Consistency: A Promise

I sat down last night, intent on writing a short update.  I wanted to tell you all that I would do my utmost to be more consistent, to set Sunday or Monday as 'update day,' on which you could expect a weekly report.  Perhaps it would not be as thought provoking as some of the more major issues, but you wouldn't have to guess and come back a dozen times only to find nothing new has been written.

Quite a bit has happened in the recent past, specifically things far outside my control, that I still haven't quite found the words to describe.  Yet, I feel like nothing of any real significance has occurred here.  I am a student.  Studies are currently my life, and as one may expect, the classes range from exceptional to average.  What will follow may be a bit dry, but I was asked by a few of your about my classes, so I hope to include at least a basic gist here of what I am up to.  Among my courses, there is a considerable amount of overlap.  The topics of my courses, their 'tagline titles' if you will, are international armed conflict and international law, conflict resolution, decision making, strategic aspects of International relations, deterrence, research methodology, Hebrew and two courses in Arabic (literary and Jerusalem dialect).  I am also in a few workshops which meet less frequently, but are designed to be more hands on and teach you techniques through experience rather than lectures and tests.  The only workshop I have attended so far is a media workshop that works on public speaking.  It is quite a lot of fun.

I have a hard time imagining it's much different elsewhere.  Despite the fact that Israel is half desert, and you may expect it to be hot all year, it is actually getting chilly.  So to my friends still at school in the states, living off campus with roommates, if you are wondering what I'm doing, it's probably something akin to what you are doing.  The main difference is when I bike to school in the morning, I must pass at least a hundred signs, very few of which I can read.  But as far as the classes are concerned, I miss the ability to actually make a schedule, as opposed to taking only the required courses (many of which are only offered once a year).  I'm trying to check out the extracurricular activities I can get myself involved in.  I am also currently working on arranging to go to a dojo to keep training in Shotokan karate.  My roommates have yet to catch me practicing kata in the living room either early in the morning or late at night, but it's bound to happen.  I do hope that I can manage to make it to a dojo around my classes.  I understand that the course is somewhat designed with people who work in mind, but personally, I'd rather start class in the morning, and have the afternoons instead of going till nine most nights.  And with that I will leave you all till next week.