#amazon internship

I've been in Seattle for about 48 hours now, and I've done a lot already.

Before I get ahead of myself, allow me to provide some background: in late February, I accepted an offer for an 8-month co-op at Amazon in Seattle, beginning in May. After staying in Boston for my first two co-ops, I felt it was time to try a new location for the third (and final) internship. It didn't hit me until late April what exactly I had signed up for ...

The Trip Home

My co-op does not begin until tomorrow (May 8th) but I had to vacate my Northeastern housing by April 24th, and I couldn't move into my new Seattle apartment until May 5th. So, on April 22nd I packed up my Boston apartment, I sent my speakers, piano, computer, and lots of boxes with movers and put the rest in suitcases.

I decided to fly Southwest to Tucson — at the urging of my father — instead of the usual direct, non-stop flights I take to Phoenix. I was supposed to leave Boston at 6am EDT, connect through Chicago-Midway, and arrive in Tucson around 10:30am PDT. Everything was going well until the pilot stood up at the front of the plane with a piece of metal in his hand and explained that it was the latch to the cargo bay, which had malfunctioned. Without a functional cargo bay door, there was no way we would be taking that plane, and so everybody de-planed and amassed around the gate agents' desk. I ended up flying from Boston to Denver, Denver to Las Vegas, and Las Vegas to Tucson, arriving at 4pm PDT. On the bright side, I had my first (legal) gambling experience at the slot machines in the Las Vegas airport. I hope they put my $2 to good use.

The Vacation

Vacation is a relative term; I wasn't working or taking classes, so I suppose my 10-day stay in Tucson technically counts as a vacation. It was great to see my family, hug my dog, visit my piano teacher, eat at my favorite restaurants, go up to Mt. Lemmon, and just relax. The weather wasn't even too horrible while I was there, only reaching into the nineties in the last couple days. Alas, on May 5th it was time to pack up once more and head to Seattle.

New Beginnings

I arrived in Seattle around noon on Cinco de Mayo. My first impression, while looking out the window as the plane approached Sea-Tac, was "Wow! That's a lot of water". An hour and an $80 cab ride later, I had arrived at the Lothlorien Apartments, where I will be living for the duration of my co-op.

I dropped off my bags, got an introduction to the apartment building and the area from Lothlorien's friendly Property Manager, and then headed out for a stroll. I quickly discovered that living on University Way is going to present conveniences and challenges: namely, there are restaurants everywhere and they all look like quite good. Lucky for me, there is a gym on the second floor of my building.

That evening, I met up with my friend Adam, who is currently on co-op at Microsoft Game Studios, and we went to Brouwer's Cafe for some delicious beer and fantastic food. The next day, Adam and I went to explore downtown. We started at Pike Place Market, where we encountered The Mirror Man (pictured below),

Video here

and eventually strolled all the way over to Amazon's new campus in the South Lake Union neighborhood ... it looked like a short walk on Google Maps, but that didn't take into account the fact that it was mostly uphill.

On the way back, we took the Seattle Streetcar to Westlake Center and stopped at the nifty Starbucks

Source: Flickr

then witnessed a game of giant chess amidst an eerie forest of blue trees

before returning to Adam's car and heading back to my apartment.

Moving Forward

Tonight, we're going to see The Avengers 3D at the Seattle Cinerama. Then, Amazon's New Hire Orientation is tomorrow, and so begin the next 8 months of my life.

With my new location comes a new plan: work out regularly and eat better. With a gym right downstairs, I intend to exercise every morning before going to work. I also have a full kitchen at my disposal, so I will be planning my meals and eating in as much as possible. I'll probably have to allow myself one or two meals out per week, considering how many cool restaurants are located within 3 blocks of my apartment, but I'll be putting my kitchen to good use.