Dearth of Activity

I woke up this morning to the music wafting in my open window from the primary school across my backyard.  Every weekday morning at promptly 8:45 the music encouraging the students to stretch, warm up, and do physical activities comes on (always the same 3 or 4 songs in the same order).  It reminds me of the images of Asian workers doing movement in unison to start the workday and remain alert.  I am usually out of the house by the time the activites are culminating, but today my studio was cancelled so I had no reason to be out of the house.  After a 10 minute break in music (at which time the children were "encouraged" - read "yelled at" by someone in charge), K'Naan's song Wavin' Flag - the anthem of the 2010 World Cup (and my RAship at GHP that summer) - came on.  It proceeded to play three times with brief breaks and, from the yelling on the loudspeaker, a few things I could see through the trees, and my best judgement, the students were performing a routine that involved waving flags.  It is a radical departure from primary schools in the US, no doubt, but the hour of exercise and group engagement at the beginning of each school day seems an interesting model.

I left the house about 9:30 and headed into studio to meet with two membes of my group who I am working with on a paper for architecture.  We chatted for a while and I feel I can safely say I have some friends in my studio group now.  Not too much work was accomplished, though I did get to skype with mom and dad so that was good.

I suppose I will talk about the differences between studio in the US and studio at Uni Sydney.  It is probably easier to mention the similarities - there are architecture students in a building... that is about it.  The studio here is a large modernist building (lots of concrete and odd angles - oh the 1960s...) Our studio does not have individual desks nor room for drawing boards or the standard fare which we have in studio in New Orleans.  Rather there are tables and chairs which are scattered around a large room with different nooks and crannies for break-out spaces, more akin to the collaborative environment which many offices have adopted of late.  I don't know how I feel about not having my own space, but we will see how things go.

Studio at the University of Sydney.

After wrapping up our meeting I headed home for some lunch and a bit of work on my own.  This afternoon a cake was delivered for Abs' birthday as I awaited for my roommates to return home.  When they got back we sat around for a chat and dug into the (cup)cakes in honor of Abs' 18th!

Birthday bite-sized cupcakes.

Finally, after Tiffany got out of class around 4:00 we all headed over to Broadway to do a bit of shopping.  I have yet to get tired of the little joys I find in their grocery stores down here. Today's gem comes from the cereal aisle...

They are not Rice Krispies, but rather Rice Bubbles.

We are soon off to get a birthday dinner for Abs, hopefully the drizzle that just started will ease off.