GENERALLY we suggest you come according to the BU official orientation schedule. Try to arrive before or on the first day of orientation, in order to take full advantage of BU orientation and make new friends. It would be better to get here as early as possible to get accustomed to the new environment, but you have to consider the extra expenses.

TEMPORARY HOUSING before September 1st is generally more expensive than the long-term rent. (There is price list for the different hotel in the admission package) If you can find somebody here to share the room with, we encourage you to come early. BU only provides tempory housing for very short period of time which is usually one week(!Not Free) during their orientation schedule.

THE first and most important thing you need to carry with you is about $2,500~3,000. You will not get your first check of scholarship until the end of September. Before this, you have to pay for 3~4 months' rent (including broker fee if any, totally $1,300~$1,500), 1 year medical insurance (above $350), 2 months' living expenses ($300~$500) and other miscellaneous expenses. A good news is that you might be able to loan money up to about $1000 from the graduate school or from BU after you get here. It's interest-free and you don't have to return it until next year. Consult the department secretary for details. Also carry some changes like $1 bills with you for use during your trip.

AS for living stuffs, don't worry too much. Generally speaking, most stuffs are not surprsingly expensive here and moerover, they are even cheaper in Chinatown (of course, the prices are 5~10 times higher than in China if you convert the prices from US$ to RMB). However, bringing something from China may save your money and make your initial life here easier. You may consider to bring the following stuffs:

Clothing:clothing for all four distinct seasons (check our informatin package for details), a pair of water-proof boots due to heavy snowfall in the winter of Boston, a set of suit or formal dresses(ONE is enough, which is relatively expensive here, although they are rarely used except for a very few formal occasions), a thin quilt and/or a warm blanket (apts. here are usually heated very well in winter, but it's hard to say so in house), some bed sheets, a pair of vacuumed pillow. However, don't bring too much clothing fot that you may soon find some of them out-of-place here. Cheap yet good quality clothes can be easily found here.

Dining: Most materials and utensils for Chinese cuisine can be found in Chinatown, which are not expensive. However, for your convenience at the beginning, you may want to bring some small items such as bowls, chopsticks and a few stainless steel utensils if you have extra space in your luggage.

Miscellaneous: a few pairs of spare eyeglasses (it's very expensive to make eyeglasses here), an umbrella or a raincoat due to frequent rainfall in Boston, some rechargeable batteries (but not recharge due to different voltage in USA), some most-in-use drugs, some anti-allergy drugs (some people will have pollen allergy here), software CDs, entertainment CD/VCDs, a calculator, some good English-Chinese and Chinese-English dictionaries, some references and tool-books and whatever books you may need (books are very expensive here). If you study science or engineering, those "important" college notes, even text books may be useful later on when doing homework, since the low level graduate courses in US often overlap with college courses in China. But don't bring things like electronic appliances and ink pens.

Dental care is extremely expensive here, so you would better have your teeth thoroughly checked and washed before you are heading to here.

IF you can't find any of your friends/relatives to pick you up at Logan Airport, please try to arrive on the dates when BU ISSO (International Students and Scholars Office) provides free ride from the airport to BU welcome center. You can also get cheaper(compared to hotel) temporary housing there ($30/day last year). Check it out from the matriculation package.

IF you can neither find any friends/relatives nor arrive on time, please fill in the survey form about your arrival information. Or you can send email to bucssa@bu.edu as soon as possible. BUCSSA will try the best to schedule a volunteer to pick you up at Logan Airport in his/her own car. Please be aware to bear your basic responsibility for paying the volunteer the fee for parking ($4/0.5hour), gas and toll ($2), which is very low compared to taxi expense. Due to the limited number of volunteers (we are recruiting now), we cannot guarantee to satisfy your request. If a match is found, we will notify you by email as early as possible.

BY any chance you missed BUCSSA volunteer or your would rather come on your own, you could:

• a) take a taxi to Boston University Welcome Center (700 Commonwealth Avenue) for about $30 (including tip, usually 10-15% of taxi fee);

• b) take T, i.e. subway, although generally we don't recommend.

The T (http://www.mbta.com/) is an alias for the subway here in Boston. There are four T lines: (Red, Blue, Orange and Green line. The Green line has 4 branches, numbered B, C, D and E. People use "inbound" to refer to the direction going to downtown Boston, and "outbound" the opposite directions. Logan Airport locates on the Blue line. Please take the airport shuttle to the entrance of Logan Airport T stop, then take the inbound Blue line T to the stop "Government Center", go upstairs to the Green line, and take the outbound T "Green B" line (Please do note the letter B on the T train) to the stop BU East, then you are quite near The Warren Towers Welcome Center.

REFER to our information package for more detailed information.

BUCSSA started the project "Welcome and Orientate New Students" WONS in 1998. We are a non-profit organization and all people working for us are volunteers without any pay. All board members and volunteers devote the whole strength to help new students each year. Every step we make requires a lot of efforts. We will try our best to help and make your transition to a new environment easier because ourselves had also been through the "newcomer" stage. What we expect from you are just the cooperation and respect to our volunteers' hard-work.
Thank you!

AT last, we would say take it easy and everything will be all right.