University of Otago

Hello blog!

Its currently Tuesday of my second week at the University of Otago. So far, going to school in NZ has been vastly different from going to school in the US. Back home we just have a certain amount of classes to attend each week, but here they say: lets make it slightly more complicated!! Each week you have your lectures (which are non-compulsory classes) and you also have your tutorials (which are sometimes compulsory and sometimes not) and then you also have your practicals (which are always compulsory). It is the student’s job to choose how many they will attend - preferably all of them.

Now that I’ve somewhat explained the scheduling, let me tell you about my classes! My two favorite classes are New Zealand Politics and the Global Politics of Food. NZ Politics has been so cool to learn about mostly because of how radically different their political system is from the United States. It makes much more sense the way they do it, however, I know it would NEVER work in any other country besides New Zealand. I also love the contrast between our two countries and the aspects of this political system that could be incorporated into our own. The possibilities are endless!!

The Global Politics of Food has also been really interesting to learn about as well; especially amidst the crises we are facing with soil degradation, crop failure, drought, food waste, food deserts and inequalities. I also really love my professor for this class - he is hilarious and obviously well studied on the subject of food. He also keeps making jokes about American politics and I’m one of the only American students in the room to laugh at them (it makes me feel like we have inside jokes together or something?).

My third and final class is Social Inequality, which is the credit I’m taking for my sociology major. Now don’t get me wrong, this is an interesting class as well, but I feel as though I’ve already learned everything that we’ve been talking about this past week. This class is equivalent to an into sociology class back at DU and the information feels a little repetitive to me. I’m sure I’ll learn more as time goes on, but right now I’m kinda just doodling in my notebook during class (sorry not sorry).

Thats all of my classes aka papers as the kiwis say!! Here are some pictures of my beautiful school for the next four months!

Thanks for reading:)