My Cooking Progress and Commentary Vlog

So as you know. This year I'm living in a dorm, and, unlike American dorms, this British university doesn't include meal plans SO we have to learn to cook by ourselves. I've literally never cooked before coming here, so my parents had to give me a crash course and hope i'm doing alright. 

Of which is a yes and no.

Last semester, of course, was 100% experimentation. I fried chicken once really well, but never did it again. I learned to boil veggie-meat soup things, which was basically my diet for the first couple weeks. I kept screwing up boiling pasta (and it wasn't the first time, either, i constantly failed back home) until I finally figured out the heat was too high after the gazillionth fail. But my favoritest thing was figuring out how to stir-fry [ON MY FRICKIN OWN! HA! Without a cookbook!] by accident. And then my experimentation took off from there.

Unfortunately, upon return from Christmas vacation I had all sorts of technical issues, grocery stores were low on stuff I knew how to cook because of the cold and the snow (really, Britain has a serious issue with not enough imports), etc. Then I got busy, so this was what I was eating for the past couple weeks. 

Anyways, so this vlog is me showing how I cook egg fried rice. Finally got an opportunity to shoot it. It's not really a tutorial/how to cause I'm not a chef, so I'm just making pointers and comments here and there.

Here's a link to more food that I've cooked last semester: http://airanimechiic.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/baby-steps-into-cooking.html

UEA Norfolk Terrace Tour

So I'm living on the campus residence/dorm called Norfolk Terrace at UEA and I've finally finally finally made a small video giving a mini-tour of my flat!

This is the floorplan that I sorta drew out because UEA decided not to provide one for some reason.. To clear up the "L" and "zigzag" thing, basically, it looks like this:

Drawing not to scale!

     Basically, I took you around in this order- starting with the entrance at #1, going into the first hallway, or shorter end of the "L" at #2, kitchen at #3, second hallway or longer leg of the "L" at #4, the bathrooms at #5, and then I walked all the way back to the yellow dot with a red arrow where my room is.

     In case you're wondering what my room looks like, this is more information and the following floor plan:

I live in room B.

And that's it! I hope you enjoyed this video or found it useful.

UEA Dance Squad at LSU Dance Comp 2013

So, I was in UEA's Comp squad and we went to LSU Dance Competition 2013 in Loughborough (which I will forever pronounce wrong).

UEA Jailbreak 2013!

Anyways, so March 8-10, 2013, was the weekend for Livewire's UEA Jailbreak fundraising event, where teams of 2 or more have 48 hours to travel as far as they can from Norwich, with the goal of raising £10000 for Cancer Research. I volunteered to help with the live tracking in Base Camp back in UEA.

Livewire: http://www.livewire1350.com (Check for reults)
The Tab: http://norwich.tab.co.uk/2013/03/07/jailbreak-day-one-live/
Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/search/realtime?q=%23jailbreakuea&src=savs

Snowing in Norwich, England!

So back in Norwich, it began snowing for realz in January. Goddamn was I excited!

Exchange Program in the UK 2012 Start

So, this fall, I began studying at University of East Anglia in Norwich, UK and I couldn't decide between keeping a vlog or a blog about it. Preferred vlog, but yea, that's what I've been doing during this hiatus- prepping for studying abroad.
Anyways, so last week was my first week at the university. The key thing is that the differences are so subtle, they stand out by a mile. Such as small lingo changes from "parking lot" to "car park", "to rent" to "to let", "biking" to "cycling", "trash" to "rubbish", "pants" to "trousers". Converting dollars to pounds ;_;. And of course, the road- driving on the left side as opposed to right, all the different lane markings. Is still getting myself accustomed to it. And naturally, of course, I have never been surrounded by so many accents before, from British, to heavy British, to really heavy British, to German, Greek, French, Polish, etc. etc. The accents are questionable whether or not it affects me in a bad way. In a sense, I'm already used to a diverse amount of pronunciations so the accents themselves aren't jarring. However, when things become misunderstood due to the pronunciation differences (i.e. "a" could sound more like "uh", etc), thats what i find awkward. My horrible cooking and direction sense are also coming in between things- my rice is still mushy, I totally screwed up boiling pasta, I burnt egg of all things. Although, luckily so far, I haven't had any problems with boiling my vegetable-chicken soups (and I haven't gotten sick of it). :)
But wait- this sounds like my experience has been crap so far right? Oho, I never mentioned how amazing my classes and basically, the intellectual aura of the place is. UEA is set in a university town, so naturally, the main focus of this whole darned place is on the education; whether it's competent or not is debatable.
Anyways, this fall, I'm taking considerably fewer classes than I would at my home university. Only three- Landscape, The Gothic, and Modernism. All of them consist primarily of readings and then a few essays. Much like literature/history classes in the US. However, unlike back in the US, I suddenly have this amazing urge to start working on them earlier and trying to think critically. If I'm able to fully develop these working skills, I hope to carry them back to the US... like big time. Also, in regards to research, back in the US, I would always use online references- y'know, wiki, google, sparknotes, etc. However, like I wished and expected, I'm suddenly using books- like real physical books- to do my research (well, of course they're required for the 2 literature classes, but Landscape is a history class). And in regards to research in the library? I. Fuckin'. Love. It. I spent a bit over an hour (understatement) just pouring through the history section of my school's library because I was so fascinated by these real, physical, primary sources. Old, fading paper, fading typewriter ink, crinkly binding, and all. Just almost surreal.
And, of course, I have developed this peculiar method of staying optimistic. For example, dorm life, which I will cover in another post, I hope, no matter how trivial a concern, my mind somehow automatically warps it into a story idea or thinking- this is what I've read about in chick lit stories, dorm stereotypes- I'm finally living it! Because, honestly, I was prepared for these problems and I'm fuckin' bathing in loving the fact that i'm experiencing it! So it's not so much the problems that I'm focusing on, I'm more focusing on the experience of having problems. Once again- like it's surreal. Also- this week- I got sick! Great way to open the semester! (Along with 2 of my flatmates.) However, optimistic thought=at least it's not around finals.
So this has been this week- I will post again next week (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

-Resa