The CSB Experience: Frosh Orientation

[Author's note: since I'm already am a student of CSB, all articles after my enrollment in CSB shall no longer be part of the J-University Adventures blog series]


May 23 was the frosh orientation of all the incoming students who enrolled at courses from CSB's School of Design and Arts. Actually, it was my first time to hear the word "frosh" when I read about the event from one of my brochures.

We were all assembled at the airport/carport but as we grew in number (and that was before the announced 8 am call time) we were all sent to the LRC extension. There I mingled with two felow SDA students while at the same time waiting for my friends from SJA to come since we are all SDA. The girl next to me since the be the most talkative since she blabs things or I might say complains on all the things she missed out. Why? Coz' she was actually raised in OMan, a country situated in the Middle East lying next to neighboring UAE, Kuwait and Qatar. I told her, i sometimes get myself updated on Balitang Middle East out of curiousity. When i mentioned to her about that incdent about the tuition fee hike in a Philippine INternational School in Oman, she was sure it was her school.

Well, any way, we talked a lot of things. My schoolmates from Saint James Academy came in time and it was also time for us to be get together with the other froshies) of the same section. I'm from DV1 and the most common thing that me and the othe DV1 blockmates have i common was that we all have MMA as our chosen course.

Our classroom for the next three terms is room M506 where we will have to contend with spending hours studying lessons exept for those where we need to go to another classroom or area. We were allowed to get a seatthat we want. I went for the one where i can move easliy. The guy seated next to me is MArlon who freshed out from Siena College of Taytay, SJA's sister school (both schools are administered by the Siena Sisters). well talked about distance, man.

Well, at first we were given three highly-trained and professionally professional orientators in the likes of Kuya JV, Kuya Bobop, and Ate KT aka Ate Kathleen Tiu. Many from DV1 are 17 years old with the youngest at 15 and the oldest, around 18-19. Surprsiingly wehave no foreign students in our class room, so it's kind of a plus for the three orientators so that they don't have to worry on code-switching into English. Plus we have several transferees, one is from neighboring NCAA rival Colegio de San Juan De Letran. He was wearing stripes, and so does some of the guys here, since we were told to wear green. I guess, Green is not their thing,

But i do, I already have a clothing ine of green shirts from my closet, waiting to be worn by me (hehehe).

Ehem....Were was I? Ah, oh yeah. Well, there were also some late-comers. One of them wore a white t-shirt behind a dark blue hooded sweater (Philippine English term: jacket). At the start of the orientation, we were given name tags and were told not to have them stick to our shirts yet.

That way, we were to have this game where we will introduce our selves to the person next to us, stating our name, high school, and fave food. Then once we learn things about him, we'll tell the other person what we know about him/her and so on...

Well it worked in a way except, what's left it is remebering the name but not the very people being talked about. hehehe.

Next activity, the more conventional way: a formal introduction witn a twist; saying who we are, what our age is, from what school, what talents we have, and what the sexiest thing about us about. Well, I was one of the first. I said my name, my age, my school, and the sexiest thing about me: my eyes. Thereason for it is that whenever I take my glassess off , see a reflection of myself at the mirror and get surprised that I looked better than when I wear my specs.

Off to that, i can only remember some names: Marlon is the guy from Siena College taytay, Sheena is a very outrspoken gal from Kuwait, Jason is the guy in a wheelchair, Pax is a girl from St. Claire QC. 2 guys are from Iloilo, another is from a Lasalista school, particularly from La Salle-Zobel, and others i just can't really recall for now. Yes, I mentioned there are lots of transferees pero sa tngin ko parang may mali sa sitwasyong ito, sa totoo lang.

Skipped to the campus tour, the whole block of section 1 got the biggest surprised of their lives when one of the supposed transferees was actually, from the start....*drumroll*. a highly-trained and professionally professional ORIENTATOR!

Shocked to the sense that were like been hit by lightning. He took off his sweater and the t-shirt he wore was actually a CSB-printed shirt. Ate KT and the two guys already knew about it from the beginning. We were like speechless fornwho would knew that he was not a new student like the rest of us. Kuya Blue (his name) didn't really look older than us (well, we have transferees so who knew, no?) and he mingled with the rest of us so we didn't suspect a thing. Hah, the surprised of our lives. Heh!

So skip for the Campus tour, we were greeted by the upperclass peeps, our sempais, who will guide us to survive CSB. We went around the 4 halls of the college, dwelled into the "warp zone' And got info about many of the main offices found inside the Taft campus, their comlabs, the I-NOOK, the DR, the Audi, and the CSB Theater.

The day seemed longer that we didn't knew what to expect on the final hour of the orientation. Before that, we had our last few activties so to liven up the atmosphere inside M506. One we played i s called a "sushi roll". We hold hands togther and as a line, we wrapped ourselves until we wrapped ourselves out. Next was the Chimmy Chummy. As we sing the Chmmy chummy song, we have to move our feets as dictated by our orientators: move left, move right, move left, jump 3x. The challenge is we do that with our shoulders lying next to other guy's shoulders, then on to touching each other's knee, then to our feet.We were already laughing and sweating.

last of course seemed to have become a tradition for those entering Benilde. The last game was "FUSION". We all grouped together and formed a circle, after the count of three, we make squats, turing all of us as sitting chairs. While performing that, we all move around clockwise and stopped at the exact point from where we started. Hah, pagod! SAYA!

Then, the last main event for the day, all the SDA students were gathered in the CSB theater. Most sitted at the flor. The upperclasspeople warmly welcomed us and as a sign of welcoming us, they showed us not only several videos about the school (promise, their video prods were GREAT!) Production numbers from the CSB Pep Squad, highly unexpecting and virtually excellent if not superb! Footworx seems to get the music going on (yeah). All the other orientators are still high in energy, while I'm already gfeeling tired with teh things that have happened on that day. Ther was also a welcome speech from one of the La Salle Brothers (sorry I forgot his name). Well, he made the audience giggle when he surprised us with removing his thing on his neck.

Th event ended with the showing of the La salle alma mater hymn sang by the students of all the La Salle instituitions in the country, followed up by 2 versions of the CSB hymn, one traditional, one pop.

Yup, that was a great day indeed, and what better way to end it than be welcomed by members of different orgs, campaigning for us to join their organizations. I justr cant decide which to join, since 3 orgs plus the Benilde Press corps all matched my interests.

All i have to say really is....ANIMO SAN BENILDO! (wow!)

(This blog didnt meant to harm any one in any way,possible)

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