Intro to Chicago

At 2:30 in the morning today, I looked in the mirror at my disheveled self, and tried as hard as I could to figure out why on earth I would want to be at my high school by 3:15 in the morning. I ended up somehow convincing myself that this trip to Chicago and Cornell was worth getting up at 2:30 for, even though I would try to sleep through pretty much anything. I arrived at the school earlier than Mr. Ramsey, which is usually the suggested arrival time. Before I knew it, we were in the shuttle on the way to the airport. I would talk more about what happened in the shuttle and on the flights from SFO to Minneapolis and from Minneapolis to Chicago O’Hare, but I slept through most of both flights.

CTA (Chicago Transit Authority) station at O’Hare.

After taking public transit in Chicago (which was much more crowded than I have ever seen BART) to our hotel, I was awestruck by just how extraordinary the Drake Hotel. Since I had already known that it was a four diamond hotel as of last year, I was expecting it to be pretty impressive, but its overall grandeur far exceeded my expectations.

After leaving the Drake in a daze, partly because I was thunderstruck by the hotel but mainly because I was just exhausted from the overall lack of sleep, we met up with a couple of WCCUSD grads who were currently living in Chicago. They took us around the town and brought us to an amazing deep-dish pizza parlor, Giordano’s. The great food was able to cancel out the only real downside of Chicago, the weather. When we had to walk from the station to our hotel, the temperature was around 90 degrees, but the humidity was by far the worst part.

The bustling lobby at the beautiful Drake Hotel.

The weather actually ended up taking a turn for the better, in my opinion at least, when a thunderstorm began at around 8:30ish and made Chicago rather chilly instead of sweltering, which I consider a pretty big improvement. These great foods also lead me to my first great accomplishment on this trip, when I was able to eat four and a half slices out of an eight slice 12” deep dish pizza. I still haven’t felt any negative effects from this feast, and hopefully that success is a sign of many to come.

The amazing deep dish pizza at Giordano’s.