Hiya! It's me again! Unlike the previous few posts, I'm not gonna start this post with a lame and tired excuse of why I broke my commitment to update my blog (yet again...), and neither am I going to make stupid promises to myself that I can't keep. Instead, let's just get straight to the post itself. Yay!
So, what's been happening lately? A LOT, lemme tell ya! My second year here in Bangor so far has been infinitely more eventful than last year, both in terms of academics, activities, and personal life. For now, I'll just talk about my academic life here in Bangor.
Well, first of all, I'm proud to say that I won the David Crystal Prize this year, which is a prize given to the best first year student in Bangor's School of Linguistics and English Language! Yaaayy!! XD It was a joint prize this year, though, so I shared it with a fellow student :) I got £100 for it, praise God, so that's really nice. I know there's another award for the best second year student as well, which would be announced next year, so I'm totally hoping to win that, too! I think, looking at my grades so far, I have a fair shot at it, but we'll see.
Now, in the UK you are expected to take 120 credits per semester, which is usually split into 60 per semester. This was what I did last year, but this year I'm doing things a bit differently. This year, I have five compulsory 20-credit modules I have to take; two in the first semester and the other three in the second. This adds up to 100, meaning I have to take another 20-credit module or two 10-credit ones. There was another Linguistics module, but I had little interest in it and I decided to not take it as it's optional for me. Besides, there was a module I wanted to take that wasn't from my school, and that's Creative Writing: The Novel, which is a 20-credit module spanning both semesters (so that's 10 credits per semester). This means my credit distribution this year is 50-70, leading to me having far more free time in the first semester than the second. (which I guess is even more reason to give me the stink eye for not updating this blog in all that time...)
But! That's not the end of the story! As some of you may know (I'm going out of my way to assume I actually have readers here), I took Basic Welsh last year. Well, I enjoyed it so much (and I felt bad stopping only at the basic level) that I decided to take up Intermediate Welsh this year. But since I already had 120 credits filled up, I had to take it outside uni, and that meant I had to pay for it :( Worth it, though! Oh, this module, like Basic Welsh, is also a 20-credit module spread across two semesters, so ultimately, I'm technically taking 140 credits this year, with a 60-80 split :P
...Or that's how it was supposed to be, anyway. See, Intermediate Welsh classes are on Thursday from 11 to 1, and that was fine last semester. However, as luck would have it, this semester I have lectures... on Thursdays from 11 to 1. And it's for one of my compulsory modules, too, so I can't miss it -_- This meant that I had to drop Welsh class, which was saddening because I genuinely was enjoying it (I wouldn't have signed up for it otherwise, now would I?), and the class was pretty bummed for me too, since me being me, I was pretty much the class clown (and it was a class of eight, so we were pretty tightly-knit). But, you know, there was nothing else that could've been done, so... *shrug*
What else is there... Oh, yeah! Last semester I learned more about the general situation of the students in my year. There was an incident last year that involved, err, lots of complaining, which led to a number of changes that the majority wanted. I am not included in this majority. And long story short, the whole kerfuffle made me realize how uncomfortable I actually am here in this school. It's definitely not the lectures nor the lecturers; they're spectacular and I love them! Maybe it's more of a cultural thing, really, but... well, I just really miss my friends from high school. The type of people who would make me feel like I can do something with my life, and that it's worth doing, instead of most of my fellow students here who simply make me feel disappointed and, to a certain extent, frustrated.
On to more happy things! This semester, one of my Linguistics modules is Meaning and Mind, which is basically an introduction to the field of cognitive linguistics! Cognitive linguistics is the field I'm most interested in, and has been since around two years ago. It basically deals with language and thought, and investigating the relationship between the language(s) we speak and the way we think. It draws upon research in other fields in the cognitive sciences, such as cognitive psychology and neuroscience. I must say, after a few weeks of being in Meaning and Mind, I was right: cognitive linguistics is totally my jam! I continually surprise myself with how fast I can follow my lecturer (who is a very notable cognitive linguist, fyi). Without trying to sound boastful, I know I generally can follow linguistics lectures relatively quickly, but even considering that, my aptitude for Meaning and Mind is a bit uncanny. At least, I think so anyway. I am now seriously considering getting a Master's degree here, in cognitive linguistics of course, seeing that Bangor University is one of the very few universities in the UK to even offer a course in Cognitive Linguistics (there's only, like, two or three other British unis that do). We'll see how that goes!
Ah, also, my Head of School is really cool too! See, early on this academic year, I got an email saying that I had to take what basically amounts to an English test. This test was compulsory for every international student that don't originate from English-speaking countries. I was very annoyed at it, because (again, not trying to boast) my English is native-level already, which is acknowledged not only by my peers and teachers, but also accredited since I managed to get an A* for my English as a First Language exam a few years ago! But I suppose it was a fair assumption and I understand why they felt like they had to do it because there really are students who need help with their English, so I took the test anyway. I did not, however, expect to fail at it. Don't ask me why!
Anyway, this severely cut into my time because failing this test meant that I had to take extra classes designed to help me with my English. So I decided to talk to my Head of School about it and (after taking a few moments to playfully insult me...) told me to email him the person in charge for these extra English classes so that he can personally tell them that my English is perfectly fine and doesn't need any help! How awesome is that? I mean, sure, that's what I wanted to ask him to do in the first place, but before I had the chance to do so he offered it himself! XD It probably helps that I know my Head of School pretty well. Awesome teacher is awesome! And to top it all off, that wasn't even the only time he did something like that, and I know from anecdotal experience that I'm hardly the only person he does that for. Seriously, that guy is made of win!
I think I've rambled long enough now. I'm not sure there's much else to say regarding how my academic life here has been so far, so I think this is a good place to end today's post. Next time: an update on my extracurricular activity life! See you imagined readers there!
