Classes

Classes are sectioned off into Lectures and Tutorials. Depending on some “units” (aka courses) you can have one or three a week varying in hours. Nearly all classes are then followed by a tutorial at another time for the same unit. Lectures are pretty much were a conveyer or lecturer pretty much talks for 1-2 hours. Some of my lecturers are better than others. I can tell when lecturers are pretty much readings off a piece of paper, which does not hold my attention very long. The tutorials are more intimate and similar to a seminar style of teaching a class. I am “enroled” (that’s the proper way to spell “enrolled” here) in 4 units, which is a full boat load in Australia. I do not think there is such thing as a “blow off” course in this university. All courses are research intensive. I am grateful that I am very familiar the Saint Xavier library database because it is very handy to know. All my courses are really interesting. It took me 4 weeks to settle on my classes, which is normal apparently. I started off in Japanese 101, which was too advance for my. In the first week I had to learn how to pronounce, recognize, and write all 46 characters of the hiragana Japanese alphabet. Needless to say, I decided that the class was far to fast paced without any prior teachings. Many students I talked to in the unit had taken some form of Japanese in high school. I switched that class to a Philosophy course, but that only lasted for a week. I dropped that course to make room for an internship I was offered during week 4. I find it odd that it took me nearly a month into school to settle in a course. Makes me wonder how other students handle all this.


(Random picture of me at the Aquarium with the Dewgongs; they're so COOL!)

My most interesting course it my “from the Beats to Big Brother: Popular Culture since the 50’s” unit. This is a modern history course where we look at history through popular culture. I liked that we had a 10-15 minute conversation about the significance of panty raids in the 60’s in reference to student activism. The class really talks about American history often. One lecture was all about the “black revolution.” The lecture touched upon the Black Panther, MLK, and Rosa Parks. I thought to myself, “I know all this already.” A good portion of lecture I actually am quite familiar with everything because she, the lecturer talks about America culture. This makes me feel bad, that I don’t know next to nothing about Australian history. I get to use the “Alien” series as a primary source for my tutorial paper. I am SO EXCITIED. I get to write a paper about my favourite movie (no that’s not a spelling mistake STEVE T, that’s also how you spell favorite here).
My “Russian Society and Culture” is pretty cool. I have a couple different tutors in this class and their all females from Russia. They have nice accents. This class has only a few students and it’s a combination between a lecture and tutorial. The lecturer does read off a piece of the paper most of the times, but the material is worth listening to. There are a lot cool people in the class to talk to so that’s a benefit. A couple of the students are close friends and have an after class drinking ritual. Its quite funny that every week when I see them, I ask how there day is going and they mention how their clothes same like beer or just got over there hangover. Australia truly is drinking culture. The best with I can put it is that in America if you have a just you offer them something to eat or drink. In Asia, they offer you something to just eat. In Australia, they offer you beer to drink.
Consumer Behaviour (again that’s how it is spelt in Oz) is a pretty awesome lecture. The lecturer, Alex, uses a lot of dry humour (again not a spelling mistake). He tells jokes during break too. There not very good, but he makes fun of his wife a lot. The material in the unit is really intriguing. We look into the mind of the consumer. We dissect a lot of advertisements. There is heaps of funny Asian commercials. The best one though was for a Veg-a-mite commercial that involved Hitler getting pissed. You can Youtube it. Just type in “Hitler i.Snack 2.0” and I am sure it will pop up. I wrote my first paper for this class and got it back. I got a 6.5 out of 10. At first, I was angry. I thought I wrote a really good paper and even had a teacher proof-read it. However, after I looked at the grading rubric. My paper was marked with mostly “above expectation” and some “meet expectations. Basically, from the way the rubric mapped out my paper I got a “B.” However, a 6.5 out of 10 is a “D” back home. A 6.5 is actually pretty good as far as Macquarie University is concerned, but I wonder what Saint Xavier will do?
My last unit is my internship course. I have to complete a 120 hours of work. I really wish it was a paid internship, but it still counts as credit. I go to my internship every Monday and Thursday. I try to work between 8-9 hours a day. All my other classes are on Tuesday and Wednesday.