early reflections

6712 had the final today, two essays, i wrote them up in about an hour and a half. i am confident in my answers, any stress i have is based upon who is doing the grading, we have an English teacher here as a TA, and i am worried he will knock off points for not liking the way i write. the questions basically had us go through the initial development of communism in the Czech Republic and the rest of Eastern/Central Europe, and the second question was the post-communist development of the Czech republic and one of its neighbors. after class i took another sweet nap, before heading off for the end of dialogue boat ride. the boat ride was fun, not only were (most) of us students there, but there were a few of our lecturers and tour guides. the boat took us up the river (so northwestish) and through a lock, and then back down the river some. about a 2 hr trip, i was enthralled in conversation with the clique of girls i hang out with for much of the time, (though the tank fell asleep at various points, apparently not appreciating not only our final moments together, but also our final moments together in such a beautiful city as Prague, she claims she felt), and enjoying the scenery, so i did not follow through on any discussion with the guest lectures. the end of the boat ride also meant our last interaction with Harlow over the course of the trip, and likely my last physical encounter with him ever. we shook hands and said our goodbyes, ill probably follow this blogpost up with an email to him, i hope to use him as a reference for my grad program applications in the not so distant future i suppose there should be some reflecting going on now that we are near the end. i will surely have better stuff after my hours of flight time, but ill put some ideas out there now. overall this was a great trip, the various excursions (barring the long walk) were engaging and educational, i have actually been to most of the locations we wandered through, but i was still enthralled at every turn. the various lectures, and guides that went with us to these places were all very knowledgeable, and for the most part engaging. my feelings are torn as to the variety of students on the trip, my last dialogue was filled with international affairs, or poli sci, or history kids, so to be here with different majors, the bios, the journalists, the comms, made it a different experience. their lack of knowledge about the region made the discussions were a little more broad than i would have really liked. but it also gave me a chance to reexamine my outlook and knowledge on all this stuff when they (namely the troop of ladies) turned to me in an aside to ask something or other.