My first first!

I got my Early American Literature paper back today and the mark said  70. I'm not very familiar with the grading system here but anything over 70% is a first, which is the highest grade! Yayyyy!

I copied this from some forum for those of you who are interested in how it works:

A first equates to the student having an average of over 70%
An upper second (2:1) is between 60% and 69%
A lower second (2:2) is between 50% and 59%
A third is between 40% and 49%

So I would've thought comparing it to the Bologna system (which we have in Sweden) would mean:

First=A
2.1=B
2.2=C
Third=D
Pass=E

But after talking to some english students during the break today I realized it doesn't really work like that. They said that basically anything under a 2.1 was not considered good. I think in Sweden being a C student is still pretty good so maybe I can't compare the grades as I have done.
Will have to investigate some more....

But right now I've still got 150 pages of A Picture of Dorian Gray left to read until tomorrow...

Last week

Ok, so last week passed in a blur. I had so much to do and so little time.
I have a serious problem when it comes to busy periods in my life: I cannot handle stress! At.all. I had so much to do last week that I pretty much had to write most of my short essay on the day of the deadline and I just can't function when it's like that. I just panic and think about how impossible it is and turn into a complete and utter psycho. 
I had planned that I would get up early on Friday and just stay at home and do the writing but then Andy informed me that the plumber was coming on Friday to install a new boiler. Ok...we both thought it would be a quick job so I stayed at home. Ummm it really wasn't a quick job. They came in here and pretty much took over the whole apartment.
I then decided to go to the library, which turned out to be closed. So at 10 am I had no choice but to head out and take the train  to uni. Now it takes me 1 & 1/2 hours to get there so I was not happy about this. I may have acted a little bit irrational and cried my eyes out when I realized how little time I had. Anyway, I started working around noon and could in fact leave uni at 5 and submit my paper...
The lesson here? CALM DOWN! It can be done.

After that stressful week of hell I did manage to have a lovely weekend. We went up north to Andy's parents and spent the weekend there. On Saturday we went for a walk in this huge park and then went out for indian food in the evening. On Sunday morning we had a full English breakfast. Now, I used to be a vegetarian so this is not really a favourite of mine. But I must say I'm getting used to it, I can even manage to squeeze down a sausage and a tiny piece of bacon these days *proud*!

In the car

Almost looks like summer!

Marbury park

Budworth mere

Autumn 

Andy with his parents

Studying

Yes I know, boring photo! But, unfortunately this has to be my life for a while. I've realized I haven't been spending enough time doing uni work. At first I thought: reading novels? Piece of cake! But...reading novels takes time and there are no shortcuts.
So I will try to work 5 days a week and full days! And also some weekends will be necessary since I'm a little behind.

I've done good today! I was at uni at 9 and had a class 10-13. I'm leaving soon but with the commute I won't be home until 8.30. At least I can get some reading done on the train! :)



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Lunch

You can really live cheap here if you love soup! 50p (about 5 sek) for Heinz tomato soup with a twist of chili...amazing!!




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Pink

I got new running clothes yesterday! I'm hoping this will make me go out running more. I had a cold a few weeks back and after that I've struggled to get back out there.

BUT, today is Monday. And we all know what that means: fresh starts!




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Sunshine

I kept waking up by sounds of the rain during the night. I already had plans to wear wellies to uni today. Glad I didn't, it's such a beautiful day at Roehampton today!



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Frustration

I've always thought that my English is pretty awesome. As long as I can remember I've had an interest for languages and especially English. When I was a about 12 years old I used to read a Swedish-English dictionary before I went to sleep just to try to learn as many words as possible....yes I know, I'm a nerd.

I've never had any problems communicating in English. There is one thing that has started to frustrate me though. At certain times when I'm speaking to Andy I really want to use a Swedish word because I can't think of the English one, or because it describes the situation better. But obviously I can't. This frustrates me a lot as I feel it's unfair that I will always have a disadvantage when it somes to the English language. I was trying to explain something the other day and I coudn't think of the word I needed to use and I ended up having a fit about how unfair it is and how I wished he could speak Swedish so I could have the upper hand for once...yeah I did that :S

Anyway, it's annoying sometimes and it's got me thinking about people that move to (and settle into) countries where the language is completely new for them. It must be so hard and so frustrating not be able to get your point across when needed. I've got nothing but respect for those people!

Referencing systems

Writing my first short essay here is not the easiest of tasks. I just wrote my C-paper last term which means I'm awesome at using the Oxford referencing system! Is this a good thing here? Nope, because they don't use the Oxford referencing system. So, I should just forget everything I know about the Oxford system and start learning a new system.
I've seen that they use the Harvard system and a couple of others at Roehampton and I though that since I've used the Hardvard system before, that shouldn't be a problem. However, I e-mailed my teacher yesterday with a question I had and she referred me to a 119 page document about the MLA system....
Whaaaaaat is the MLA system? No idea....
Good thing it's only a mini paper of 1000 words, it shouldn't be too much work.

Appreciation

When Frida and I have been on vacation in Thailand we have had this thing of reminding each other to actually enjoy and appreciate the time there. We could be lying on the beach and one of us would say -Are you remembering to enjoy this?

My time in the UK has been enjoyed to the fullest so far. At least a couple of times a day I automatically remind myself to appreciate the fact that I'm here. It might be on a canal side run, on the underground, when walking to uni or even in a lecture room; I just pause for a few seconds, look up, soak it all in and smile.

I cannot begin to tell you how happy I am here.

Busy

Monday and Tuesday will be spent like this:



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Friday!

Ahhh Friday! My favorite day of the week! I decided to have a lie in today since I've been working so hard during the week! But I guess it's back to business now. I've got two novels to read and a short essay to write until Wednesday and Thursday next week. AND we're going away over the weekend again, this time to visit Andy's brother and his family up north. It's really nice to go away and meet Andy's family and also see more of the country but it does put a little pressure on me finishing uni work in time. Next weekend we'll just stay around here though so should get a lot done!

Yesterday after uni Camilla and I went for indian food and some drinks. We went to Brick lane, which is an area that has markets during day time, night time there are millions of indian restaurants there :) I need to go there for markets during the day sometime! Ayway, had a really good night! We were talking about doing something every Thursday after uni unless we have visitors or something else planned.

Roehampton <3

At Stockholm uni it was hard finding a seat anywhere in the library. Here you get your own room, without booking! :D



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Another week of poor planning

Can't believe I've done it again! Didn't study at all Friday, Saturday or Sunday because we went away. I'm sitting here now wondering how I'm going to get everything done for my classes tomorrow and Thursday. I'll just have to try my best and try to remember not to do this again! We're going to visit Andy's brother next weekend but we're not leaving until Saturday morning so the Friday will be spent studying!

Other than that everything is just fine over here. I've had a cold for over a week now so with that and with Mikaela being here I haven't been able to do any running. But I think I might be well enough to go for a run today or later this week :)

Half marathon

I went to Hyde park today to cheer on Andy who ran a half marathon!


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Random stuff

Mikaela brought my laptop over so now I can write longer posts again!

The past weekend was great! It was so good seeing Mikaela and we had such a great time! We managed to do a lot while she was here; a night out in London, shopping and sightseeing in London, wandering around Berkhamsted, Sunday roast and visits to pubs in Berkhamsted. It was great! Won't see her until Christmas now though :(

This weekend was going to be a quiet one at home because Andy is doing a half marathon on Sunday. He now got the idea to go up north since he wants to go see this car he might want to buy. So we're going up to his parents for one night tonight and then tomorrow I get to wander around Manchester while he goes to check out the car. Looking forward to it!

Everything is great at uni! My week has been pretty stressful as I hadn't done any work over the weekend. I changed that terrible 'Early modern literature' class and took one called 'Language, society and power' instead. I had my first class yesterday and it was good! The teacher seems amazing!
My other two classes; 'Early american literature' and 'Gothic and fantastic literature' are really great too! I just love that most my studying consists of reading novels! I'm just loving this term already!!

I'm really having such an amazing time and am already starting to worry about going back home, time just goes too fast!

A day at uni

It's been a nice day at uni! Had a morning class, then soup lunch in the sun, afternoon class and now £2 beers at the student pub :)






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Poor planning...

Unfortunately visits from friends mean a few intense days of studying after. Still at the uni library...

My amazing view:



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