SCHOOL LIFE
It has been really nice to stay on top of everything so well for class. I cannot say this enough, but having done one course at a time before, I seriously get my work done so quickly and early. I suppose the fact that I am only taking three classes also contributes to the fact that I have not had an overwhelming amount of work to do. I will note that yesterday, my professor for my history and culture class randomly decided that we needed to finish a 400 page book by next Tuesday... a book that he has previously told us to casually read. One thing that has caught my attention with class is the amount of time that is literally wasted doing nothing related to learning in any way. For example, recently in my culture class we literally spent 45 minutes of the 90 minutes in class listening to the professor talk about the most random stuff. Similarly, on Monday in my psychology class the first 30 minutes of the 3 hour class were spent chatting.
SOCIAL LIFE
I definitely have been having a nice time with friends lately. My friend Niels from Germany turned 25 last weekend, so like 25 people got together to celebrate with him. (Now, I will note that we got together at my friend Fred's hostal, where he has now lived for 6 weeks... he has become really good friends with the people that work there and I doubt he will ever leave... I told him I am just going to start referring to the place as his home. The other night I went over there, cooked dinner and did his sewing--seems pretty home-y to me!). Sunday night I went to my third salsa lesson, which is getting popular with my group of friends. It went really really well. I am now at the point where I have enough trucos up my sleeve to readily do different figuras without having to think extremely hard at doing so, meaning that it all comes together much more naturally. Sometimes I still get overwhelmed and lose count which basically means that I do not mark the time and get sloppy! Last night I went out to a concert of a Chilean friend. It was really fun, although the music was different than what I normally listen to (it was in English, and I would describe it as something like The Killers), meaning that I had no clue how to jam out to it!
LOVE LIFE
If you read that and honestly thought was going somewhere, the joke's on you! Who knows the last time I dated... ha.
CORNELL LIFE
It has been pretty weird for me to know that New Student Orientation is starting up on campus and I am not there. I mean, trust me, I know that somehow they are managing to continue on without me, it just feels weird because I have been pretty involved during the past two years with it. On top of that, it is always such a fun time on campus and I feel like I am totally missing out. There have been a couple of times I have felt lonely about not being there as the school year starts off because I still have a lot of good friends on campus, but such is life. On the psychology front, my research professor and I submitted a research manuscript to the Journal of Counseling Psychology to be peer-reviewed. This is a big deal for me because I lead the research project and am first author on it. I am sure that it will be a long road to getting the paper published, but it's a start!
GRADUATE SCHOOL LIFE
Again, if you read this and thought that it was going somewhere... you were right to think it was, but the joke is still on you! I have gotten pretty lazy with my grad school applications. Luckily, before I left I had to get everything in order, so I would say I am 3/4 of the way done. However, it still remains that I need to write my 14 personal statements and applications to the individual programs. This will be a lot, but luckily I can use the same base-essay for each, and the applications are pretty basic and I have already started many of them.
SPANISH SPEAKING LIFE
I have come to the conclusion that trying to fully immerse yourself into a Spanish speaking culture is really difficult. I have realized three major set-backs: 1.) Everyone speaks English! Even if I want to escape it, there are so many people that speak it, that it is easy to ask how to say something in Spanish rather than have to use Spanish to describe the word that I lack. In addition, many people just straight up want to speak English with me. 2.) A lot of my friends are international students, and although they do not necessarily have English as their primary language, they speak it quite well, meaning that sometimes we slip into English (although I really try hard not to!). I have been meeting more people that are Chilean which is good, because that gives me to opportunity to have casual conversation in Spanish and learn from what they are saying to me. 3.) Technology. Oh my goodness I think this is the one that has been the most debilitating. I mean, it is so easy for me to be able to have epic phone conversations on Skype in English, it is easy for me to read the news in English, and the listen to English podcasts. I have intentionally tried to limit some of that exposure, but it is hard to do when it is so readily available. I mean, I would have to be a pretty big tool to just tell friends and family to forget about talking to me which I was here! Really though, I think the only way that I will ever be fully immersed is if I move to the middle of nowhere in a small indigenous town that is not accessible by anything besides a llama a some type of charm to scare off the chupacabra.
BLOG LIFE
Finally, it is revived!
Okay, so this is my third try at posting something! Glad to hear all is well in Chile. Mike and I are off to Scotland, returning Sept. 18th. Keep dancin' and I'll keep fiddlin'. I am planning to play some music while there. Maybe Mike will follow your lead and do a little jig---Not!!
ReplyDeleteLove, Jackie