ritas kleine welt

last week, i attended a block seminar in the institute for eastern europe studies. our group consisted largely of students from the german department, a handful of students of eastern europe studies -- and me as the representative for the english department. the seminar was great; i learned a lot -- and in nine out of ten cases i had not a single clue what the others were talking about. talk of the whooshing sound of a topic going right over your head. they were a nice but scary bunch of phd-students. bouncing off cultural theories off each other as if they hadn't done anything else during the last ten years of their lives. scaaaaary!!!

1) finished marking the first-years' exams

2) made someone laugh

3) eating my first kimchi

when i came to my office today, i stopped by my pigeon hole really quickly just to see whether some of the house mail had been delivered and if some form had to be returned. there really was a form that needed signing, but on top of it all, there was also a small paper envelope.

let me just say, little gestures like that are the best picker-uppers in the world. a little bit of validation of what i do here at the university with teaching literature and cultural studies sure helps LOADS. because, frankly, i most often get the impression that my seminars are one thing above all: pointless. but every once and a while there's something like this...

this year's first years are a bunch of unmotivated, lazy students. it seems like nothing i do might interest them. not even remotely! i don't know. either my questions are really that stupid and the answers so obvious, or they just can't be bothered with using the grey matter between their ears. whatever i do, i receive blank stares -- and an occassional blink, as if to show me these are not puppets sitting in front of me, but actual people.

let's hope next week it picks up, now that we have covered the least favourite bits (poetry and history of english theatre).

1) dietmar's baby is cute

2) dietmar's baby scares the living day lights out of grown men

3) dietmar's baby is cute

bellow you will find a collection of the best answers from last week's exam marathon. all in all, the students performed brilliantly. but there was the odd occassion when my learned colleague (MLC) and i were literally poking in the dark. i don't know whether on that occassion my face either showed utter disbelief or whether it registered mild amusement. let's hope for the next round i have finally acquired a poker mask!

after 56 oral exams starting last tuesday in the grizzling hours of the blessed a.m. and the consumation of countless cups of tea, it is finally done. i can now officially anounce having survived the marathon that answers to the name of "modulprüfung 1102". it is over. it is accomplished. i am pooped and brain dead. which means that i can return now to the blessings of mr foucault and his warped ideas about the order of things.

you have no idea how much i am looking forward to that one week in london next month!

the exam marathon for this week has finally come to a premature close: the last student didn't show up. so next monday my doctor daddy and i are left with the glorious remains of the final 10 contestants. so far i can say that my students overall achieve rocking scores somewhere in the high Bs and low As. and here and there we even find a smattering of perfect scores.

so since very day this week has pretty much been eaten up by examinations and going home totally pooped out of my mind, social life had received quite a damper. yesterday evening it was pub-time for a few hours. but for tonight's meetup with the people from our department i am just way too much gone around the bend already. in about ten minutes, i am homeward-bound and the plan for the evening has been reduced to passing out in bed with a book covering my face.

toodeloo.

my Doktorpapa and boss has returned from his trip to ireland. funny how everyone in our institute makes it their top priority to meet him as quickly as possible. he has returned from the island of green grass and mist sporting a fancy beard! it is most astonishing, really. it's like an entirely new side to him that we haven't seen before. although we should have, judging from his pitch black humour and the occassional outburst of anarchy. (which always lasts only for an average .5 seconds, but still!)

i am not saying it often, but i do llike my students very much. they are so tiny and cute and i can inflitrate their minds with all sorts of icky stuff and useless knowledge. well, useless outside university circles anyway. their oral exams are just about three weeks away and they start getting this slightly panicy look. like a rabit sitting eye to eye with a gigant eagle. and no matter how often i tell them, 'don't worry! it'll be like a pleasant chat over a cup of tea,' they are still scared stiff. bless them. but i am very confident that they will be little smarties pants and will perform terrificly. till then, though, they will remain walking bundles of nerves. they just don't know yet, how much they actually know!

it's been a month now that i have been sharing the snug little office with dietmar. what can i say, i miss it already just by thinking of the day in september that i have to move out again. but i received permission to return for an hour or two each week so that i can hold my office hour.

so mondays have been turned now into this longass marathon teaching day for me. three seminars back to back and at the end my office hour. but i can't complain. that gets pretty much all the work for uni out of the way in one fell swoop. only on wednesdays i teach another seminar (anglo-welsh literature) for which i'll do preparations every tuesday. so between preparing for marathon-monday and sprint-wednesday, i am now free to actually get work done on my dissertation. which is quite nice for a change.

at this very moment, i am sitting in my new office. the new father had popped in earlier today to show us all the details to enroll the bachelor students for the next semester; i have set up my two literature seminars with the glorious help of the 'copy-paste'-strategy and now i am waiting till 4 o'clock when we will be shutting down the enrollment.

life is great!

... you may find me in the English Department, Geisteswissenschaftles Zentrum. just follow the yellow brick road and at the end you may find the little office that i share with dietmar.

today was my last day as working person at the copy-shop. from now on, i shall only return in the role as 'the paying customer'. ironically, as i am now just about to start my second work contract with the uni, i received today the invitation for the interview with the crack of dawn.

so, please, for next thursday, keep all your digits crossed for this lowly wee one that she will return from the interview in one piece.

ps. i now have officially arrived in the 21st century. for about an hour now, i have been the owner of a new mobile phone -- including camera and mp3-player.

pps. i still feel that this glorified potato peeler is way too much for just calling someone, but at least it's got the added bonus of being pretty.