school and such: 12 angry men with no end in sight.

Came home from class last night at 9.30pm and I'm going to class again soon! Ahhh. My second course started last night from 6pm to 9.00pm, but we were dismissed at 8.45pm. Yeah, my second course. So far I have only been taking one course, hehe!

This second course is really interesting, it's on parapsychology. Maybe the point of having 6pm-9pm course is to highlight the dramatic effect of having this lesson at night. But anyway, some of us are requesting to move the lesson into the afternoon. I mean, winter is coming soon and they want us to go for class in the darkest and coldest of winter?! It's so depressing.

But anyway, this course should be quite interesting, never mind the fact that it sounded really cheem last night. I think I should able to catch up when I get my hands on those textbooks. Parapsychology! Haven't even heard of those stuff being taught in NUS. From what I know, the department in our university even took off a chapter related to this from the exposure module, which was one of the more interesting topics. Consciousness, hypnosis, altered states, you know.

And one of the coolest things studying here is that the lecturers who teach you are actually researchers, like those who've had their research and journal articles published, and most of them are or were practising clinical psychologists/therapists and organizational consultants. The lecturer for parapsychology, because it's such a new field that few would venture in, is one of the pioneers in that field. I mean, the people who wrote the textbooks were his colleagues!

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Just came back from lesson, and seriously, why does it have to rain every time I go hunting for textbooks?! Argh. Plus on an empty stomach until 4pm. Sigh. At least this time it was easier. Got 2 out of 3 books that I need. Doubt I'll read them all anyway. Thought that I would buy the smallest of the textbook 'cos it's like a summary of the concept and very concise like what the lecturer said but it's not available in the bookstore, so I just placed an order on the net. Like, on the Swedish book website which apparently everyone here uses called Bokus. The website doesn't have English version, they only provide a translation of a few keywords from Swedish, so basically I completed an entire order including setting up a new account all in Swedish! Zai lah. Heehee. Free shipping within 8 days! The book is really small so I hope they'll just drop into my mailbox so I don't have to collect it from the local office :/

Anyway, for two of our three oral tests we watched the films 12 Angry Men and No End in Sight, and I like how they incorporate films into the course to illustrate the concepts more clearly (forgot to write that down in the evaluation oops). I haven't taken this course in Singapore yet so I don't know how they carry out the teaching of this module, but I'm quite sure this is not done. I took MNO before and the films they show us are so totally boring and just pure vomiting of the theories from the textbook. These two films are very aptly chosen and very thought-provoking, you should go watch it!

So my first course is coming to an end, which is fast. It has barely been two months! Had my reservations about this course initially, of course. I mean, I intended to take Group Dynamics sometime or another, but as this was one of the two Psychology courses in this university, I definitely had no choice but to take it. The exercises were a bit demanding, but I really enjoyed the seminars. I meant to write about them right after the first session but I think more things kept coming up that it slipped my mind.

There are only 6 people in my seminar as I mentioned --- 2 Swedes, 2 Japanese, 1 Spaniard and me. It was a nice mixture I felt, and it was good that there were locals in my group so I actually felt that it was "Swedish Group Psychology" and not just Group Psychology. The seminars went pretty much unattended by the tutors, not that it made much difference. So we would read 4 chapters before each session (which I barely finished everytime), and just discuss the readings. So we would just talk. And I mean, just talk! Talk about group relations, what we read in the textbook, what we see outside the textbook, politics, gender, Christmas (lol) in different countries, work life, life itself, cultural differences. Basically it was just like a chatting session (I mean, of course we did discuss about the textbook). But in the process we, or at least I, learnt a lot about other cultures, right from the horses' mouths, and I really liked it. It is definitely better than just going clubbing or partying to make friends with people from other nationalities when you can't even hear them above the music and noise level. I remember the first time I walked out of the first seminar, I felt ... refreshed? Refreshed about the way lessons, or group discussions are conducted here. Refreshed that I kept smiling to myself. It felt good.

I hope the subsequent courses will also be enjoyable.