A Year at St Andrews...

Exams are on. My last one is on Tuesday (ie tomorrow). Well, what am I doing here then, you ask? Why, procrastinating, of course!

Yes, I know, I really should get back to studying. But, I only have a few days left in St Andrews, isn't it cruel that I have to spend them studying? Especially when the weather is so nice outside and the sun doesn’t set till 10!

Ahh… I really wish I was staying here for the summer. Not that I don’t want to be back in California, because I do. I miss my friends and family terribly and I can hardly wait to see you all again. See… then I think about all these things, and I wonder what it's going to be like when I get back, and I get distracted. It's so much nicer to wander in dreamland than to study.

Gah! anything's better than studying. I've already taken a million facebook quizzes today, and there must be approximately two left that I haven't taken. I've signed up for my classes for fall quarter in Davis and it just hit me that I'll have to get used to Davis all over again. If you're wondering if I've changed at all, I don't think I have. But I'll leave it for you all to judge when I get back.  *sigh*

Alright, alright, I'll get back to studying. Mitochondria play a role in controlling apoptosis…

The semester is drawing to a close; this reminds me that my time in St Andrews is ending as well. And soon I shall have to return to California. This will be a bitter-sweet time, and when the time arrives I shall dwell on it more, but for now, I shall talk about what I have neglected to do so for a while.

I meant to write about these events as they happened, but for some reason I kept putting it off. Either due to lack of pictures, too much school work or just plain laziness.

The first of these is the Kate Kennedy procession. This is organized by the Kate Kennedy Club and old and esteemed males only university club. The procession is a celebration of the history of St Andrews and involves people dressed up as distinguished members that have had a connection to St Andrews. It has its roots in a procession in honour of Kate Kennedy, the niece of Bishop James Kennedy, who was welcomed into town and renowned for her beauty. Her arrival signalled the beginning of spring.

This is probably the longest I've gone without putting up a new entry. The main reason being that I was ill for a week with the worst cold I've ever had. It was not fun. All I could do basically was eat and sleep. My friends were really nice; they came up and saw me from time to time and brought me medicines and soup and videos to watch. It's nice having friends like that.

I'm completely better now, and second semester is starting to pick up very slightly. I've had two labs so far. For my Infection & Disease virology practical, we were working with strains of the flu virus. This was interesting and slightly scary, especially for me, seeing as I had just recovered from a cold and have no intention of being that ill again for a very long time. Thankfully, I didn't get the flu.

Also, there's another string of Birthdays now which means there's a party every weekend. I've decided that I can only handle going out one night a week and I'm sticking to that. Should be good for my health and my studies ;-).

This past week was reading week over here.  Reading Week is a week's break from classes, meant for students to catch up on reading and other work. Most people however, go home or go travelling. A few of my friends went to Berlin, a couple went to London, another went to Ireland and few others travelled around Scotland a bit.

I just stayed in hall. I was going to take advantage of Ryan Air's superb cheap flight deals, but I had an essay to write. I knew I would feel incredibly guilty if I went without having my essay done, and I knew that I would not be able to get the essay done before I went either. So I stayed here, stuck reading and writing about animal mating habits for my evolution class.

I found that living in the computer room in hall is actually not that bad. I like the lighting in there. It's a great place to study in, without being isolated. It's right opposite the dining hall, so that's convenient. It makes for a good spot to write essays, and it's nice when you have a friend in there as well.

One of my friends was writing an essay for his history class and so we'd both sit there tapping away at the keyboards, occasionally stopping to complain about how pointless it all was (me), to share a weird name in the text (him), or to tell the other about a funny passage (him and me). It might have lengthened the process a bit but it definitely made it less boring.

I did make it to Edinburgh for a night. I went there with a friend to see a play, which was quite interesting. I had fun. We had fun and spent the night at her friend's flat. We walked about Edinburgh for a bit that day, and did a tiny bit of shopping. We went to a store that had there really interesting dresses. One of them had heavy bead-work all over it, it probably weighed half as much as I do. I decided to try it on. It didn't feel quite so heavy when I was wearing it and it was reasonably okay to dance in as well. I definitely wasn't going to buy the dress, it costs something like £295! Definitely out of the question! I sneaked a few pictures of myself in the dress, though.

I worked on my essay a bit more after I got back from Edinburgh on Saturday. Then on Sunday, I had dinner with my academic mum and discovered that I have a brother on that side as well. He's quite a cheeky fellow, when our mum said she'd like to adopt him he said he wasn't sure because he had two other mums lined up and would have to decide who's the best.

The days here are getting quite short. It's four o'clock in the afternoon as I write this, and I've already had to turn on the lights in my room, although it's not completely dark just yet.  Yesterday was a dull day with heavy cloud cover and we didn't get to see the sun at all. Today was nicer, the sun showed up for a bit and it made me happy. 

This week is probably going to be uneventful, until the weekend that is. This coming weekend is Raisin Weekend, and is the highlight of the St Andrews social calendar. It should be fun, and I am looking forward to it.

The first week of classes has come and gone.  It took me a while a find a couple  of my lecture rooms, but I found them in time and wasn't late to any of my classes. There are a lot of differences in the way things are taught over here. Not that I didn't expect things to be different, I did, it's just that now, I'm a bit worried that I might not be able to cope. We have major essays to write and actual researching to do. A small voice inside me keeps saying that I should have stayed in Davis where everything is familiar and therefore easier.

Our scheduling is quite interesting as well. They tell us our lab times after we've signed up for the classes and in some classes we have to sign up for the different lab times after that. The responsibility of making sure our lab times don't clash is on us.

All that being said, once I get a grip on the system, I really want to do well. My aim is to get on the Deans List, or well, to at least get First Class marks. I am taking all biology classes after all. I don't expect it to be easy, but I'm going to try my best.