Ready Set Lecture!

So Lectures began on Monday and wheew they are amazing.  There is nothing more exciting than learning about a whole world, a whole time period that always confused me.  Each lecturer that comes has their own niche of expertise and when they share they are so passionate.  I will have two lectures per day for the next month until Michaelmas term begins.  There is something fantastic I realized today.  We don't ask questions during lectures, they don't ask us to ask questions.  Instead, we are given a bibliography for each lecturer and then on our own we are supposed to find answers to our questions or read more on what interests us.  It is such an beautiful way of teaching.  

Yesterday we learned about whether or not the medieval period owed any credit to Rome, and about the medieval Bible.  Today Augustine of Hippo was presented, and then the effect of monasteries on the medieval world.  It is almost someone is presenting a secret map to how our civilization matured into what it is today.  

I must also admit that I really know very little about this time period. Monday I sat down with one of our text "Carolingian Culture: emulation and innovation," and I felt that opened up a foreign book.  I could read the words but they did not register with any special meaning or made medieval culture any more understandable.  That diminished a little today.  I know things will begin to weave together so I can look at the larger tapestry of the Medieval and Renaisance history (acknowledgment to Rhetoric and Dr. Spencer).  

I am also working on being myself.  Everyone here is very knowledgeable in many areas, can sometimes talk extensively on things I have never heard of.  There are times I want to pretend and nod my head as if I agree, or insert a sentence with a tone that says, "yeah I already knew that," when really I don't.  I have been trying to be honest with what I know and be enough of a student to learn from my peers and admit when I do not know what they are talking about.  Well those are my most current thoughts, read them with the knowledge they can and will change abruptly.  

One more quick thing, more of a request.  I am going to Amsterdam this weekend and If anyone knows someone there I would love to stay with someone local than just at a hostel.  Two good reasons are that it saves a student from exhausting their bank account too early and I would much rather learn about the culture than see all the sites, which only comes from someone who is from there. 

Cheers! (by the way my English accent has greatly improved)