Saturday, March 3, 2007

Today's lesson.

Last week was my first week of school here in Dunedin. (What? School?). There was major pain and agony, but I survived and prospered in the end. I am taking three papers here, all at the 300 level. They are Marine Ecology, Biomedical Ethics, and Advanced Regulation of Microbial Gene Expression (!). Both the Marine Ecology and The Microbiology have lab components which I am looking forward to (go Team Nerd!). In M.E. we will visit various harbours, fiords, soft shores and hard shores during the labs and even go on a few field trips! It helps that Dunedin is on the ocean, as is most of NZ (or so it seems anyway). The university campus is wonderful and beautiful. It is complete with really old buildings, a quaint river, many bars, and people with funny accents. I'm making some friends in classes pretty quickly as the accent factor has proven to be a point of interest. The classes are all pretty small compared to what I'm used to: 20-50 students, rather than 100+ per class. The profs also baby the students more and give nice handouts before each lecture. This is good because it will ensure maximum slacking capacity.

This week I sampled more of Dunedin bars, hung out with a few more locals, bought some pretty flashy children's size rugby boots and almost (!) learned to surf. High tides and very rough seas prevailed, but Markus says we will not give up and if he has to swim beside me and hold the board steady he will!

On another note, Krystle and I have decided that boys (especially Kiwi boys) are like their cars. We know a kid named Sam- and like his car he is very nice to look at and is intreguing because the handle is broken. However it is not very reliable and neither is he: we cannot find our vodka and suspect him and his antics. On the other hand we have Markus, another friend who is a bit less flaky and much more reliable: he took me to get rugby boots, to random parties, rugby practice and almost surfing at the beach. However, like his car, he is not quite as special to see as is the first case. We almost have a theory here.

And that is today's lesson.

3 comments:

Meghan said...

Hey Rebeckie! It looks like you are having an awesome time-the pictures are beautiful! By the sounds of it you have settled in wonderfully and life abroad is suiting you well. Between all the surfing, beer and rugby when do you fit in class?!

Things here are about the same cold and wintery. Everyone is doing well.

Continue loving life over there and keep blogging.

Love, Meg

Mare said...

A theory eh? I think there needs to be more data before you can declare the theory...I demand you go out and meet new boys and see thier cars! :P Plus we MUST have a picture of these spanky new rugby boots.

Anonymous said...

Have fun, just remember BIG BROTHER is watching. Well, the younger of the two anyway.