Sunday again...

Music: Piano, no words...

Some passages from this weeks' blogs which really struck me (strong writing!):

This past weekend was Columbus Day Weekend. I went home for the first time. It was AWESOME. I didn't realize how much I missed it. Being home made me think of a lot of things. Living in New Hampshire, fall is always annoying for us because flocks of people come north to see our foliage. Growing up there, I would be like "What's the big deal? It's leaves changing color." When fall came the normal stressors of longer lines at restaurants, traffic, and never-ending raking is usually what came to mind. When visiting this past weekend, I realized why people come to New Hampshire to see such sights. I have never realized how gorgeous it actually is. My boyfriend and I spent most of Saturday driving around looking at how gorgeous our town is in the fall. We have lived in NH for most of our lives, and never realized it. It was really cool to experience this. It also made me think of how different fall at home is from fall at college. Fall in NH is like nowhere else. Fall in NH is apple picking, pies, apple cider, pumpkins, hayrides, town fairs, foliage, and cozy fireplaces. For NH, fall is our Christmas. It entials certain events that most, if not all, residents take part in. At college, it doesn't even seem like it's fall at all. This might be because of the setting. I'm on the ocean, which would never happen at home during this season. The leaves barely change. Sitting here in the library right now, I'm looking out the window that overlooks campus and can see one truee that is starting to change to red, that's all. Due to the weather, passerbys are in shorts and t-shirts. I didn't know how much I missed the traditions of home until I was there again. I realized how much I miss the little things like getting out of bed without climbing down on my desk, showering without shoes, having my own bathroom, sleeping in a queen size bed, and eating home-cooked meals! Another prevalent thing was sitting in my bed with wireless internet! I also missed the freedom of driving from place to place. Although I hate to admit it, I also really missed cooking. Over the weekend, I made three pies, a chicken dinner, and cheesy potatoes. I think that I satisfied my need to cook for a while now.

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I have just finished reading through chapters 5 and 6 within My Freshman Year. There was a lot of information and observations in these chapter which really appealed to my interest. Nathan examined many aspects of American ways which are more than true. I can not say that these observations can account for the entire American population, but many statements made by the foreign students which she interviewed stuck me as very interesting.

Throughout her interviews, Nathan stumbled upon and quoted many international students whom were both insulted and awestruck by the level of ignorance that American students hold for other cultures. To some students these statements may strike them as offensive or untrue, but in complete honesty, from my point of view I can verify that as an American college student I know very little regarding the cultures and lives of other countries. And why shouldn't I? I would never justify my ignorance upon a particular topic to the fact that it does not "apply to my major." So why ARE Americans so ignorant and uninformed when consulted about the cultures and lives of other countries. One of Nathan's French foreign exchange friends highlighted some assumed reasons for American ignorance as she stated, "Americans teach like the only important thing is America. There is no required history course in college. The history course I took on Western civ. at AnyU was middle school level, and it was very biased. I mean they taught how, in World War II, American saved France and saved the world, how they were so great. The courses don't consider what Americans have done wrong. All the current events here is news about America and what America is doing. If it's about another country, it's about what America is doing there. There's nothing about other countries and their histories and problems. [In France] we had lots of history and geography courses, starting very young. I learned about France, but then we had to take a course in U.S Industrialization, in China, Russia, Japan too. We got the history and geography of the world, so we could see how France fits into the bigger picture" (Nathan 89).

This chapter provided me with a minor epiphany. It's not that I'm not interested in the cultures of other countries, because often I think about how amazing it would be to go to another country and learn about the people within it and the country itself. It made me realize that as often as I had thought about studying abroad, I had never really considered all of the amazing things that could come from studying abroad in another country. I knew of course I would develop and learn different living habits than the ones I held at home, for living in another country poses so many new experiences and opportunities. I would have the opportunity to meet so many new and interesting people, but I would also have the opportunity to experience the culture of another country first hand, up close and personal.

Shouldn't we all know a little bit more about the world around us?

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In my plans, specs, and building codes class on Monday, we had our first hour exam. All i knew is that it was going to be ridiculously hard because the exam was covered in a total of 22 chapters in three different books. There was such much information we learned over the course of the semester so far so i didn't know exactly how much i knew and how much i didn't.

Sunday night came around and it was 6:30 so i sat at my desk hoping to study the rest of the night and know all the information like the back of my hand. I wasn't used to studying for something this hard. In high school, i listened in class and soaked up all the information so there wasn't a reason to study. Now there is way to much information to do that plus the professor doesn't teach everything you are responsible for.

I started going over all the information chapter by chapter and i realized that i did know alot of the information but there were still more to know. I made flashcards and wrote out everything a bunch of times hoping it will stick in my mind. By 9:00, I knew so much new information and i was surprised at myself and rather proud of myself. Usually i can never just sit down for that long and actually study. I went into the exam pretty confident.

The way the exam was set up was that there were about 16 questions and each question's point value ranged from two points to 12 points. But the thing was, if you added up all the points, it was over 100%. The professor told us that you can only get a 100 and that if you get a question wrong, half the point value would be subtracted from your total score so guessing on answer wasn't the wisest. I handed my exam after 40 minutes and i thought i did pretty good. I didn't answer enough questions to get a 100 but i think i got somewhere in the low 90's or high 80's. I thought i did a good job knowing that the exam covered so many chapters. Now i jsut have to wait for find out my score.