This past semester has been full of amazing experiences and times growing closer to friends. I am very blessed to go to this university and be surrounded with a Scholars group that cares a lot about each other. Some of the experiences I have had pertaining to the Columbus To-Do List include going on a group trip to downtown Columbus, attempting to go to the Greek festival, attending a Greek Orthodox Church and getting lunch, going to the North Market with ENR Scholars, saving a rabbit, and watching the sunset.
The first trip I took into Columbus was the group trip that included people from my floor and other dorms at OSU that my close friend Ted knew before college. During this trip, we went to Jeni’s, boutiques on the Short North, Rich Street Bridge along the Scioto Mile, Bicentennial Park, the Greater Columbus Convention Center, and the State House. The whole trip was great but my favorite experience was running through the water play area with Parker, one of Ted’s friends, and becoming completely soaked and trying to hug the people who refused to go in with us.
The next thing I did with a smaller group from our floor was trying to go to the Annual Columbus Greek Festival and ate dinner at Fuzzy’s Taco Shop. We ended up going at the end of the festival when it was closing down so we couldn’t experience it in full swing. We decided to go into the Greek Orthodox Church and after talking to a woman there she invited me to a service. Ted joined me the following Sunday for the service since he has had regularly attended an Orthodox Church before going to college. After the service, which was beautiful and nothing I had ever experienced before, we went to get lunch at The Melt. My favorite part of this experience was the singing at the church combined with the smell of incense at the service. It was a very surreal time and brought me much joy and excitement about experiencing something new.
The last experience I had in Columbus, besides going to German Village with Ted, was when the ENR Scholars went to the North Market together. After eating dinner made by a Vietnamese food vendor in the market, my friends Alex, Grace, Ted and I went to watch the sunset. On the way to finding a spot to watch it, we ran into a couple outside of a business that was trying to catch a domestic rabbit. It was a very comedic sight watching all of us chasing after this poor rabbit for around thirty minutes. We eventually caught the rabbit and walked a little ways to an area underneath a bridge on the Olentangy River to watch the sunset. It was extremely beautiful and my favorite moment was watching the sun go down with my friends and the water running against my legs. It was a time that I needed after moving into college and was a moment when I truly felt alive.
My overall favorite experience from this semester’s Columbus To-Do List project was when I went to the German Village with Ted. It was such a pure experience and the night was perfect in the sense that everything looked like a fairy tale and I could spend genuine time getting to know someone I consider to now be one of my closest friends. I would recommend all of the experiences I had in Columbus to anyone. These experiences have become some of my favorites since going to OSU. I have learned that at times Columbus is hard to navigate, in all of my experiences it was while using the COTA Bus, but once you get the hang of things it is not too difficult. To someone who is trying to do the same activities, Columbus is what you make it. It is a large city and easy to feel lost in but by putting yourself out there and being open to new experiences you can love it a lot. I plan to continue exploring Columbus. The next things I hope to explore in the city is the Columbus Museum of Art and seeing a Columbus Symphony Orchestra performance.
