Revolving mid-terms. One more to go.

[icarus]

Sitting a room that smells like wet dogs, students sniffling with the first colds of winter, the Ethnomusicology professor hands out a midterm that's much harder than our practice exam last Thursday. I thought I did well, until we staggered out of class and someone said, "I couldn't think of an instrument in the 'silk and bamboo orchestra' that's from Southeast Asia."

"The sho," I said confidently.

"The sho's not in the silk and bamboo orchestra."

It isn't? Uh-oh.

My Sanskrit midterm? Oh hell this class is tough. I wish I were ten years younger. Those sci-fi databases that plug into people's minds now sound like a good idea and to heck with pesky little "mind control" issues. I'd like to just type a glossary of Sanskrit words and download them to my brain.

The feminine demonstrative paradigm I was supposed to know for the exam? I think I got it.

Recognizing the verb forms? I probably made up a few verb roots unknown to the Sanskrit language (until now) but at least I could identify the person, number, etc.

The section on identifying the declined versions of nouns of adjectives... Oh man. Picture a sentence. Now scramble it like a crossword. That's what this section of the test looked like to me. I relate to the student who said on the way out the door, "I'm not used to being behind the curve!" Amen, lady, amen. Sanskrit is taking me down a peg.

The translations from our readings? I think I nailed that.

The new translation on the last page. Um. Er. Well... there was a lot of guessing since I only recognized one of two verbs, couldn't remember the definition of the pronoun svara, the word tava, and the meaning of shapam which seemed to be an adjective (I think). The verb in the the subordinate clause didn't agree with "son" which at first appeared to be the agent of the clause, so svara was probably the agent.

Ah, well. The one good thing about have two midterms with only ten minutes between them: like pulling off a band-aid, it's quick and painless.

Comments

[balikpulang.livejournal.com]

Nuts! I'm from Southeast Asia, I'm passionate about music, and I have no clue ... the pipa? erhu? angklung? Curious what (and where) you're studying? Good stuff!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Ah! We're studying Ethnomusicology, and I'd share the music with everyone but sadly UW has been too careful to avoid any reproduction.

I've always loved gamelan music but Legong is absolutely new to me. Wow. The other day we set up an entire gamelan orchestra in class.

The pipa came from the middle east, while the erhu's from the Tibetan/Mongolian border. The angklung... now that's a possibility.

Icarus

[balikpulang.livejournal.com]

The pipa came from the middle east, while the erhu's from the Tibetan/Mongolian border. The angklung... now that's a possibility.
See now, this is cool. Didn't know all that! So, are you majoring in music or Asian studies and eventually plan to do a world tour performing with say, Yo-Yo Ma, one day? (I used to live in NYC, and am now in Singapore - and the one thing they have in common is at least a decent performing arts scene)

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm majoring in Asian Studies, and there's a particularly good professor specializing in some of my other areas of study who just happens to teach Ethnomusicology. The class is one of the "cross-regional" options for the degree, though primarily I've been hoping to make a connection with him.

Icarus