College

Well, here I am. I have finished my first week of schooling at UofA and am starting my second week. I moved into my dorm a week ago Thursday and I love my room. It's a fairly good size and it's not that bad to keep clean. Check it out! (Click on the pictures to see them more clearly)


My room is on the third floor, but it leads to the outside. It does not really make any sense when you try and explain it to people, so hopefully you can understand by seeing this picture...


Looking down my hallway (the community bathroom is the first door on the left; our room is on the right side of the hall)


Alysa's and my room!


My side of the room! (my posters are not up yet, though...)

The best thing about my room is my roommate. Alysa and I get along so well. I was seriously scared before coming here that I would get an awful roommate, and all of the things I was scared I would get in a roommate, Lys is definitely the opposite. Since the very first day we moved in, we have been friends. We do almost everything together and we tell each other everything. It's amazing how you can know someone for such a small amount of time and you can become such good friends. It's really great that I have her because I don't know many people here. I have a few friends from high school that I hang out with, but for the most part, I hang out with Alysa and Chelsea Shidawara (for those who know her). Chelsea basically lives in our dorm, not even kidding. She is constantly over at our dorm and the people at the front desk just let her into the locked building, thinking she lives there. It's pretty funny, actually. I am still looking for a good Christian group to get involved with. I have been trying out various ones but I haven't found the one that just clicks. I hoping to join Future Teacher's Club, but I don't know when they meet. I am just really hoping that a find a good place to belong and some friends to belong with.

My classes are OK. I have five classes, 16 credits. Every morning besides Friday at 9:00, I have my American Sign Language 4 class. Level 4 classes are supposed to be your second-to-last class before you are fluent in American Sign Language, but the level of this class is nowhere near that. The professor takes things very slowly and the curriculum that she is teaching is what I took last year in high school. The people in that class are so not up to the standard that they should be. All of last week, we were doing review of "level 3" (which is really a review of level 2, something I took two years ago) and the students were having trouble with the simplest things. They would forget words that were some of the first words you learned when you were first learning how to sign. I was sitting there the whole time thinking, "Are you KIDDING me?! You use that sign in just about every other sentence..." It's been awful. I sit in class and do Sudoku the entire hour and the professor and TA don't care because whenever they ask me a question, I sign it perfectly and answer it perfectly. Both of them can't believe I am a freshman because I am far above all of the seniors (which is what most of the class is comprised of). It's just a waste of my time, really. I am going to talk to my professor about possibly switching to a higher level of ASL, but she has been out of town for a week. I still need to take 16 credits, so if I can't switch to a higher level, I am stuck in this incredibly boring and irritating class. Every morning. Yuck.

My other classes are pretty good. The rest of them are general education classes that have nothing to do with my major but they are required to graduate. It's funny, the classes I was looking forward to, I no longer am, and the classes I was dreading, I no longer am; so it's just a give and take. I am taking Writing Systems of the World, The Physical Universe, The Many Ways of Being Human (not like we don't know how to be human already...), and Structure of Mind and Behavior. My Writing Systems class is one of my favorites. I have it Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays for one hour. I think the material is going to be interesting and the way the class is set up, I think it is going to be super easy. My professor is kind of funny: he speaks VERY softly into the microphone to the point where you can barely understand what he is saying unless you are in one of the first five rows. As quiet as he is, he's a really good professor; he really keeps my attention and is a very nice man. So far, I am really enjoying that class. My Physical Universe class is OK. I have it Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays for one hour. My professor looks like my old algebra teacher from high school. He is kind of an awkward man and seems very skiddish and nervous in front of the class. He is quite boring, actually. The class seems pretty hard with lots and lots of reading, and I am really unsure how I am going to study for that class. But who knows? It could get better. I absolutely love my Many Ways of Being Human class. I have it Monday and Wednesday lectures and then a discussion session with some of the people from my class lead by one of the TAs (who is really great, mind you). The class is supposed to be a mix between economics and sociology focusing mostly on capitalism, but my professor didn't like that, so she changed the focus to be about the economy of language. And apparently she can do that because, according to my discussion TA, "Jane Hill is a freaking legend." I adore my professor. She is so funny and she really makes the class enjoyable. The material she is covering is so interesting and she makes it really tangible. Apparently this is the last year she is going to be teaching before she retires and I am so glad that I got a chance to have her before that happens; I like her a lot and her class is definitely my favorite. My last class is Structure of Mind and Behavior and basically it's an intro to psychology class. The class seems hard, but the professor is really good, so I think I will be OK. The class is about 600 people full, and I mean FULL; there is hardly ever an open seat. Even if you arrive five minutes before the bell, it's difficult to find a chair. I don't really like the lack of personal quallity of the class, but what can you do? It's a good class all the same.

That's really all that I can think of to tell y'all. I am going to posting weekly blogs (definitely not as long as this one and the previous ones) most likely on Tuesdays or Thursdays, so please check often and please leave comments. Keep me in your prayers; you are in mine. Love to all.