Banking Woes & Week in a Nutshell

Hey all,

This week has been basically the same as last week .. just class after class with some labs thrown in. Lets see we learned/reviewed molecular biology and biochemistry (so lots of DNA, transcription, RNA, proteins, etc.), there was also some thin and thick lens formulas, a bit of physical optics (more properties of light), and then the new fun part which was retinoscopy. As I believe I mentioned before in a previous post I was in the lab group that got to do it this week and so we did spot retinoscopy which I found was a bit harder than the streak retinoscopy (which their going to show us later in the term, but I was already shown at work and a bit at Georgian). Although we didn't do the ret on any of our classmates this week it was still fun and great practice, and I can't wait to do more...but it's going to be good that next week I get to do more Ophthalmoscopy, so that I can get more practice on that, and we're going to try and draw what we see this, which is going to be very interesting given by drawing abilities ;-).

Aside from classes this week I actually decided to start studying, so I've actually spent a few hours each day in the library! I know it was a shock to me too! In the evenings not too much happened this week...got free pizza at optics society meeting where Keeler (an ophthalmic instrument company) came and showed us many of there instruments. Then on Wednesday was more free pizza at an International Optometry student meet and greet where we got to meet some of the other international students from 2nd and 3rd year and chat with them over pizza and wine. I say it as International since really there were only maybe 3 students there who were not from Canada, the rest of us were all Canadian. It sounds like apparently there are like 13-15 Canadian students in each class (although this year with our about 28 Canadian 1st years we're the biggest so far!). It was nice talking to them and seeing what they're all up to and their backgrounds and I was surprised at the number that either went to Waterloo, or Georgian, or both! It was a good night execpt the pizza went really fast and it was too bad that only about half of the international students attended it, but it was still a lot of fun.

One other thing that I did this week was I also finally got my banking sorted out! Basically as an international student I can not open a bank account until I get a confirmation of enrollment/bank letter from the university, which I can't get until 24hrs after I enroll in my courses. My enrollment was 1.5wks after I arrived, so I got the bank letter on Oct 1st. I then went to the bank on October 2nd. There were two banks to choose from that sort of offered international students a no fee bank account: Natwest and Lloyds TBS... since I could never talk to anyone from Natwest, I ended up going with Lloyds. They were both the same, in order to get a free account as an international student I had to put x amount in the bank account within the first month and keep it there for at least 24hr (so no big deal there). I went to Lloyds and set up the account, put a few pounds in at the time I set it up and then wait for my card and internet banking stuff in the mail. I was also given all the codes that I needed to send money transfers, so on the 8th I got my mom to wire money from my Canadian account to my UK account. Then on the 9th I was able to view my UK account online and I was surprised to see a nil balance... not even the few pounds I put in while I was at the bank! But I figured I would wait till Monday and go to the bank and activate my card and also check about the money. Card was activated fine, the money transfer can apparently take up to 4 days...so with the time difference, holidays and nothing happening on the weekend they still had till Tuesday to receive and process it, so that was okay...but as for the few pounds they had no idea but would look into it and get back to me later in the day. They never got back to me...but then again I had my cell off when I was in class and don't have voice mail set up so no big deal. But I checked online on Tuesday and still no money .. so I went back to the bank with everything they had given me and asked where my money was. This time they decided to get the manager right away since no money was in the account. The manager was really nice and friendly and she quickly realized that the person who had opened my account had written down the wrong bank branch number which effected everything, and so all my money went into someone else’s account!!! but she assured me that they would of course correct the situation and make it all right by the end of the day on Tuesday, and she then gave me all of the correct numbers too. So I went home and at 3pm that afternoon I checked and it was all there which was nice that I finally had gotten it sorted out! It was a bit annoying...but I was happy with how they handled the situation, so I’m keeping my money with them...and hopefully no more bank problems :-P

Well now I just realized how late it is! Normally I can tell by the amount of noise outside .. as around midnight it usually starts getting loud with everyone heading to the clubs .. but tonight it has been eerily quiet .... actually now that I think about it the whole campus and even in town it has been quieter than normal for a Saturday! .... oh right it's probably because it's Diwali (the festival of lights).

Happy Diwali and Saal Mubarak everyone!


- UK word of the week "Hob" this seems to be used to describe the cooktop (or even just one of the burners) -