Done with tutorials, onto the next essays
My two tutorials went okay this week, better than last week I guess. The politics one he said at least our essays were better, but then he kept asking me questions I didn’t know. Taylor would answer more quickly on one question, so the next question he would direct it at me. I felt better after the tutorial when Taylor said he felt bad because Lee kept giving me the hard questions. During the tutorial, I was just feeling like I was completely ignorant. It was on the UN. And I know the structure of the UN and stuff like that, but didn’t really read up on my current events, know the history, just not the present. But he at least seemed to think the essay was okay. I’ll try to do better next time. That’s all I can do. It’s on NATO. Can’t wait.
Economics lasted almost two hours because he kept us over. Normally tutorials are one hour, but Simon last term asked if he could have us for an hour and a half, so now Chris just assumed that’s what he would have us for, but then he tries to squeeze too much into that time. And he gets really frustrated when we don’t get through it all. And now he’s talking about having us turn in a rough draft of our essay on Saturday, then rewriting and turning it in on Sunday. We are already turning it in four days before our tutorial, and he doesn’t even give it back to us beforehand like Simon did. He’s having us do five essays, when the university syllabus says we’re not supposed to do more than four, short answer questions for three weeks, and then he also wants us each to do two presentations with typed handouts on top of the essays. I think I’m going to ask Simon and Joe, my tut partners, if this is a typical amount of work. It seems like way too much, especially when we each have another tutorial each week on top of that. I think it’s the first time Chris is doing a tutorial, but I don’t want to be the only one complaining if we just had an easy econ tutorial last term. We’ll see.
On other updates in my life at the moment, we were going to have an outing on the river today, but not enough girls could make it, so now we’re supposed to have one tomorrow instead. I still haven’t been out on the river. I did do an erg (on the rowing machine) with Ula last night, and felt like I was going to die afterward. And now one of my arms is really sore for some reason. My mom and I are supposed to be getting our plane tickets today, I think, which is good, before they get any more expensive. I’m hoping I can get my essays done early this week because I have to do some research on my thesis and get some application stuff done for internships this summer. Suke wants me to meet with someone about my thesis by 6th week this term so I can have an idea of what to do over Easter break. So now I have to get a question I want to answer that is more specific than “What is the effect of the economic relationship between China and US (the trade deficit) on US firms?” Any ideas? Let me know. Also, if anyone is just really wanting to send me something over here, I could use some more cereal, like granola or honey bunches of oats or something. I’m almost out of what I brought over, so I guess I’ll be trying to find something that looks good over here. I’ve become addicted to cereal.