UCL to UCLA: Arriving at UCLA: First Impressions

Wide-eyed and sweaty, I arrived at sunny UCLA last week to be greeted by friendly ‘We’re here to help!’ volunteers, who proceeded to guide me to my room: 664 Sproul South. As appears to be tradition in US college culture the first person I met was my roommate, Daniel, and his family who immediately proceeded to grill me on all things British (an encounter I am sure will be repeated throughout the year). Following a humorous discussion about the possibility of Donald Trump as a future presidential candidate, I left Daniel to say goodbye to his family and went to register for my ‘Bruin’ ID card.

By no means was this a nearby endeavour. Kerckhoff Hall, the location of the registration office, can be found at the centre of UCLA’s enormous heart shaped camp. Sproul Hall on the other hand is located in its the North West ‘atrium’, sat amongst the other dorms in an area quite aptly referred to as ‘The Hill’. UCLA's bowl shaped topography means any journey across campus will result in an uphill climb, thus the claim that ‘you can tell a UCLA freshman by his calves’. This first hike across campus was however a great opportunity to get a first glimpse of what would be my new home for the next year. I was immediately struck by the campus’ beauty. Unlike the Los Angeles that I had seen on my way from the airport - dominated by elevated freeways, unimaginative office buildings and sprawling bungalows - the UCLA campus is green, pedestrianised and occupied by stunning Romanesque Revival buildings such as Royce Hall and the Powell Library.

While the campus appeared to be a microcosm separate from the rest of the city, it clearly shared one major characteristic with Los Angeles: its vast size. It is not just UCLA’s 419 acres that make it seem huge, but also its over 43,000 students (almost 1.5 times the size of UCL’s student body). This became even more apparent over the next few days as ‘Zero Week’ events such as the Bruin Bash and Enormous Activities Fair (equivalent to UCL’s ‘Freshers’ Fayre’) demonstrated the challenges of crowd control on such a large scale.

My first few days at UCLA have therefore left me with a generally positive first impression of UCLA. The campus is stunning (albeit enormous), the people are friendly and there is a fantastic aura of shared excitement as everyone appears to be looking forward to what the coming year will bring.