you know it's getting late in the semester when your bowdoin email slowly gets more clogged everyday with inane emails regarding stuff on campus and sends you the course catalogue to register for classes. how can i think about classes at bowdoin when i am in the midst of finishing up here? it really does not help my emotional roller coaster that i still seem to be riding.
well i am done with my history class which is great. i had the oral exam on monday. it's worth a story because it explains so many things about argentina. okay. the class is called historia social de argentina I. it is a first year sociology/history class that meets once a week (mondays) for 4 hours. the final exam was oral, meaning that we would be called into the professor's office one by one, answer a few questions about the material we've learned over the past 3 months, and walk out. because it's a first year class, there were about 50 students in total. this is where it gets messy. in the united states, if an exam was scheduled like this, the professor would pass around a schedule with 10 minute time slots for you to sign up for. you would get 3 email confirmations and be able to show up early, ready for your turn. well, this is argentina and there are no schedules, no email addresses, and no confirmations. the professor divided the class of 50 in two, she took one group and our other lecturing professor took the other. i did the oral exam with the one other ifsa student in the class and we were told that we would be the últimos, or last to go. so for almost 4 hours, we sat outside the classroom, jealously watching the argentinos go in, and then return 15 minutes later. the first hour, we studied. the second, we talked with some argentinos. the third we played tic tac toe, connect 4, and the grid game. by 6:30, i was sweaty, tired, hungry, and just ready to go. finally the professor comes out and beckons us in. she asks us basically to review the entire social history of argentina and in less than 15 minutes, we were done, aprovechemos, we had passed.
there are many things wrong with this experience. i was shocked that our professor didn't at least tell us that we would be going dead last and that it would be almost 4 hours until we would talk with her. some of the argentinos were in the classroom for barely 5 minutes and some were in the room for almost half an hour. we had no idea when we would be going based on the shoddy scheduling. if i had at least had an inkling, i would have shown up to class at 5 or 6, or at least gone down to the basement of the building where there is a small café to just relax. it was frustrating, but sea lo que sea, it is what it is.
now that i am done with one class, i have 4 essays to write by next tuesday (two for my women's classes, one for music, one for spanish). two more exams and one additional final paper for music stand in my way of being officially done "studying abroad". then it's just relaxing, catching up with my family, and spending time in mendoza to complete the experience. this weekend ifsa is "sponsoring" (false advertising since yes, mom, we actually have to pay for everything. ifsa basically just drops us off) an excursion to san rafael, a town about 3 or 4 hours south of mendoza. the town is known for it's rafting but ifsa is being argentino and making us pay for it. on the other hand, it will be nice to get out of mendoza and it's rising temperatures (example: it's 10pm and still over 80 degrees out...what happened to deserts getting cold at nighttime?). i am really looking forward to spending time with other people from the program because we only have 5 more weeks together!
crazy. i was going to write about the sickening and corrupted things i learned about argentina in my women's classes, but i will save that for another time when i am feeling more scholarly. right now, all i want is a popsicle, some ice to chew on, and a hammock outside.
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