So I was going to wait till the end of the week to make a proper post but we had our first day of class today and it’s been a while since I did this so yeah. So after a week of sunbathing, drinking, randomly ending up in a gay club, jumping in fountains and generally getting better acquainted with the city and the peeps, term officially started today and brought with it a lot of cold weather and rain. Which was a bit of a shock to the system after spending every day in 30 degree heat and playing in the sun, and then this morning we had to wear wellies & coats. I kinda get the feeling the weather here is even more bizarre than Edinburgh in terms of the number of seasons you get in one day but ah well. So this morning I had two hours of French grammar (yes classes here are two hours long, bit different to our 50 minute lectures back home) which was a lot for a Monday morning. But I was happy that I actually understood the majority of what was going on, and although I hate grammar with a passion the class seems more geared towards helping us than testing us which I really like. After lunch we then had a class about analysing French literature. Again, I hate French lit. It’s not that I don’t like reading or reading in French, I actually really like it. It’s more the analysing and writing essays about books which at the beginning I like and by the end of the course I hate. But since I’ll probably have to take a literature course next semester and no doubt do at least a bit of it in fourth year I figured it would be useful, and it does actually sound quite interesting. Again it was easy enough to understand and the profs seem really helpful and nice. Despite only having two classes today I ended up being in uni for nearly six hours, which is another thing that’s different here. Back in Edinburgh I’d maybe have one or two classes, come home for a bit then go back for another class. Whereas here, because the campus is outside the city itself and there’s so much to do around there, it makes more sense to spend the whole day there. Even though I’m only about 10 minutes away on the tram, there’s no way I would come back between classes. I’m also knackered even after just those two classes! Which makes me glad my workload is a lot lighter, with only two classes on Mondays & Thursdays, one on Tuesdays and the other days free. I also joined the ski club last week and can’t wait to get started with that, although obviously ski season doesn’t really start until December, might join some sort of mountain climbing / hill walking club, and going to start swimming a couple times a week. Basically I think I’ve got a good balance, with not too many classes but enough to keep me busy and learn quite a lot, a few different things to keep me active and enough time to just chillax and go out. 🙂