First Day of School!

Hello and Happy 4th of July Eve!

Today we had our first day of classes and I had the same class with five other people from our group. We woke up at 8:00, bought our bus tickets, and got to our class room in plenty of time. I made Matt, Jake, Luke, Ross, and Mike turn around so I could get a first day of school pic so if any of their mom's are reading this, this picture's for you, haha.

We actually got there about 15 minutes early so a couple of us grabbed a small coffee and I had a tasty thing similar to spinach pie (one of my favorites back home).

 None of the Turkish students nor the teacher showed up until 9:00 when our class started and we could tell the teacher was nervous when he was setting up his laptop. He told us a different professor backed out of teaching our transportation engineering class so he had to teach the class and that his English was not very good. It was pretty much 30% English 70% Turkish but we found out later that he spoke old Turkish so the Turkish students didn't even understand him all the time.

It was funny because one of his slides had expectations for him and for us. His expectations were to teach the class, be at office hours, and help when possible which the Turkish students found hilarious. They seem to laugh a lot when they find something funny. But our's was basically to show up and do work and lastly to "not be rude, if possible." Then he continued through the slides and pretty much just read the slides. He had his own notes too as to what to say in English and you could tell he was really nervous because his hands were shaking. But it's okay, we understand he was put in a crappy situation and the students are already very willing to help us out.

Once the class was over after about an hour (it was scheduled for three hours) we wanted to find a cafeteria or something so we went to a small cafe similar to Sparty's but they didn't have actual food. We asked the people working there where the cafeteria was and they didn't know what we were talking about but some of the guys from our transportation class were able to show us and recommended a meal for us to eat and even sat and ate with us. They were very friendly and we talked about a bunch of different things. Only 1.5 guys are shown but there were four there. One of them worked in Missouri once and has been to Chicago, Ohio, and I believe he also said Michigan (the guy taking the picture).

Somehow we talked about whether they liked American girls or Turkish girls and they said they don't really care too much about either but really like Russian girls. So I'm pretty thankful I don't look Russian so I don't have to play that game. Other than that, we found out about how they don't understand our professor either and that all other civil engineering classes have never been like that. They're usually all taught in English by professors who know the language well.

The guys we met were very friendly and even rode the bus back with us to take us to a printing shop
to print the book/information we needed. We would have had no clue what to do book-wise if they didn't tell us so that was nice. But unfortunately they didn't have the file we needed so we have to print the stuff a different day.

Another group went to a fluid mechanics class and they seemed to really like their teacher and said it was pretty basic to start out with. This is the class they're in the process of approving so I hope it works out for them.

Nine of us were finally able to register for classes so we went back to the main campus and I was able to take a few pictures of the campus (these pictures don't accurately show how beautiful the campus is).

Other than that we haven't been up to too much. I tried to buy cereal and milk for tomorrow but the milk wasn't refrigerated so I was kind of sketched out about it plus I didn't feel like looking for a bowl and spoon to buy. I'll be looking forward to my daily bowl of cereal once I get home. Five of us also tried ice cream for the first time here and it was very good and a more thick with a slight gum-like texture. It was at this place below and Sean, Qianqian, and I also played backgammon while waiting for our dinner.

Mehmet asked us to go out again but we decided not to because the majority of us have hydrology together at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow (we're such responsible students). So the guys are playing poker instead with Turkish money right now but I don't feel like losing money so I'm just going to watch. We're looking forward to celebrating Fourth of July tomorrow though at our welcome party and then my birthday's on Friday so we have some celebrations to look forward to!

I'm kind of tired of posting blogs every day though so I probably won't post one until at least Thursday but maybe later (unless something crazy happens tomorrow).

Iyi Geceler! and Happy 'Merca Day!