Packing:
It took me one solid night, a few hours, to pack up my things. I had to really just go through and organize my stuff and what I would bring home. Let me say that I accumulated a lot of just "crap" while I was here that I need to trash. I also had to clean and make sure I didn't do any damage. It's the typical moving out of the dorm stuff. Lucky for me, all my things fit into one suitcase, one backpack (my laptop) and one duffel bag. Not bad for a girl who came over with two suitcases and two duffel bags! I left behind some shoes and a few items of clothing.
Finals:
I had 5 exams, one paper, and one presentation when I got back to Graz. I arrived on Monday, June 20th and the next day I had my first final. I studied as well as I could and it paid off! I got my grade back Tuesday and I passed the class. It was one of my more difficult classes, Intro to Literary Studies I. It may have not seemed that way since I have taken so many literature courses in the past, but he was so technical about analyzing things that I was worried.
My other exams were in British History, American History, Survey of American Literary History and German. I had already taken the German written final and then later today I will take the German oral final. I'm not too worried about either. The written was easy enough. While I was a little worried about Survey of American Literary History and American History, both those tests went fine. I passed Survey of American Literary History and I am still waiting on American History. I was very stressed about British History. We started in 100BC and went all the way to present day for British history. I went to class, took notes, studied with another girl in my class, made a study guide, the whole thing. I spend a lot of time preparing for this test. I received my grade yesterday, a 5 which is basically an F. Here's what the professor wrote to me when I asked if I could do something to bring my grade up.
"It is only fair that you should have the same number of attempts to pass the exam than the other students. However, since you are leaving the day after tomorrow, this may be difficult to do. The only possibility I see is that you sit for the exam under supervision at your home university, on 4 October, which is the date of the second sitting here. Please name a contact at your home university, who would be willing to act as supervisor, and ask this person to get in touch with me.
I must say, however, that with 32 credits out of 100 (leniently graded), the result was a very clear "fail", and there were a number of rather appalling mistakes."
I think I'll just take an American History class back home. It's not worth my time to study for an exam that was so hard and asked the most ridiculous questions. My presentation for Native American Studies went great and my professor is working on getting my grade in early so I can send my finals grades back home as soon as possible.
Out of all the classes I took this semester, Survey of American Literary History was my favorite. I learned about America and the major events in America, through literature. It had a completely different prospective on things and I really loved it. For example, we learned about women's suffrage. Instead of reading just about women's point of view, we also read texts from a man's point of view. I was also exposed to different ethnic writers and their viewpoints on America. While I did have to study for the exam, it wasn't hard to study because I had enjoyed the class so much that I learned during the semester. By far my favorite class while on exchange and one my favorite classes I have taken in college.
Friends:
When I first came to Graz, I didn't make friends right away. Well not in the first week anyways. It was hard for me and I really felt like I would never make friends. But God had a different plan for me and I made more friends than I have time to see! I was so blessed to go on exchange and make some of the best friends in the entire world (and they are literally from all over the world). I cannot tell them or you how much I am going to miss them and how they really made this exchange for me what it was. Graz is a nice city, but it wouldn't hold the meaning it does for me if there hadn't been the people here to share it with. I won't get all mushy and sad on this blog, but I will miss these people here and cherish the time we spent together. I love them all. I hope that one day I can see them all again and now it gives me a reason to go to Finland, Australia, Canada, Italy, South Africa, and of course travel all over the US (Virginia and Oklahoma).
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| Dinner at Laura's |
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| Family dinner at V&P |
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| Marco, Nikita and I at coffee on the Island Cafe (The Mur River Coffee Shop) |
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| South African Dinner! |
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| Family Dinner at Marco's |
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| Family Dinner at V&P |
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| Marco, me and Ryan eating "pancakes" (crepes) at Emilie's goodbye party |
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| Me...cooking?!? |
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| Me and Paula :) |
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| South African food (I forgot the name) |
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| The last picture with Emilie |
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| Paula, Ashley and I (or "the girls") |
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| South African Dinner Night |
Zach is arriving in Graz in less than 4 hours. We are about to begin our two and a half week journey around Europe and I am so excited!! I'll blog as much as I can in the next two weeks and I will be home July 17th. I guess all there is left to say is, tschüss Graz, Sie wird für immer in meinem Herzen sein.
Love,
Sara
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