Does Anyone Have a PENN?

Today's adventure begins with my first ride on a Philadelphia subway.  It was much cleaner than I expected it to be. I was expecting them to be horrid and putrid and in some aspects the were, but not nearly as much as I expected. This is a contrast between the way I expected downtown Philadelphia to be.  I predicted the city to be neat and orderly, however it is much more dirty.  Now granted the city is very old which may in fact make it appear as though it was dirtier, but it is still far from what I expected.

In addition to visiting downtown, our cohort also got its first look at the university.  The PENN campus was majestic and had some very impressive architecture.

The buildings were made of stone which was a relief from the massive amounts of brick buildings in the city.  I liked the feel of the campus, especially in the library and the main quad.  Although it may be a large campus, it felt relatively small after going on the tour.

For our evening plans, we ate dinner at a fancy steakhouse in downtown.  There we met with Dyana So, a former Pinole Valley Student and good friend, and numerous other PENN representatives.  It was a very comforting feeling to be able to connect with a great friend like Dyana for the first time in months.  I also had a great opportunity to speak with Frank Cabrera, a student at PENN who is also involved in the incoming freshman applications.  He gave me some great insight into the way in which administrators review an applicants skills, abilities, and interests.  I felt that my chances of getting accepted into PENN was much better after listening to Frank tell us the weight of SAT scores in the decision making process.  Before, I believed that my SAT scores would be the deciding factor in my application, but now I realize that it is the personal statement that is most important.

As for the dinner itself, I felt that the food was not worth the price paid.  I ordered a steak and that's exactly what I got; a steak and nothing else.  The steak itself was almost burned on the outside and seemed very dry.  I attempted to remedy this with steak sauce but that only made this worse. The sauce was very sweet, but it almost tasted like it had vinegar in it, which was not a good combination at all.  Although the meal was very pricey, I enjoyed the steak dinner at Scalas in San Francisco much better.  Other than that, it was an amazing evening and I would do it again in a heartbeat.