So, I don't mean to be a dick, but..?

I realized today that I haven't given many details about my classes which do take up the majority of my day. So, since it is a little overcast today (aka I don't have a good chance of becoming more of a bronze goddess), I thought I would tell you about them!

Firstly, the way classes are scheduled are that from last sunday to this sunday we have class every day. They do not consider weekends since it is really all dependant on when we are in port. There are 8 class days before we get to Spain, and this makes up about 1/3 of the total class. So, before we even get anywhere, I will be 1/3 of the way down with my classes which is kind of nice becuase I will want to focus on the countries once I am in them. Also, they only have 2 of the 6 engines working so that we don't get there ahead of schedule which is kind of annoying, but I guess it is Semester at Sea.

This morning I woke up at 4:30 EST for my 8 am Spanish class. I really enjoy Spanish. I am having a good time learning it, and my professor is really cool. His name is Fernando Diaz, and he is from Spain. So, of course, Spanish is his first language. But he is so full of energy and excited to teach us about it that I can't help but love him. We are in classroom 1 which is right off of the dining hall. So, we have to shut the doors for noise reasons, and the classroom can get pretty toasty. Since my professor is so excited about Spanish, he usually has the BIGGEST pit stains I have ever seen by the end of the class. I haven't made any really good friends in the class, but it is still early. I am enjoying the material, so it is all good. We have  a final, quizzes, a journal that is due after each port, and a word diary that we have to record 20-30 words in each week that we learn. I am learning fast, and I hope that I will not be too lazy when I get back to Pitt and will continue taking it. We also have to pick to of the following to do in Barcelona: speak spanish at a resturant, ask for directions, visit a museum, and some others. I will probably do the first two. I am super excited to get there.

Secondly, I have Global Studies at 9:20 after Espanol. MOST BORING CLASS EVER. It is all about the anicent history of all the countries we are going to which has never been an interest or a strong suit of mine, and I hate it. Also, the professor is super annoying and is always trying to hard to get everyone to laugh which bothers me. Yesterday, I fell asleep, and my notebook slide down my legs and into the chair ahead of me. Luckily, Candice was there to laugh at me. It is just totally not my thing and not enjoyable at all. We only have a midterm and final, so I will probably just cram for them. Sorry mom and dad, but it is DULL.

Last is my negotiating for value class. I LOVE THIS CLASS. The professor is from Canada, and he is super knowledgable and funny and has great, real world examples to explain the material. The classes are also really interactive so we are not always just sitting and listening to him lecture which I love. We are basically learning about negotiating and how it is different from bargaining. Also, we are learning about the balance between the outcomes and the relationship with the other party, and I really think I will be able to use what I learn in real life. A lot of the stuff reminds me of business things that my dad has told me about, which makes me sure that I will use it. For example, today in class we started an exercise we will do every day for the next 10 days of class. We have to turn in a sheet of paper saying whether we are going to cooperate as a class or compete. It has nothing to do with any sort of action, but it is just the idea. This exercise accounts for 5% of our grade. So, if the whole class decides to cooperate, everyone gets an 89% for the day. But if one person decides to compete, everyone gets an 85% and the one who competed gets a 109%. If two people decide to compete, then everyone gets an 82% and the two who competed get a 105%. And it continues. But if everyone competes, we all get a 25%. And it is anonymous. So, we did it today and 9 people competed. JERKS. I clearly didn’t. Everyone who cooperated got a 68% for the day, and everyone who competed got a 92%. So, after that was done, we were allowed to talk, and we decided to all cooperate. But there were these two guys who didn’t seem to thrilled about it. Even though we all agreed, I am sure they will mess it up. So, whatever. I’ll keep you posted. But I really love the class.

Also, the amazing race was yesterday which was a scavenger hunt sort of thing and whoever won got to get off the boat first in Spain. We didn’t win, but it was really fun. The puzzles were super hard, but we didn’t do too bad. It was crazy though. People were all over the ship. The main rule was that we weren’t allowed to run which was pretty funny. Haha. We also had a meeting for intramurals today, and all of my friends and I signed up to do basketball. In the meeting, there were a bunch of guys and girls, and it is basically being run as like a pick-up game sort of thing. So, this boy was sitting in the back and raised his hand and said “So I don’t want to sound like a dick, but I don’t like playing with girls. So, are we like splitting up or what?” LIKE WHAT THE HELL? All of my friends and I now hate him, and I am definitely going to elbow him in the face when I get to play against him. I understand that it is different, but couldn’t he of said “Are we splitting up girls and guys?” or “Is it going to be co-ed or should we split up?”. It was just annoying. So that is all for now. Still on the ship and still losing an hour of sleep tonight! What a joy!