I
promise you all I’m not a total beach bum.
I actually didn’t even lay eyes on a beach once today. In fact, today I started classes! Finally!
I am here to study after all, so I guess it’s about time my vacation
ended and classes began. (But does the
vacation ever truly end?)
My two
classes today were “Technology, Culture and Society” and “Aboriginal Australia.” The former was very small, and seemed like a
good group of people. The professor
looks awesome, too. This one is
technically supposed to be a second-priority class (as of right now it doesn’t
count towards any credits back at home) so I may switch out of it later. It was a lot more fun than I thought, though,
so I kind of hope I don’t have to now!
The
second class, at the time of 3-5PM, a.k.a. Ideal Nap Time, was also super
interesting. Unfortunately, it was also taught
by a man with a very low, rumbling voice, and was held in a very hot, stuffy
room, a.k.a. Ideal Nap Conditions. So I
yawned all through this class, but luckily I have three friends in that
class! They kept me awake when I was
about to doze off. The class material
itself is very exciting, though. The
course covers the history of Australia before European colonization. The native peoples of Australia are actually
so amazing; I’m really excited to learn more about how their societies work!
One
thing I noticed in both classes was that at the beginning of the lecture, there
was always an “acknowledgement” slide.
Before starting anything, the professors would acknowledge the native
people of the land the University rests on, and pays respect to them as the
true owners of the land. This was a
really cool thing that I’ve never seen in the States. I also learned that at public events, it’s
common for an aboriginal group to perform a Welcome to Country ceremony, officially
giving others a welcome to their land. It’s
really cool how respectful the people are here towards the native peoples, even
when they went through the same brutal colonization process as the Americas. (Of course, a lot more respect and reparations are in order, but this is still more
than I see in the US.)
It was
interesting to see the makeup of these classes I was in. They’re relatively low-level courses, and
both can be gen eds for any major, so there was a good variety of people in
each one. To my surprise, there were
even a ton of international kids! Even
in my smaller class, I was by far not the only one with an American accent. I
even sat right next to a guy from Canada!
It’s pretty nice to not be too
much of an outsider.
Other
than classes, there was a little event tonight at International House to open
nominations for the Resident’s Society; the group of people who run the events and
such in the house. I was nominated for
Environmental Director, which is so exciting!
The Environmental Director is in charge of taking care of the beautiful
courtyard garden we have, as well as making any new changes to improve it! It would be so fun to be in this position, so
I hope people vote for me!
I don’t
have any pictures to share from today, sadly.
Lecture halls really aren’t that interesting in any part of the
world. I do have this one picture I took
on my phone a few days ago though, of the central walkway on campus.
It’s
taken from the exact spot that a picture on the brochure for UNSW was. As I was walking, it just kind of struck me
that I was actually seeing this, when just months ago, I was skimming through
that brochure trying to decide if UNSW was right for me. Needless to say, I’m really glad I made this
decision!
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