the countdown

1st April - for me it's not April Fools. It's the start of the countdown to the end of my student life. Today I paid £42 to hire the graduation gown, hood and cap. And I reserved tickets for the ceremony. This is it, last 2 months of my 20 years of education.

This is what's going to happen in the next 2 months:

4 April: EALC30012 essay on Kabuki due

5 April: planning to hand in my resignation at the restaurant

6 April: stupid EALC30000 grammar test (yes - we're still doing JLPT 2級 stuff. *yawn*)

8 April: last EALC32000 assessed presentation

30 April: (hopefully) my last day of work at the restaurant

3 May: EALC32000 essay (in Japanese) due

6 May: EALC30000 Japanese-English translation (3.5 pages from Norwegian Wood - it's about food and cooking. Thank goodness I took the time to read recipe books when I was in Japan)

9 May: EALC30000 oral assessment (another 10min speech?)

13 May: Dissertation due

16 May: parents' 30th (pearl) anniversary

24 May: EALC32000 exam (translation plus Japanese writing)

31 May: EALC30012 Japanese Theatre in Historical Perspective exam

After the exams I'll probably do absolutely nothing for a few days before heading south to London to look for a new place to live in. June is going to be just flat-hunting and house moving. Graduation is 14th July, then after that I'll probably go to HK to visit family. And while I'm in the Far East I'm hoping to hop onto a 3-hour flight to KIX so I can feel like the old days again. Maybe just for a week or so.

Apart from travelling, there are several things I'd like to do this summer: read novels (there are way too many books I want to and ought to read which I haven't had the time to do so), watch movies (ditto), catch up with friends in London and HK, read lots of magazines, blog more often and take plenty of photographs.

My parents asked me what I'd like as a present (for graduation - I don't really know why. Should I be getting a present?). The first thing that came into my mind is a Canon EOS5D Mark II, a full-frame DSLR with HD video. Yes - I'm ready to jump ship (from Nikon to Canon). I still love my Nikon F50 and I still love film photography. But a DSLR is just so handy. Anyway I thought of it, but immediately abandoned the idea. The camera costs like £2k+, there's no way I'd have my parents pay that sort of money. So then I thought of a Canon (!) PowerShot S95, which would replace my current Panasonic Lumix DSC-LX3. S95 is a little more compact so I can tuck it away into my pretty plum-coloured clutch from Coach. But then they might be baffled by the idea of me getting yet another camera...