Brief Thoughts on My First Time in Illinois

Pretty much the whole time I've known Eduardo, I have know that he is more ambitious than me in many ways. When we started dating seriously, I appreciated both his ambition and the knowledge that it would take him to great places one day. I was always excited about the possibility of following him wherever his ambitions may take him - especially since I never was big on goal setting for myself.

Now, Eduardo has the opportunity to get a PhD at a school ranked #5 in the country for Mechanical Engineering. Not only that, but he received the National Science Foundation scholarship, which allows him to earn a living while he is in school! We are incredibly blessed and I am so proud of him. I am also not too surprised that we are about to end up living for 5 years in a state that I have never even been to (until very recently, that is). The school, of course, is the University of Illinois. From the internet and hearsay I've learned it's a large school (about 40,000 students) in the twin cities of Urbana and Champaign, whose populations total around 100,000 including the students. I have told several people familiar with the area that we are moving there, and I've pretty much only heard two things in response:

"You think Texas is flat? Illinois is flat. " and "I promise, if you move there, you'll love it". "

 I'm always happy to hear one of those comments; I'm not so crazy about the other one! But now that I've been able to visit, I think they are both true.