Overwhelmed by Uni

First week of lessons is over for me! Oh.Em.Gee. I am currently quite overwhelmed with the courses for Asian Studies. A lot of read up, research and writing to do! It is also quite difficult to adjust to a totally new educational system when you have to do everything yourself. Everything.

No more spoon-feeding like what I experienced for 13 years in SG. Gulps.

Seriously, there are A LOT of essays to write!

How long has it been since I last wrote an essay? Year 1 of poly? :/

I am so overwhelmed. And having a prof (Asian) who doesn’t speak proper English with weird pronunciation of words doesn’t help at all! Eg. “advanced” pronounced as “alance”? Very difficult to understand what he’s saying… :T

Good thing the courses for Korean is still manageable and not as seemingly stressful as AS!

My timetable

This is my timetable. First thing I thought of is: Wow so slack! Lol.

Click to enlarge!

The classes are pretty much fixed except my tutorials on Wednesday which I will be only be able to sign up tomorrow after the first lecture. I hate Wednesday, obviously because of the lousy timing and 3 hours straight of lec and tute! Arggh.

Oh and no classes on Friday!~ I don’t even have to arrange my tute or whatever for a longer weekend. My Fridays are automatically off! Yippee!

 

It’s only the 2nd day of school but this evening I felt like Kel and I are going to have exams soon because we were quietly studying by our desks! The whole apartment was so quiet and we were deep into our studying. Feels like exam period! OMG. ><

Everything confirmed!

It’s official! I’m doing Korean level 2 courses(aka subjects) this semester! :D

This afternoon, I went to see the coordinator for a so-called language placement interview. But it turned out that it was just a few simple exchange of conversations between us- like, do i have a cat at home? or a dog? which floor did I stay at back home in Singapore? Who am I living with right now? What is the name of my housemate? etc.

Very simple and short questions.

Oh and about my other major? ASIAN STUDIES! :)

Asian Studies is probably the other major I’m more keen in doing. The other majors are blank to me. Either I have no interest in them or I have no idea what it’s about.

Thus, here are the courses which I am doing for this semester:

1. Conversational Korean 2
2. Continuing Korean
3. The Rise of Modern Asia
4. Japanese Popular Culture

Every international student has to take 4 courses each semester so as to complete their program in time. For my AS major, there was only one level 1 course offered this semester so I had to choose a level 2 course which is Japanese Popular Culture. It actually has a prerequisite but I went to the course coordinator and told him that there weren’t any other courses offered. He told me it would be at my disadvantage that I’m starting level 2 without having done any arts courses before but he went ahead and approved as there weren’t any other courses offered for AS major.

Thus, this made me realised, I am doing 3 level 2 courses for my first semester in Uni! OMG. Korean is okay since I’ve got the background. I’m scared for the Japanese Popular Culture although it sounds fun and all… :x There’s actually the Korean Wave Culture course in AS but it’s not offered this semester, if not I would definitely choose that.

It’s not good to enrol into Uni in Semester 2. So many courses not offered! Fed up!

In any case… just to summarize, these are my majors for BA:

KOREAN and ASIAN STUDIES! :D

Oh yeah. Today I attended the class for Korean. It doesn’t have lectures or tutorials. Just a class by itself. Languages generally don’t have lectures because it requires more interaction between students and teachers. Therefore, the class venue is smaller as well.

There are actually more Caucasians than what I expected. I expected two or less but there were more than 5 in the class. Some Caucasians and Asian Australians were super LOUD and NOISY in class. My ears felt like they were about to burst because I sat in front of them. =.=”

But I guess their Korean ain’t bad. They make me go, damn I need to work hard! I cannot lose to them! LOL. :P

Failed at jogging and cooking

We finally went out jogging today! Kel and I have been planning to go out jogging but somehow our plans are always delayed.

It was kind of a failure. We jogged for about 15 minutes before we called it quits. I was expecting Kel to have better stamina than me since she’s into sports. But we were both tired out after a while. As newbies (especially me) we can’t really rush into running too much. It takes time to build up one’s stamina, right? Hehe.

Jogging(or perhaps I should say walking since we did that the most) around the suburb is so relaxing. It’s so peaceful and quiet around the area. The atmosphere is dry, warm from the sun and cooling from the season. So it all adds up to a rather comfortable weather. But the air can be too dry which caused our throat to hurt while we breathe through our mouths!

When we came back home after our little exploration around the suburb, I attempted to cook some homely dishes which our mums and grandmas would usually cook, like stir-fried vegetables, potatoes along with some carrots and onions, for lunch But it was EPIC FAIL! :x

I stir-fried potatoes, carrots and onions together. It came out awful because the potatoes were still hard inside but rather burnt on the outside. I wanted to cook until it was softer but it turned blacker and blacker, I had to stop before the potatoes become charcoal!

The spinaches were okay, except that it was too salty! I added too much soy and oyster sauce. :P

Luckily my rice turned out okay.

I didn’t take photos because I felt demoralised. Haha. It’s okay, it’s my first time and learning from my mistake will me improve (i think).

Unicell

Another fun-filled day today! I’m really playing hard before school starts. I’m going to “PIA” for Uni when it starts so right now, I have to enjoy myself first. Uni to me equals no time for play. Just read read write write.

Anyways, Kel and I went for a unicell group outing (LY, you’re not gonna like this :P). It’s a Christian cell group whereby the members gather to sort of… bond by doing various activities together. We actually didn’t know it was a unicell group until we reached that place. We thought it was a BBQ session for only S’poreans.

But when we were there, we realised there was a mix of S’poreans, M’sians and Chinese (China)! And after reading the list of activities we were going to do today, I realised it was like a cell group gathering! :O

We played ice-breaker games, sang Christian songs and had BBQ session. It was super awkward, especially the sing-along session. We didn’t know how to sing Christian songs and could only stare at the lyrics while others sang in a choir-y, church-y voice. In between songs, they praised the Lord and did some prayers in which Kel and I could only sit there with our heads down. AWKWARD!

After that, it was all pretty good. BBQ session was great. Food was delicious and I got some heads-up on what International Relations is about from a guy who did IR in UQ for his degree. After hearing what he said, I began to re-consider my choice of choosing IR as my 2nd major. It doesn’t sound scary or complex (because he didn’t went into much details of it), it’s just that I’m afraid that with no prior experiences of dealing with IR, jumping into it would make me regret it in future. That’s why I’m re-thinking of choosing Asian Studies instead. My interest lies more in AS than IR. EEEEHHHK!!

Anyways, during the unicell activity, we came to know of a China girl, named Joy (yet another new person). After the activities ended, she asked if we wanted to go to town and just walk around sight-seeing. She hasn’t been there before but we on the other hand had been there for sooo many times. We still went along though, because we had no idea what to do after that (Unicell ended at 1pm).

We walked around town, window shopping, watching wonderful performances by the street and just enjoying ourselves with the scenic environment. Aus is just so beautiful.

We even went to the Museum after finishing our time spent in town. :) We’re artsy-fartsy people! :P

Photos time!

This was where the unicell activities were held.

In town, there were lots of interesting events!

 

A demonstration? There were even some policemen nearby… o_O”

Walking from town to South Bank (where Museum is). Beautiful scenery!!

Guess who? :P

We actually took quite a lot more other pics but I’m so sleepy to upload more now. :/

Oh and one more interesting thing I found out today. Joy said that back in Beijing, the University she studied in actually gave them unlimited internet access and allowed them to download stuff from the internet!!! It’s like the Uni has their own download sites or something like that in which only their Uni students can download from. That’s why she was able to watch sooo many shows! I swear she watched like most of the hot American series out there, like Desperate Housewives, Gossip Girl, Grey’s Anatomy, Ugly Betty, etc and even sitcoms like How I Met Your Mother, Friends, etc!! She was able to download them all, okay! China= download paradise= more piracy. No wonder. Their Uni is encouraging them… WTH right. But I LIKE IT! I’m so envious.

We went to her house after that, guess why?

Because we WANTED TO GET SOME SHOWS FROM HER! Okay, mostly it’s Kel who wanted to get shows like Gossip Girl and other movies. I got Cats! As in the famous musical play, Cats! (A poster as seen in one of the pics above) “Memoriess~~~All alone in the moonlight~~”  Get it?^^ YES, Joy even has the theatrical version of Cats in her laptop! I was so amazeddddd… and absolutely envious of the Chinese people. For once. :P

First self-prepared meal

I had a delicious dinner today! My very first self-prepared sausage, mushroom and onions pasta!

TADAH!

I know pasta is like the 2nd or 3rd easiest thing to cook after instant noodles. But it’s the first meal in which I prepared everything, from ingredients to the main course! And it turned out delicious! Really. :)

At home in SG I don’t get to cook because there would always be someone to do it for me. Now I’m taking baby steps to learn cooking for myself! :D

Bonus:

Goo Junpyo’s favourite ramen in a pot. ;D

It is a g’day!

Two interesting events happened today.

Kel and I were shopping once again at the Indooroo shopping centre (i think we’ll be sick of it soon since we go there almost everyday). We wanted to buy sunglasses because although it’s winter in Bris, it is always very sunny in the day. Unlike Singapore, there aren’t a lot of shelters around. We practically walk a lot on the open streets so it can get pretty blinding if we don’t get sunglasses. Plus, we need UV protection! ><

We came across this booth selling sunglasses and went browsing. There was sales going on so we were kind of interested. While browsing, we heard the salesgirl talking to another customer. We overheard the salesgirl saying she’s Korean. When the customer left, we were still looking and quite keen in getting a pair. To be honest, we’ve been scouting for cheap, good and suitable sunglasses but to no avail until today.

The Korean salesgirl then approached us after that to help us with choosing the glasses. While we were trying on the glasses, the salesgirl came up to me and asked where we’re from. Then we began chatting… as I told her I’ll be taking Korean major in UQ. Her whole face practically lit up when she heard that. It was obvious she was ecstatic.

She began to talk to me in Korean… I could still understand a few of her questions, but when she bombarded me with long and confusing sentences, my brain just went dead. Lol. I could still answer her with short answers in Korean, but most of the time I answered her in English. I really need to revise! ><

After that, she told me that 3 months ago, she went to UQ to look for students majoring in Korean because she needed help with her English. She said she could help the students with Korean, while they could help her with English. I don’t know why, but she said she couldn’t find any students. So she was really happy to have met me…

She gave me her hp number and told me if I need any help just contact her. :D

Plus, Kel and I managed to find a suitable pair of sunglasses each! Double happiness! :P

Even out of school I am able to meet new people. Seriously, everyday I meet someone new! Today’s no exception! ^^

Oh and here comes the 2nd interesting event is…
Both of us actually pushed home a supermarket’s trolley!! HAHAHAHA!!!

It was so FUN! It was so THRILLING! It was so TIRING!

We went grocery shopping and bought lots of things. Kel also bought her bean bag so we had TONS to carry. We have seen trolleys around our neighbourhood, so we were like, HELL JUST DO IT! And pushed the trolley back home! XD

It was sooo tiring because of the hilly ground. But the feeling after that is just like, a sense of achievement. :P

Believe it or not, there is a hotline for trolley collecting on the trolley handle itself. Hmmm… perhaps we should call it. The trolley is still parked downstairs. XD

My new life thus far in Bris is kind of cool and I’m just beginning to like it. The lovely weather, the nice environment, friendly people, superb convenience around our place, beautiful school and FRIES!

But I have to tell myself, this is just the beginning and school hasn’t started. It could become totally different when school starts. I’m excited, nervous, thrilled and happy school is starting soon- NEXT WEEK! :D

Enough of words, here are more pictures of UQ… More specifically, the UQ Lakes! Lovely, beautiful and just utterly serene!

Besides people feeding the ducks and birds at the lakes, they eat by them too. We spotted a few people seated at the bench alone, eating their sandwich lunch. Typical angmoh, right? X)

 

Can you see what we’re pointing at in the following photos?

THIS is what we’re pointing at: