A review of the orientation
September 17, 2006by Hajera Khaja
Once upon a time last Friday, there was a very cool student club at UofT, called the MSA, short for Muslim Students’ Association, that held its first ever orientation to welcome new students and to introduce them to the coolness that was the MSA. The frosh that came to know of this auspicious event were very excited and went traipsing off to tell all their friends and foes about it. As the days passed on, they gathered in huge numbers, flooding the MSA exec with lots of emails about their excitement and willingness to register and partake in the day’s activities. Their nights passed with much difficulty and they couldn’t wait for the day to come when they would be finally bestowed with the title of ‘MSA member’ and got to meet all the older MSA members.
Although the waiting seemed long and endless, last Friday finally did arrive, trailed by clear blue skies and sunny rays shining down upon the frosh. They started the morning early with presentations by the MSA President, Student Affairs and the Student Administrative Council. By the end of the session, the frosh were left amazed and speechless at all the wonderful ways they could get involved and thanked their lucky stars that they chose to attend UofT and not York. Next on the agenda was a tour of every cool place imaginable on campus – except that it wasn’t really a tour, but a scavenger hunt that had the frosh running around campus trying to find answers to mundane questions such as the number of stalls in the washrooms near the prayer space in the Bahen Center. And to the end the fabulous day, the 60 something frosh that registered met with the 200 something MSA members at the big barbeque at the SAC Lawn and shared many laughs, advice and wisdom over burgers and free popcorn and cotton candy.
Having been initiated into the MSA and crowned new MSA members, the frosh and all their peers who were a part of the orientation lived happily ever after. Except for the author of this fairy tale who wondered what sort of feedback the frosh would give if they were asked to comment on the day’s events and activities. The End.
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Waiting for the food.
Asmaa, making a beeline for the frosh to sign them up.
Frosh forging friendships
Aasim: Man, this is hard work!
No room for the sisters!
Who knows how to operate the cotton candy machine?
Asim, the extraordinaire does!
Look at him go!
All fed and happy
Cleaning up, and Ilyas finally decides to help
… and makes sure he’s rewarded for it
It was a nice day, alhamdulillah. Except for the fact that the food ran out at the end and we had to go somewhere else to eat! Grrr.
And one of the upsides of the day was my complete ignorance of how to use the cotton candy machine. The weirdly-shaped balls of fluff and strange stares of pity were proof enough of my incapacity. Thanks.
I smelt like BBQ and smoke all day Friday. I got funny looks back in my lab. Infact it took two days to get the smell of smoke out of my hair.
oh yeah and unlike some other people, I did get something to eat
The MSA Orientation was good, Masha’Allah. I accomplished my goal: getting connections for the MSA. However, I think next time, there should be a clear indication of MSA representatives, for people (especially those who have come alone and are a bit shy to go into the general crowd for information). Perhaps just a small booth with someone constantly present who can answer questions about the MSA (the various committees, contact information,etc). May Allah (SWT) ease your task.
Wish I was there too. Wish you all the best in your studies as well as careers.