This is my first post, so I guess I’ll begin with introductions…My name is Christina Miller, and I am a sophomore here at Puget Sound. I am from Chattanooga, TN, so I have come quite a long way from home. Though I do love my hometown, my freshman year and the first part of my sophomore year here in the Northwest have been wonderful. Surprisingly, I have even managed to survive the rain, which was a really big change for me, since I grew up in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. If you are at all worried about the rain and the cloudy skies, I’m just here to tell you it’s really not that bad. I actually enjoy playing in the rain now, and though it does get a bit dark in the winter, everyone really learns to appreciate the first sunny days of spring. The reason I brought this up, though, is because it just started raining for the first time this semester last week, so I just got out the rain boots and I’m pretty excited to wear them again!
Anyway, back to my intro…I’m a Comparative Sociology major which is an interdisciplinary major combining Anthropology and Sociology. Honestly, last year at this time, I had absolutely no idea what I was going to study-and it’s nice because you don’t have to decide your major until 2nd semester of sophomore year. So I took some classes that counted as Core requirements (just the requirements you have to take from each field of “thinking” to fulfill a Liberal Arts education), and realized that I was primarily interested in International Relations, but I enjoy studying people’s social relationships as well as politics and economics. I am also minoring in Japanese and Studio Art (just for fun!). Hopefully, next year for my full junior year I will be studying abroad in Japan at Waseda University (早稲田大学). I can’t wait for that, but I will talk about it more when I know more details.
Like most other Puget Sound students, I am involved in lots of clubs and activities. I don’t know any student that is not a member of some organization or club that they really enjoy. I dance with Repertory Dance Group (RDG). I’m actually in Justine’s lyrical dance (Justine is another blogger on this site). I am also doing a beginning tap dance. Other than dance, I am an International Student Mentor, and I am mentoring a student from Vietnam. Uyen is so great-we are going out to a Vietnamese dinner tonight and I am so excited! Being from Tennessee, I have never had Vietnamese food before.
I have 2 jobs, one on campus and one off. I’m a tour guide, so if any of you come to campus for a visit and I am your guide, let me know you have read this! It is not a work-study job, but I have had 2 other work-study jobs during my freshman year, and they have lots of options (recycling crew, printmaking lab assistant). Also, I work at a church’s nursery about a mile from campus. It is really nice to get off campus sometimes and make friends with people that are from this area.
So now you know all about me and what I do around here, so feel free to comment or ask questions! It’s fall break this weekend so I’ll be headed to Seattle during the day tomorrow and I’ll be picking up a few extra hours at the tour guide office. I’ll try to post again with pictures of Seattle!