As a part of the course requirements for one of my classes, I had to attend at least one professional conference from the list of conferences assigned. Earlier in the semester I decided I would attend the MOABA (Missouri Applied Behavior Analysis) conference in St. Louis, Missouri as it was towards the end of the semester. I thought this would give me two months time to settle and adjust well with the routine before I travel to the new city to attend the conference. However, before I knew it, the dates for the MOABA conference were upon me. I was excited to know that some of my classmates were also attending the same conference and delighted to learn that my roommate, Naomi, decided to join me for the trip to visit her family friend. I was curious to see the city and the popular monument, the St. Louis Arch, also known as “The Gateway to the West”. It was overwhelming to manage a trip in the middle of such a crazy time of the semester. However in the end, I found my two-day visit to St. Louis was a very memorable and refreshing (much-needed) break.
We decided to travel to St. Louis via Megabus, a double-decker coach bus. After a long day at school we started our journey at 5 in the evening. I was feeling extremely sleepy, but the interaction with some of my classmates was so interesting that it kept me up. I am glad that I chose to go to MOABA, as it was a wonderful opportunity to get to know others in my class and socialize with more people.
We reached St. Louis Union Station at 11 pm. It was freezing cold outside so our group of 11 students quickly hailed two cabs to the hotel. We were pleased to reach the hotel so soon and rushed out of the cab and hurried to the reception so that we can go into our rooms. But we soon realized that we were at the wrong Holiday Inn. It was interesting to know that St. Louis had two hotels with the same name, but it was a very frustrating situation to face at that hour landing a strange city.
Fortunately the receptionist was very helpful and called for another cab. We all were helpless and couldn’t do much other than waiting outside in the hotel lawn. We were so irritated with the cab driver and started venting our anger and frustration about the situation. Our conversation soon moved to the comparison between the St. Louis and Chicago and we all agreed that Chicago is much livelier and a better place to live. Girls will be girls – we were so busy with our interesting random discussions that we almost forgot about going to the actual Holiday – Inn (Vikings) and that we were waiting for the cab. We had to wait for about an hour for another cab to go the Holiday – Inn Vikings. We were in a great relief to see a cab after such a long wait at that hour in the night, making our journey truly eventful.
We decided to travel to St. Louis via Megabus, a double-decker coach bus. After a long day at school we started our journey at 5 in the evening. I was feeling extremely sleepy, but the interaction with some of my classmates was so interesting that it kept me up. I am glad that I chose to go to MOABA, as it was a wonderful opportunity to get to know others in my class and socialize with more people.
We reached St. Louis Union Station at 11 pm. It was freezing cold outside so our group of 11 students quickly hailed two cabs to the hotel. We were pleased to reach the hotel so soon and rushed out of the cab and hurried to the reception so that we can go into our rooms. But we soon realized that we were at the wrong Holiday Inn. It was interesting to know that St. Louis had two hotels with the same name, but it was a very frustrating situation to face at that hour landing a strange city.
Fortunately the receptionist was very helpful and called for another cab. We all were helpless and couldn’t do much other than waiting outside in the hotel lawn. We were so irritated with the cab driver and started venting our anger and frustration about the situation. Our conversation soon moved to the comparison between the St. Louis and Chicago and we all agreed that Chicago is much livelier and a better place to live. Girls will be girls – we were so busy with our interesting random discussions that we almost forgot about going to the actual Holiday – Inn (Vikings) and that we were waiting for the cab. We had to wait for about an hour for another cab to go the Holiday – Inn Vikings. We were in a great relief to see a cab after such a long wait at that hour in the night, making our journey truly eventful.
