Day 2 (Washington State University) - Spokane, Washington United States

Today I got a tour of Washington State University, aka "Wazzu." Campus is set on a hill so there is a plethora of stairs and hilly areas to climb. Joe said that Washington is known for its colleges and university buildings to be constructed of red bricks, so every building - new and old - has red brick in it. We walked through the Student Union Building known as the "CUB." Central doesn't have a Student Union Building but maybe they'll do something when they renovate the UC. The CUB consisted of the bookstore,a variety of places to get a quick eat, anauditorium that could be used as a movie theatre, big cushy areas to study, and there was a RSO fair going on when we went through. One door in the CUB went outside to a catwalk type hallway where you could overlook the football stadium - which is in the middle of campus - as well as the surrounding area, it was a great view, but very chilly. Other places on campus that we visited included a popular place called "Ferdinand's," where you can get homemade ice cream and cheese. The cheese, known as "Cougar Gold," is very popular within the area. The ice cream was fantastic, I had Tin Lizzy, which is vanilla ice cream with caramel and pieces of chocolate toffee in it

For lunch and dinner we went to one of the on campus residential restaurants. I haven't even been here at Wazzu for 24hrs and I have already learned that this University does things in the complete opposite fashion as Central. The Res Res forexample: instead of swiping your student ID card and eating in a buffet style of as much food as your stomach desires like at Central, at WSU you pick out your food items, take them to a checkout counter, and pay per item. I suppose this style prevents a lot of waste and overeating. It also seems (after talking with Joe and observation) that eating isn't as a social event as it is at Central.Many students were eating by themselves and not in the big obnoxious groups like at Central.

Later that night we went to "Tunnel of Oppression," which is a popular diversity program put on at colleges and universities across the country (but I've never heard of it). Joe had to be a guide (another RED responsibility). It's put on for three days and is where students (most of who are forced to attend) go through a bunch of scenarios displaying a type of oppression - immigrants working in poor conditions, roommate having a medical issue, homelessness, hearing impaired, rape, gay bashing, and masculinity stereotypes. A group of 15 or so students went through together with the guide leading them through students who are acting out these intense scenes. Afterwards there is a debriefing session. The whole event takes about 45mins-1hr.I could tell there was a lot of time and work put into organizing and executing Tunnel.