We were living at Tropicana for two months. Tropicana is very comfortable. Every room gets a lot of sunshine. Each room is wide and comfortable. There are a living room, three rooms named A, B, and C and two bathrooms. The living room has three sofas and a TV. And there was a bicycle UCSB student’s who lived with us. Everyday we relaxed there and we did our homework there. Also, we watched TV, movies and a video. We really enjoyed spending time there. (Kaho Takatera, Chihiro Usuda)
Photo by Kyoka
Many people are living in Tropicana dorm. The front desk staff are so kind. They solve problems for us. Sometimes we interviewed them and they answered kindly. Also, one of the staff there was so friendly and talked to us a lot. He knew Japanese greeting, so he always said Japanese greetings when we met him. And there was a family and father of this family was a manager. He was so kind and always smiled when we met him. (Kyoka HIroya & Urara Azuma, Kaho Takatera)
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Photo by Kyoka Hiroya
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Photo by Kaho Takatera
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The fitness room has many fitness machines. There are six running machines, a bicycle machine, a lot of dumbbells, weight training machines, and so forth. The gym is great because we can use it any time that we want to. Also, there were usually people who were training there. We met some people and talked with them. They were very strict to them, so they worked out hard. (Kyoka Hiroya, Kaho Takatera)
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Tropicana dorm has a game room. There are a billiards, table tennis, two video games, and air hockey. We used most of all. The table tennis has a machine that can speak, count points, time, and play music, such as cheering song. Also, the billiards were difficult, but I really enjoyed it. But sometimes there was noise in the evening because other people who did camps were playing there later at night. But it was a fun place and we really enjoyed it. (Kyoka Hiroya ) |
Photo by Ryuhei Kondo
Photo by Kyoka Hiroya
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Tropicana also has other places, theater room, pool and cafeteria. The dormitory pool has a lot of beach balls. The theater is a lot of seats and we can use it free. The seats were so comfortable. We can eat some snacks there. We used there twice. We watched “Titanic” and “Men in Black 3”. They were so fun. We laughed and we cried a lot when we watched “Titanic”. I want to watch it again. (Kaho Takatera, Kyoka Hiroya)
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The cafeteria were big and staff were so kind to us. When we entered there, we had to show room key and scan it or in advance to register the fingerprint and when we enter there, just held a finger out over the machine. The food was so delicious. Meat often came out, so we ate a lot of types of meat. Also, there was a lot of fruits every day. Most of us like to strawberry, so we ate a lot of strawberries there. We felt sad when there was no strawberries. We used 2 cafeterias on a daily basis. One of them was big and bright. But another one is a little small and dark. But a smaller one was very useful because it was in the same dorm. But another one was in the other dorm. (Kyoka Hiroya)
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Photo by Urara Azuma
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Photo by Kyoka Hiroya
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The pool was big and had a lot of balls in the pool. The temperature was not bad in the afternoon but, in the evening it was a little cold. There were some beach chairs, a table, and some chairs. This pool is located in the middle of this dorm, so we could see it every time. We swam twice. And we had to hold the balls because there was a deep zone and we couldn’t stand by ourselves. Also, we dived a lot. We did a lot of types of diving. All of us have other types of dive. We took many pictures and videos. We really enjoyed swimming there. (Kyoka Hiroya) |
There was a laundry room. It has used by people who have a laundry card. There were 7 washing machines and 7 dryers. The costs of washing machines are $2.0 and dryers are $1.5. The time required for washing machine is 25 minutes and dryer is 42 minutes. So we had to wait an hour to finish all of the process. We used them a lot. Every week we washed our clothes. In the early days, we didn’t know how to use them, so we made a lot of mistakes. But in the last days, we could use them completely. (Kyoka Hiroya)
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Photo by Ryuhei Kondo
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Photo by Ryuhei Kondo
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The dorm was not so far from Kerr Hall. We had to walk about 15 minutes. There were a lot of intersections. When we crossed the intersection, we had to push the button. If you forget it, you never cross the intersection. Don’t forget it. There was a bus stop near the dorm. So we could use bus stop when we came back to the dorm from Kerr Hall. The dorm located in the corner, so you can find it soon. Also, there was a family live there. A father of that family is a manager of Tropicana. His name is Ben. He always cared for us. We really enjoyed to spend time there. (Kaho Takatera)
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Photo by Haruka Sakamoto
Photo by Ryuhei Kondo
Photo by Ryuhei Kondo