Why is it hard to choose? Similar schools, or good in different ways? I guess that's a happy problem, though :)
Interesting that you should ask that -- I have sort of a love/hate relationship with Boston. When I first got here, I hated it -- I was excited to be living in a big city, but I got used to NYC over the summer, and Boston has about 600,000 people, I believe, while NYC has 8 million. So it wasn't really what I expected. Also, in New York, so many restaurants & stores are open late at night, or 24 hours, and there are always people out at any hour of the night.. whereas in Boston, everything shuts down early. Even the Boston subway shuts down at 12:30, whereas NYC's is 24 hours. That also annoyed me (especially when I needed to make a 6:25 a.m. flight and the subway wasn't open and it took forever to find a taxi). Then, the crazy weather threw me off, especially when it was winter for so many months, and so very cold. I was forever finding fault with Boston, just random things, like how there are only 2 movie theaters here (although there are more in Cambridge, that's where the art houses are), &c.
However, since I got back here from spring break, my attitude changed. I think the warm weather (which is a regular thing now, finally) had something to do with it. Now I appreciate the history here, and all the things to do. I think the thing that helped the most was I decided to explore the city by foot, so I walked all over and found neat places and neighborhoods, parks, statues, little things of interest. Now I walk a few miles each day through some of the nicer parts of Boston, and it's lovely.
I guess I haven't that much answered your question (even with all this rambling!) -- I guess it's a pretty good college town. I think I'd be really bored if I went to school in the middle of nowhere, so I like that there's so much to do here if I want to stray from campus, plus I can take the commuter rail to interesting places, or the Chinatown bus to New York, even. Sometimes it gets a little annoying that wherever you go, there are college kids around, especially when they are of the rich, designer handbad & sunglasses variety (and there are so many here), or the constantly-drinking type.. Oh, that's another thing, since the city shuts down so early, and the T as well, on weekends people usually head to this nearby town to go to random people's apartments and drink, just because it's within walking distance. And I don't do that, so my options are limited. There aren't any midnight movies or anything because people would be stranded because of the subway, and while I'd walk through New York at all hours of the night, Boston at night looks all post-apocalyptic in that it's very dark and no one's out so that scares me.
Wow, that was really long.. but anyway, overall, I guess it's a good college town because you can make it be what you want it to be.. I guess if I went to a school in the middle of nowhere, there would be even more people drinking rather than doing things because there's less to do. I just didn't really think my college decisions through, and things like the crazy weather surprised me.
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Date: 2006-04-14 05:07 am (UTC)Interesting that you should ask that -- I have sort of a love/hate relationship with Boston. When I first got here, I hated it -- I was excited to be living in a big city, but I got used to NYC over the summer, and Boston has about 600,000 people, I believe, while NYC has 8 million. So it wasn't really what I expected. Also, in New York, so many restaurants & stores are open late at night, or 24 hours, and there are always people out at any hour of the night.. whereas in Boston, everything shuts down early. Even the Boston subway shuts down at 12:30, whereas NYC's is 24 hours. That also annoyed me (especially when I needed to make a 6:25 a.m. flight and the subway wasn't open and it took forever to find a taxi). Then, the crazy weather threw me off, especially when it was winter for so many months, and so very cold. I was forever finding fault with Boston, just random things, like how there are only 2 movie theaters here (although there are more in Cambridge, that's where the art houses are), &c.
However, since I got back here from spring break, my attitude changed. I think the warm weather (which is a regular thing now, finally) had something to do with it. Now I appreciate the history here, and all the things to do. I think the thing that helped the most was I decided to explore the city by foot, so I walked all over and found neat places and neighborhoods, parks, statues, little things of interest. Now I walk a few miles each day through some of the nicer parts of Boston, and it's lovely.
I guess I haven't that much answered your question (even with all this rambling!) -- I guess it's a pretty good college town. I think I'd be really bored if I went to school in the middle of nowhere, so I like that there's so much to do here if I want to stray from campus, plus I can take the commuter rail to interesting places, or the Chinatown bus to New York, even. Sometimes it gets a little annoying that wherever you go, there are college kids around, especially when they are of the rich, designer handbad & sunglasses variety (and there are so many here), or the constantly-drinking type.. Oh, that's another thing, since the city shuts down so early, and the T as well, on weekends people usually head to this nearby town to go to random people's apartments and drink, just because it's within walking distance. And I don't do that, so my options are limited. There aren't any midnight movies or anything because people would be stranded because of the subway, and while I'd walk through New York at all hours of the night, Boston at night looks all post-apocalyptic in that it's very dark and no one's out so that scares me.
Wow, that was really long.. but anyway, overall, I guess it's a good college town because you can make it be what you want it to be.. I guess if I went to a school in the middle of nowhere, there would be even more people drinking rather than doing things because there's less to do. I just didn't really think my college decisions through, and things like the crazy weather surprised me.