Greetings all,

Well it's been an exciting few weeks! I've just come back from a trip to Palmerston North where I did a presentation at the New Zealand Psychological Society conference. This conference talk thing has been terrifying my fellow undergraduates and me for months now, so it is wonderful to have it finally over with. We had a pretty good time at the conference, although neither the city nor most of the sessions I went to were particularly exciting. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, nothing too controversial happened. My professor is fairly outspoken and has in the past gotten into clashes at this type of thing. She does research on how easy it is to create false memories, and her conclusions are not well-liked by those who believe that memories (of child sexual abuse, for example) can be repressed and subsequently recovered.

We had a great deal of fun hearing tales from my professor and the PhD students about the adventures of various big-names in psychology. Palmerston North also boasts the best playground I have ever seen in my life. Two of the guys from the lab and I chanced upon it as we were out exploring the city. It went on and on and had a giant hamster wheel, trampolines, and a sort of big zip line that you could sit on and fly down. It was amazing! I'm pretty sure it could not exist in America because of the potential for lawsuits.

Anyway, overall we had a lot of fun, and it was good to get out of Wellington for a while and see a bit more of New Zealand. There were lambs gamboling in the fields as we drove along, and it was all very picturesque.

Despite my best intentions, I have not been doing as much fencing as I planned this year. However, my flatmate's boyfriend recently brought most of the flat along to the Medieval Club's fighting practice, which was quite an experience. They basically just hit each other with blunted rapiers and sticks and things, without any of the rules that sport fencing has. I found it difficult to adjust to both the lack of rules and the new style they tried to teach me. Needless to say I was trounced repeatedly (I had some serious bruises to explain the next day at university), but it was lots of fun!

On the classes front, the most exciting thing lately has been a visit by an Iranian woman to the Political Islam class that I have been sitting in on. She was absolutely fascinating. She did a great job of explaining Iran's political system, and convinced me, at least, that there is much more potential for real change there than I would have thought. She also had great stories about jumping from roof to roof while fleeing the morality police and dancing with her head scarf wrapped around her arm so she could put it on immediately if necessary.

Finally, another movie plug. I highly recommend District 9 for those who like Sci-Fi. It was very unpredictable and kept me riveted the entire time. It was gross in parts and there is a lot of death, but it's a great story very well done.