I bear a charmed life....in Scotland!: First day of classes!

And so it begins.

Today, after nigh on two weeks in Scotland (holy crumbcake, Batman, has it really been only two weeks? It seems like I've been here forever...), I finally started classes! I'd almost forgotten that I was here to actually, you know...STUDY...and I'm glad that the courses have finally gotten under way. I usually hate the first week of classes because everyone has to talk shop and go over the mechanics and the structure and policies of all their subjects, but I was getting a bit restless with nothing really structured to do with my days.

I only have two classes on Monday, one at 11:10 and one at 2:00 (or 14:00, as some clocks say here...confusing as hell.) The first one is a third-year honors level history seminar that meets once a week from 11:10 to 12:50, called Ghana: Colonialism to Socialism, 1880-1985. From a look through the course syllabus and what the professor (whose name is Paul Nugent, by the way---totally cool) was talking about today, this class sounds like it's going to be really interesting. I took an introductory African history class last year, which of course focused on the whole continent; I'm looking forward to focusing on such a specific region and time period. Downside? I have to lead discussion at one of the seminars, which is quite possibly one of my least favorite things to do in academics ever. Oh well. It happens.

My other class, Celtic Civilization 1A, is structurally very different: it's a first-year class, with lectures three days a week and a tutorial (smaller, discussion based class) once a week. From what I can tell, this class starts out with an introductory history of the ancient and medieval Celtic peoples and then moves into the current sociological implications of the term "Celtic" and "Celt." Apparently there's all sorts of components to the class, including history, culture, language, art, and anthropology. I'm excited. I'm picturing something like this: