It's more than than half way through my exchange term at the University of Birmingham and I am seriously too busy to update this blog because I have too much going on! That leads to the point that I also have too much to write about. Every single day has been a new experience for me and I am trying to make the most out of it.
I really enjoy my life over here in England. I find life here much more relaxing and simple than what happens back home. While some of it is simply just a different living arrangement (ex: living in a dorm with short commutes instead of bussing 3 hours each day), I find people here much more laidback and never seem to be in a hurry. Canadians are known for their constant apologies but from what I have noticed here, the English are polite and apologize just as much for non-valid reasons.
Academics has been fun! I am taking 4 modules (they call it modules instead of courses where courses mean something completely different) that add up to 60 credits which is the full load. I decided to take all Computer Science modules because the universities's website is a complete mess to find what modules that are for other departments. For UBC students, you will never appreciate CWL/UBC's course registration system until you are away. To register for modules, I had to hand in the module registration through paper which then the head office of my department messed up. Very smart of them to not automate the system. :)
Because England undergraduate degrees are 3 years in length, I did not find much challenging modules for me to take because I am in my 5th year of my undergraduate degree and have plenty of working experience for an ugrad. I decided to take 2 graduate level modules, Computer Security and Cryptography with master students and 2 undergraduate courses in Operating System in C/C++ and Compilers. I have to say that after taking the compulsory modules for the Master program for Computer Security, I am tempted to do a Masters in Computer Security. It is a very fascinating field with lots of potential and I learned how insecure majority of the web and software applications are. I have also learned how many bad mistakes I have made in the past too. So far, I have been finding almost all my assignments really easy.
Ultimate. One of the main reasons why I chose Birmingham was because they had an Ultimate Frisbee club here and it has been one of my highlights during my time in Birmingham. The club has roughly 70-80 members and consist of open, women and mixed teams. Usually at practice (they call it training), both genders practice together. For fall, Ultimate is played indoors where indoor regionals and nationals is held and outdoors start in spring. For the first time in my ultimate career, I got a chance to play on an open's team to compete at Midlands Open Regionals. It was frustrating at moments due to my inability to defend against stronger, faster and taller male opponents but I played with extremely supportive teammates that cheered for anything I did. The following weekend, I competed at the Midlands Womens Regionals where the university's womens team qualified for UK Ultimate Women's Indoor nationals for the first time in club history. Not only did the team qualified, but the team also won the region by winning a whooping 8 games in one day. These wins include over teams from Oxford, Cambridge, Nottingham, University of East Anglia, Oxford-Brookes. It was really mentally exhausting and the focus of the team was to stay mentally ready. This was also the first time in team history that a team of any division won a region. There were some strong players from other teams that are going to compete on the GB u23 squads so hopefully I'll get another chance to compete against them. By winning the finals, I was selected as the Finals MVP by the tournament director. While these ultimate tournaments have taken time away from my time to travel, I much rather spend my weekends with the people I like than going to museums by myself. The endless laughters I had with the team during road trips or silly moments during tournament play are only partial reasons why I enjoy my time in England so much. What is better than getting to teach Ultimate to a group of dedicated, developing players and contribute back to the Ultimate community in something that I am very passionate about?
I've got much more to talk about which includes the trip I made to the Google London office yesterday but this post is getting just a little long. Stay tune for more! :)
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