1. TUPD EMERGENCY HELLO THIS IS GOAT
Your program warns everyone about crime in frequented study abroad cities so your peers from small rural liberal arts colleges start to get freaked out but you sit back with your pepper spray and New Orleans experience and cue the shade.
2. WHAT’S WRONG WITH BEING CONFIDENT
6,750 Tulane undergraduates come from 50 states and 58 foreign countries (thx TU admissions), therefore this is probably not your first rodeo with moving to a new place and an unfamiliar culture. In all probability, you went abroad alone, ready to meet new people in part thanks to your ~*geographically diverse*~ experience at Tulane (dependence is 4 losers!!!!)
3. I’M SHMACKED
Your program also knows you’re from Tulane and immediately likes you because they think you know how to handle your alcohol (and you think that too) – until you ruin that charade on the first night when you and the 2 other people from Tulane get lost/too drunk/shut down the club (the boot doesn’t close until 6 am!!!!!!111***)
4. PARTY ON THE NEUTRAL GROUND
When your abroad city also has liberal open container laws and your new friends flip out while you casually sip your drink and pretend like you didn’t forget that it’s illegal in most places.
5. MARDI GRAS
“SO MARDI GRAS, RIGHT?” Right!
6. ONLY AT TULANE, ONLY IN EUROPE/ASIA/AFRICA/SOUTH/CENTRAL AMERICA
You talk about New Orleans almost every day in some capacity to the point that someone around you has considered transferring to Tulane or going to Tulane for grad school.
7. CAN YOU PASS THE TONY’S
You can’t find hot sauce even though you’ve looked in every store and you live in a depressive bland state for the first two weeks.
8. I WEAR YOUR GRANDDAD’S CLOTHES I LOOK INCREDIBLE
Being loud and dressing wildly is considered offensive and you’ve been told to tone it down by multiple people (in multiple languages).
9. DO IT FOR THE INSTAGRAM
You miss the food. You miss dat dog, you miss red beans and rice, you miss crawfish boils and po boys, and yes, you might even miss bruff. You go to bed at night imagining your first beignet back in New Orleans and shed a metaphorical tear.
10. THAT IS SEAUX NOLA
People around you may talk about never wanting to go home, but you know the city you are going back to is just as amazing (if not more so) than the beautiful one you study in.