Hitman, Batman, Upperclassman 

It’s the beginning of Week Two and I’m still getting lost on campus. The University of Melbourne’s base in Parkville is an urban mixture of old and new: tall buildings with glittering windows climb towards the sky, and the older buildings sit comfortably off paved paths lined with silver-barked trees. As I walk from class to class, I lift my head to the sky and feel at home in the long shadows. St Andrews is beautiful, but it is so wonderful to be somewhere tall.

Classes here are different: a combination of reaching Honours level and being somewhere new. Lectures are fast-paced and busy. My Latin class is around ten people, taught by a kind, soft-spoken man who, in addition to Horace, is guiding me through the Georgics. I had forgotten how much I love Latin, and along with this lapse, I have forgotten much Latin. In both cases, my memory is returning.

Between classes, I head to the library and do my reading to the soundtrack of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Lunchtime is often spent with my friends from res, whom I now know sufficiently well for small talk and pleasantries to be replaced by sarcasm, gossip, puns, and other low forms of conversation. Today, however, I discovered the joy of a capella, rediscovered the joy of Imagine Dragons, and took part in a flashmob in the Union dining area.

I watched Wolf Creek.

Don’t watch Wolf Creek.

Definitely don't watch Wolf Creek if you're going hiking two days later.

Around forty residents, myself included, are currently living out our own personal horror stories: the brutal, Hunger Games-esque Tag ‘Em and Bag ‘Em which has swept like a disease through the hallways, sentencing the fearful to their rooms and the foolish to their demise. Each person is assigned someone to track and tag; once tagged, you are out, and the tagger goes after whomever you were tracking. The game lasts two weeks. There is only one survivor. The centre of the mayhem, Suzanne Collins’ cornucopia, is the Games Room, where the most residents can usually be found. I can neither confirm nor deny my own plans to venture into that cannibal’s den. 

 Fact: Melbourne was nearly called Batmania. In 1835, John Batman bought 500,000 acres from Wurundjeri elders – the only time on record, alleges Wikipedia, that European colonisers actually bothered to negotiate land occupation with locals first. However, due to language barriers and Batman’s concept of land ownership being entirely European, the treaty was far from cross-cultural, or, one might say, actually a major scam. The official British objection to the treaty, from Governor Bourke, was that the Treaty had 'no effect against the rights of the Crown': rather than criticising the treaty's glaring flaws, Bourke placed the rights of the empire above the rights of the indigenous population, but is anyone really surprised? Anyway, I digress. Batman called Melbourne Batmania. But not many other people did. Sadly.

That's it for now. Back to the books - tutorials start tomorrow...