First week of class

So the vacation is actually over.

Classes last semester ended the beginning of December and I have been on vacation since then. Class seems like a foreign concept. But, that is the reason that I'm in New Zealand after all. It was only fitting that it was pouring rain the first day of class. Since the walk to campus is 20 minutes long, I took the bus.

The kiwis call each course a "paper" because you hand in a paper when you're finished with the class. So I am taking 4 "papers." None of the classes are related to my major which is disappointing because those are the classes that actually interest me. Instead, I am suffering through these rivetting courses:

- Environmental ethics

- Games, Rationality, and Choice (which counts as my Philosophy requirement)

- War, Peace, and Society (this takes the place of a History at Loyola)

- Reading Sacred Texts: The Gospel of Matthew (a religion course)

Although these sound horrible, they are. But I need to take them at some point to graduate so I might as well take them while I am in the beautiful country of New Zealand which will soften the hit. The classes are in huge lecture halls, something I am not used to. The lectures are even recorded and posted online, so attendance is not required. Each class is broken into smaller groups called tutorials, which are mores similar to the class size I'm used to at Loyola. There are so many differences between here and Loyola. I'm happy that I get to experience a large university and basically attend two different colleges during my time!