First of all, I have to admit that I am having the best time of my life here at UC Davis! Not only am I studying at a four-year university but also I'm having fun meeting new people from different backgrounds.

The first thing that I noticed when I arrived here was the fact that mostly everyone, even faculty, uses a bike as their main way of transportation, which is something that’s not common in East Palo Alto, my hometown. Something that I don’t like about Davis is the weather; I am used to the cool weather in the Bay Area and coming here to Davis has been a complete change because the weather here is really hot.

I was accepted to “Casa Cuauhtemoc,” a Latino based dorm building and one of the most social dorm buildings here on campus, where I have already made a lot of new friends. Not only am I able to socialize with my neighbors, but also I am able to study and do homework with them, which is really helpful because I get to know them better while we study.

I have also met a lot of faculty, which is good because it is difficult to take classes with five hundred students and not be able to interact with the professors. That is also something new to me because I attended a small private high school where the students were able to obtain one-on-one help. Being here at UC Davis is different.

At the moment I am taking a pre-calculus class, an engineering pre-calculus class, chemistry, a writing preparation class, and an aeronautical engineering seminar. Although it is difficult to achieve, I have decided that I want to double major in aeronautical and mechanical engineering. My dream has always been to become an astronaut to be able to go to space, but I also have a great interest in cars and would like to develop new operation systems to improve cars.

So far that has been mostly what I have experienced here at UC Davis, but I am looking forward to seeing how things go for me the next couple of quarters. I promise to write about my new experiences at UC Davis.

-Jose Gilberto Martinez
UC Davis