I'll let you know again :)

Hello dear readers,

I am approaching the halfway point with strong steps... October 9th marks the halfway point of my time at university. Unbelievable... I am currently in a 5-week exam phase. Every week I have at least 1-2 exams, plus the usual quizzes and homework. Week 3 is over now, so only 2 more weeks to go. After that, I have one (in numbers: 1!) week without exams before it starts again. And someone claims again that you can get grades here without doing anything. However, the grading of the exams here is sometimes... well, questionable. Despite calculation errors, you get the full score on a task. If the teacher is not satisfied with the curve (i.e. the grade distribution), he simply raises the average - that's how I suddenly had 7 points more in Supply Chain Management. Well, I won't complain about that. So currently I still have 670 out of 700 points in that subject!

This week, not only were there elections in Germany (which I don't want to write about here), but also at Ole Miss. Even 2 of them. On the one hand, there was a vote on changing the mascot - from the bear to the landshark, and on the other hand, Mister and Miss Ole Miss were elected. For weeks now, there have been signs all over campus promoting the candidates. In addition, there are thousands of stickers. I have seen people walking around wearing stickers from 5 different candidates?! So the chances are higher that the winner will be among them. Oh, by the way, the winners will be announced at the Homecoming Weekend, which will be the next home game. So there are still 2 weeks in between.

Since there was no home game for Ole Miss in the past few weeks, I took the opportunity to engage in other activities. Two weekends ago, we went on a hiking trip to Tennessee with Ole Miss Outdoors. It started on Friday afternoon with a group of 2 group leaders and 10 participants (7 Germans, 1 Spaniard, 1 Indian, and 1 American). Due to various delays, we arrived at the parking lot at half past 1 in the morning and spontaneously decided to camp there. IN TENTS! There is simply nothing better... But there is something better. On Saturday, we walked a total of more than 21 (twenty-one!) kilometers. And not necessarily in a straight line, according to my iPhone, I climbed 115 floors up. Probably the same number down :) Over hill and dale, sometimes it felt more like climbing. In between, we saw beautiful viewpoints and waterfalls. Exhausted but proud, we reached our destination after about 8 hours. Foster Fall! There, we treated ourselves to a refreshing dip before getting ready to set up the tents and prepare dinner. Strangely enough, I slept MUCH better in the second night. On Sunday, after breakfast and the opportunity to visit the waterfall again, we headed home. However, I missed out on this opportunity. At that time, I simply didn't want to see closed shoes anymore :D On Sunday evening, we arrived back in Oxford. Exhausted but happy!

Last weekend, I had visitors. Namely, my brother and my mother. On Friday, I showed them around Oxford, and on Saturday, we spent the whole day in Memphis. We were accompanied by Jannis, another German who is crazy about football ;) First, the Memphis Pyramid, then Beale Street. The Pyramid is a huge Bass Pro Shop, an outdoor store. You can simply buy EVERYTHING that has even the remotest connection to outdoor activities, fishing, hunting, etc. Really intense. In addition, there is an observation deck, which you can reach with the largest freestanding elevator in the world (?)/the USA(?). Beale Street is definitely more interesting in the evening, but we were lucky that there happened to be a car show at that time, so there were mega cool cars everywhere. After that, we wanted to at least see Graceland from the outside, but that's not possible. Everything is hermetically sealed off, you can only see the two airplanes from the outside. Even for parking, they already charge 10$. The admission prices range from 30-80$, so we decided to skip that. In the evening, we went to a football game. Since Ole Miss had a bye week, we had to find an alternative. Fortunately, the Memphis Tigers happened to be playing at home, so we could watch their game. They simply have a live tiger in a cage - for the ENTIRE game! On Sunday, we went shopping, and on Monday, the two of them continued their journey towards Natchez and New Orleans.

What's coming up next? This weekend, we're going kayaking, and on Saturday evening, we're going to Tuscaloosa to watch the Ole Miss away game against the Alabama Crimson Tide. The weekend after that, we're going to New Orleans.

Best regards from Ole Miss

Franz

P.S.: So that I can start mentioning a few names, here is the "credits" for the hike:

Starring: Rowena, Lucia, Franzi, Domi, Kathi, Harriet, Anastasya, Manasi, Taylor, and our fabulous group leaders Emily and William!