It's Time to Get Up and Get some Knowledge!

First off, yes the title is a Finding Nemo reference, and yes I am probably going to make quite a few more throughout my time in Australia. Now that that's settled.... School started this week!!! Ordinarily I would not be excited about that, but I haven't been to school since the first week of December and I'm honestly SO ready for this break to be over.

Last week, Devyn and I went to orientation.... Let's just say it was an interesting experience. There was a lot of arguing between our guides, there were more than a few miscommunications about where we were supposed to be and when, Devyn and I walked home in the pouring rain, they were essentially starving us and the list goes on and on... But that was just the first day. The second day was quite a bit better. The president of the student association came to apologize to us about what happened the day before which was very thoughtful. Plus, we got a ton of free stuff which is always a good thing. However, they did starve us again and they made us sit through two hours of not even slightly important information.

The way school is set up here is very weird compared to how it is back home. Back home we set up our schedule with about 5-7 classes depending on the number of units and how much you need to get done and you are put in a specific class at a specific time. Here, you have to take only 3-4 classes depending on how many units they are and you get a timetable instead of making a schedule. The timetable has a couple of options for times and days that you can take the class and you choose which one you want to go to. I am only taking three classes this semester! I'm taking applied music practice, drawing, and visual arts foundation 1. I'm honestly really excited. I'm going to come home with an Australian accent, I'm going to be able to paint and draw, and I'm going to be able to play the piano.

The only thing that I am really nervous about is finding my classes... I have been around this campus so many times and I have absolutely no idea how to get anywhere on my own. Which is really funny to me because this campus is so small compared to NAU and at NAU I have never had a problem getting around. Luckily, if I get lost, there is an app that I can download that is supposed to help me find where I'm going. We'll just have to see how I do on the first day.

So this post is going to be a little bit different this time. I am writing this part on Tuesday night, and tomorrow after I get home from class I'm going to give a little update after this divider. Then, I'm going to give another update on Friday or Saturday after the week is over. Hopefully this works!

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So it's the end of the first day! I only had one class, piano, so it wasn't too exciting. Devyn and I got to that class super early so the piano teacher was teaching us some Chinese while we were waiting for everyone else. Out of all of my classes I think I am most excited for that one! I was really nervous for that class because I have never been able to learn how to actually play before, but I am a lot less nervous now. The teacher showed us some ways to make playing a lot easier and there are practice rooms in that building so I can pretty much practice whenever I want.

After that class got out, Devyn and I got to talking about classes and, long story short, I'm taking Chinese instead of drawing! Since that class ended up being more of an architecture type of class, I really just was not feeling it. I already can't draw and I really don't think that I am magically going to learn how to design buildings without that skill soooooo.... yeah. That was really all that happened today!

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It's the end of the week! Tomorrow was actually supposed to be the end of the week, but because I dropped that drawing class I only had class two days this week.

Today was so long! I got up at about 6, headed to class about 8:30, left that class early and headed to the next one that started at ten, and was there until 4:00!! There was a bit of a break in the middle where Dev, Meg, and I went to get some lunch, but other then that I was in class all day. That second class that I went to was Visual Arts Foundation 1... I honestly thought that this was supposed to be a photography class, but it's more of a weird photography, photoshop, painting mash-up and I am really not ready for that. I didn't have any homework from the other two classes, but this class gave me five assignments in one day! It would have all been fine had the class not been so boring. Just to give you an idea of exactly how boring, we sat for two hours listening to the lecturer tell us not to sniff charcoal or eat paint and the effects of that..... I really don't know how I am going to be able to sit through that class for five hours a day and then on top of that sit in the drawing studio for another 3-6 hours a week. I am seriously regretting taking this class, but I am really glad that I only have three classes instead of four.

That's really just about it for this week. It was a lot less exciting than I thought it was going to be.There really wasn't much to tell from two days but there you go! That was my first week at Charles Darwin University!