Classes Conclude

Somehow, I have reached my last week of classes in New Zealand. On Monday May 29, I had my last Media of New Zealand class. Our professor was revising (I learned that means “reviewing”) the material from the course because we have a final exam on June 19th. It will be online and multiple choice but the questions look way more confusing than I would have expected from a multiple choice test! Luckily it’s also open book.

I walked into town after class with my friend Sophia and we went shopping at New World. We are hopefully going to meet up again after our exam to celebrate being done with the class and to say goodbye before I depart the country.

On Tuesday I had AI class. One of the professors we had during the first week (teaching about history of AI) made a triumphant return to go over other AI topics this intro class didn’t have time to cover. On Tuesday I was also still hard at work on my fourth AI assignment. It’s about scheduling and finding the efficient routes for deliveries without trying every single route.

After class I made my way into town to the Te Aro Design Campus where I was going to have my children’s book printed. Amazingly, I ran into a student from my Visual Narratives class who I knew had printed out a book of the same shape and size as mine so she helped me fill out the print request form. I kept running into people from Visual Narratives since they mostly go to class in this building. I talked to one person for a while about all her animation projects.

I got the pages printed but realized that my book was 26 pages but printed on paper so there was two blank pages. So, I knew I would need to add two more pages to the book – by tomorrow. I decided on adding an “Author’s Page” and just a cute drawing. I returned to Kelburn campus for AI Help Desk but the tutor was more willing to tell me how many points I’d lose for not doing it correctly than helping me understand what I was doing wrong…

I then went to my last tramping club meeting. They won’t be holding meetings at the school anymore since the semester is ending. They went over what happened last week and what would be happening soon including all their mid-winter plans. Then they showed a video they had put together from a tramp back in April. I wasn’t on this one but if you’d like to get a sense for the club, check out a couple minutes of this! https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=fA-kr3fRrWc&feature=youtu.be

That evening, I finished adding the Author’s note and drawing for my book and then went to the Everton study area to do some debugging of my AI assignment.

The next day, I headed back to the Design campus, got my book printed correctly, submitted my Media of New Zealand essay(!), and then got a bagel for lunch from a place called “Ugly Bagel”. I then walked into a parking lot and joined a phone call with my parents and Elina to wish my cousin Zev a happy birthday! He turned 21!

I was early but decided to head off to my final Visual Narratives class. Being early gave me time to staple the books I had printed. I am very happy with how my story came out! If I’ll be seeing you this summer or at Brandeis, I can show you in person! If you don’t think I’ll be seeing you in person soon, let me know and I’ll send a digital copy!

My professor gave a fascinating presentation on the future of narrative. He talked about a wide variety of topics from how conspiracy theories are attractive to people because they fit narrative structures more better than real events like Covid-19 to how AI will affect art. Then we all went around and looked at each other’s projects! Everyone did a very impressive job!

I sure will miss that class! I walked back to Everton (and stopped for a banana chocolate crêpe on the way!) and got ready for dinner. I met up with Skye, Rebekah, and Autumn from the Arcadia group and we walked down to town because tonight was the Arcadia Abroad Farewell dinner. At the restaurant, we met up with Jane, Olivia and some of the other students. We all reflected on our trimesters, ate yummy food, and had a lovely time. I gave Jane and Olivia each a copy of my children’s book which they really liked!

On Thursday, in the morning, I went to campus because Jane had given us Arcadia shirts yesterday as a gift but mine was too small so she said I could pick up a larger one from her when she was at a cafe on campus. I said hi to her and Olivia and got the shirt! It was so kind of them to provide us with one! After having five successful book prints on Tuesday, giving one to my professor and giving those two to Jane and Olivia, I was running low so I went to a new print shop to get more made but they had high prices so I tried another on campus but they couldn’t figure out how to print them. I’ll just have to go back to Te Aro campus next week to do it!

Our AI assignment was due yesterday but we are allowed three free late days and I had one left so I went to the help desk and finally realized why I wasn’t getting the correct solution so I made the needed fix and submitted later that day.

Thursday is Dungeon and Dragons night for my flatmates and their friend Dylan was over getting prepped on his DND character so I was able to give him a copy of my book because he was interested in seeing it and will be working as a teacher aid at a primary school soon so it seemed fitting! When they all returned from DND, we discussed possibly doing a fun iceskating night in Upper Hutt but it looks like it will be hard to arrange around everyone’s schedules, especially since I don’t have a whole lot of time left in Wellington.

The last day of class was a Friday. I called my parents in the morning and caught up with them a bit. Then AI tutorial where we were going over what to expect on our final exam which will happen in person on June 22nd. Yikes!

In the afternoon, I FaceTimed my friend Michael from Brandeis. We had a lovely time catching up. It was great to see him! I know he is a dedicated reader of this blog so- “Hi Michael!”

Afterwards, it was a bit windy but I wanted to go to Scorching Bay Beach which is in Miramar and fly my drone. I hadn’t been before so I decided I’d go even if it was too windy to fly so that I could at least see it. I took the bus which was about a forty minute ride and arrived at the beach. The wind seemed to have died down so I called up Air Traffic Control and took some pics. I wasn’t able to go more than 200 feet because of my proximity to the airport so the photos aren’t that much different than what I could do from the ground but better than nothing. Two little kids were playing near me and asked me how old I was. They were six and four and very sweet. They said goodbye many times and kept waving as I headed out.

I walked for a bit on the coast and then got tired and took a Uber back to town. I went shopping at New World in preparation for the overnight tramping trip. Since we are making a Charcuterie Board at the hut, I bought some cheese, crackers and fruit to bring.

I caught up with my flatmate Sam at dinner and in the evening, I made some sandwiches and packed my backpack for the tramping adventure. Would you like to hear about the tramping trip? Well, just wait a few days and there will be a whole blog post about it!