I've been in love with everything Harvard since I was about five years old when my dad and uncle were talking about great colleges (I don't think I'll ever forget that day in Albuquerque), anyway I've never stepped foot on the campus in my life. Everything I know about Harvard comes exclusively from the Internet: whether that be from Gilmore Girls via Netflix, Youtube videos or Harvard's virtual tour. If there has ever been a single school that was a must see in the heart of Maame between 2003 to now, it would be Harvard.Cambridge is, for starters, beautiful. Everything about it is completely wonderful. I'm still not sure if I'm saying that because I've romanticized the entire town for so long, or if it truly is breathtaking; I think it's a bit of both. Cambridge feels like my hometown--remember, I'm the kid that packed the same home lunch for years, so I'm a fan of normalcy. I will admit there is one disparity: the roads are very narrow, and I was always convinced we'd hit something, even though we never did. Still, I enjoyed my time. Everything there is brick, on Massachusetts Street, I mean, which is a lot like Massachusetts Street in my hometown. The people are friendly, the sidewalks aren't very dirty, and bikers do whatever they want all the time.
Everyone knows how I feel about Gap--short story: I love the Gap. Anyway, literally steps away from Harvard Yard is a Gap store and an Urban Outfitters (even though I don't really shop there anymore, it's good to have choices), plus an Anthropology (I'm not sure I can even afford that, especially as a student, but again, it's good to have options), along with an American Apparel (I really can't afford that, but I can take pictures of cute outfits in the dressing room and dream).
Harvard itself is beautiful, as if that wasn't already obvious. Harvard Yard is smaller than I expected, but Harvard isn't really known for its high acceptance rates or anything, so it's understandable. Everything around Harvard Yard is made of brick, or at least some sort of stone. We went on a guided tour, so it included stories of different buildings, which really pulled everything together to know that a certain pile of bricks once housed George Washington or another was on its third try at being a building. The college is pretty spread out, there is the main campus on Mass., but it branches out throughout Cambridge, with every building looking distinctly Harvard-esque.The worst moment of my life happened when I identified a Harvard student, from some obscure, exclusively Harvard video from Youtube. I'm sure he was weirded out, but I was on a high from the Cambridge air, and Yale students were in the room next to me. I was very easily knocked off of this pedestal when my mother asked for a picture, which I refused before he could even accept or deny because I am most definitely not a creep.
While on tour, we stopped at the "John Harvard" statue. I put this in quotation marks because John Harvard is not the one immortalized in brass, it's actually some rando that was related to the President of Harvard at the time. Another nugget of information: our tour guide said they call it the "Statue of Three Lies" because John Harvard isn't pictured, the establishment date on the statue is wrong and the founder's name is wrong. The "John Harvard" statue was created by the same man who did the Lincoln Memorial, so maybe he was a bit preoccupied at the time, but still, poor work, man. I saw a Youtube video where a bunch of kids got so drunk they allegedly peed on the statue, but I still got in line like everyone else, and rubbed the statues stinky, pee stained foot. It's supposed to help you get into Harvard, I guess only time will tell if I even have the gall to apply.
The filter options at Harvard are very nice, again not as good as my hometown, but Harvard isn't home to the most artistic people. I'm trying very hard to not let my sweet disposition for the school affect my scoring; between how the many filter options, and how certain buildings had their own filters, I'm giving Harvard a 7.5/10 for its Snapchat filters.
My next stop was MIT, which I will discuss in its own post at a later date. After we leave the Boston area, we'll be headed for the Big Apple.
If any of you have been to Harvard feel free to tell me what it was like.
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