Tess' blog

sorry it has been such a long time since i posted. everyone around imperial is under revision and exam stress, some people only have exams to get through now others have some more lectures before or if you are lucky and do physics you get both exams now then lectures and more exams! though it is nice not having too many at a time. anywhoo not much exciting is going on. most societies have stopped or slowed for revision including the Pimlico scheme i did where you act as a teaching assistant at a london school. all that i have going on apart from my studies at the moment is training for my 10km run for Great Ormand Street Hospital on the 27th of may. it should be a really beautiful route passing most of the famous monuments of London along the Thames, i am actually starting to look forward to it since i discovered the other day that i am actually capable of running 10km with out stopping in a time much shorter than i expected! go me! (still incredibly slow but hey you have to start somewhere! )
hope to post soon with more interesting things to say…till then feel free to sponsor my run at http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/fundraiser-web/fundraiser/showFundraiserProfilePage.action?userUrl=challenge4charity

This weekend has been amazingly, fantabulously, superbly glorious. That is mostly because it has included a vast amount of sweet homebaked food! An extra special treat when you are a uni student and freshly baked treats are solely provided by you and your friends from a shared kitchen. When going through pictures of the what we made this weekend I also found pictures of the cookies I made over christmas which I forgot to post on here. I figured better late than never so here goes.

Weekend treats (our excuse was a birthday party not just general consumption!)

Here are some sandwiches we made and the rest of the pictures are my christmas cookies.

So in the spirit of keeping you updated on the first year university experience here what my week was like.

The previous weekend I was given an assessed problem sheet so I thought to my self , don’t plan anything then you can go through a first draft of that . What actually went down is that Friday night I went out to a last minute friend’s birthday celebration at London’s Comedy Club. Saturday I woke up late then walked to Fulham for an amazingly mouthwatering home cooked meal and a whimsical french film snuggled up on the sofa. As soon as I arrived back in halls get a call to go to Evelyn Garden halls to play articulate since neither me nor my friend can form big enough groups in our halls alone to ever play (clearly we’re really popular), and as we all know an occasional game of articulate is necessary to get by! I ended up staying there till 2am eating pancakes. This is when I make the dumbfounding discovery that several of my friends have never had proper American pancakes. I know what you are thinking, this is just horrific, how could I possibly be friends with people like this, well we are getting there. To rectify this problem it was arranged that they would come over to my halls next Friday to make them together. Needless to say not much got done the rest of that weekend.

I have to say pancakes are so helpful. That Tuesday I was getting a tad stressed about my workload in the library. I left to get some free pancakes and ended making them for over 2 hours before feasting on the ones left over. It was here is was given the idea of how to make my basic American pancake recipe that bit fluffier. My oh my did it work well, if I do say so myself! It make have taken a few batches and some dodgy hobs to perfect but I think i have finally mastered it and fed some hungry students along the way. Not only did I not fall asleep when I went back to the library I also was pretty productive. On my way back I was in such a good mood I skipped and sang down exhibition road thinking no-one else would be around only to run into two people as I go around the corner. Sometimes I forget I live in central London!

Friday in celebration of handing in our assessed problem sheet we celebrated by making our new perfected pancakes and chatting till the wee hours of the morning.  Saturday one friend from another uni came to visit then Sunday another one came to visit so all in all no work got done again…. I think I am starting to see a pattern. Anyways that all means I should stop writing this now and do some of my problem sheets!

Camden

So just found these on my camera. They are pictures from chinese new year. The first one is Neslon’s Column (i believe…) lit up with a moving dragon and the second is the crowd earlier on when there were acts on the stage. Genius me didn’t actually think to get any picures of the stage or any of the performers in their stunning costumes. Sorry! There is, however, a picture of the National Gallery where you can see famous painting like Monet’s lilly pads and Van Gogh’s sunflowers.

So you may have picked up that I have been talked into doing a 10k run for Great Ormond Street Hospital. Because of this fundraising is necessary in order to make my quota for sponsorship. One method tried so far was to bake masses and masses of quotably “the best chewy chocolate chip cookies”…or so the recipe said!

Anywhoo point being I had some of the most fun that night in my halls than I have had all year. Just imagine running around halls greeting people by shouting “COOKIES!” then shoving the great smell of fresh out of the oven cookies before running back to check the next batch aren’t burning. So I recommend next time you have some free time make a fairly large batch of cookies for your halls and pass them around. It is a great way of getting to know people and they will love you forever (or at least as long as they have a chewy cookie) I had so much fun I am thinking I will try making cookies for my hall without demanding money some time in the near future. (though if anyone in my halls is reading this they may have to remind me!)

So sorry about my number of posts last month guys.  I would like to say January is a particularly hectic month with exams and what not….but I don’t see my coming up months getting any less so.
You are catching me in a great mood right now (despite an impending lab report.. yes when you get to uni lab reports will be the bane of your existence!). As you may have noticed … it has SNOWED!!!!!!!!!! one of the things that makes me love Britain the most, the fact the whole country can bond over something.

If you are not at uni yet just want to tell you it is one of the most mental but amazing experiences ever. Even someone like me, who that didn’t get up to much before i got here, is completely run off my feet trying to keep up with everything going on. You will not get a chance to get bored at Imperial. Yes you will get so many worksheets that if you got them all out of your folder at the same time you may have to use your scientific brain to learn how to swim through paper to prevent yourself from drowning, but you will have a million other things to get up to as well.  Apart from the lab reports (though remember your listening to someone more into theory) its all pretty interesting. For example I cant remember that last time before uni I was as excited as I was last week when I learnt triple integration! I couldn’t stop grinning in the lecture…I mean literally, I tried as I thought I must look weird to the other students!

Break down of a typical(ish) week at imperial:

-get an assessed problem sheet at the beginning of the weekend due in a week.

Sunday- go to London chinese new year celebrations and fireworks, catch a glimpse of some famous paintings at the national gallery at the same time.

Monday and Tuesday (as well as full day of lectures)- try and make a dent in assessed and non assessed problem sheets (oh yes still getting non assessed problem sheets this week) and french coursework

Wednesday- only half day of classes then off to local London school to act as teaching assistant for the afternoon then evening outing across the road to the one and only Cirque du Soliel! great to get subsisdised tickets with university halls.

Thursday  (classes continue)- use that fact the library is practically 24/7 to stay up late finishing work due on friday… yes i know i should have finished it earlier.

Friday(more classes though half day only!) – after lectures celebrate having finished work due in by buying cookies and losing student card on the way back from store. panic looking for it. stop panicking. meet relative in london for tasty bread and butter pudding. ask security for help with card at 16:42. run to ID office top get there by 17:00 for new card. get there at 16:46 and find they close and 16:45. Give up eat cookies! using iplayer preparing for quite weekend stuck in halls working. get call to go to trendy club. head out with coat, oyster card and deodorant. Meet up with other university of london students, end up missing club but still have great night. crash in other uni halls.

spend all Saturday day chilling around london playing in snow. crash another night.

head back to halls for free brunch next day. have usual sunday freak out about work that hasn’t got done.

start panic working and the cycle begins again…..

So, in the effort to be a better person after being thoroughly intimidated by all the amazing impressive people I have met since starting at Imperial, I am determined to be able to run 10km come the 26th of May to raise money for Great Ormond Street Hospital. Any support would be greatly appreciated.

http://www.virginmoneygiving.com/challenge4charity

The holidays are here and I am taking a brief break from studies to be festive at home preparing for christmas. As you may have seen from my other posts I’m feeling particularly excited about christmas this year. Just today I made 3 different kinds of christmas cookies and decorated a christmas tree and the downstairs of my house. But I have decided to spare a quick thought for those who are in a position I remember being in last year, mid university application .

First things first, if you haven’t submitted applied yet then dont worry, it does require work but it is not too bad. Everyone stresses over their personal statement as it is the one thing we have control over but dont worry too much. If I were you I’d try and make sure that there are no spelling mistakes or lies in it but other than that just relax a little. I remember being utterly clueless and starting my personal statement with “I want to study physics because….” . But as I calmed down a little and realised that, as boring as I thought I was, I did actually have things to say I managed to get something a tad more interesting (though also more cheesy) written down.

If you haven’t written a personal statement yet here a a few pointers. I would write down in a list all the things you have enjoyed doing in your subject of choice, all the things that inspire you to take it further or things that made you realise that this subject was for you, then all the things you have done to do with it not directly for school ( I think you could include school projects if you particularly enjoyed them as well as books you may have read, work experience, etc).

Once you have that list I’d try writing it up properly in a way that flows smoothly. Thats was never my strong point so unfortunately I can’t give you many tips there.

I understand that many of you will have already submitted an application so there is nothing you can do there. For those expecting interviews that havent had one already (again I realise probably a little late) here are some other tips.

Try and be relaxed, more often than not they just want to get to know you and they are not going to prod you like a test guinea pig until you astonish them with your genius new ways of thinking (you may laugh but I seriously thought this way before my interviews). Also they expect you to be nervous so dont worry about trying to hide it, it wont make you look any worse. I found it helped me to try and talk a little bit with my interviewers before and after we had any technical discussions so I was less nervous about speaking to them when answering their questions and could just worry about the problem at hand.

Finally once all is over and you are simply waiting to hear. Big hint, if a university says they probably won’t give you a decision until a certain time then don’t freak out until that time arrives and dont expect to hear from them the instant that period begins. For example my interviewer at imperial told me I’d get a decision in 2 to 6 weeks and as soon as those first two weeks passed I was obsessive in checking my email to see if they sent anything. If I were you I’d enjoy your last year of school or gap year or what ever it is you are doing as you won’t get a chance to do it again in the same way. I know me and some of my friends have found ourselves reminising about old school shananigans from our last year at school or what people got up to on their exciting year abroad, none of which woud be possible if you worry too much about your application.

One way I calmed my self down is by thinking of what would i do in the worst case scenario. As much as i didnt want any rejections, when I considered my options if I didnt get accepted anywhere they didnt seem so unreasonable (for me that was get a job, try and find work experience, maybe learn something new and apply again, but with more experience!)

Anyways I hope this is at least mildly helpful. My main message is “don’t panic!” you are about to embark on one of the most exciting parts of your life no matter what happens and you should make the most of it!

So I know most of these are not on campus but I went to Oxford street and Trafalgar square today and I couldn’t resist!