Happy Halloween, everybody! I spent a nice night in Canterbury with my flatmates. We had originally planned to go on the Canterbury Ghost Tour (which is something they have every night, not just for Halloween). However, due to a few crossed wires communication-wise and a late start, we ended up a little late for the start of the tour. We hustled around downtown Canterbury looking for the right street, and eventually we spotted a big group of people gathered around a guy in a silly outfit. Bingo. So we joined the crowd and followed the tour to...a car park. Real spooky. The guide stood in the middle and started talking about some ghost activity or some such, but it was really hard to hear anything he said because he didn't speak up and he did that rambling British thing. Plus, since for my flatmates English isn't their first language, it was doubly hard to understand him. And on top of that, it wasn't even scary, like we thought it would be. He kept things really light and told jokes the whole time. So when the tour moved on to another not-so-scary destination, we split off and wandered back to High Street. We found a really nice cafe/bar and sat and had drinks and talked for a while. I think that was much more fun than the tour was.
Halloween seems to be just as big a holiday here as it is in the states. I'd say over half the people we saw in town were in costume, or at least had their face painted. There were lots of zombies and witches, and there were lots of guys dressed like the Joker. I also saw a couple people dressed like the guy from A Clockwork Orange. So dressing up for Halloween seems to be a big thing, but I don't know if the kids here do trick-or-treating at all.
Well, I'm off to London in the morning so I should get some sleep. Good night!
Friday, October 31, 2008
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
I Voted!
I voted today! It's the first time I've gotten to vote in a presidential election, so I was kind of excited. My regular absentee ballot still hadn't shown up, so I downloaded an emergency write-in ballot, filled it out, and popped it in the mail straight away. Hopefully it'll get there in time to be counted. And if not, well at least I tried my best.
I just finished reading Fahrenheit 451. It was really good, very thought-provoking. And definitely much easier to understand than the Aristotle and Galen that I've got to read for class.
We had a really interesting debate about ancient Greek views on dissection in class the other day. The class split up into three groups and we were each supposed to argue the side of one of three medical sects--Empiricists, Dogmatists, and Methodists. Our group was the Methodists, and lemme tell ya, it was really hard finding info about them. Everything I searched for was about the religion rather than the medical philosophy. As it turns out, the Methodists had no strong feelings either way about dissection, so we got to sit there and listen to the Empiricists duke it out with the Dogmatists. The debate got really lively, so that was interesting at least. I don't know why I'm writing so much about this, except that I spent a good chunk of my weekend working on it. :P
Anyway, here's a fun picture to make you smile. It's the label from a bottle of hand soap I bought. (I know, I'm easily entertained.)
I just finished reading Fahrenheit 451. It was really good, very thought-provoking. And definitely much easier to understand than the Aristotle and Galen that I've got to read for class.
We had a really interesting debate about ancient Greek views on dissection in class the other day. The class split up into three groups and we were each supposed to argue the side of one of three medical sects--Empiricists, Dogmatists, and Methodists. Our group was the Methodists, and lemme tell ya, it was really hard finding info about them. Everything I searched for was about the religion rather than the medical philosophy. As it turns out, the Methodists had no strong feelings either way about dissection, so we got to sit there and listen to the Empiricists duke it out with the Dogmatists. The debate got really lively, so that was interesting at least. I don't know why I'm writing so much about this, except that I spent a good chunk of my weekend working on it. :P
Anyway, here's a fun picture to make you smile. It's the label from a bottle of hand soap I bought. (I know, I'm easily entertained.)
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Busy, Busy
I think I'm finally getting over the cold that's been plaguing me all week. I've been taking it easy since I wasn't feeling very well. I got a lot of reading done for my museum class, but there's always more to do. Right now I'm supposed to be reading some selected works of Aristotle for my Graeco-Roman medicine class too. Busy busy!
Yesterday I went to ASDA, which is the English equivalent of Walmart. There was lots of nice cheap stuff there, which was great. I splurged a bit and bought a pair of trendy brown boots for fifteen quid. It's very fashionable here to wear ankle or calf-high boots with your pant legs tucked into them. Long jackets and beret-style hats are also very in. I've never been a real fashion plate, so I guess we'll see how it goes.
I'm a little disappointed that my museum class was cancelled this week and will be cancelled next week as well. Apparently the professor is ill. I had my presentation on the British Museum all prepped, but I didn't get to give it since he wasn't there. The week after next we won't have class either because that's our scheduled reading week. So I won't get to meet with that class again until almost a month from now! That's a big chunk of time, especially considering we only meet once a week for 12 weeks.
No new pictures today, unfortunately. Though I'm going back to London this week (hopefully), so I'll post pictures of that later in the week. And maybe someday this week I'll walk around campus with my camera too. :)
Yesterday I went to ASDA, which is the English equivalent of Walmart. There was lots of nice cheap stuff there, which was great. I splurged a bit and bought a pair of trendy brown boots for fifteen quid. It's very fashionable here to wear ankle or calf-high boots with your pant legs tucked into them. Long jackets and beret-style hats are also very in. I've never been a real fashion plate, so I guess we'll see how it goes.
I'm a little disappointed that my museum class was cancelled this week and will be cancelled next week as well. Apparently the professor is ill. I had my presentation on the British Museum all prepped, but I didn't get to give it since he wasn't there. The week after next we won't have class either because that's our scheduled reading week. So I won't get to meet with that class again until almost a month from now! That's a big chunk of time, especially considering we only meet once a week for 12 weeks.
No new pictures today, unfortunately. Though I'm going back to London this week (hopefully), so I'll post pictures of that later in the week. And maybe someday this week I'll walk around campus with my camera too. :)
Monday, October 20, 2008
Laundry Day
I feel rather productive today. I got up at eight and had a nice morning of drinking coffee and reading in the kitchen. Then after my lecture I came home and did some laundry, vacuumed my room, and cleaned too. When I went back to the laundromat to get my clothes, though, I discovered that half of the dryers were broken and the other half were busy and had a queue of people waiting. So I loaded up all my wet clothes and took them back to my room, where I hung them up or spread them out across every available surface. As I'm writing this, I've got jeans hanging from the ceiling, t-shirts splayed across the top of my wardrobe, and socks dangling from my bookshelves. I find it rather amusing, but I think next time I'll suck it up and wait for the dryers.
Just a quick update for today. I'd better get back to my reading which, right now, is Plato's Timaeus.
Just a quick update for today. I'd better get back to my reading which, right now, is Plato's Timaeus.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
London!
Today was my first trip to London, huzzah! And what a really excellent trip it was. Valentina, Sarah, and I left the flat around 8, got the bus to the Canterbury train station, and took the 8:45 train to London. The ticket was only eleven pounds (with the student railcard I bought), so it was a great value. The train ride was really nice too. We could see the English countryside rolling by, there was lots of space for us to stretch out, and the train itself was remarkably quiet. We got to Victoria Station a little after 10:00. It was a bit intimidating to be in such a huge train station, but Valentina knew where to go, so I just followed her.
By the way, you might want to get comfy--this is a long post.
The first thing we did was buy bus/underground passes. Well, that's a lie--the first thing we did was buy coffee to wake us up. But then we bought our Oyster cards (why they call them that, I don't know), which work like a pay-as-you-go discount transportation card. They were really convenient because we only had to swipe them to get into the underground. Taking the underground was really cool for me. You have to go down something like 150 feet underground in these huge elevators--you can take the stairs, but there are all these signs telling you, basically, not to because it's such a ridiculous climb. So anyway, we took the tube to Russell Square, which is really near the British Museum. We walked through the square and found the museum pretty easily, being the humongous building that it is.
Okay, so the British Museum. Can I just say "wow"? It has to be the single coolest museum I've ever been to. And it's free! The Great Court in the middle is beyond amazing. It's this enormous round room with a glass ceiling and a another huge enclosed room in the middle. I got some pictures of it, but I'm not sure they can do it justice. I went through the Enlightenment Gallery first, which is an exhibit that focuses on the beginnings of collecting and museums in general, and the British Museum in particular. I have to do a small presentation about the Enlightenment Gallery this Thursday in my museum class, so now I can say I've been there first hand. And it was really incredible. There were so many artifacts and books and statues from so many different cultures that I didn't even know where to start. That one gallery alone was so huge, it took me an hour to go through it, and I could have spent more time there.
After I'd explored the first floor of the museum, I met back up with Valentina and Sarah and we walked to London's Chinatown for lunch. Then we were going to split up for a few hours, and I had been planning to go back to the museum to see the rest of it. But then I decided that since it was my first trip to London, I wanted to explore a little more of the city instead of just seeing the museum. So I put my museum-exploration on a temporary hiatus until I go back to London a second time (probably in a week or two) and went walking around London with Valentina instead. And I'm really glad I did, because London is awesome! We saw Trafalgar Square, Picadilly Circle (I just love saying that), Regent Street with all the high-end shopping, the London Eye (not up close, but I saw the top of it peeking up from behind a building), and tons and tons of really cool architecture. We were going to see Buckingham Palace and Big Ben, but we ran out of time, so I'll see those next time. I took tons and tons and tons of pictures--I love my digital camera. I didn't even care that I looked like a total tourist because tons of other people were doing the same thing.
London is great, but it's super crowded! There were huge throngs of people just about every street we went down. It never really bothered me that much except once when we briefly went in Topshop, which is a trendy clothing store. There were hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people crammed into that place. Granted, it's a huge store of three floors, but still! Everywhere I turned there were just walls of people, and at any given point at least three people wanted to be standing in the exact same spot I was standing in. It was crazy.
Everything's really expensive in London too. Even just a simple t-shirt from a store would be 30 or 40 pounds (that's 60 or 80 bucks for me!), and a tiny cup of soda was one pound-fifty. And I was also surprised at how early shops close even in a big city like London. As soon as 5:00 rolled around, lots of stores closed up, and I noticed the museum closed at 5:30 too. (I swung back by the museum to pick up a guide-book so I can a) have it for my presentation and b) plan my next trip there.)
Around 5:30 we headed to Covent Garden, an area in London with lots of shops and cafes, to meet back up with Sarah. We got another round of coffees and sat in an indoor courtyard type of thing. There was a guy singing opera for a restaurant nearby, so we got to listen to him a bit too. Then we decided that we should probably start heading back since it would take us a while to get home. So we took the tube back to Victoria and got the 7:03 train to Canterbury.
Once we got back to Canterbury, we made a quick stop at Tescoe's (the supermarket in town) and caught the bus back to campus. Then we had dinner, for which Helen joined us. After that, I had a cup of tea, came back to my room, and here I am!
And here are all the pictures of my awesome day! (The glass over some of the displays in the museum really messed with the pictures, but I think they're still fun to look at.)
By the way, you might want to get comfy--this is a long post.
The first thing we did was buy bus/underground passes. Well, that's a lie--the first thing we did was buy coffee to wake us up. But then we bought our Oyster cards (why they call them that, I don't know), which work like a pay-as-you-go discount transportation card. They were really convenient because we only had to swipe them to get into the underground. Taking the underground was really cool for me. You have to go down something like 150 feet underground in these huge elevators--you can take the stairs, but there are all these signs telling you, basically, not to because it's such a ridiculous climb. So anyway, we took the tube to Russell Square, which is really near the British Museum. We walked through the square and found the museum pretty easily, being the humongous building that it is.
Okay, so the British Museum. Can I just say "wow"? It has to be the single coolest museum I've ever been to. And it's free! The Great Court in the middle is beyond amazing. It's this enormous round room with a glass ceiling and a another huge enclosed room in the middle. I got some pictures of it, but I'm not sure they can do it justice. I went through the Enlightenment Gallery first, which is an exhibit that focuses on the beginnings of collecting and museums in general, and the British Museum in particular. I have to do a small presentation about the Enlightenment Gallery this Thursday in my museum class, so now I can say I've been there first hand. And it was really incredible. There were so many artifacts and books and statues from so many different cultures that I didn't even know where to start. That one gallery alone was so huge, it took me an hour to go through it, and I could have spent more time there.
After I'd explored the first floor of the museum, I met back up with Valentina and Sarah and we walked to London's Chinatown for lunch. Then we were going to split up for a few hours, and I had been planning to go back to the museum to see the rest of it. But then I decided that since it was my first trip to London, I wanted to explore a little more of the city instead of just seeing the museum. So I put my museum-exploration on a temporary hiatus until I go back to London a second time (probably in a week or two) and went walking around London with Valentina instead. And I'm really glad I did, because London is awesome! We saw Trafalgar Square, Picadilly Circle (I just love saying that), Regent Street with all the high-end shopping, the London Eye (not up close, but I saw the top of it peeking up from behind a building), and tons and tons of really cool architecture. We were going to see Buckingham Palace and Big Ben, but we ran out of time, so I'll see those next time. I took tons and tons and tons of pictures--I love my digital camera. I didn't even care that I looked like a total tourist because tons of other people were doing the same thing.
London is great, but it's super crowded! There were huge throngs of people just about every street we went down. It never really bothered me that much except once when we briefly went in Topshop, which is a trendy clothing store. There were hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people crammed into that place. Granted, it's a huge store of three floors, but still! Everywhere I turned there were just walls of people, and at any given point at least three people wanted to be standing in the exact same spot I was standing in. It was crazy.
Everything's really expensive in London too. Even just a simple t-shirt from a store would be 30 or 40 pounds (that's 60 or 80 bucks for me!), and a tiny cup of soda was one pound-fifty. And I was also surprised at how early shops close even in a big city like London. As soon as 5:00 rolled around, lots of stores closed up, and I noticed the museum closed at 5:30 too. (I swung back by the museum to pick up a guide-book so I can a) have it for my presentation and b) plan my next trip there.)
Around 5:30 we headed to Covent Garden, an area in London with lots of shops and cafes, to meet back up with Sarah. We got another round of coffees and sat in an indoor courtyard type of thing. There was a guy singing opera for a restaurant nearby, so we got to listen to him a bit too. Then we decided that we should probably start heading back since it would take us a while to get home. So we took the tube back to Victoria and got the 7:03 train to Canterbury.
Once we got back to Canterbury, we made a quick stop at Tescoe's (the supermarket in town) and caught the bus back to campus. Then we had dinner, for which Helen joined us. After that, I had a cup of tea, came back to my room, and here I am!
And here are all the pictures of my awesome day! (The glass over some of the displays in the museum really messed with the pictures, but I think they're still fun to look at.)
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| British Museum |
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| London |
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Walking and Pseudo-Museums
Boy, my feet hurt. I went walking around Canterbury today, visiting the Pilgrims' Hospital and the Canterbury Tales attraction. They're not really museums, per se, but they're educational and cultural, so I'm still learnin' stuff. The Pilgrims' Hospital dates back to the medieval period when lots of visitors would come to Canterbury to visit the Cathedral of St. Thomas Beckett. The hospital is relatively small, or at least the parts that are open to the public are small. When you first walk in, you have to go down a half flight of steps, as main floor is below ground level now. You pay your one quid admission charge at the desk there, then go down another half flight of steps into the crypt, which is now full of various artists' works. (I didn't really understand what the art had to do with the hospital.) There weren't any objects or anything left over from the medieval period, so I have to say the archaeologist in me was kind of disappointed. Then you could go up a level to the chapel, which is still in use. Apparently the hospital has residents in wings that aren't open to the public.
After that I went further up High Street to the Canterbury Tales attraction, which--I'm not gonna lie--was extraordinarily creepy. The whole place was like a haunted wax museum. You walked from room to room (all in near darkness), listening to an audio tour read from Chaucer's point of view and staring at the creepy plastic peasants. Luckily, there were two other random tourists going through the place at the same time as me, or I think I would have bailed. I could hear weird noises coming from other rooms, and if I stared too long at any one of the characters in there I started to imagine it was moving. Eep, creepy. I'm not sure it was meant to be creepy, but there you go.
So other than that, I've been keeping pretty busy here. I went to a fruit market this morning and picked up some bananas, blackberries, and grapefruit (proving that I do eat more than just ramen). Last night I went to the sci-fi club and we watched Back to the Future and Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, so that was lots of mindless fun. Also, just tonight I went to an open lecture on Eurojust, which is a legal/investigative coordination between members of the European Union. The speaker talked about coordinating between different governments and different levels of government, and how Eurojust facilitates transnational crime solving. I know that might sound a bit dry, but I found it really really cool. I could tell the moderator was a bit unhappy, but personally I was glad that the speaker ran over time by about half an hour. :)
Here are the pictures from the Pilgrim's Hospital and Canterbury Tales, and I also updated the Canterbury photo album with a few new shots. (I'm not sure why, but some of the dates of my pictures on the Picasa website are all wrong.)
After that I went further up High Street to the Canterbury Tales attraction, which--I'm not gonna lie--was extraordinarily creepy. The whole place was like a haunted wax museum. You walked from room to room (all in near darkness), listening to an audio tour read from Chaucer's point of view and staring at the creepy plastic peasants. Luckily, there were two other random tourists going through the place at the same time as me, or I think I would have bailed. I could hear weird noises coming from other rooms, and if I stared too long at any one of the characters in there I started to imagine it was moving. Eep, creepy. I'm not sure it was meant to be creepy, but there you go.
So other than that, I've been keeping pretty busy here. I went to a fruit market this morning and picked up some bananas, blackberries, and grapefruit (proving that I do eat more than just ramen). Last night I went to the sci-fi club and we watched Back to the Future and Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, so that was lots of mindless fun. Also, just tonight I went to an open lecture on Eurojust, which is a legal/investigative coordination between members of the European Union. The speaker talked about coordinating between different governments and different levels of government, and how Eurojust facilitates transnational crime solving. I know that might sound a bit dry, but I found it really really cool. I could tell the moderator was a bit unhappy, but personally I was glad that the speaker ran over time by about half an hour. :)
Here are the pictures from the Pilgrim's Hospital and Canterbury Tales, and I also updated the Canterbury photo album with a few new shots. (I'm not sure why, but some of the dates of my pictures on the Picasa website are all wrong.)
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| Pilgrims' Hospital |
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| Canterbury Tales |
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| Canterbury |
Sunday, October 12, 2008
The Duchess
Well, I just got back from seeing the movie The Duchess with one of my flatmates. It was a really good movie, and also very sad. I thought Keira Knightley did a good job, but I totally hated Ralph Fiennes, as I suspect the audience was meant to. The theater itself is a really cool place too. There's a big cafe that's always very busy and crowded. And I don't know if this is really all that unusual or not, but there was an usher in the cinema who used a flashlight to help late-comers find seats. I guess I haven't been to many movie theaters where there was an usher period.
I may have mentioned this already, but everything over here seems to close really early! My American sensibilities are used to 24-hour Starbucks and Walmarts, but that's not the case here. Most shops are closed by 5 or 6. Today, for example, I went to the campus library around 7 p.m., but it was already closed! It's open 'til midnight on weekdays, which is nice, but apparently on weekends it closes really early. To be honest, it's a little aggrivating for a night owl like me, but nothing I won't get over.
Things in the flat are really going well. I'm trying my best to be sociable and not hide in my room all the time, so often I'll go to the kitchen and have a cup of coffee and talk with my flatmates. This may sound silly, but I like the feeling of our mini-community, and I'm glad we've got the shared kitchen to hang out in.
Tomorrow I'm going to get up "early" and try out the walking path into Canterbury. (Supposedly it only takes about half an hour which, if true, would be great since it will save me 2 quid on the bus ride.) So I should probably try to get some sleep soon. A la prochaine! (Until next time!)
I may have mentioned this already, but everything over here seems to close really early! My American sensibilities are used to 24-hour Starbucks and Walmarts, but that's not the case here. Most shops are closed by 5 or 6. Today, for example, I went to the campus library around 7 p.m., but it was already closed! It's open 'til midnight on weekdays, which is nice, but apparently on weekends it closes really early. To be honest, it's a little aggrivating for a night owl like me, but nothing I won't get over.
Things in the flat are really going well. I'm trying my best to be sociable and not hide in my room all the time, so often I'll go to the kitchen and have a cup of coffee and talk with my flatmates. This may sound silly, but I like the feeling of our mini-community, and I'm glad we've got the shared kitchen to hang out in.
Tomorrow I'm going to get up "early" and try out the walking path into Canterbury. (Supposedly it only takes about half an hour which, if true, would be great since it will save me 2 quid on the bus ride.) So I should probably try to get some sleep soon. A la prochaine! (Until next time!)
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
You Mean I Have to Study Too?
Aha! I had my first cup of tea in England today. Thanks to Dan and Beth, I've gotten to try Irish tea, and now I've had English as well. It wasn't proper "traditional" English tea (I went for raspberry instead), and I didn't have crumpets with it, but it was still good.
I'm slowly getting into the swing of studying. Somewhat to my dismay, I'm beginning to learn that my museum class is going to necessitate many, many trips to the library. We've got two core textbooks, but then the professor assigns loads of miscellaneous articles and chapters from other books as well. Trouble is, there's just one copy of each of those books in the library and 20 students who all need them in one week's time. Exactly. I'm hoping that at lecture tomorrow the professor will address that issue, and maybe just photocopy the chapters we need instead.
I bought a cell phone yesterday. Or I suppose I should call it a mobile. It's just a cheap pay-as-you-go phone, but I decided to get one so that I'd have it in case of emergency, especially if I go traveling somewhere. The cell phone company that I'm with is Orange, and supposedly they have these "Animal" plans that give you different rewards for buying minutes. The most interesting one was Camel, which lets you call abroad for 6 pence a minute. So it's cool but not something I have to have, seeing as the Skype and Windows Messenger video-calls have been working so well.
Well, it's getting colder here. Time to break out the sweaters and jackets, which is fine by me since I have so many stylish sweaters. ;) Plus I get to wear my Kent sweatshirt. And surprise, I have a picture!
Cheers!
I'm slowly getting into the swing of studying. Somewhat to my dismay, I'm beginning to learn that my museum class is going to necessitate many, many trips to the library. We've got two core textbooks, but then the professor assigns loads of miscellaneous articles and chapters from other books as well. Trouble is, there's just one copy of each of those books in the library and 20 students who all need them in one week's time. Exactly. I'm hoping that at lecture tomorrow the professor will address that issue, and maybe just photocopy the chapters we need instead.
I bought a cell phone yesterday. Or I suppose I should call it a mobile. It's just a cheap pay-as-you-go phone, but I decided to get one so that I'd have it in case of emergency, especially if I go traveling somewhere. The cell phone company that I'm with is Orange, and supposedly they have these "Animal" plans that give you different rewards for buying minutes. The most interesting one was Camel, which lets you call abroad for 6 pence a minute. So it's cool but not something I have to have, seeing as the Skype and Windows Messenger video-calls have been working so well.
Well, it's getting colder here. Time to break out the sweaters and jackets, which is fine by me since I have so many stylish sweaters. ;) Plus I get to wear my Kent sweatshirt. And surprise, I have a picture!
Cheers!
Monday, October 6, 2008
Rain, Rain
This past weekend was very relaxing. I read a lot (mostly for fun, though I did think about maybe getting some reading done for my classes...) and watched a bit of TV. But it was British TV, so at least I'm absorbing the culture, right?
As promised, it rains a lot here, which I think is great. A lot of the time it's sort of overcast, which you might think would be depressing. But I think it just seems really calm. I've gotten used to putting my umbrella in my bag every time I head out to class or the shop. I was sitting at my
computer on Friday afternoon, and when I looked out the window I noticed a big storm cloud rolling in. I thought it looked neat, so I snapped a picture. You can see the flats in the building opposite mine, which are really just mirror images. At night the kitchens of the various flats are always lit up, as none of the Parkwood kitchens come with drapes on the windows. My flatmate Sarah calls the kitchen windows "TVs" because at night you can watch all the students cooking their dinners in the brightly lit kitchens.I went to an open lecture tonight entitled "Churchill and Roosevelt," given by Professor John Lucaks. The lecture itself was sort of interesting, though I wish he had gone into more depth. He only spoke for about 45 minutes, and he talked mainly about the written correspondence between Churchill and Roosevelt. However, the room was really warm and I admit I didn't stay through the end of the question-and-answer section because I figured leaving early would be preferable to passing out on the floor.
I bought an official University of Kent sweatshirt a couple days ago. The price was a little steep (a bit over twenty pounds) but I figured it was worth it. When else am I going to study in the UK? It's a light purple, and it'll be perfect for those rainy class days.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
First Week of Class
My first week of classes here at the university went well. The Greek and Roman medicine class looks like it'll be much more interesting than I had originally thought, and my museum class should be pretty great as well. I'm supposed to visit the British Museum in London and give a presentation about it, so hopefully in a few weeks' time I'll have some great pictures from that. I've noticed though, that university here feels quite different than college at home. A lot more individual study is required, and no one really tells you what specific things you should be reading at any given time. That's both good and bad, because while they don't have any busy-work or pop quizzes, you do have to be really motivated to keep reading on your own. I think it'll be a great experience though.
Other than that, there's not much new to report this week. On Tuesday I went down to the city center again and picked up a coffee maker and a watch, so now I'll be both alert and on time for class. :) I also got a library card for the public library here, which is small but nice. The library also has British shows on DVD, so I can watch those and not have to pay the $240 TV license fee to watch live television. And on Tuesday night I checked out the university's sci-fi club, which was very cool. (Didn't take long for my nerd side to surface, did it?)
That's about it. 'Til next time!
Other than that, there's not much new to report this week. On Tuesday I went down to the city center again and picked up a coffee maker and a watch, so now I'll be both alert and on time for class. :) I also got a library card for the public library here, which is small but nice. The library also has British shows on DVD, so I can watch those and not have to pay the $240 TV license fee to watch live television. And on Tuesday night I checked out the university's sci-fi club, which was very cool. (Didn't take long for my nerd side to surface, did it?)
That's about it. 'Til next time!
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