So this seems to be a logical time to do a bit of a summary of my time thus far in Ol' Virginia. We are now on our fall break (which is something we don't have up in Canada), and I am taking advantage of a few days off to meet Pops up in Boston where I have a good friend studying dentistry. I am definitely excited to see what Boston has to offer and get near the ocean again!
Tonight was also quite cool because I had the opportunity to go to the first meeting of the Virginia Central Fulbright Chapter to welcome all of the visiting Fulbrighters. The reception was held at Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Museum (which was founded by a former Fulbrighter who started their Australian Aboriginal art collection whilst in Australia on their Fulbright scholarship). The museum is situated in a great little park on the outskirts of Charlottesville, and here is a link to the museum for those who are interested:
http://www.virginia.edu/kluge-ruhe/
It was actually quite cool and I definitely felt privileged to be in attendance. The other visiting Fulbrighters include a lady from Indonesia and one from Hong Kong who are pursuing a PhD in nursing, a visiting Political Science teacher from India and an Environmental Engineer from India, an MBA student from Norway, a fellow from Russia, and a lady from New Zealand pursuing a PhD. Also in attendance were former Fulbrighters who had studied abroad and now meet up 3 or 4 times every year to welcome newbies like me and to reminisce. The live entertainment was provided by a great little trio, the lead singer was influenced quite heavily by the Mali African tribe with whom she lived amongst while in the Peace Corps and as a researcher performing cultural studies for her PhD. She played an awesome African guitar-equivalent percussion instruments and told stories about her time with the Mali peoples.
The semester is starting to fall into place. It definitely took some time to get back into the whole school routine, and now one-third of the way through semester one I think I am back into the groove of reading, writing, and researching!
I would have to say that the two best experiences in Virginia so far have been:
1) the completely unexpected awesomeness that is Animal Law. I enrolled in this class kind of as an afterthought initially not really knowing what it was going to be like, but the range of guest speakers that we have had so far on everything from basic animal cruelty protections to the Michael Vick dog fighting trial and emerging issues in animal rights, coupled with the fact that I get to research and write on novel regulatory reforms for the regulation of shark finning combine to make it all a sad, yet gratifying, area of study;
2) the people are great! My roommate is awesome and it has been a blast getting to know him and his story and to experience America through the eyes of a German! The rest of my class is really solid as well! Getting to know them academically and then recreationally (through the Deportable softball team) and then socially has been a blast!
With all of that said and done, without a doubt I miss Canada. The old adage that the people make the place is definitely true, and while I always knew that the group I have around me in Edmonton is awesome, you don't really realize exactly how awesome and in how many ways that awesomeness affects your life until they are not there! You all know who you are!
Well, I am going to try to enjoy this weekend because I can tell that the semester will kick into high gear after the break. Papers, readings, and assignments are all going to pick up in intensity and frequency... ugh!
Until we meet again...
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