Academia at Otago

While I like my classes here, and while it's awesome that I only take three classes and that I'm done with them after noon on Thursdays, academics are certainly not Otago's strong spot. In all three of my classes today, students had their cell phones out and were texting in plain view of the lecturer (don't get me started on texting), and nobody seemed to care! In my media studies class, the prof asked how many people had done the reading. About seven people out of over one hundred students raised their hands, and he said, "not bad, not bad." Are you serious?! If seven percent of the class had done the reading at Oxy, the prof would have exploded and started assigning pop quizzes no sweat. It's ridiculous! The readings are at a much easier level (granted, I'm taking a 100-level class and a 200-level class along with my 300-level class) and in the syllabi (called "primers" or "course descriptions" here), there's two parts about the reading: a "required" reading, and a "recommended" reading. The recommended readings are all entire books, not just articles or something, it's basically the reference list for the required reading, so obviously nobody is reading it. Profs ask questions, and the only people that answer the questions are people without kiwi accents: it's only international students! It's kind of funny, if it wasn't so sad that kiwis float through classes.

Since my classes aren't providing me with much to fill my time, I decided to start working out to burn off the cookies I made last night (I couldn't figure out the conversion of grams to cups, so I think I doubled the amount of butter necessary...obviously, they were delicious that way, but I think I ate my weight in cookies) and I made the 20-minute trek to the gym. It's practically a workout to get there, especially if it's raining. Somehow, I feel like I'm burning more calories walking to the gym in the rain than if it's dry, probably because it's unpleasant. I'm also signing up for a wine appreciation class, and a bone carving class. They're both expensive, but they're not classes I can take at Oxy, and I figure I should take advantage of it now while I can. I also went over to talk with the local elementary school, and it looks like I can get into a classroom sometime next week which will be AWESOME because a) I miss having crazy kidlets in my life, and b) kiwi kids have the cutest accents, so I obviously need to get that in my life too.

I know I said I wasn't going to talk about texting, but I can't resist...texting is the most annoying thing ever. Nobody here makes phone calls with their phones, they just sit around and text all day! It's so irritating, because nothing can ever get resolved in anything less than three texts. A sample text conversation goes like this:
Me: Hey, I'm going to the Bowler tonight for quiz night...you should come.
Somebody else: Oh sweetas, that sounds wicked. When are you going?
Me: We're leaving my house at 10, come on over before then.
Somebody else: Where do you live again?

And it goes on like that. A simple phone conversation would be over in 30 seconds, but no...the texting conversation goes on. It's $1.49 per minute to call somebody else, though, and I get 500 free texts for $10/month. I will be thrilled to return to the States and have the decision available whether to call or to text, depending on the situation. Stupid texting.

I just looked at a syllabus for my child development class, and it looks like I have an essay due next week...hmm. I might want to look into what it's supposed to be about. The prof is clearly American, since no kiwi prof assigns any sort of work due till at least April. Oh well, it'll give me something to do. I never ever thought I would describe writing an essay as "something to do" but NZ classes have not proven to be the most challenging academically. Still, just being over here is a constant learning experience, and I knew from negative day 30 that exploring the culture and the land were going to be just as fulfilling for me.

Heaps of love back home...