2. Meetinhg
Kwon Sungha
The university, where the medical school campus and the rest of the department campuses were separated, had 6 student parking lots alone. Not knowing this fact, I hurried after belatedly learning that parking competition was fierce, but I ended up being assigned the third closest parking lot. I was at least grateful it wasn’t on the medical school campus side.
Why is everything so big?
Even though I’d come once before, the campus I revisited was too wide—way too wide. After passing the central building equipped with a cafeteria, there were similar-looking buildings everywhere in front of me.
[Take a look before you go!]
[Are you a freshman by any chance?]
One side of the campus was particularly noisy. When I turned my head, students who had come out for club promotions were handing out flyers along with maps. From among the various clubs, I picked up a flyer and map together from the table that looked the quietest.
Is that it?
The place I barely found by looking at the map was a three-story building not too far away. Even though it took quite a while to get here from the parking lot, perhaps because I left with plenty of time, there were still 30 minutes left until class.
Because it was early, the lecture hall was empty, but I hesitated to go right in and ended up turning my steps away. Seeing an ashtray placed between the current building and the building next to it, I took out a cigarette and put it in my mouth.
Another student was already there first. Just from a quick glance at his profile, I immediately realized he was Korean. The way he smoked with his cap pulled down low looked so familiar that he didn’t seem like a freshman like me.
When I lit up a few steps away, the other person finally looked at me. Then he made a noticeably surprised face before quickly turning his head the other way. But even after that, I felt his conscious gaze several times.
When I returned to the lecture hall with 15 minutes left before class, the seats were half full in the meantime. I took a seat around the middle and was looking at my phone hoping time would pass quickly, when the chairs filled up in an instant. The lecture hall became full in just 5 minutes.
Perhaps because it was a required course, there were unusually many students. With over 200 students gathered, naturally the inside of the lecture hall was noisy. Just from looking at their sitting postures, there was a stark difference between who was a freshman and who wasn’t.
Huh?
At the place I turned my head to without thinking, the student I’d seen a little while ago was sitting. It was right in the front row, but because it was completely at the end, it felt quite far. The way he rubbed his eyelids as if tired and yawned also didn’t seem like a freshman.
[Let’s start class.]
Ah. I’m screwed.
The moment I saw the professor who came in right on time, I thought that.
There were two professors conducting the same lecture. One for the morning class, one for the afternoon class, and while filling in the empty time slots, morning seemed better than afternoon so I chose this professor, but the moment I saw his face, I had a gut feeling that my choice had failed. It was because his first impression was the worst.
The professor, who looked stricter than anyone else, wasn’t sweating a single drop despite wearing a long-sleeved shirt on this hot day.
[I’ll explain how we’ll proceed. First…]
My expectation that we might end a little early since it was the first day of the semester crashed down from the first class. The professor, who spent 20 minutes explaining the grading criteria, surprisingly opened the textbook and then wrote large letters on the blackboard.
「Management」
Looking at the word management, the words that would be heard next immediately came to mind, and sure enough, the professor continued for 30 minutes with just an explanation of the subject on the theme of ‘what is management.’
His work ethic of not wasting even a little of the 50-minute class time was admirable, but among the many students, no one was grateful to him. All the students sat with disgusted expressions until the end.
[See you Wednesday then.]
As soon as the professor left, complaints poured out from here and there.
[I thought I was going to die of boredom, fuck. What is this really, from the first day?]
[Ah shit, I knew this would happen. That’s why I tried to sign up for Mr. Peterson, but it ended as soon as it opened…]
[This professor also doesn’t give any fucking points on assignments. He grades super strictly.]
I’m really screwed.
No wonder I signed up for a lecture that was the only one in the morning too easily—there was a reason for everything. It was already a famous professor among students, but I was so happy just to have successfully signed up without knowing that. If I’d known this would happen, I would have rather taken it next semester with a different professor.
I could tell from the first day. This semester is definitely not going to be easy.
I deliberately held out until after the third lecture and had lunch at an awkward time. At 2:30 PM, there were still quite a few students in the cafeteria.
Considering how spacious it was, there were too few restaurants, but I didn’t really care. Anyway, hamburger, pizza, and sandwich shops were everywhere you went. If there was anything unexpected, it was that a Chinese restaurant with a panda drawn on it was on the corner side.
I walked to the sandwich shop in the center without hesitation. I ordered a tuna sandwich set menu that cost less than $5 and took a seat on one side, when—buzz buzz—my phone in my pocket vibrated.
Yoon Sora: [How is it???]
Yoon Sora: [Did you make some friends???]
How long has it been? What friends?
Me: [This semester is a bit]
Yoon Sora: [Why]
Me: [The lecture halls are a problem and the professors are a problem too]
I should have thought carefully about the routes and made the schedule, but the problem was that I applied recklessly because I didn’t want to miss the classes I really wanted to take.
The first and third lectures were close to the central building so there was no big problem, but the second lecture sandwiched in between was held in the farthest building of all. I was really bewildered when I realized that I even had to cross a crosswalk to get to that lecture hall building.
I was fortunate to have left 30 minutes of buffer time between classes after hearing that the campus was large, otherwise I would have had to run between the wide buildings every time.
Sora, who called right away thinking something had happened, laughed for a while after hearing my story.
– You just have to think of it as good because it’s exercise too. But why the professor?
Although the building was far, except for the second one where at least the professor was okay, the third one was also a wrong choice. The young professor, who was taking on a professorship for the first time this year, didn’t seem strict by nature but was excessively enthusiastic, so the weight of assignments and presentations was too high.
– Anyway, you’ll do well on your own.
“I’m most worried about team presentations. One is overwhelming enough, but there are three.”
– Does it seem like there are people you can work with?
“It’s the first day, so I’m not sure.”
– Hmm, what about Korean people? I heard there are a lot of Korean people at that school.
“That lecture had only a few people so there weren’t any, but it seems like there are some in the first lecture.”
Even so, in the case of that class with over a hundred people, since there were no separate team assignments, there was no need to exchange words with other students.
– You need to meet people quickly so you can eat lunch together and stuff.
“I’ll meet someone eventually. It’s only the first day.”
* * *
Just two days after saying that, a new contact was added.
「Seo Gihyun」
It was the name of the first person I met at university.
Wednesday morning—
It definitely felt more tiring than Monday, perhaps because it was the day after working. Anyway, thinking I should be diligent at least until the first week of the semester, I left with plenty of time today too, and as expected, arrived very early.
Just having come once on Monday, the building had already become familiar. As soon as I arrived, I checked the lecture hall and went to the back of the building. I was smoking a cigarette in the smoking area when the person sitting on a bench a little away gradually approached toward where I was. The other person was, today as well, wearing a cap pulled down low.
He seemed to hesitate for a moment, then took out a cigarette and put it in his mouth.
[Can I borrow a light?]
It was English. English with a distinctive accent still remaining slightly, but with a reasonably not-bad pronunciation.
Instead of answering, I took out the lighter in my pocket and handed it over. Then I heard a word of thanks from the other person. Smoking with one standing ashtray between us felt unusually awkward. This time too, the other person kept glancing at me several times.
“Um…”
It was right before putting out the cigarette that didn’t have much left.
“You’re Korean, right?”
At those words, I nodded without realizing it.
“Yes.”
The other person made a noticeably pleased expression and from then on began pouring out many questions and words.
“Did you just start this time?”
“Yes.”
“Where’s your high school?”
“I came from New York.”
“Wow. Really?”
The other person, who was excessive if you said excessive, or if you looked at it positively, had better social skills than others, introduced himself as a third-year student and talked about this and that even though I didn’t ask. He said he’d been in Chicago from the beginning and it had been about 8 years since he came to America.
“Then did you come alone? What about your family?”
“They’re in Korea.”
“Oh. All my relatives live here. Nice to meet you. Oh right, can I drop the formalities? You can be comfortable too.”
“Yes.”
“You don’t know anyone in Chicago at all?”
“I don’t.”
“Wow, then I’m really the first. Tell me your number. Contact me if you need anything.”
I’m not the type to be shy anywhere either, but I was a bit flustered because this was the first time someone approached me this quickly. Just from borrowing a lighter once, he talked to me, dropped formalities, and even got my number.
But strangely, I didn’t feel like I disliked it.
Is this because of appearance?
Looking at the other person whose smiling face looked particularly kind, I actually laughed.
“I changed my major starting this semester. So I didn’t have anyone to take classes with, but this worked out well.”
“What’s your major?”
“Economics. What about you?”
“Business. Is this course a required course for economics too?”
“Yeah. Ah shit, did you hear the rumors about this professor? He’s supposed to be totally terrible.”
It wasn’t quite a rumor, but when I told him what I heard on the first day, the other person sighed.
“I’m taking it because I had no choice after failing to register for another professor, but what about you? Did you fail too?”
“…No. I didn’t know.”
“That makes sense. Ask me from now on. I’ll ask for you since I know a lot of business majors.”
“Thank you.”
“Come visit the dorm later too. I’ll introduce you to friends.”
That night, Sora said as expected, Kwon Sungha was born with good fortune with people, and it worked out well. I just thought, could it really be called good fortune when I’d just gained one person I knew who couldn’t even be called a friend, and moved on.
But after a few weeks passed, I realized that I was really lucky.
