and so it goes

this morning a truck driver stopped to say "ni hao" (i think) and let me cross. he tried to make small talk (yes, in the middle of a pedestrian crossing) but i just smiled and said thank you. i guess my loser appeal crosses borders and cultures. heh. so much for filipino security guards greeting me on the street.

but on to other things. like schoolwork.

or the absence of.

for some insane reason the tutors decided to change things up a bit, and give us INDIVIDUAL design work. instead of the traditional team design project. because we have been "progressing at an impressive rate in comparison to the previous years." i don't know how much of that is bollocks. but whatever. the point is they're making things up as we go along. and the result is a couple of headless chickens in one classroom. i'm not talking about the students, here. okay, maybe i am, too.

it's a bit frustrating to not know where you're going, or what you're doing. we're given bits and pieces of what we COULD be doing, or what we MIGHT have to submit, but no clear indication of EXACTLY WHAT the end product is supposed to be. i know tihs is not undergrad, and that they shouldn't be feeding us everything. but that is exactly what the tutors are doing, and worse, they're doing it a week at a time. i'd much rather they just give us the bottom line and have us figure out how to reach that on our own. honestly, though, i don't think the tutors even know what the end goal is. hurrah.

we had group presentations again last thursday, and our team volunteered to go first so we can get more comments. and we did. get more comments. compared to the last time. BUT... let's just say quantity is not the same thing as quality. and ours is not an isolated case, i think. the other teams that presented didn't get as thorough a scrubbing as i would have expected. heck, *i* had questions for my classmates that the tutors didn't bring up! and they're just BASIC questions like, did you make sure the base conditions are consistent throughout the study? or maybe, so how do you interpret this data, and what exactly do you understand about it? not to be callous about it, but i feel like *i* could be teaching this course!!! then again, i took this up five years ago, so i really have an unfair advantage.

and now for the good news... i'm glad i did not get into the 16-month program. because as it turns out, the m arch students are going through the same things the m sc students are. same classes, same courses, same project work. just different timetable when it comes to the dissertation. which may be a good thing, but not necessarily. prolonging the agony, so to speak. and paying dearly for it. (in pounds sterling!)

thank god for small miracles.

as my sister says, HE knows what's best for me.

amen.