First day of classes

Today started off beautifully. I woke up at 7am to blue skies. After a nice run through Duddingston village (settled in the 1100's) I had breakfast. At breakfast, which I was planning on eating alone, a nice fresher sat down across form me and introduced himself. I honestly didn't catch his name, but it's not like I would have remembered it anyway. That seems to be a common theme here. Anyway, this boy and I did the small talk thing: he is from Holland, etc. Then we talked about classes. He told me he had class at 9am. He also told me that he didn't know which building it was in. This was at approximately 8:49am. Campus is at least a 15 minute walk from our dorm complex, and that's only if you know right where you're going. Needless to say he didn't help my anxiety about the first day of classes.

After I finished my breakfast in peace I returned to my room to organize my things for the day. Included were: planner (that has where all of my classes are held), raincoat, umbrella, notebook, etc. My first class was Fluid Mechanics. I had a lovely bike ride to the King's Buildings (the engineering and science campus) and had a bit of time to kill my locking my bike and walking around.

Ashworth Laboratories: where I had Fluid Mechanics

Biking is very big here!

After Fluid Mechanics I had only 10 minutes to unlock my bike, cover over 2 miles, relock my bike, and find my classroom building for Linear Algebra. I arrived around three minutes late and very sweaty. The Linear Algebra class is enormous but the professor seemed really into peer-learning which I think I will like. He had us discuss with our neighbors and try to convince them of why 2 is less than 3.

After math I had an hour break in which I had a snack and leisurely biked back to the King's Buildings where my next class, Water and Wastewater Systems 3, was to be held at 2pm. Yes, I have to do this commute multiple times a day. Hopefully only on Mondays! Anyway, I think this class will be very interesting. It is all about water and which water needs to be purified. It seems like it will be a good balance of the science of the actual chemical processes and the social aspect of the availability of clean water.

When I left wastewater systems it was sprinkling outside. I knew I was going to have to tackle biking in the wet weather eventually, but I didn't think it would be on the first day. But such is the weather in Edinburgh. It wasn't raining too hard so I strapped my raincoat around my waist (because I am not bike-savvy enough yet to have put a plastic bag on the seat to keep it dry) and headed up to the main campus, yet again, for my History of Art class. I had sometime to kill so I thought I'd ditch my bike at my dorm and walk the rest of the way. By the time I had done that, it was pouring. Ugh! But it was a great excuse to break out my spiffy new rain boots!

Art History, at 5:10pm making it the latest class I've ever had, was another large lecture. I met a nice girl from Norway who was also having trouble finding the building. This class seems like it will be more critical reading than I've done in a long time, but also very interesting.

So it looks like Mondays will be my crazy busy days. Tomorrow is much easier. Now I have to go get ready for basketball practice!