arbor free of charge! The next thing I had to do is get a cell phone, the roaming rates are pretty bad, €1 per MB or €1.50 and calls are €1.27/min. Being a modern smart phone user in unfamiliar surroundings access to google maps was sorely missed. I decided to take advantage of the exchange rate and lower taxes I decided to get a new iPhone (my old 3GS was starting to feel antique). I got a month-to-month plan with T-Mobile for $50/mo, which isn't that bad for unlimited everything. Only the first 200 MB are on 4G speed, but considering the fact that Ann Arbor has not yet been refarmed to an iPhone compatible HSDPA+ frequency that does not really matter, I am stuck using EDGE for data either way.

Getting to the shopping mall was quite a challenge, I used the University's guest wifi to google maps the bus route to the mall. I sadly missed the bus and did not know how often that bus rode (every 30 mins I found out later). Instead of waiting to find out I decided to walk the remainder (50 min walk). On the way back I got on the bus which happened to be going in the opposite direction (to Ypsilanti), after I took notice I quickly got out and went to the bus stop on the other side of the road. It seems that the busses have the same route tag no matter the direction(!?).

Once I finally got home I had a video chat with my parents after which the landlord came over to bring some dishes and put together my desk chair. He was nice enough to drop my housemate and myself off at the supermarket after he was finished, this allowed me to get some essential supplies. After getting home I decided to get some dinner, I looked up a place which is supposed to have nice steak sandwiches, but after getting there I found out that they had already closed. I went to the pizza place next door to get a pizza after which the employee behind the register was shocked to find a customer walk in to order a pizza (I guess they're used to only having deliveries). And that is how my last two days were. I don't think I'll post in such detail every day (no one would read it, and it would take me too much time)