As you might have noticed, lately this blog has been mostly personal updates rather than actual ๐บ๐ง cฯ๐โแบธ๏ผฎ๐ ๐ ๐! The reasons for this are multiple… I’ll recount the most direct ones.
A) Almost two months ago I started teacher training which finally filled my days with lots of hours of supervised work and got me thinking about things other than my own personal progression and figuring out other people’s issues instead of coming up with imaginary problems to solve through reading and writing the works of other people who had little to do but come up with problems and solve them and/or create more problems for others.
I think that pretty much covers it! Oh, and I finally live in Brighton rather than its suburb, so in my free time I can actually freely go outside and do fun things (like swimming, or just, I don’t know, swimming? daytripping to Shoreham? that’s a possibility). When I’m not watching Shameless (US version), that is.
By the way, Shameless (US version) is such a great show. I don’t know if you’ve watched it but dude, I’m addicted. I’m at the stage where fictional characters are my best friends at the moment and I’ll gladly replace my real social time with Netflix social time. At least the Netflix people will solve their own problems (or die, that happens, too).
I’ve been taking pictures of nice views lately, especially this week as it’s half term break so officially I should be working on my APK and planning lessons for next week but technically I’m, well, doing that as well as other things, like having way too much screen time and coming up with exeats just so that I can get out of the house. Today I’m at the University of Sussex campus in Falmer and it looks glorious. When I walk through this campus, every time I feel like an authentic American college student (in a good way, stating that just in case there’s a bad way). It’s all due to the space, in the first place. In the second place, its situation outside of the city centre – you know, you have to get the bus here or drive or have a pretty long cycle, just like getting anywhere in America (well, at least in most cases, from what I’ve heard – and from my own experience – everything’s so far apart!). I’m going to ignore the fact that this university, like too many universities in the UK, has adapted the American college ‘aesthetic’ to create and brand its merchandise. I don’t mind University of Sussex ads throughout the city – I actually like them a lot – but you won’t catch me dead wearing a University of Sussex sweatshirt or backpack or carrying a mug or whatever, because of their design.
Not a plug here, just illustrative figures to show you what I mean:
They’re not ugly, okay? They’re very pretty, I think. The colours offered are nice and subtle, none of that neon bullshit.
I googled the definition of ‘varsity’ because I never knew what it actually means, but I always had a connotation with American colleges and sports teams specifically. Turned out varsity is an old British word for university – makes sense when you think for a second – but hey! Google confirms my connotation as correct, saying that in North America varsity refers to “the principal team representing a high school or college in a sport or other competition.” (I’m guessing Sussex University merchandise designers were going for that second meaning).
Ok, now I started digging deeper into the history of the varsity jacket – bomber jacket, letterman jacket, flight jacket, whatever you call it, baseball-style, whatever. Ok, clothes are interesting. To an extent. As always, I stick with practical clothes and none of that flimsy status-bearing women’s stuff. (By the way, I’m so glad Shabitat got rid of the “men’s clothes”, “women’s clothes” categories. Removing these labels was long overdue – especially since we’re in Brighton!).
I’ve now veered into “okays,” “wells,” and “by the ways” zone, so I best be wrapping up this post. To round off my latest life experience retell, I gathered some photos for you below. Enjoy them and please leave a comment! Tell me how you’re doing, what your campus was like, or anything else.
kotersey 