It has been a month since I left New York City, and I couldn't let go of a single piece of memory in Columbia. I have been constantly amazed by the tremendous amount of opportunitiesin Columbia, and my life was enlightened in every possible way.

The classic landmark in Columbia campus

Living on campus, I was lucky to know some friends who are extremely assiduous and absolutely sincere. They were polite, but definitely not intimate. Regardless of my accent, no one here has ever teased me as a FOB (“Fresh-off-the-boat”). During the summer, most of students on campus were seniors, some of whom worked in hedge funds, bulge bracket banks, or tech companies as interns, and the others were faced with graduate school deadlines, job interviews, etc. It sometimes frustrated me that the Columbia University students are too busy concentrating on their own aims and objectives to spend some quality time hanging out with me. But C’est la vie, that’s why this is Columbia.

The Butler Library

Located in upper Manhattan, NYC is one of the most disparate cities in culture and religion around the globe; Columbia contains tens of thousands of students from diverse backgrounds. The undergrads here in general work really hard (that’s why they are here) towards their career or life-long goals, though many of whom can easily find a lucrative job after graduation. Columbia is such a unique place with such an amazing concentration of super smart, cool, and engaged individuals. I was fully aware of this fact during every single second of my summer session.

Time Square

While trying to make maximal use of my time at Columbia, I was oblivious to the fact that it’s impossible to compress the life here into six short weeks. There is always something new to explore. Every day when you wake up in the morning, confronted with endless choices of spending the day, it can be bewildering to a large extent.

Compared with Harvard, Yale and Princeton, Columbia is in New York. Whatever you can possibly come up with, this city has its way to satisfy you. Thus a fake ID can be quite necessary for college kids who want to socialize.

Hanging out with friends

The constant debates in Uris Hall, the all-nighters at Butler, the disgusting food in John Jay, and the frat parties on 114th, they are all unforgettable. Columbia was once ranked the “most stressful school”. Even during the summer session, I still remember working on problem sets with my friends in Schapiro Hall, staying up until the early mornings. But what you could not have anticipated is how unprepared, how lonely you can feel in this sea of strangers and endless opportunities. While you are wandering through the buildings, it is as though the paths themselves come toward you. You pursue, or are pursued by, its own paths. The land goes on and on. The path we take to get educated has obstacles, but no final barriers. 

Some of my friends asked me how guys were in NYC. Well, they are hot guys. However settling down, marriage and monogamy are never in New Yorker’s lexicon. In a fast-paced city like NYC, you could never know whether the guy you have been dating for three months is your boyfriend or not. Defining the relationship seems too serious and freaks people out. When they have a substantial life on their own, committing to a relationship simply takes too much.