First Two Days of Classes

My first day of class was yesterday and it went fairly well. I only had photographing the urban, however it was four hours long. The class was from 12 to 2 and then I had a 2 hour break, then back to that same class for another two hours (4-6). The entire class was lecture about the history of the camera obscura, which was the first camera ever made back in the 1400s. My professor seems nice, she's from Canada so it's easier to understand her which is always a good thing. The class, however, is not what I expected at all. I thought it was going to be more of a photography class but instead it's heavily art history based and we do the photography on our own time. At the end of the course we have to turn in a portfolio along with a 1000 word artist statement. I'm not too thrilled about the artist statement. We also got our first assignment yesterday which I was not expecting at all. We have to construct our own camera obscura out of anything we can find. I was a little upset about this seeing as we have limited resources to utilize so I will most likely have to buy some supplies to construct this thing. Along with building this simple camera, I have to take 5 photos of myself building it as well as 5 pictures of the images of 'picturesque' architecture or ruins projected on the screen of the camera obscura. So I have to go around Stirling and other places trying to somehow find old unused buildings to photograph. Not quite sure how or when I'm going to do this. Once I finally have the photos, I have to upload them to a blog my professor created and then write out captions for all of them. And as if all of this isn't enough, I have to write an 800-1000 word paper on the history of the camera obscura. This is all due on Monday. I am not happy about this at all. Especially because I am going on the Isle of Skye trip this weekend and there is an all day excursion on Thursday to St. Andrews. My plan is to construct the camera today or tomorrow then wait to take pictures on the trip because I feel like there may be more opportunities to see ruins in the highlands. Then I can focus on my paper today and tomorrow as well as Thursday night. Then add in my thoughts about the camera experience to my paper at the very end. HOPEFULLY I can get it all done on time!
After stressing so much yesterday about this project I figured it was a good idea to unwind at a bar last night (even though I had class at 8 am). So Kyle and I went with  several people from our butler group plus a few others from the program to a bar called Cape around 10 pm. Since it was a Monday night it wasn't too crowded but there was a good amount of people. It was Karaoke night and a guy from our group, Greg, decided right when we got there that he was going to sing! It was hilarious when he got up there and sang the extended version of  Bat Out of Hell by Meatloaf. While at the bar we also made some Scottish friends, well they were just really drunk and really friendly. This one girl came over to our booth and was trying to teach us how to speak with a Scottish accent. We could barely understand her though because her accent was so thick! Although I didn't get much sleep it was well worth it seeing as that was my first bar experience in Scotland! I mean I'm only going to live in Scotland once so I might as well enjoy it! I had a great time and got a lot closer to my group of friends here which made the night even better.
This morning I was up by 7am and quickly got ready to leave for Marketing and Branding Scotland by 7:30 with Kyle. It takes about 15-20 minutes to walk to class so we had to leave early to ensure we found it okay too. The Cottrell building, where the class is, is very very confusing. It has several corridors and hallways that have no system at all. We ended up finding it okay since yesterday we went there when I had a break. We were the first ones there, before the professor even. We were nervous that the classroom had been moved. However, 4 minutes before class started the professor showed up and then finally everyone else arrived. This session was only an hour long, so all we did was go over the syllabi and introductions. This professor seems really awesome. He is British and he kept talking about beer and alcohol throughout the whole class. He even said that at the end of the course he wants to celebrate by going to a pub! I've never had a drink with a professor before so that should be interesting! This class doesn't seem like it has as much course work as my photography class so I'm glad I won't be too stressed.
For the rest of the day I'm going to be working on this photography project so I'm not too worried and stressed this weekend while I'm away. I may even take a little nap since I didn't get much sleep!

Cheers!