This post is here mainly to fill in the quota of of a blog a week, that I semi set myself. So............ I'll have to whip up some magic to put some interesting uni experiences down.
The first one I can think of is not really a uni experience just a general life one, I met my best friend from primary school on the train, which was pretty cool. Except as always with old relationships it was kinda awkward we were both still (as had happened at primary school) going in different directions. So I got to find out all about my old friends, which was oddly seemingly the same as what they were doing/ wanting to do when we were at primary school. Not along the lines of a vocalisation of "This is what I want to do," but as in when we were small he/they acted in a simular style. Surprising that, people becoming what they wanted or acted like when they were small. Then again people can change massively, but when I met up it was as though things hadn't changed at all.
So that was cool ... I watched Henry V on Friday for Homer to Hollywood and have to, as is my duty report that it is a pretty darn good film with the accompaniment of one of the greatest men in television, Brian Blessed. He apart from Liam Neeson, is where all logic fails, they're just awesome in their respective roles. Ok now that the fanboyism has left I can say in all honesty that it was a decent film. The problem was that I was falling asleep by the end of it. Not because it was boring! (Also note the whole thing about the film was a lead up to saying I'm tired from the week.) It was because my week was electric! and surprising hectic! (10 points for song reference) Resulting in me being a zombiefied mess by the end of week. Firstly I blame doing things (such as uni, moving, living) . Secondly I blame (more realistically) an addiction to watching Buffy (Don't judge me) and staying up. WHICH IS THE FAULT! Of none other than younger siblings (even though you know in your soul that a vampire Tv series is good for any 10 year old) and a crowded house of people who like watching tv at certain times. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The thing I want to, need to say is that.... Even I a person of introvert origins get tired from too much introvert activities. EVEN THE SEEMINGLY INNOCENT. Anyway things take up a lot of time, ergo it's really easy to get busy busy.
Which brings me to another thing I've done! Some bits of my assignment ALREADY! Yep I'm that prepared or readily wanting to do work. It's what I did on my day off (lucky Thursday), which while productive fails to properly achieve the spirit of uni, well meby it does, except at a rather explosive rate. But now I don't have to worry about doing much for the rest of the next week. I mean I haven't finished but I've at least made some headway, mostly halfway up on the scale of all my subjects. So free time I've been spending with work, not fun but frees up the weekends or rather days in the coming week because you know in your heart of hearts you've made some progress. The only problem with that method of doing things (at least for me) is that you never get enough work done and your free time is swallowed up in a Black hole of studying/working on far off projects. So with reality hitting me squarely on the head, as long as something sometime gets done, I, you, people should be fine.
And Uni, is still incredible for the simple fact that I found out uni Uni members get a lounge, with comfy seats and other awesome extras like Tv, showing semi awesome day time tv! Another awesome feature that I found out was the comics in the Rowden, they are ultra nerdy cool, yep streamlined nerdyness that backflips onto itself to create what will forever be known as killing frees with Batman. He avenges my mentally ravenged brain along with all the other superheros.... Moving away from my attention to Batman, the Rowden is excelent for time out, especially if your mind is either mush or corregated iron. It soothes the mind, with the awesome chill out area and chill out music and chill out but always nerdy (which is a plus for me) comic books. Also the Tv in the Rowden shows some actual TV not mind numbing Passions or Hughey's Cooking adventures (which in their own rights can be good for you too).
Ok that's the end of my spiel, now all I have to do is remind myself how awesome Creative Writing is (people critic your work very well and nicely, I am feeling bad about criticing (not meanly) a lot about a certain poem, but I started on a positive).
There we go all done.
Now off to bludge a bit.
Yoddeuss/Dan
P.S I think I'm the only person in Arts doing Infomatics as breadth. I'm special.
T'SUP!
It is 3.35am, Saturday morning. I've been (geekishly) downlo- ..
I mean, 'legally obtaining' Season 2 of America's Best Dance Crew (yeah I know season 3 is out, I'm behind).
Just glimpsed the first half of the 'live auditions' bit.
Speaking of first glimpses, it also seems that most of us are now starting to understand a little more about uni life and the lifestyle, need to organise your time, and how heads of subjects indiscriminately set due dates and assessment tests on and around the same dates.
The first glimpses of actual homework are appearing, for me, being one of the billions (or hundreds) of Accounting & Finance kids, there's a Business Law test, a Micro (economics) test, ARA (Accounting) assignment - all due this coming week. And a QM one due not too far after that.
So I could start revising and getting into it.
OR just do what the rest of my college mates are doing - having no time for work and keeping a constant supply of alcohol flowing to the liver. Alcohol is like water to you collegians.
yarghrgh!
ASH!
PS: Is anyone's elses tutes really quiet? Like, you're encouraged to talk but no one does? Mine are/were, but are starting to be a little more vocalised.
Why are so many bloggers college students? There are at least, what, four? five? Also, why do I keep meeting so many college students?
Now that's over with, let's talk about CLUBS AND SOCIETIES. What, if anything, have you joined and why? What has been good, and why? If you joined nothing, why?
I joined the Secular Society (because I am fond of his noodliness and it was only$1), the French Club, the Africa club, the Mauritian Students' Society (vain attempts to get in touch with my roots happening here), the Arts Collective, and the Islamic Society. And the tai chi and wushu club.
I haven't been to any events from the Secular Society or Mauritian Students' Society yet, because they clashed with other stuff and I'm lazy. And I haven't really done anything with the Islamic Society yet except go to a free barbecue and have a Swedish-French conversation with a friend. But I have been to the French Club, and let's face it everyone, it's BORING. My French sucks and I need to improve it, but seriously.
Africa Club was fun - I met a lot of really interesting people, and, bizarrely, some old friends. And I LOVE the tai chi and wushu club. Actually, I love wushu - tai chi is kind of dull. Wushu, for those of you who don't know, is a form of Chinese martial arts. It's really fun, though painful at times.
Last Thursday I went to an Arts Collective meeting. I wasn't really clear on what the Arts Collective was when I signed up - I'm still not really sure. but it was fricking AWESOME. We did creative writing exercises, which sounds awful and usually is - but these were really good! And it was just great! And I look forward to many more sessions of collaborative art! Or something.
Now, my physics book is glaring at me. I should go.
We eat together. We shower together. We shit together.
That's college life for ya. I never really considered myself prude, but there's something about hearing someone else squeezing out their shit that just drives me insane. I don't know why I find it disturbing, maybe because the bathroom is sort of meant to be a private place. As much as I love being surrounded by lovely squeezing shitting people, I still appreciate my privacy. The problem is privacy = an attempt to study. I seem to utterly fail on this matter, especially since I'm the type of person who can't say no.
In all seriousness, I've been in Australia for a month now. A whole month! Feels like I've been here forever (as in a good way). To be honest with you, the way I perceive time has changed completely. If I don't see my flat mate for two days (which, trust me, happens) it's all of a sudden a LIFETIME. Omg, what have you been up to?!
I think the reason to this is that the speed of life increases as you start uni. Your days get longer, and you simply do more stuff than ever before. Having said this, it doesn't necessarily mean you do more work. Speaking of which, this is something I should be doing...
To those who feel they haven't found a 'mate' yet, don't worry. Just remeber it's only been a month. You'll soon find someone to fart with.
does anyone not believe you when you say you're sick anymore? I just spent the day trudging (yes trudging, i couldn't even walk at a normal rate) around campus, and still people looked at me suspiciously when i replied 'eh. been sick all weekend' to their cheerily and completely formulaic question "How are ya?" .
is there some conspiracy theory at work that i don't know about? or is university just completely devoid of human emotion when it comes to having a little compasion for the other person?
Anyway, that was just on my mind, and now i digress.
Today was my first day of week three (i wagged my two lectures yesterday and stayed at home, where my bed became my sanction as it had been for previous days prior) - crazy huh!? i can't believe we've been here for nearly a month; well it will be a month if we counted 0-week. So the question i wanna ask right now, as i type quickly waiting for packed to the rafters to being (that show is so family-orientated its cute) is have any of you made friends? as in 'real' friends? i'm talking about the real deal - phone numbers, facebook, myspace, twitter, whatever's your style - and they can't include people from your high school! I'm gonna be honest here and say its a lot *insert swear word* harder than i thought it was going to be, possibly even more-so when you've got some of your best friends doing another degree just down the hall...
And for those of you who have made friends, many many fantastic amazing friends - wanna give us newbies some advice?
ta taaaa lovelies
ooh ps: have any of you been to the media collective meetings on Monday? i haven't been for the past two weeks for reasons i couldn't control, and now i feel kinda outta-the-loop!
:)
I have started biting my nails again.
This really annoys me because it took me three very dedicated months to kick the habit in the first place and then after just two weeks at uni I'm stressing out enough over work to like, totally ruin my french manicure ya know? Haha, I am being purposefully blonde just in case I was about to inspire any hateful comments about 'real issues' etc etc.. But seriously... I am slightly annoyed.
The work load is getting bigger and bigger and it (stupidly) only hit me today that just because the pages in my eco history tute reading manual say 'week 3 reading' above them, doesn't mean that trying to do it all on Monday night of week 3, when it's due by Tuesday, is going to be possible. So yeah, time management is not proving to be my strongest asset so far this week.
Otherwise though this week has started well :) I contacted Farrago about doing an article for the upcoming 3rd edition so am really excited about that but keep having to force myself away from my journalistic desires (ooer) to get my uni work done first. Have been worrying this week about how I'm going to (hopefully) launch my journalism career. A lot of the big papers etc offer the majority of their internships to Media and Comms students so it's going to be harder to get in on one just by doing the BA. Still, I spoke to the careers advice team (who were very lovely btw) who suggested that, unless I wanted to switch course (which I couldn't do until next year apparantly?), I'm best just working really hard and showing 'drive and commitment' with lots of extra curricular experience. Hmmm.... so, any future journalists out there, think carefully about the BA vs BA Media and Comms when you're choosing your uni course.
Anywho, I'm off to the city to see 'He's just not that into you', again. Has anyone else seen it? I think it's FANTASTIC, but unfortunately it does mean that I can't stay and finish my blog... I'm sure you are all totally devastated. Not. Sorry, I will be more interesting next time.. I hope.
Love, Natty x
I seem to have forgotten how to do my homework.
I spend quite a bit of time seated, papers spread around me waiting to be inked and perused. Instead, I turn to eBay, FaceBook (I'm late to the game, but the MouseHunt application is all addictimafiyingive;) and any other channel that does not actually involve drawing supply/demand curves, figuring out correlation coefficients or A = L + Eq. Basically, I'm really good at procrastinating and generally not being a Comm student.
Today I spent some time hanging around music students, generally being a nuisance and/or pretending to be One of Them. I figured it would do well for my general state, as they are unlikely to have finished the Accounting assignment already, or rearranged equations to get r like the tute sheet asked for in stats. Questions posed by me include: "So, what happens after you get your degrees?", "So you guys apparently hate all pianists and mainstream guitarists, who do you like again?", "Do you sit around discussing Bach?", "Okay, if not Bach, Mozart?", "If there's a diatonic scale, is there a triatonic one? Quatratonic? Sexatonic? Octotonic?", "Do all flautists have a flaut-y look to them?" etc. etc. etc.
It had the EXACT OPPOSITE EFFECT. I felt SO DUMB when they talked about movable dohs and relative pitch and yeah okay the moaning about how irritating it would be to have perfect pitch was kind of pretentious, but STILL. FEEL SO DUMB as my music tastes pretty much consist of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Johnny Cash, Etta James and Michael Jackson right now.
So, what happened? I. Went. Back. To. Doing. Commerce.
Really. I got some reading done straight after my Music School encounter. I've realized this is an integral part of university life- being made to feel stupid, and then running to my Quantitative Methods books for solace. I recommend this kind of therapy for any student frustrated at their own departmental doables. Just go visit the music school.*
Kisskiss,
Suzi
*NB this does not work if you actually know something about music.
P.S. This should be taken in a completely lighthearted manner. I love music students, I do. "You sing the body electric" ;)
So, it's now week three of uni and already I feel like I'm drowning. When it gets to the stage where I have to schedule time to cut my fingernails, has it gone too far? Seriously, is anyone else this busy?
I have about 19 contact hours per week, give or take three hours or so. I have wushu twice a week (it's really awesome by the way), I have MUCS once. That's about another seven hours all together. I have never done two of my subjects before (physics and biology). Another subject I haven't done for a year (maths). My last subject has a fair bit of reading (English).
So why do I feel so behind in basically everything? Does anyone else feel like this? Am I alone in the world?
The most weird thought struck me today: Will I be a blog ghost?
History class, you pick up a dusty book from a shelf. You sit there and think: this mate had something clever to say. Or what happens most of the time, why do I have to read this? Right, for my history class....
Year 2038. Future students will sit in front of their computers (maybe computers will be considered old) and browse through the blogs. And the essay question will be something like this:
Why did the people of the 21st century feel the urge to blog? Analyse and discuss.
I look at this and I laugh. It's funny because it's true. Why do my generation feel a sudden necessity to share their personal thoughts on the web? Just look at Facebook. It's almost scary, come to think of it.
I honestly don't know what will happen when a blogger dies. Does his/her blog remain? Does he become this virtual ghost in cyberspace? Will there be a 1st and 2nd generation of bloggers? If this is the case, to which blog generation do I belong?
Maybe those are the type of questions you'll answer in your essay. In 2038.
It could start like this:
Olle was a uni blogger during the FINANCIAL CRISIS ERA, and was heavily influenced by Facebook and Australian culture.
SPOOKEY!
Well I do. And they were amazing. I was reminded of them the other day when I went to the RCH for a meeting - the lady organising it had this really nice popcorn for us to eat. It was Coles Organic popcorn (green bag, flavour was "sweet and salty") and it was amazing. So if you're desparate for a low-sugar yumminess hit (it's semi-diabetic friendly) then go down to Coles and find a bag.
Anyway, uni. It's interesting but you appear to have to structure your time yourself. I have a weakness for stupid internet things that occupy my time. The Impossible Quiz. Various forums and sites, mainly about fantasy or general chat. Trying to get my uni email to co-operate with Outlook 2008. Actually that last one is a pet peeve. I've tried a lot of things (including instructions from the uni) but I get the feeling it just wasn't meant to be. It was quite strange...I can receive emails but not send them. I used to get an error telling me my IP had been blacklisted - fixed that by activating SSL and now I can't send anything because apparently my client doesn't support the right authentication method. Bah. Squirrelmail isn't that bad, I can live with it.
Where was I before I began to ramble? Oh yes, structuring time and avoiding distractions. University is very different to high school / VCE / HSC and you need to adjust appropriately. By this stage (week 3) of year 12 i probably had half a dozen different pieces of work completed and a couple of SACs on the horizon. Well, in comparison, the sum total of the work I've submitted (or have completed for) uni. is:
- Assignment One for Calculus One. 2 questions, took me about 30 minutes
- Biology ILT on Microscopes. Took about 30 minutes, completed before uni started on March 2nd
- Biology ILT on Osmosis. Took about 30 minutes
That's a grand total of 90 minutes worth of work that has actually been submitted to the uni. My memories of VCE aren't too clear, but I think that I'd have completed a lot more than that by this stage last year. Lectures appear to be things that you need to go over, not just turn up to. Having not done Biology at high school is a slight disadvantage seeing as those who did do it are telling me that we've learned nothing radically new yet. Maybe it's a bit more than "slight".
Nevertheless, it appears to be the extra effort that you put in that makes the difference at uni. I suppose I could wait until SWOTVAC to start revising, but something tells me that I don't want to make that mistake again (my break between school finishing and exams starting was amazing). Looking at my Fallout 3 time/date stamps is something that always reminds me just how much fun I had.
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