March 1st: The First Day of Class

Today was the first day of classes here. Well, actually, I only had one class, Computational Mechanics. The first things I noticed when I walked in was that the professor had some big ol' burly sideburns, a wrinkly and stained polo, a baseball cap, and that he wasn't even wearing shoes. I guess this is just another thing showing how laid back Oz is. He did seem to know his shit, though, and I felt like he was actually really good at explaining things, unlike a lot of professor's I've had at UWP.

The campus here is totally different than any other than I've been in. It is like a jungle where you are wandering down wooded trails and suddenly you arrive at a building. It's very spread out as well. I feel like instead of having large buildings to house many classes, they have more of a "let's build a little shack specially for making clay pots" approach instead of having an art building. That may be a bit of an exaggeration, but they do have 3 little buildings that are each for making sculptures.

Today's class was in a lecture hall that's part of the mathematics building. This was interesting as well, because, instead of walking into a building with hallways, this building had a totally open concept. It's just an interconnected web of rooms that, in order to walk to the next room, you are actually outside, but covered by a ceiling. It's pretty different. Today was pretty light, but tomorrow is definitely going to be a lot busier. By the time the semester is fully underway, I'll have 7 straight hours of class on Tuesdays. Tomorrow, I have 5 (I think) but maybe more. I still haven't fully figured out there systems of lectures, tutorials, computer labs, consultations, and whatever other odds 'n' ends course delivery methods they use. We'll see tomorrow!!