Slept in until noon

Last night was my third and final College Royal Ball. I was definitely fortunate to have spent it with a big group of fantastic people. This is likely the first time I have gone where I was not trying to impress anyone, where I left the house without first freaking out about what I was wearing and worrying whether the other girls would look better than I did.

This evening ash, jaxx and I took a walk at 730 to watch the sun set. The spring forward time change is a blessing, even if it hurts for one night.

There are three packed boxes in my room with things that I don't think I'll be needing again before we move out. I have lived in this room for almost three years. At least my furniture has been here this long. The hardest thing to start packing was my books. There is something comfortable about having shelves full of books, however, realistically, I will not be reading most of them in the next month and a bit.

I own about 14 pairs of shoes. Most made in China. A few from places like Vietnam, Cambodia and just one from Canada. Which I happened to purchase at Value Village. Tidbit of information about me: I desire to own a collection of pumps with an rainbow-like assortment of colours.

continued from previous post: Latin America and Al

Topic 2b: My Spanish professor found out that I was not accepted to Argentina. I had emailed her to ask for advice as to which country to visit and if she had heard of any good language immersion programs. She wrote back to say that she had a little chat with someone at the centre for International Programs (well, she didn't call it that but I hope that's what she meant) and I can go. I'm supposed to ask her tomorrow. WHAT? It doesn't work like that does it? And why me? There were 26 or so other people who were not accepted either. You know what is the weirdest part? I've gotten myself so worked up about the idea of another country, a cheaper program, a homestay family, I'm not sure if I want to go on a university exchange anymore. Sigh.

Topic 3: I have recently begun turning to another source for my news. I started regularly checking CBC website for news. Then I added BBC for a broader picture since it caters a bit better to world news than the CBC. Now my new pal is Al Jazeera. I must admit that when I heard that it was a popular and credible news site my first reaction (ok, i'm ashamed) was "I must have heard wrong. How can a credible global, news source come from the middle east??" So I rejected it right away based on my own biases. I decided to give it a chance this past week and I must say that it is not as extensive as BBC in terms of number of stories but it has to be the least biased news source I have encountered and has as wide or greater coverage in terms of countries and geographical areas covered as BBC. I recommend.

3 topics on my brain

topic 1: I'll go for the most superficial first. I have a rant. One of my classes designates a certain portion of our marks to case discussions. This brings out some very annoying, vacuum like behaviour from the class. In order to illustrate my point I will now be facetious.
Professor: today we will be talking about the pants that I'm wearing and different options I have for pants.
Annoying student: I would first like to say that the pants you are currently wearing are really great pants.
A.S.2: First, I would like to agree with what A.S. 1 said and add that black is a great colour for you but that the option of grey pants would be equally flattering.
A.S.3: I think a lighter shade of black might be good.
A.S.4: Or even a shade somewhere in the middle, with a stripe.
A.S.1 (again): When my dad buys grey pants he buys them from *insert expensive store here* and they have quite a few striped pants in stock right now.

I could go on forever, or have thought of a better example but the point is that they all scramble to say something, anything, that no one listens to what the other students say. They constantly make the same point as someone else or just make a random comment to open their mouths. I refuse to stoop to that level. Rant over.

Topic 2: actually I have class right now so i'll have to cover these later. So this just became solely a rant post.

Not a rant

I just need to prequel this with: it isn't rant about political correctness.

When riding the bus my mind wanders and I often find myself reading anything and everything in sight. I noticed a sign that stated: These signs are reserved for seniors and persons with disabilities and ...sont reserve por les agees et handicapees. (excuse the lack of accents)

Notice a difference? Depending on the language used there is a politically correct term. Is this an anglocentric phenomenon? If you're english and 'disabled' you are "a person with a disability" or now at guelph "differently abled" but if you're French you're still handicapped.

busy weekend

I pretty much threw the biggest, most funnest party of my party throwing life for our dear friend who will be hitched this summer. Problem? That's all the bragging I can do because the happenings have to remain top secret. Oh well. Just know it was a fantastic party!

Friday night I officially 'barhopped' for the first time. The flow was Cowboys, Doogies, the Ranch. Great times. Even if Cowboys was a little dead there was still line dancing lessons.

Here is the deal: I'm not going to Argentina. At least not through the school. i was accepted to the Monterrey campus of the Mexican ITESM university. Looking through the brochure the campus is amazing (10 soccer fields! what?). The perk is that the city is beautiful and it is a popular destination for international students so meeting people shouldn't be too difficult. However, it is expensive to do since i would be paying Guelph tuition (when I don't even need more classes to graduate and can't get a minor for the ones I take), and a few thousand dollars for living and food. Thats not counting insurance, fun times, flight, etc.

Here is what I'm thinking
Objective: learn spanish
-Monterrey is beautiful but I would likely be encouraged to take a class or two that would improve my spanish and then classes in English. Also, I could fall into the trap of only associating with other exchange students and just speaking a lot of English. I don't want that.
SO: I am now researching schools throughout latin america that offer straight Spanish. I would live with a host family (room and board!) and take 4-6 classes of spanish daily with 4 or 5 other students per class. All of this costing the same or less than the term in Mexico. Right now my top choices are Antigua, Guatemala and Quito, Ecuador. Ah, life is exciting, no?

i could really go for some ice cream

As seen on a poster/ad just outside Laura Secord:
"It just isn't Easter without a Laura Secord cream egg"

hmmm. is that what Easter has become? According to the logic of this poster Christ could have stayed behind the rock forever but as long as we all get Laura Secord cream eggs there is still something to celebrate.

Update on argentina/mexico wallowing: I don't think I did a thorough job yesterday, i think i had fun by accident. i've moved on to denial/avoidance until sunday.

Pathetic Fallacy

It's March 1st. This morning during my first class I received an email stating that i have been accepted on exchange to Mexico. You heard right. Not Argentina. Needless to say that I am thoroughly disappointed (crushed you might say). There are many factors that I can talk about in another post but basically I want South America and not Mexico. I'm not happy.

i have purchased the latest issue of Adbusters and some pop and I'm going to wallow for the rest of today before I decide what to make of this.

Who was I?

I have to write a presentation for Spanish and in an effort to procrastinate I have been reading my very earliest of blogs. (you would avoid a presentation if you had to talk about *in spanish* the role of money in war and marriage and draw other comparisons between material and spiritual topics)

Normally I avoid my old writings because I inevitably end up wondering what i was thinking at the time and how I managed to retain friends (I suppose that will but this very blog in that category in about a year).

I started the blog when i was in second year, just 19 years old. I am about to turn 22 and it is interesting to see things that have changed. For one, I took a long quiz-thing and apparently I wanted to be married by the age of 24. Don't get me wrong, that would be great and all but it's looking less realistic now.
Apparently I also considered myself to be significantly right-leaning politically. Wow, things have changed.

On another topic here are some fun cultural tidbits from Linguistics class (inspired by Beth's cultural facts post I suppose).
1. both French and Spanish have no word for generic term 'sibling' like English does
2. Spanish has a word for 'your child's-spouse's-parents' ; consuegros
*lots of praise and may a bit of chocolate for anyone who can identify another language that has a term for the above relationship
3. the word belly originally referred to all the skin covering one's body

Less than fundamental

It's almost 6am. The tossing and turning started soon after the lamp was turned off around 2am and ended with me turning on my computer about twenty minutes ago. Tomorrow promises to be a long day without sleep but one can only lie awake for so long without giving in to it.

In my boredom I searched random blogs and after many chinese, portuguese and computer blogs that I quickly bypassed, one caught my attention. It's a blog by a Christian who considers himself a seeker and (I think like me) wants so much to have the truth from the New Testament but still has questions.

He has articulated some of the thoughts I have been having much better than I have been able to. It is appealing to get a taste of some of the more liberal Christian theology (still reliant on the Bible but willing to accept that it may just not be as simple as one prayer).

If anyone takes the time to read his blog (I recommend "Father, forgive them" and "an extravagant hope") I would be very interested to hear what you think.

who do I have to bribe to get a longer break?

26 hours of bus time logged, three days at home, 3 loaves of zuchinni bread scored: still very behind in my homework. Well worth it though.

This evening I had to entertain myself so i played with windows movie maker, took pictures of random inanimate objects around my house and watched House on peekvid.com.

Maybe I'll name my (potential future hypothetical) daughter aubrey

Every year the Sault Star puts out a "Babies of the Year" for the previous year with photos and names of the recent additions to the local population. Usually there are a good number of Luigi's, Maria's and Anthony's studding the few pages of babies. There was actually many fewer than usual however, one little dude made up for it. His (rather unfortunate?) moniker Massimiliano Sicoli. How his dad convinced his mangiacake mother to use that one I will never understand.

A few other names that make me question the right that parents have to name their children were Dargus (yep, a little girl), Bishop (ok, i know this is a Catholic town, but those are high hopes, why not call him Cardinal? or Pope?), and the people who made it out of highschool before grade 10 literacy testing were little Kaylob and Alexxa's parents.

Something that speaks to the changing demographics of the north: there was a very cute little guy who wasn't white! It is officially the first time i've seen that i'm sure. Little master Bhatt son of Vipul. Times are a'changing.

One Wonder of the World: Check

Sarah and I arrived back here safely after a day-trip to the spectaular Niagara Falls. For a city of 76000 there are an incredible number of larger than life displays. Even burger King was outfitted with an 8m Frankenstein. First things first we saw the falls:

Then we went under the falls:

The amazing force of the falls was fantastic. I couldn't help but wish that I could have seen its beauty and power in a less "tourist" way; being able to come across it having heard the rumble for miles and breaking out of the forest to stand at the edge of the falls. That is how they were meant to be viewed.

We also spent some time at the IMAX and Ripley's Believe it or Not which, by the way, was pretty darn nifty!

Actually, upon further investigation, apparently I have no experienced an actual 'wonder of the world', not even a natural wonder for that matter. Well then, i'm just going to start my own list. The Wawa goose is now on the list. Check #2!

Back in the Day

Today, to divide up a 4th year assignment we gave out the question that no one wanted by playing "inky pinky ponky". It's still useful.

3 Cheers for literacy!

i'm sure i have posted previously on my love for books, but since it is a love then bear with me as I do so yet again. One of my favorite places in the world is Chapters. I always know when something has been altered, a new book or topic put out on display. I probably wander that store 3-5 times per week.

On top of wandering the store I now browse the website looking for new books that ineterest me. I have a $20 gift certificate from Christmas for Chapters however, it is impossible to choose just one book!!!

My wishlist currently consists of:
-The Hanging of Angelique: The Untold Story of Canadian Slavery and the Burning of Old Montreal by Afua Cooper
-Reflections of a Siamese Twin by John Ralston Saul
-A passage to India by Edward Forster
-The meaning of Everything by Simon Winchester
-The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell
-Night by Elie Wiesel
-Paris 1919 by Margaret mcMillan
-Candide by Voltaire
-Shake Hands with the Devil by Romeo Dallaire
-Crow Lake by Mary Lawson
-Che Guevara by jon anderson (i should know this if i'll be going south!)
-The Anatomy colouring book
-Blood Diamonds by Greg Cambell
-RIghts Revolution (Massey Lecture Series) by Michael Ignatieff
-The End of Food by Thomas Pawlik
-Darfur Diaries by jen marlowe
-THe Lonely Planent: Bluelist

This week proves to be a busy one with 3 midterms, one group assignment, one spanish composition and who knows what else. Good thing spring break is almost here!

Down Down in an Earlier Round

I am a lyric snob. I always try to know the correct lyrics of a song because it bothers me when words are ambiguous while i'm trying to sing along. I even laugh a bit when someone else is just singing it and obviously does not know the correct lyrics. Yes, I realize it is of no importance and I am officially going to stop being a lyric snob.

Also, it is quite difficult to be a grammar stickler when trying to follow the "one cannot end a sentence with a preposition' rule. Sometimes it just sounds ridiculous!
por ejemplo, Who is this for? What would I say in regular everyday conversation: For whom is this? This is for whom? Naw, i'll keep my 'poor' grammar. But the benefit of the linguistics class is that I'm finally being taught the intricacies of grammar that were denied of me in elementary school. A world of knowledge is opening up.

New Official Degree Program

Someone in one of my project groups suggested this for the new slogan on marketing clothing:
Bachelor of B.S.
Major: Group Work

Maybe you have to be in the program but, oh, haha. It's the only marketing clothing I would ever consider buying. At any given time the 4th floor of the library is 75% commerce students. Finally a program that doesn't encourage individual thought, just what the world needs!

The Giver (warning: spoilers)

In an effort to add yet another book to my 'shelf of pride' I borrowed "The Giver" from a friend. It was a wholly unexpected storyline and it was marvellous.

The story follows young Jonas who is caught up in the predictable life of a small community obsessed with perfection and 'sameness'. In order to avoid the dangerous consequences of individuality and free choice the community is built around control where no one chooses his or her own path. The more eerie part would have been the parallel between this fictional community and the Chinese cultural revolution under Mao. In the story each morning and evening the characters would sit in their 'family units' and share their dreams from the previous night and feelings from the day. The other members of the unit would then discourage strong emotion with reason and understanding until everyone felt content (if anything at all).

How is this like the cultural revolution? In order to control everyone beneath him Mao created mandatory journalling for hours each day where all emotions, thoughts, conversations throughout the day had to be meticulously recorded or risk being accused of withholding anti-Mao sentiments. People gradually went mad and were unwilling to speak to others or even think negative sentiments for fear of having to write them down. Why would a community choose to live this way? (ok, its fictional, but just a rhetorical question anyway)

The boy that the story is centred around is given the great honour of being the new Receiver of Memory. He is destined to take on the memories of the entire world when there was still emotion and pain and love. For the first time he is able to question how his community operates. Unable to open the eyes of his family and friends he can no longer turn back to emotionaless ignorance.

The community put all of their suffering and pain onto one person in order to be in control. But how much did they lose?

I could go on forever about this book but I won't. But I could. But my hands are really cold. And i'm in class.

Passing Time

The title is a bit deeper than is warranted.

I keep getting email reminders from the convocation office suggesting that I apply for graduation soon. I have deleted them. Today is Feb. 2 and in six more days I will have let the chance to graduate this summer pass me by. I have all of the classes I need but I am taking a chance that I will get to do an exchange. Maybe it would be better if I were applying to graduate because it would bring some finality to this year and this degree. Just 6 more days to be strong.

Something that I don't like to admit is that I often lack confidence. This morning in Spanish (a class I typically perform well in) I choked, multiple times, even mumbled because I was unsure of my answers. I put so much pressure on myself to do well in that class now that I constantly stumble. I often feel like two different people: one who tries to come off as self-assured with friends and in groups and another who is terribly shy and afraid of making a mistake. I need to take more risks!

21 going on 90

I have started getting tired (like dead-tired-curl-up-on-the-floor-at-a-friend's-house tired) by about 9pm. Since when have I been such an old lady? I had better start eating dinner at 4pm to accomodate my schedule.

The change from first year until now is stark and a little frightening. I guess I just thought I would be fun my whole life. But really, I appreciate down time, 8 hours of sleep, getting my work done on time without rushing, old lady pace.

Am I growing up?

Happy blood day

Sorry for anyone who doesn't like blood. But today I fulfilled one of my life goals so that deserves celebration (Canadian Blood services provides the cookies!).

I had an appointment at the clinic for 1120am. Iron test: passed again! Then I had to sit for 20 minutes waiting to have my heart rate checked (among other things). It was pretty much impossible to convince my body to calm down, I could think of nothing else but keeping my heart rate low (which is effective, of course). Reading didn't work. music didn't work. Closing my eyes and breathing deeply really didn't work.

Number 43 was finally called and I passed temp: 37.1 degrees. blood pressure: 105/66, good. Heart Rate: 107! Haha, I think I might be an excitable person. its supposed to be under 100. so she asked me some questions and then took it by hand and I made the cut with 10 beats to spare!!!!

One draw back: the whole process took over 1 1/2 hours meaning I, yet again, missed my Spanish seminar. This is the third week that it has been running and I have yet to make it! That's nightmare material.

first week; I just forgot.
second week; went home for a funeral
this week: i don't bleed fast enough.