Longboarding Around Campus

Hey guys, I hope everyone who came to DiscoverUSC had fun and learned a lot! Both my brother and dad came down for the event, and they were pretty impressed with the ViterbiEXPO going on inside of RTH. But I know I enjoyed leading the lab tours and learning about some of the research that faculty do here. Definitely was a nice start to the week.

Longboarding around my neighborhood!

Anyways, during Discover, a high school student asked me how I get around campus, since he saw a couple people biking or boarding around. I originally started with a bike my freshman year, since I thought I would really need it at USC. It turned out that it was a little silly, since my dorm (Birnkrant) was really close to all of my classes, and nothing was more than a 5 minute walk from it. I calculated that the time it took me to lock my bike to a bikerack made up for the time I saved biking somewhere (since the distance is so short – yay math!). However, I began doing a program called JEP (you can read about that here), and the school location was about 10 minutes off campus. This actually made it worth it to bike, so I did use my bike for that. Having a bike if you live on campus is still a great option, but I think that you should see if you really need one before investing in it. I know that my bike was locked to the rack for most of the semester, which was kindof a waste.

My awesome roommates last year, who convinced me to try longboarding

Both of my roommates freshman year had longboards, which I thought was really cool. I had never longboarded before (or anything like skateboarding), but I thought I would try it. I first learned by just going up and down the carpeted hallways in Birnkrant. It took me a little time to figure out how to balance on it. I then started going outside, just boarding around the quad at night, so no one could see me look like an idiot. It didn’t take me long to realize that boarding around at night was pretty meditative, and that I found it a great way to relax. I would just plug in my iPod and go around campus aimlessly, usually with a few friends. It became a way for me to explore and learn more about USC, since there are a lot of really interesting places on campus that no one really knows about. Kinda like Hogwarts or something! I won’t divulge any of that here, and I’ll leave you to explore that for yourself if you choose to come here. But I have great memories of these late-night longboarding runs.

I had just gotten a balloon from a Viterbi event, and so I thought tying it to my wrist would make me look way cooler. Which it obviously does.

I bought my first longboard as a Christmas present to myself last year. I still use it everyday (probably multiple times a day), to get from my apartment off campus. I find it to be a great mode of transportation, and I’ve even convinced my roommates to start as well! To me, it’s more than just a form of transportation, which I admit, is a little weird. But if I ever need a break from studying, I’m usually just skating around playing my favorite songs, since it always makes me feel better after.