Uni

I had to enrol for the second year of my university course today and I'm really excited about it.

Last year enrollment was really crazy because I was a first year student and everyone needed to verify who they were, their grades and all their other details. It took forever and included a three hour long wait in a small, stuffy corridor surrounded by hundreds of people who didn't know each other and were equally as annoyed and confused by the process as I was. Thankfully a couple of us found solidarity in that! I'm overjoyed that registration for this year was all done online and was much simpler!

I'm studying German with Theology at Queen's University in Belfast, which is also where I live. I major in German which means that I four classes each year in German and only two in Theology. I really love my course! I started off at uni studying German and Spanish but I dropped Spanish at Christmas because I was really bad at it and picked up Theology. I thought Theology would be simpler and easier to follow... which in some ways it is because it's in english at least but it's a bit hard to get your head around!

Because Queen's don't have their own Theology department they run the course through lots of different, smaller colleges. I chose to study at Belfast Bible College which is a Christian college. It's in a really nice setting and I really like it there but sometimes I wonder what it would be like to have class with people who didn't believe the same things as I did. Sometimes being in a bit of a Christian bubble is a bit annoying.. but anyway! They give us free tea and cake every morning so that's a bonus!

Last year for Theology I took a class which studied the gospel of Mark. That class was really interesting to sit in but very confusing when it came around to the big assignment and the exam because I didn't really know what was happening. It all worked out alright though!

The second class I took was Introduction to Theological Thinking which I found extremely interesting but most of the time I found it difficult to follow and diffcult to remember what all of the different theologians thought because I had no background knowledge in church history and nearly everyone else did. I was a bit disadvantaged but I did alright in the exam and the assignment so it all worked out okay too!

I didn't really try at all to get anything out of Theology last year because I found it difficult starting a new college and trying to meet new people as well as starting a subject that I'd never studied before so I'm going to put in way more effort this year to actually learning something useful. Grades for last year didn't count anyway!

Sooo... what does this year hold? I'm taking four classes in German, two of which are compulsory language modules which include a bit of history and business, reading, writing, grammar and oral stuff which is usual with language courses. I didn't really mention much about German from last year because I just loved it all from start to finish. I love everyone doing the course and the classes were really great.

So yeah... I'm taking the language modules and I'm also taking two other modules. I don't know much about them yet apart from their titles. The first one is entitled "Religion in Modern Day Drama and Theatre" which sounds like it will be really interesting so I'm excited about that one! The second is about German Cinema and I know nothing about that. I don't study that one until after Christmas though so we've plenty of time to figure out what it's about.

As for Theology I'm taking a class called "The Christian Doctrinal Tradtion" which is compulsory I'm not very excited about it. It sounds like it might be as confusing as the theological thinking module from last year but I'll go in hopeful! The second module I'm taking is a church history module for the 16th century period which I am looking forward to more than I can tell you! It's going to be all about the Reformation and that's my favourite church history period.... maybe it's something to do with my love for German ;)

So that's what I'll be doing this year and once this year is over it's time for me to go off to Germany for my year abroad! I'm looking forward to it SO much but at the same time I'm terrifed :) but hey... we've still a while to go until that!

Oooh and I'm also taking a course in Modern Greek on Thursday evenings.... just for fun!