Studies at KU

It's been nearly a month now since I first came to Copenhagen. Things here have become familiar to me: both life and studies. :)

In the University of Copenhagen ('Københavns Universitet' in Danish =KU), one intresting thing is that the course here has very few contact hours and a great proportion of self-study. We meet the teacher 2 hours a week in class, and a whole semester consists of 12 weeks, which means all in all 12 lectures to attend, but we have two read at least 300 pages of novels, articles, textbooks, etc. per week to get ourselves prepared for the lectures. Therefore, self-discipline becomes extremely important in studying in KU, which is a very new situation for me because it is quite different from that of ZU.

My class schedule at KU is as following:

Cousre 1: Yoga, Meditation And Healing In India
Course 2: Film And Society In Postwar Britain
Course 3: Twentieth Century African American Women’s Fiction
Course 4: Grammar and Perspectives on Language
Course 5: Danish Culture and Society

Because these are all courses in the humanities, we spend a lot of time in class discussions and off-class readings. I think for students of science or engineering, things must be very different.

This week I happened to have done two presentations in class. One is for 'Film And Society In Postwar Britain' about the 1958 British film 'Room at the Top' in its historical and social context, together with a Danish classmate; the other is for 'Grammar and Perspectives on Language' about the 'Cooperative Principle' in Pragmatics proposed by language philosopher Paul Grice, together with a Chinese classmate.

Both presentations seem to have been quite successful and got positive feedback. My teachers liked them, and some classmates also praised me afterwards. :) An elderly student in the film class (he is at the age of my grandfather, but I'm not sure if he is studying for a degree or simply auditing this course) knew that I'm from China and told me after class that my presentation was great. He also asked me for how long I have been studying English; I answered ten years. Then he said, "For ten years" - a pause and a complex facial expression as if in deep thought- "Your English is very good."

I said "thank you" to him and was very pleased. But I tried to understand what that pause and that thinking expression meant. I don't know if this "your English is very good" means "As a Chinese your English is surpringly good, I never expect a Chinese student to speak such fluent English" or does it simply mean "your English is very good, by any standard." But I guess possible implicatons do not matter much in this situation. It is nice to be appreciated anyway.

Another dialogue that I found interesting happened between a shop owner and I a few days ago. I was trying to top up for my mobile phone and the shop owner was very nice and friendly; he helped me because I could not understand the top-up instructions in Danish.

"Your cell phone is really nice. I've never seen one like this before. :)"
"Oh really? Thank you. :)"
"....Are you from Japan? :)"
"No, I'm from China...The cell phone is of a Korean brand, but I bought it in China. :)"

It just reminds me of the time when we were traveling in Paris before the JF Orientation Meeting last September. We were having dinner at a Frech restaurant and Zhen liked the food there very much, so he decided to give 5 euro tip to the waiter.

The waiter was delighted and asked "Are you from Japan? :)"
"No, we are from China. :)"

Sometimes I simply find these dialogues very interesting, though I don't know how to interpret these dialogues properly. After all I think the recognition and identification between different cultures is a very intersting topic to explore.