So I took my big suitcase, packed my stuff, and left home on March 3rd...The first time I left this city, it's not like in France, that we can TGV everyone, here is fly everywhere. The place arrived in Chicago on time, it was snowing--it was nice in Philadelphia by the time I left, but seemed that it was horrible in Chicago, and Appleton might be worse...Ugh...The O'Hare Airport in Chicago is one of the busiest airports in the world, it's pretty huge~The flight was delayed. It was only 35min fly from Chicago to Appleton, but I was stucked in the airport for 5 hours, and the boarding gate changed all the time--what a desaster!!!However, fortunately they didn't cancel the flight, and I still arrived in Appleton somehow...Yeah!
Got the airport in Appleton, called the hotel shuttle and went directly to Country Inn & Suite, which is not too far from the airport, but kind of far from Appleton downtown too^o^! Since we had the free bus go from the hotel to the conference center, it's not a big deal...
I was not snowing by the time I arrived Appleton, even though it's pretty cold, and snow on the sidewalk is more than half meter high, wooow!!!! The driver told me that there were a thunder storm like 2 days before i arrived, and it just stopped--How lucky I am, hahaha!
The hotel did surprised me~I was thinking i should be a hotel with 4 bed in a room like the
youth hostel in Paris, or even worse like a dorm room, but it was a really nice hotel with whirlpool, swimming pool inside the hotel, internet, and large nice room. I was prepared to share the room with someone else, but the other never came, so I paid for one person and had the room of two for the whole 4 nights! Awesome~!Since there was really nothing around, I could only stayed in the room, but it's good to have rest after a long flight...so I just called Mum and went to bed...Nice~
Got up pretty early the next day, but the bus will not come until 12 p.m. so I "walked" a bit on internet, sent some e-mails to tell my friends that I was still alive...Took the first bus to the conference hotel--Radisson Paper Valley downtown, registered, and began the introduction session. It was getting a bit weird, because I saw that nearly everyone knew each other already, and they seemed to be surprising to see a Chinese girl from Philadelphia to be there, hehe~I tried to talk to some students there first, but they came in group, and seemed not really want to talk to people out of their group...alright, give up! The first one I talked to was the man sit beside me, he has his own winery and he was new there too, a nice guy though. The nicest thing is we had ice-cream during the break of the session, that was really good ice-cream, better than all I've ever had: milky, creamy, but not too sweet...what a paradise!!!--Ya, Wisconsin is famous for the farm:)
The first day finished with the receiption, I left the hall pretty early, and took a tour of downtown Appleton, stood on the bridge for a while even if it was cold, I still prefered staying there rather than inside...However, it's a small town, so I went back pretty soon, and thought to check my e-mails, but Jeremy, one of the students of Steven Point, a very cute little boy.:P I had a good talk there, and waited for the bus to get back to the hotel. We met some people from Wisconsin State Park--Dan, Peter, Tim--while we were waiting for the bus, they are nice--and that's the end of the first day!
The next 2 days are much more fun. The keynotes speakers, Scott Deming and Jeff Salz are awesome and I had been talking to people the whole day, and knew lots of people by the end of the conference~
One thing I need to mention here is the banquet of the last day, the steak was the best steak I had ever! Thick, tender, even...Woooooowwwww~~~~
Overall, I had a very good time in Appleton, awesome food, drink, and ice-cream, and very kind people...It is a little bit weird that I went there, but it was really a nice experience, and I felt that I got to another level...
Finished the conference, repacked my stuff, took the bus to Milwaulkee...Heard that it is the
biggest city in Wisconsin, but I don't like it that much, it's just a normal city, but not that cute... Most part of Wisconsin is like Europe, not very CITY, but they are really nice, I'll go back there some summer, and will definitely go to Wisconsin Dells where there are some big amusement park!Alright, time for the train, said Good-bye to Wisconsin, next station: Chicago...
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