Last week I had to laugh when I saw an email from OCL – it said all returning Map Hill residents would have to stop in at OCL and have their cards reverified or something like that.  The first reason was that I knew the email would get lost in all the other Babson Ugrad emails, leading to an angry rampage from returning students.

But the second reason was a bit more personal…

See, I was back on campus nice and early this year for Winter Session.  The first problem is that classes started at 9 am on January 3rd, the same day the college opened (that’s right, you can’t stay overnight January 2nd.)  So what were out-of-state students supposed to do?

I drove about 10 hours on the 2nd hoping I could sneak into my room somehow later in the day, but I could not even get in the building.  So I left and found someone I knew to stay with for the night (which was alright, except I didn’t want to leave my car filled with thousands of dollars worth of stuff out on the street in freezing cold temperatures.)

So I came back at 7 am on the 3rd, hoping to get right into my room, unpack, and take a shower before class.  That would have been nice, but things don’t happen so easily when OCL is involved…

I got into Map Hill, but my card did not work on my door!  That made me wonder what OCL meant when they said “You’re all set to live in Map Hill for Winter Session.”  It must have meant something like “we’ll take your $500 now and once you come back we’ll see if we can get you in a room.”

So I waited until about 8:35 when OCL opened and went to find out what the problem was.  It turns out my card “expired” on December 17.  How convenient…

I’ll spare you the agony, but I waited at OCL and ran back to my dorm a couple times before they finally got my card working properly.  Once I got into my room, it was already 9:18, so I had to leave right away to go sit in class for 5 hours.

As I sat in class, I just kept wondering why my card hadn’t been updated beforehand, why OCL does not know what they’re doing, and whether or not there would be any hot water for me to take a shower later.

Just another day in the life of a Babson student…

[And if you're wondering about the hot water, the answer was no.  When you pay for winter session housing, you get the privilege of staying in a dorm room.  You do not get heat or hot water.]