Week 29 - Midterms and Intramural Racquetball Champion

As I leave on Friday in the morning (and miss one class and one quiz) I have to post the weekly update today on Thursday. This week was all about midterms - on Monday I had my software engineering exam, on Tuesday I had digital image processing as well as 3d game development and on Wednesday I had my cyber security midterm exam. All of them went quite well - I already have the result for digital image processing and I'm totally okay with it (84/100).

Besides taking these exams and studying for it, I went climbing on Sunday and Wednesday. On Tuesday I should have my last racquetball game of the racquetball tournament, but my adversary did not show up -> so as I won all my other games I won the tournament now :).

Furthermore, I also went again to the Boxing Body Beatdown which is every Wednesday and we had our first soccer game on Thursday. I also went to Fat Patty's on Tuesday, went to Jake's on Wednesday and I'll also go out again to Fat Patty's today.

AND NOW: SPRING-BREAK, I AM COMING :D!!!!

Week 28 - Poker Night, International Party and Preparation for Midterm Exams

Again one week passed and I can say that it was an eventful and fun week. On Monday we went to the "Herd Talent Show" where 8 Marshall students performed various acts from singing to dancing. On Tuesday after I went climbing I had my second game of the Intramural racquetball tournament and I won it - so now I'm in the playoffs :). On the next day, I only had one class as one of our professors wasn't at the university that day and at the evening and night it snowed a lot - so classes on Thursday and on Friday got canceled :D. So the first free snow day had to get celebrated with a new run in the snow with only swimming wear and shoes. I also went climbing that day and we also played soccer on a field that was covered with 15-20cm snow which was really fun. At night we borrowed a poker suitcase and played poker with about 12 players which was also really nice.

On Friday after working on a few assignments in the morning, I went climbing again - and I completed a 5.10b route the first time :). Afterwards we played again snow soccer and at night we had again one of the International Student Organization parties (Unfortunately this time I don't have any pictures).

As I have 4 exams on the first 3 days of the next week I had (have) to study the whole weekend for my midterms... But after I complete these exams I'll go on my spring break trip to Buffalo, Niagara and New York and therefore I have something to look forward to :D.

Week 11 and 12 - Gaming Night and International Festival

The 11th week was rather quite, there was not much going on. I had the Spanish midterm, that I passed with great success :). I was also able to get an exception to take an Computer Game Development 3D-Course next semester and so I won't have to make the Computer Graphics course in Austria.

Besides the academics, there were about 160 Mexican students arriving at Marshall - they are making an English course and will stay for 5 weeks. On Thursday, I had a racquet ball game, which I also won and therefore I won the whole racquet ball championship for this semester. At the next day, we had the first INTO-party with the Mexicans which was great fun and afterwards there was a game night at the Campus Christian Center, where we played Mario Kart and learned a new card game.

In the 12th week there was more going on. I had to finish 2 projects and make a presentation about the software engineering project, but that was also going well. On Thursday we watched a comedian show - "Dakaboom" was making a comedy/singing-show that was pretty cool. At the next day after class there was a ceremony where a lot of people thought of the plane crash on December 14th, 1970 where 75 people lost their lifes, including the whole Marshall football team and some of their fans.

Afterwards, we helped to setup some stuff for the International Festival on Saturday first. We also went to the first basketball game this season, which was really nice, Marshall won. We participated in the halftime show - I represented Austria and carried the Austrian flag over the basketball court. Afterwards we went to Margarithas, a Mexican restaurant where we had a party with the Mexican students. Dancing is really important to Mexicans and you can see that they practice it a lot, because they can do it very well. I tried to learn Salsa a little bit but I think I will never be able to move like they do :).

On Saturday, I stood up pretty early to finish my poster for the International Festival. After that we had brunch and went to a tailgate party with the International Student Organization and we also went to the football game afterwards. Marshall won again and has now 10 wins and no losses! Go Herd :). We had to leave the football game earlier to be on time at the International Festival. I shared a table with the Netherlands, where I answered a lot of questions about Austria. And you won't believe it, there were more than 10 people who thought I was from AustrALia :). I think I really should buy a t-shirt "No Kangaroos in Austria" :). I also wore my Lederhose and that was really an attraction for the Americans, I was a motive in I guess more than 30 pictures. Furthermore, I also participated in the fashion show, where a lot of people represented the clothing of their contries. The festival lasted 3 hours and we went again to Magharitas and Jakes and had a really funny night.

Today (Sunday) and the whole next week, I will try to achieve as many points as possible for the Marshall Cyber Security team, where I was recruited to solve hacking problems. It was really hard today to solve some of the problems, but finally I could really help the team.

The next week is already the last week before the Thanksgiving break and I am really looking forward to the trip Chicago and Cincinnati and afterwards there are only two weeks left until the winter break - time is flying, but I am glad that the semester is almost over.