The first week of the second semester is over and I have spent it navigating a whole lot of bureaucratic bullshit to take the modules that I want for school.

The system that we use to bid for the modules we take for school functions like an auction. You have a fixed number of points and you "buy" modules. In the Arts faculty, if you declare your major you bid in a separate round that semi-guarantees that you will have the modules you need for said major allocated to you. If you don't declare your major, you fight it out with everyone else in the "normal" rounds.

It seems straightforward right? WRONG. Because every year the number of bidding points in your "account" is topped up. This means that someone in year 4 could have thousands of points more than a freshman, and the latter is thus necessarily advantaged in the bidding.

I think I explained this all quite nicely here. Which I take credit for because there was little attempt to have the whole bidding process clearly explained to freshmen in my most sincere opinion.

Okay so what happened was that I didn't declare my major because I was overthinking things and also because technically I have til the end of freshman year to decide on what I want to major in. And then I found out I couldn't even bid for any of the Lit modules I wanted unless I was a Lit major. I DID NOT KNOW THAT. Because nobody mentioned such a prerequisite's existence before the bidding process started!!!

A kind friend suggested I email the professors and request plead that they let me in. Which I did. That's when I found out that a whole bunch of people had gotten themseleves in the same fix. I'm going to skip to the end and say that I finally did get all my classes, after a number of phone calls and filling out a bunch of online appeal forms. I hate those forms because they ask you to explain your appeal in a "relevant and concise manner" AND within 800 characters and so I don't get to express my annoyance with the whole situation as well I'd like to.

And this was supposed to be a truimphant declaration of how I'd fought for what I wanted and gotten exactly what I wanted. And then I really looked at what I'd be studying for the rest of the semester and it looks like this.



This is A LOT TO READ. And this is only for 4 of my 5 classes. But this is exactly what I asked for. The good news is that I think all my classes are really interesting this semester. I'm doing 2 literature modules one about critical which is as the title suggests is about learning to read well ( funfact: I only have one book for this class). The other class is called background to western civilsations and it involves reading Epics and other such lengthy and complicated texts. I have no knowledge of Greek mythology whatsoever which is why I'm taking a really long time to get through the first six books of Homer's The Odyssey BUT the fact that I haven't given up reading yet shows that it's worth the effort. Also we are studying the books of John and Genesis from the Bible which I think is really cool. I don't have a very strong opinion on religion as yet, but I think I will be looking at the Bible as if it were a work of fiction when I read about it. I understand that statement alone could offend a number of people, but I said AS IF IT WERE a work of fiction, not that IT IS a work of fiction. I do this only because I don't want to cloud my mind too much with thoughts about my own uncertainties about religion while I'm looking at the Bible in a literary fashion.

I'm also doing a freshman seminar that discusses the topic "Should fiction be censored?" The seminar, as its title suggests is attended only by freshmen and has no final exam (YAY).However, I do have to read 4 books for the course. What's interesting is that all those have at some point been banned. I suppose in today's context this means very little because I don't think any of them are actually banned in Singapore today. But I get to feel like a badass while I'm in the seminars anyway. Yes, this is me really living on the edge. :P

My favourite class (so far) is Religion and Film. This is because instead of ploughing through 2873876328 pages of readings in preparation for tutorial which is what I do for every other class, I get to watch a movie. :D We're watching The Exorcist for the last class according to the schedule which is why I won't be sleeping that week.

My last class is Intro. to Political Science. I took this class mostly because I was curious. The thick green book at the bottom of the picture is the main book for the class. It's not a reference book so I'll prolly have to read at least 80% of it which is about as intidmidating as it sounds.

I really hope I become a better reader and writer from all the work I'm going to have to do for my classes. I've chosen things that I think will challenge me and I'm the most excited to do school work that I've been in a long while.



Now please excuse me while I go back to reading. :D

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