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A rainy refreshers

January 17th, 2011 amguar12

Hey all!

I can’t believe how quickly last week flew by! It was definitely one of the best weeks here so far. The first week of the spring term is called ‘refreshers’, just like the first week of the autumn term (orientation week) is called ‘Freshers Week’. Unlike in Freshers, when you were trying to get to know everyone, figure out where things are and put your best foot forward, refreshers was relaxing because you already know people and could just jump back into a familiar routine.

I generally do not see the others from Holy Cross here much at all, but it was really nice to see them after the winter break and catch up on how our breaks were. As I mentioned in the last blog, I really needed those 4 weeks at home, and thoroughly enjoyed them. While at the end of last term I was really burnt out at Sussex (probably due to the increased work load and extreme disappointment over not being able to see my friends in Ireland), I can’t believe how refreshed and relaxed I am now. Seriously, if I had to end my abroad experience after last term, it would have been incomplete. Getting many hassles straightened out last term, I have decided that I’m really going to embrace and enjoy this term, and live it up in England!

To re-cap last week, I had classes from Monday-Thursday, and I must say that the classes I am taking this term seem really interesting so far! I am in two art classes – Communicating Art and Art of the Modern Era, which are both really fascinating (until recently I really wasn’t that interested in art, but we looked at many Italian Renaissance paintings in my Italian class last year at Holy Cross, and that sparked somewhat of an interest). My other two classes are Philosophy of Mind (a confusing class but at least philosophy is my last common area requirement to fulfill!), and Health Psychology, which is awesome! Seriously, I am in love with that class, and it is really structured so far, which is good in my opinion. I will still have to take at least 3 psychology classes next year at Holy Cross to complete the major, but I love psychology so it’s not a problem.

Beyond academics, there were a few social things going on last week, and unfortunately, lots of rain (the rain sadly caused the cell phones on the vodaphone network, which I am on, to not work on campus for nearly 3 days!). Monday night, the campus pub, East Slope Bar, had a Dubslope Night, which played Dubstep music (really popular here, and one of my flatmates plays the music all the time in our flat) and was a great night to see the other Holy Cross people. Another night there was a student band playing at East Slope, which was also very good. When you get bored of East Slope, you can always head out for a night in Brighton (which I do occasionally) or chill in the flat (which I do a lot!). Also, I have now started buying the weekly bus pass into Brighton, which really motivates me to explore the city more (yesterday I just walked the seafront for awhile, seeing all the vendors selling stuff, people exercising, music playing – seriously it felt like a mini-vacation!).

OK, I know this post is a bit long but it was a good week last week, and now that we are in Week 2 already, I need to finish up an essay that is due for Wednesday (it is actually from my Social Cognitive Development class last term, but they gave us from October to January to work on the essay, a bit too long in my opinion but whatever). Anyways, I hope the rain stops soon. Talk to you all soon!

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