It’s a three-day, two-night stay at a sunny locale close
to the beach, with palm trees, pools and tennis courts everywhere.
Housing, food and recreation are included in the package price.
There are hundreds of 18- and 19-year-olds meeting for the first
time. And there’s no curfew.
To new Bruins, orientation can sound like three blissful
vacation days, so many think this translates into the perfect time
to hook up.
Though orientation can be quite fun and social opportunities
abound, you should direct your energies toward the platonic. You
have an entire year to initiate your dorm room bed ““ at least
wait until you own the sheets.
Doug Ludlow, an orientation counselor from summer 2004, said
plenty of students at orientation have asked him what he thinks of
guys or girls they are interested in, but he cautions against
taking immediate romantic action.
“Orientation is not the real world. … When you go to
Cancun and you throw the rules out the door, some people think
(orientation) is the same way. But you don’t spend the next
four years in Cancun,” Ludlow said. “There are plenty
of awkward moments, thanks to stupid decisions at
orientation.”
Aside from orientation’s deceptive vacation feel,
there’s also the superficial super-closeness that fuses
individuals together as friends, best buds or even “soul
mates” in a matter of days.
Most everyone is bubbly and talkative, and you may feel you have
10 to 20 new friends by the end of the session, but very seldom do
orientation friends turn into your closest college friends.
The few friends I’ve retained from orientation only have
become lasting pals because they have intersected my life in places
other than that three-day, two-night stint in
“paradise.” It sometimes takes common classes,
extracurricular interests or finding out quarters or years later
that you have friends in common to “rebond” with
orientation buddies.
So if orientation friendships rarely become substantive, why
would orientation hookups turn into anything more by Beat ‘SC
Week? Even if all you’re looking for is some casual
closeness, such action can come back to haunt you way before
Halloween.
Even if you think you can hook up sans consequence, your partner
for the evening may not think so. If the thought of fielding phone
calls, e-mails and instant messages from a premature hookup makes
you woozy, resist the urge.
Though you always should ponder before you peck, orientation is
a bit dicier. The time period between orientation and Zero Week can
be unbearable. Excitement quickens your heartbeat just a bit, a
UCLA buddy list appears on the screen, and you start to really dig
this college thing now that it’s almost tangible.
But do yourself a favor: Wait until the fervor of freedom has
gone down to low-tide levels before you make eyes at the many fish
in the sea.
If the two of you are meant to be together, it will happen amid
dorm-floor dinners, midterm study sessions and football tailgate
parties. For now, just take the time to talk and make as many
“friends” as names you can remember. Don’t rush
into anything sexual before you’ve started your first week of
lecture.
For now, class is adjourned with one parting thought: What
happens at orientation, much unlike Vegas, does not stay at
orientation.
Bonos is the 2004-2005 managing editor. E-mail her at
lbonos@media.ucla.edu.