Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Stretching the academic muscles

I started my classes again this week. It’s sort of an inter-term because the new semester doesn’t really start until February. Since I paid for classes in January, I figured I’d better go.

Can you tell I was reluctant? I dragged my feet so much on the first day, but I actually had an enjoyable time.

I arrived at 9:30 and found out that I didn’t actually have class for nearly two hours. I hadn’t been able to find out the schedule ahead of time. However, I had known this was a possibility. I headed to a café next door to have a second breakfast and finalize my question list for the FMS.

When I entered the classroom, there was a stack of books on the table, but no sign of anyone. Finally an elderly woman poked her head in. I recognized her from the back of one of my textbooks. She said hello and then disappeared for a few more minutes. Eventually she returned, bringing with her a priest from Argentina who has been in a few of my classes. He was supposed to have an individual class, but everything was moved around.

There we sat-a Catholic, a Protestant, and a Russian, presumably Orthodox. :)

+/-

The main topic was fairly boring, the ethics of casinos; but we had a fun time together discussing it. The priest from Argentina is less fluent than I am, so sometimes the teacher told me to translate, only the priest doesn’t know English. :) So I tried to make the words sound Spanish. Sometimes he said something in Spanish and I could understand. We also got confused about whether we should use informal or formal address, so we switched back and forth a lot!

I had been reluctant to begin classes again, but I felt more motivated by the end of the day. It’s always interesting to meet new people and learn new things.

2 comments:

  1. That last comment sounds like the first line to a bad joke.

    ReplyDelete
  2. That was the idea, although it's not actually the end of the post, there are a few more lines...

    ReplyDelete

Just added word verification to reduce spam. Nothing personal!

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