If you don't know what the above means, it means I have started my Spanish lectures....
AHH! ¡NO ME GUSTA! I haven't done Spanish for four years and I've kinda thrown myself in at the deep end. Despite this, I thought it was going to be a lot harder than it has been to pick it up again, but so far it's been ok as I understand all the grammar and stuff, it's just a case of trying to remember all the vocabulary which has fallen out of my brain. Constructing any form of vaguely interesting sentence other than "I have a cat" and "I like your skirt" is a very slow process at the moment but I've downloaded a handy little app which gives me a bit of sneaky help in lectures. I feel I'm getting along ok so far as other people in the lectures have been doing it for a whole semester already and they're not very good... but then again there are people who are whiz kids with the vocab which means they're miles ahead. I know all I need to do is get learning vocab to catch up, so hopefully I'll be alright in a few weeks. Miss Avila (for all those at Godolphin) you'd be proud of me! Look at how colourful and childish my textbook is though...
Haha! Everyone at UNSW is so science-y, so I look like a right muppet walking round campus with that bloody thing when everyone is carrying around their Mechatronics ('making robots') drawings and stuff...
All my Music lectures are good so far too, my favourite has to be Electronic Music, which I know sounds like a load of bullshit, but actually it's all about Sound Art and moulding your own sonic spectrum as a composer and stuff and is basically like an extension of a module I did last year in electroacoustic composition. The lecturer is teaching us loads of technical stuff in ProTools (the music software I use back home) which is really helpful as at the moment I kinda just bumble along with whatever I've worked out how to do. It'll mean I'm able to actually get the sound I want and hopefully be able to write some pretty funky stuff. Watch this space!
Our campus is really nice and spacious and green. Here's a little snap of the main quad...
Please note the blue skies and sunshine even though it's the middle of Winter! Hahahahhaaaa. Also, here's a pic of Goosey elegantly gliding down the Brasser Steps...
There are so many steps from the lower to the upper campus as the whole site is built on a hill. It takes about 20mins to get to the Library which is right at the top. Not good for me when I have to zip from one lecture in lower campus straight on to another in upper.... I think I'm going to have to just always be late for that one...
My timetable is good and bad at the same time.... the bad things are that I have five solid hours non stop on a Monday, and five more with only a one hour break on Wednesday, but then I have Tuesday completely off and only one or two hours on Thursday and Friday. My days are pretty full at the moment as I am still sorting out admin, like forms that I have to go and get signed to send back to Newcastle. The funniest and genuinely weirdest thing happened today actually... I was hunting round the music department to try and find the right person to sign my form, and this strange gangly man decided to take pity on me and help me find my way. He heard that I was British and told me that he'd been at York University doing Music, and that now he was a research student here. We chatted politely a bit on the way to the office about how I was finding it here so far blah blah, and he asked me what I played etc., and then when I found the person I was looking for we went our separate ways. I had to wait outside the office for a bit longer as I had to get more than one form signed, and he walked past again and gave me a funny little wave... then, next thing I know, five minutes later he was back was a whole flute sonata photocopied for me! He explained that whilst I was here I should try playing something Australian, as this was by an Australian composer, and then he did another funny little wave and scuttled off again. Ha! This other girl who was waiting at the office too asked me how I knew him, and when I said I didn't know him at all we both burst into hysterics. What a strange, but sweet, but still very strange, man... it honestly must have cost him a fortune to photocopy all those pages! They're A3 too, not the most practical of size.... bless 'im.
I ran straight to Goose after it happened and she thought it was hilarious. I guess I'm going to have to learn this flippin' thing then....
I've had a long busy day of lectures and I've got a cold at the moment so feeling a bit under the weather which just made the day drag by sooooooo ssslloooowwwlllyyyyyy. Also, being poorly in Australia is so expensive! $12 for Lemsip.... c'mon now!
Best be off to learn some Spanish vocab and/or this bizarre flute sonata.... pfftt....
B
