<p>I visited the campus for Discover UCR on April 22nd and was pleasantly surprised at how green the Riverside area was. I thought I'd post some small, random bits about my visit. </p>
<p>Ever since I was in the 8th grade, I'm always associated Riverside with brown. After all, polution's brown, dirt looks yellowish brown, all the campus buildings are some shade of brown, red, or yellow. Forgive me, but when the words Inland Empire are spoken, I automatically get a mental image of crusty mountains and a big yellow sun oppressing over the region. My visit today presented me a total opposite of what my sterotypes suggested. </p>
<p>The views surrounding the campus were filled with lush hills of green. It was really quite a beautiful view. Looking up at them from the residence halls, the green hills actually reminded me a bit of scenes from Braveheart. </p>
<p>As for the campus itself, it was a bit smaller than I had expected. I recall going to UCSD many times when I was growing up in La Jolla. I'm nothing close to being an expert on this matter, but the actual campus layout seems very similar between the two. The Rivera Library's was not impressive from the inside but I guess it gets the job done. The UCR Carillion Tower is nowhere even near as tall as I fathomed it to be. </p>
<p>The most peculiar thing I remember about my visit is the air quality. I can't recall that I ever breathed one breath of normal air. Every once in while, I caught a breath of something really awful. At other times, the air was just never regular air. The trees and plants around campus permeates the air with their own signature smells that cloaked the entire school. All day, I either smelled perfumed air from UCR's plantlife or got an occasional whiff of polution from nearby traffic. But I was really never able to fill my lungs with good, wholesome regular air. The polution didn't bother me one bit. I spent my early childhood in Beijing, and polution there in the early 90s was three times as bad. Just think of all the heavily industrialized cities around the world. Riverside's really a piece of cake compared to Victorian Era London and a great number of other severely poluted cities. </p>
<p>Perhaps all the green form today's visit was just a product of recent rainfall in southern Cali. The picturesque setting might soon be expunged by the heat and it'll go back to being dirty and brown. But nonetheless, I'm glad I was able to see the college when it was at its best.</p>