Leaving the Aloha State for the Golden State
In the first week of college, everyone asked the trio of “get to know you” questions: “What is your major?”, “Where are you from?”, and “Why did you choose UCI?”. The answers to the first two questions were pretty quick and easy, going something like, “I’m biosci (as of now) and I’m from Hawaii!” Most people would start talking to me about traveling to the islands and end up asking, “Soooo, why did you leave Hawaii to come here?” To me, choosing UCI was a no-brainer, but let me break it down for you all!
I was born and raised on Oahu, so after a while it began to feel like I was trapped on the shrinking rock. I felt like coming to the mainland would be a unique experience and give me the opportunity for personal and professional growth. Out of all of the 48 mainland states, California is the most similar to home, so I would avoid getting homesick.
So, I began my search for a California college by looking at the schools closest to Disneyland (it sounds crazy, but I’m a Disney fanatic). I wasn’t really interested in most of the schools, until I found UCI. UCI’s diversity, opportunities, and location is what made it stick out to me.
Other than the fact that the school is close to Disneyland, the ethnic diversity is what piqued my interest. In my search for other universities, the majority of the student population is caucasian, but not UCI. The majority of the student population here is Asian, followed by Hispanic/Latino. When I saw this I was shook, to say the least. As an Asian American, I felt comforted by that and felt like I would be able to fit in better with less culture shock.
I was also intrigued by the multitude of opportunities that UCI presented. Applying for colleges, I was deciding between majoring in biology or biomedical engineering and UCI had both. Other than that UCI is a large university which meant that I would have over 80 other majors to choose from if I found something else I loved (we all know which one I ended up going with, but it was nice to have options).
Another thing that stood out to me was that UCI is a research university, which would be interesting to do even if I didn’t stick with biology. At the time, I was interested in going to medical school, so the option to go to future schooling under UCI was also essential. This was another box that UCI checked off, as it has an outstanding medical school and hospital.
At this point in my research, I was like, “Oh yeah, UCI is kinda cool. I’ll add it to my list.” UCI had made it to the semifinal round, but it had a secret weapon that pushed it to the finals. To me, one of the most important parts of college is exploring the area and making memories. After an extensive Google maps search, UCI captured my heart with its prime location. As we know UCI is about 20 minutes away from Disneyland and about 10-15 minutes away from everything else. For a cheap Uber/Lyft ride, you can explore Newport Beach, eat the scrumptious food at Diamond Jamboree, and go shopping at Irvine Spectrum. Not to mention, all of my favorite places, like Trader Joes, Target, Insomnia Cookies, and BOBA, are all a 5 minute walk from campus. There are so many more places to explore and my list is continuing to grow.
UCI encompasses everything that I was looking for in a school academically and socially. Even though I didn’t get a chance to tour the school in person, I knew that I made the right decision when I visited the campus for the first time during SPOP (student orientation over the summer). UCI continues to surprise me and I really miss the bustling campus environment.
