INTENSE!

Today was my first day of my Systematic Theology course.  This class is notoriously difficult, because it requires the writing of a personal credo...which is essentially an enormous paper in which we expound our views about everything in the entire universe in a way that is thoughtful and coherent.  But even though it was only the first day...it was possibly the most intimidating class ever.

The class opened like the first day of every class by going over guidelines..the most noteworthy of which, in today's case, was the discovery that if any class member is discovered using their computer for anything other than taking notes during class time (Facebook, Email, etc.), he or she immediately fail the course.  And even though we shouldn't be doing those things during class anyway...sheesh.  That was intimidating.  The classroom went absolutely silent at this point - presumably because half the people (like me) were shocked out of typing notes and the other half were on Facebook and suddenly feared for their academic life.  Other guidelines include addressing classmates as "Mr. or Ms. So and So" in order to encourage an atmosphere of respect, and the typical no cell phone rule.  On this point, actually, I was slightly concerned because my professor used the phrase "switched off", and I usually just turn my phone to silent...but at this point, I was too scared to reach for my phone to turn it off all the way, for fear that it would seem like I was texting in class.

Like I said.  Intimidating.

Even more intimidating, however, was the afternoon preceptorial session, the discussion-based portion of the class that divides the 60 member course into groups of 12 (meaning there's no hiding).  It's one of those courses where disagreements are encouraged, but you're still afraid to speak up for fear of being wrong.  Most of us just sat there like deer in headlights for the 50 minute session...hopefully the intimidation factor will lessen as the course continues.

Even so, I think it'll be a really good class...I'll just have to make sure I keep my head above water!

Spoiled

Today I discovered how spoiled I have become in my foreign language studies.

Take French and German, for example.  For each of these languages, I had a pocket dictionary at my disposal.  In the case of French, I also had a bigger Larousse dictionary and a Bescherelle verb conjugation dictionary to reference when working through things.  These were all very helpful, but the tool I used the most (much to the chagrin of my professors, I'm sure) was wordreference.com.  Unlike online tools like Google Translate, WordReference doesn't translate entire phrases, but just acts as a thorough online dictionary.  Type in a word, get several possible translations back.  Easy.  If you don't understand a word, it takes all of about 5 seconds to figure it out.  In fact, I still use WordReference frequently when I'm translating letters and such for my job.

Here's the problem.  Ancient Greek doesn't have an online translator.

And that is really, really not cool.

So instead of typing in my query and getting a translated result back in 0.365 seconds, I have to spend anywhere from 5-10 minutes searching for unfamiliar words in the giant lexicon, the back of my textbook, or the back of my Greek New Testament, in the "dictionary."  That's 5-10 minutes PER WORD...and the Greek words that I don't understand are plentiful.  The time adds up fast.

The problem with all this is that you have to know the "lexical form" to look up the word...which often doesn't look anything like the word you're trying to find, because Greek has like 50 different spellings for practically every word in the language, depending on its usage.

Say you have the word "elelutha" in front of you, for example: to ascertain its meaning, you need to know to look up the word "erkomai."  And those don't look the same, now do they?  And that's even one of the easy ones to remember...

And of course, you get all the Greek characters involved, so in the time it takes you to find a possible definition you've forgotten which word you were trying to look up in the first place, and have also probably lost your spot on the page.  And of course, by the time you find your spot on the page, you've lost your spot in the lexicon.  It's a vicious cycle.

So while I was working on Greek for a whopping 11 hours today (to be continued for another 1-2 hours after I post this), it dawned on me how truly spoiled 21st century language-learners have become.  We can have everything on modern languages at the click of a button, and it's REALLY nice.  Even the magical analytical Greek lexicon, which lists words in all their forms (and which I discovered in the library today), still takes awhile to get through, and really only adds another book to the pile.

And so I admit it.  I've become spoiled in my foreign language pursuits.

So now, three days from the end of the course, I've begun to realize why the nickname around seminary for my summer Greek intensive course is "Suicide Greek."  As I told my friend T.Wes in the library today, if something goes wrong with my salvation and I wind up in hell, I'm pretty sure you'll find me at a dimly lit library table, under a stack of Greek lexicons and scattered with scratch paper.

Only three days, two tests, one quiz, and translating all of 1 Thessalonians to go!

Better Day

Today was a better day.  It started off well - I actually READ my Bible this morning (I know, right?).  That's a new one this year.  I decided to start doing my 10-minute daily meditation homework first thing in the morning when I haven't had time to get all stressed or distracted, and that put me in a contemplative God-mood that motivated me to actually have a personal quiet time.  That was good.  To be honest, though, I quickly got bored...I'm out of practice, for one thing, and I was exceptionally tired this morning for some reason.

In a way, the better-ness that was today was kind of intangible in a way.  I just felt more confident than usual, I guess, which made me feel happier than usual.  I actually spoke up and said intelligent things in class today, and I think I've actually been working my way into my professor's good graces.  For one thing, I think they're starting to know who I am.  These big lectures are an abrupt shift from the liberal arts class of 5-10.  It may have taken a semester, but I think I'm actually starting to get used to the change.

All in all, not too much exciting or interesting to report.  It was 6-hours-of-class-Tuesday, so academia dominated my day.  Given how good I felt today, I'm surprised to find I have so little to write about...that's why I called it an intangible happiness before.  I'm thinking it's a direct result of that "let go and let God" mentality I'm trying to adopt.

I won't belabor the point that I don't really have anything to write about today.  Now, Dallas IS supposed to get another "wintry mix" tomorrow...we'll see how that pans out.  Class or no class tomorrow?  Come back tomorrow to find out...

(Suspenseful ending, right?)

Class Marathon Day #1: Defeated

So my Wii Fit age was 22 today.  Apparently 3 days of Wii Fit is all I really need to be totally awesome.  Actually, I think I was just unusually good at today's balance test.  If the Wii Fit has taught me anything, it has shown me that I have horrible balance.  Again, acknowledging how often I trip when there's nothing to trip over, this isn't super surprising.

Today was the first of my Tuesday class-marathon days that will be the standard for this semester.  I have three classes, spanning from 3:00-9:00pm, with only 2 ten-minute breaks in between.  All in all, it was actually less grueling than I thought it would be.  When I was at Transy, I would be out of the room going from thing to thing for upwards of eight hours.  I think I can handle the six hours of straight class.  The only problem was getting hungry towards the end, since I have class all the way through anyone's definition of "dinner time."  I brought a granola bar, but I was still pretty hungry toward the end.  But I survived, and made a burger wrap out of the "Hungry Girl" cookbook as soon as I got home (happily, that recipe takes all of 5 minutes to create).

Speaking of classes, they're going well so far this semester.  I've managed to stay on top of readings fairly well, and follow the lectures more easily.  As far as schedule is concerned, I like having my two three-hour (once a week) classes on Monday and Tuesday...because even though it's Tuesday night, I feel like the week is practically over.  Tomorrow just contains the spiritually fluffy support group that is "Spiritual Formation" class - unfortunately meeting at 8am - and going to the gym with friends afterwards.  Hopefully I won't fall over from sleepiness...we all know how bad my balance is.

In other life news, I have discovered that that pole I backed my car into is completely new, and I backed into it my first time back in the parking garage since December.  So I feel significantly less stupid now...even if I still have a giant dent in my car.