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Today I started of at the St.Peter’s campus for my film analysis seminar. After this class, I caught the bus to the City campus.

At the City campus, I ate lunch and then went to my Spanish class. In Spanish we learned basic greetings and names. It was kind of boring though as it’s a review from when I was in high school.

After class, I rode the bus back to my flat where I had spaghetti for dinner.

Tonight was the student raid at the bridges which is basically students only and a ton of discounts. I went to buy a textbook. Lame, I know. I didn’t end up buying the textbook since it would be much cheaper on Amazon. I did end up buying the Martian and the Maze runner books. Also, at this book store I get 10% back since I’m a student.

Getting a bus back to clanny was even worse than usual. I flagged the bus drive but, he kept on going. After 45 minutes, I finally got onto a bus and made it back to the flat where I watched Netflix until bed.

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Today I watched Netflix until I got bored. At this point, I started researching scuba equipment. After I got bored of doing this, I tried messing with UDK (unreal development kit) which is what we are using in my games technology class to develop. Lastly, I watched more Battlestar to end the weekend. Also, I had spaghetti for breakfast.

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Today I went and got a haircut. The place that I got my hair cut was able to do exactly what I normally get.

After my haircut, I went back to the flat and made myself spaghetti. Genius me did not think about how an entire package of spaghetti could feed an army. I stored the remaining two container fulls of spaghetti in the fridge hoping that I would be able to finish it all before it went bad.

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Again, I just watched Netflix all day. I had finally finished watching all of Warehouse 13, which was a great TV show. I began watching Battlestar Galactica which is somewhat realistic Sci-Fi and so far seems like what intergalactic space travel could be like in the distant future. The basic premise is that a military ship called the Battlestar Galactica lead a fleet of civilians away from the Cylons which are AI based robots created by the humans. So far, there hasn’t been a single alien race even though the cylons sometimes seem like they are.

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Today, I slept in. After I got up I went to the CitySpace and paid my £75 for scuba club. That’s about $115. This free includes my PADI open water certification which, in the U.S. would cost me more than $300. After passing the fee, I went to the scuba shop where I signed my waivers and registered for my first pool session. One thing that is funny is the scuba shop is also a gun store but, the only firearms that they sell are air soft and bb. After I left the scuba store, I went back to campus to get on a bus and go to Tescos extra.

At Tescos, I purchased more food. The one weird thing that I bought was Flame grilled streak crisps. The flavors here are really unusual, the closest thing to normal they have is cool original doritos which are just cool ranch. I can’t find barbecue anywhere and that’s why I got the steak. Back at my flat, I tried the crisps, at best they tasted like burnt steak. After this I made tacos for dinner and watched more Netflix. In case you haven’t figured it out yet, I waste a lot of time watching Netflix.

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I woke up this morning and started watching Netflix. I think I left my room a total of 3 times to eat other than that I watched Netflix all day. I went to bed around 23:00 so that I would be well rested for the first day of school on Monday.

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The adviser appointment that I scheduled the previous day was scheduled for 09:15, I showed up at the bus stop at 08:49 and, the bus should have arrived at 08:57. After waiting until 09:00, it became obvious that the bus had come early (The bus is never on time when you need it to be). I ended up walking to campus so that I would be on time. In my meeting, I had my adviser drop one of my classes and add both German and Spanish into my timetable for the full year. At the end of the meeting, he sent my module choices to the people that make the timetables for analysis. After this meeting, I went to CitySpace.

For fresher’s week, there was scheduled to be free haircuts and smoothies in CitySpace. This wasn’t scheduled to start for an hour so, I sat on the sofas until it was about time. I went to the room that this was in at 11:00 because, I wanted a free haircut. When I arrived I found out that they weren’t doing free haircuts which was fairly disappointing. From there, I went back to the Forster building where we had a mandatory study abroad scavenger hunt.

In the Forster building we were divided up into teams then sent out around Sunderland to find the answers to questions and get random objects. The hunt made us walk clear to one side of the city centre, then to the other side and, finally back to campus. In all, our route made a large triangle that took an hour and a half to complete. Surprisingly the team that I was second to complete the hunt. We were told to return at 15:00 to find out who had won the hunt. This gave me time to go back to the bank.

I walked to the bank from campus where the banker was able to open my account with no problems. When I went to cash my check however, the lady at the counter was grouchy that I didn’t cash it the day that I got it. It was all sorted out though and I rode the bus back to Clanny. When it was time to go back to campus, I had planned on riding the bus. The bus wasn’t on time again and I had to walk all the way back to campus for the second time that day.

On campus, we learned who had won the hunt and surprisingly it was my team. The prize was a chocolate bar the size of a gold bar. I was disappointed that I had walked all the way back to campus for about five minutes though. I went to the bus stop where I waited 30 minutes for the bus to arrive. Back at Clanny, I watched Netflix for a couple of hours.

I went downstairs as the plan had been to go to a roller disco and then a paint party on campus. Instead my flatmate was making cookies (she makes really good cookies). Around 18:30 we decided to go to Tesco’s for some grocery shopping. Tesco’s is like the Wal-Mart of the UK except a little smaller. After everyone checked out at Tesco’s, half of us took the groceries back to Clanny and the other half walked to a pub where we would meet up to watch the Rugby World Cup. When we arrived at the pub, we had to leave as my flatmate was wearing sweatpants that didn’t meet their dress code. We ended up going to CitySpace where they had the game on. One of my flatmates went and bought pizza while we were watching the game.

After the game ended, we left CitySpace to meet up with the flatmate that bought the pizza. We ate it on a sidewalk  near the city center. When we finished the pizza, we went back to Clanny where I went directly to bed.

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On Thursday morning, I had my adviser meeting where we learned about the format of our classes and what we were taking. Most people receive there time tables but, I did not. Because I had wanted to take German and Spanish, I had to wait to sign up since my adviser did not know that my first language was English. This meant that I had to schedule an appointment for Friday with him. This meeting ended around 14:00 then, I left for the bank.

I arrived about 20 minutes early for my appointment and waited for quite a while. When I was taken back, the banker took copies of my passport and proof of enrollment. Then he entered all of this information into the computer. After about 30 minutes of doing this he submitted the application. The application was flagged for further investigation for some reason and he told me that I would have to come back the next day to get my account opened. I went back to the flat after this and yet again watched Netflix.

Around 19:00 my flatmates and I went to a comedy hypnotist. The show was very entertaining and one of my flatmates was hypnotized. I won’t detail what they did as it was an R rated show but, afterwards we had to help our flatmate piece together what had exactly happened (He didn’t remember hardly any of it). Back at the flat I went to bed and got ready for Friday, the busiest day of the week.

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Today, I didn’t have any induction or mandatory classes. I woke up and around 12:00 then, went with one of my flatmates to get our meal stipend checks. After getting the checks, we went to the Bridges where I went back to Primark for hand towels and a blanket. Next, I went to Tesco’s where I bought cleaning supplies and some food. From there, I went back to my flat and watched Netflix for a while after I put my food away. Around 21:00 I met up with my flatmates in the lounge and went to Gatsby, the first PLAY night club. Gatsby was packed shoulder to shoulder so we didn’t stay long. From there we went to the second club called Verve, this club was much better and had a fairly good DJ. After about an hour there, we were going to go to the last club, the Basement. We we got outside of Verve we saw that the line to get in was clear around the block so, we decided not to wait around. One of our flatmates that was with some of his friends was in the line though. He finally got in after waiting an hour then, left five minutes later because of how packed it was inside. After we had left Verve we ended up going to a restaurant called the Proper Roast. I had a diet coke. After we left, we went back to the flat where I went immediately to bed because, it was already about 01:00.

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Today I woke up and went to campus for induction. In the morning session, we played an icebreaker game and registered with the university so that we would be current students. Then it was lunch time.
For lunch a group of us went to Greggs in the Bridges. I had a slice of cold barbecue chicken pizza and a bottle of water. All together, the meal only cost me £2.50. After lunch we went back for the afternoon session of induction.
In the afternoon session we heard from a police officer, a sports and, a health official about safety and well-being while in the UK. My flatmates and I were in a hurry to get out of this meeting to get to bowling though.
I had purchased a wristband earlier in the day that would allow me free access to fresher’s week activities. For bowling only the first 60 people got in for free. Because we were 30 minutes late getting to the bowling I expected to pay the £5 fee. Surprisingly the place was not busy at all and I got in free. Entrance also included a free drink. Everyone around me has a pint but, I just had a diet Pepsi. We bowled two games which was fun but, bowling shoes weren’t provided. I still managed two games over a hindered though. After the games we went to a pub for dinner.
Bar food in the UK isn’t very different from the US except for possibly the fish and chips. I ordered a BBQ hog Burger which was a hamburger with pulled pork on it. When the waiter brought out the food though, I received a hotdog. I decided it would be fine as it was huge like, over a foot long. After dinner we went back to the flat and I went to bed.

The date that my posts show that they were posted is the day that the post is about NOT the day that they were actually posted.