life of a waterloo uni student during exams.

I have the utmost respect for anyone in CS or engineering or any other program at Waterloo that has a ton of exams. The drive you need to study for as many as 5 in a week is wild, and here I am barely making it through one. But I somehow lived, so here's how my full week of struggling and complaining looked like. Broken. I saw results that were meant to write. I waited all for this moment. You're like a breath of fresh air. The exam is coming up soon, August 10th, and I'm honestly like prepared to, to like get cooked. Hey guys, welcome back to another video, another week in the life, but this time we're actually studying and prioritizing school. I'm in the last week of my summer term at university, and of course it's the busiest week since we're wrapping up with classes. I had 3 classes this term, I finished with one last week, and my focus for this day was finishing a paper for my second class, which I successfully ended up completing in this very nice co-working space near campus. 我等了一生你来来。It was nice being able to work out of my room. I just feel way more productive and focused, and my goal is to always finish something before heading home. I was going to take the Aeon Train, but old news, once again it was out of service. What is it with Aeon Trains being out of service the moment I start filming? If you guys watched my last video, the Aeon Train also had a service disruption. On my way home, I decided to stop by and get the strawberry banana smoothie bubble drink. This summer I found a love for boba teas, actually called bubble teas. I always call them boba teas, but they're my go-to sweet treat. I do prefer the non-milk teas though. They're definitely a lot better. Hello guys. So I finished with 2 out of the 3 courses I have. I have a French to-go and we're going to start studying for it. But before that, let us go on a little camping trip with my family. We're going to have some fun. Just recharge. And after that, I'm going to come home and we're going to do some French studying and grind away and get a good— a decent mark for French. So yeah, let's start packing and let's do this. I have so many clothes on the floor, you guys. I'm going to have to— we're only going for literally one night, so I shouldn't— I'm not packing much. But yeah, I'm going to choose like two outfits and should be good. We're literally only going for a freaking day. Sure, sure, sure, yeah, sure. A few moments later. Okay guys, so we are all ready and set to go. It was actually super stressful getting everything packed. Um, I was like last minute once again, but I'm in the car first, so— and I think I packed everything. Anyways, I'm so excited for this road trip. Hello guys, so we just made it to the campsite. We're gonna be staying in a little yurt like we always do. I was sleeping in the car pretty much the whole ride just because I was so tired. I went to bed super late last night at like 4 AM just because I had so much to do during the day and also I wanted to finish a workout. But yeah, so super tired, but we made it. It was a pretty quick road trip and now I'll just show you guys how this whole place looks. At the beach right now, and I'm still debating whether I want to go swimming. To be honest, I feel so self-conscious with like wearing a bathing suit right now. I just feel really— I don't know, I've been having really bad like bad body image days recently. Oh my God, guys, it's freaking freezing! Can you guys hear the waves? Actually kind of feels good. You know, I think I could do it. I think I could do it. Hello guys, so me and my sister are just sitting and waiting for our parents because we are ahead of them. We've been walking for over 3 hours now, which is so crazy, at 11K, and we still have an hour to go, so we're almost almost here, but still a pretty long way to go. It's been really nice just being in nature, and yeah, spending a full day just walking is awesome. I feel like that's super productive. Let's give it a try. Whoa, it's really bubbly. It has this like these little bit pineapple pieces. I don't know, I don't really like it. Let's try the scone. Kakao. We're back at our yurt and now we're going to try our dessert. So first I'm going to try these that we got. Mm. Mm-hmm. Merci. Probably the best food from today. Mm-hmm, so good. Next we're trying this coffee ice cream that we got to share. It tastes like an ice cap. Okay, let's try it out. It's pretty good. Bonjour tout le monde! So it is the next day, I'm back from camping, and today is the day we are starting to officially study for the French exam that is going to be coming up next— either next Friday or next Saturday, somewhere around the 9th or the 10th. I haven't created an outline yet, but my plan is— my professor, he sent us this model exam, this example exam. I just printed it out, as you guys can see right here. What my plan is to do right now is I'm just gonna go through this exam and I'm gonna try to understand it, and then I'm probably just gonna— it says right here, if I'm correct, I haven't translated it yet, but if I'm correct, it says that This is a model of the final exam for French. Note that the exam will have similar instructions and similar structure. So this is good news. It's going to be pretty similar. So if I know how to do all of this, then I should be comfortable with doing the actual exam. I figured out the first two steps of the process. As you guys saw, I am going to be pretty much creating flashcards for all the vocab we learned. We have a full-on like list of all the vocab we've been learning, so I'm going to create flashcards from that and try to like start slowly start memorizing all the terms. And then I will use ChatGPT to help me create practice problems, practice questions with all the vocab that we learned. And this is going to be a really great first step because the first part of the exam is translating common vocab, and 100% the prof is going to be including vocab that we learned from the course. So if I have a good understanding of some, at least, at least 50% of the vocab, then I should be good to answer some of the questions. I really wish I started this earlier. I didn't realize how long of a process this is going to be. Okay guys, so I have about 157 flashcards created. I just used this app called Revisely, which honestly worked super perfectly. All I had to do was upload the vocabulary document I created and created the flashcards for me, which is so convenient because I don't have to manually do it. I tried doing it in Quizlet and Quizlet is just not working. I had to like manually put it in, so I used Risely instead. And so this is good. I have lots of words I can memorize. That's what I'm going to be doing. So my goal with these flashcards is to just kind of read them all throughout the day. So when I'm going on a walk, just make sure to read them. When I'm on the ION train, read them. So I'll make it a goal of mine, a challenge to just like look at these flashcards whenever possible. So I'm just like surrounded by them all this week. To be honest, I don't even know if I have all the vocab down, but I feel like 159, 157 is a good amount. So even if there's more out there and I'm missing it, I don't think I should worry about it because we're reaching for good enough here, guys. We're not trying to reach for perfection. We're not trying to memorize everything. At this point, I have less than a week, so we're really just trying to get as much content into our brain as we can. I'm not even worried if I'm missing some vocab because I definitely probably am, but I'm not going to worry about that too much. Hello guys, a little update on how studying is going right now. What I'm doing is I'm creating like— like I'm actually creating an exam for me. It's safe to say today is mostly just like getting everything organized and getting an outline of this like full exam done so then I can just like keep repeating it. It's actually been pretty fun just because I've been like multitasking. I've been creating this outline and then I've also been watching like YouTube videos on the side. I I just finished listening to a podcast about dating, which is weird, I know, guys. I've just been like really interested to learn more about dating, but a little, a little break. I'm going to have this drink. I am not a pop drinker. I don't drink soda or anything, so I don't have a problem with that. But this like tastes exactly like a can of soda. But this is like the healthy kind too. This is like no calories, no sugar, anything. This is exactly like ginger ale, guys. Like, it's crazy. It tastes like an energy drink too. Okay, so I'm gonna continue making this practice exam, and hopefully I have enough questions to print out and we can start we can start studying. Progress? Not as much as you'd think. I did end up finishing creating the practice exam and I have it printed out. So that is— at least that's good. Now I can just like start going over and learning all of this. But other than that, I didn't really like fully start diving into the content yet. I probably— I'll probably go on a walk soon and just like quickly go through like my cue cards, my flashcards, I took a little break and I was— I went to post some content. I needed to post a LinkedIn reflection for Socratica on my account, and then I also wanted to post a Socratica recap on my Instagram. So I have those posts up and ready, but actually before I officially start studying, I do need to finish some questions that are overdue, and I'm going to do that while watching some YouTube videos. And I'll just like quickly do it, and then I don't know, I don't know how quickly I'll be able to get it done. It's a lot of things to do, but hopefully once I have all those finished, I'll be able to start fully studying for, for French. So yeah. Hello guys, we are locking in. We're gonna study for— I'm gonna like put on a timer and I'm gonna study for, for an hour, just trying to get good progress on the practice exam because like I was doing the practice exam today, but I feel like I haven't really gotten much much into it yet. I practiced more of the vocab with flashcards, but again, like, I haven't been like super focused. Like, this morning I studied, but I was listening to a podcast while studying, and then after coming home from like running errands, I, I was watching YouTube videos while studying. So it just hasn't been really focused. So I want to just do a full-on like deep focus, um, studying for an hour, and then after that I'm gonna finish off by reading a book, and then I will go to bed like at 12 PM. I will go to bed at 12 AM because, guys, last night I went to bed at 3 AM in the morning. I don't know what I was doing. I was like watching random YouTube videos, and that's just not good. I need to be sleeping. So next hour, we're just— we're locking in, and then I will see you guys after that hour is finished. Let's do this. Hello guys, so it is the next day. It is Saturday and today's plan is to just continue studying for French. I feel like I didn't get too much progress yesterday. I don't know, it's just, it's so hard for me to study right now just because I don't feel the sense of urgency to. Like, I still have a week to go and see, because I still have time, I feel like I don't have this like this stress on me. That is telling me to like hurry up, you gotta study. But I'm really trying to like push through that, and, and I'm trying to get the sense of urgency because I know last minute studying is not the best. I'm not going to learn anything from like cramming last minute, so I'm really trying to get some progress with it. And hopefully today I'll get some progress. My plan is to maybe study somewhere else today. I have— I might be going to play some volleyball with some of my Socratica friends. Usually I don't really like spending my weekends doing school, but it just needs to be done, so I'm really trying to push myself to get some progress today. Hey guys, so these last last 3 hours were absolutely crazy. So I wasn't studying for French. I was actually working on editing a BuildSpace video, like a demo video for BuildSpace. So you guys know that I've been like working on— I was doing BuildSpace, like the 6-week program where I'm working on the documentary, and I never actually ended up submitting the demo day video. The last update, I don't know why. Maybe because I— maybe I don't know why I didn't, but one of the people from BuildSpace from the BuildSpace team reached out to me. They're like, yo, where's your demo video? We would love to like use it for something special. And I was like, oh, oh shoot, I got to hurry up then. So, so for the last 3 hours I've been just working on editing, like filming and editing the demo video, which I finally finished and I sent it and I finished just in time. He told me that he wanted it by 5 p.m. and right now it's 4 p.m. in San Francisco. He's from San Francisco, so just just in time. I submitted just in time and I feel so like so good. And I'm really glad that he reached out because like I pretty much finished season 5, which I'm so happy about. So yes, I'm so grateful for his reminder. And now I'm going to stop editing and I'm going to probably take a walk or maybe go on a run and then I will come back and I will continue working on French. So I was just about to start studying for French And then out of nowhere, an email comes from Build Space, like, pretty much like congratulating anyone, everyone, for like finishing season 5 and all that. And I read the email and I scrolled down, and I was just like curious because there's like, there's like, they choose 20 people to get like a $5K grant. And I was just like curious, like, who got it. And I was just scrolling through it and I saw my freaking name on the freaking screen. And I was like, I started like screaming, like, fuck! That's all I've been— I'm usually— I don't usually swear, like I'm not a swearer, but I freaking won. I was one of the— what? I'm one of the 20 people that got a $5K grant. That's insane, you guys. I never won anything in my life. I never got an— anything this big before. The city is not the place for us to be. Why you hate me? Was it something I did? Yeah, I don't need to offend, I'm just waiting. I just came back from a walk and I, I'm gonna be celebrating my win with some jackfruit. I got this from Farmboy today. I freaking love jackfruit. I'm obsessed with— this is like the best dessert ever. Like, screw ice cream. I went on a walk and I saw like so many people lining up for ice cream, and I was like, this is amazing. So I'm gonna eat this and just celebrate because I am so freaking happy and so insane. Like, first ever grant. I've never won anything before, so this is just like— this just makes me really happy that like my efforts are really like playing through. And see, I'm just gonna eat this, celebrate. Mm, this is so good. I'm in the car right now, and as I guys told you before, the It's gonna be my first time driving this route in a very long time. I used to drive the same route when I was back working as a lifeguard at a pool, but it's been like years, so let's see if I can still get there without breaking any rules. So wish me luck. I did it, guys. I fucking did it. I drove all the way to the library on my own. I'm just so proud of myself. Like, you guys, I actually did it. Like, I knew the rules and everything It was just so smooth. I'm so proud of myself. Hey guys, so I'm at the library. There's actually quite a few amount of people here, which I guess I'm not surprised because it's summer, there's a lot of kids. Um, but I have this table right here that I am just gonna start studying at. I really love this, like, the atmosphere, honestly. Like, this just gives me back so many, like, childhood memories. Like, I'm getting kind of like nostalgia from this because I remember we used to always go to the library with my parents, with my mom, and I would like be like one of these kids here. But yes, anyways, I really like this style. I really love like— I think that I actually prefer this environment so much more than like university environment because I've just, you know, I've seen like my people my age so often and sometimes it's just nice to be able to see people other ages. So great progress so far. What I've been just doing is pretty much trying to memorize all these different French words, and how I memorize is I just like rewrite them a bunch of times until they're ingrained in my mind. So I'm going to be doing that all throughout, and hopefully I have some— I already memorized the direct object pronouns and the indirect object pronouns so I know that I've memorized "avoir passé", "avoir passé", "avoir être", and I've memorized some vocab, but there's still a lot of memorizing to go. And honestly, guys, I'm like just thinking about the exam Friday, and I, I just don't know how I'm gonna do it. Like, there are just some words that are going to be hard to fully memorize, and I'm— I don't even know what words are gonna come up on the exam. They might be completely different words. So I'm so like, I'm so scared for it, but whatever. At least I'm like studying for it. I'll get points for some parts. So I just finished studying at the library and I don't know, guys, honestly, I'm like super frustrated. I feel like I'm going nowhere with this French studying. And like I felt, just felt so distracted. Like I got some progress, like I've memorized some things, but at this point I really hope I can just pass with like, I don't know, just pass. A pass is like, what is it, pass like a 50 or 60? I just really hope I can get at least 60 because it's just really tough. I'll probably like come home today, um, come home, I'm gonna have dinner with my family and then continue studying. Wait, wait, wait, wait. What do you like about this girl? I mean, there's like a lot of things. Hello guys, so it's the next day and as you guys can see, I'm right here in my backyard enjoying this beautiful view. And honestly, I don't know why I didn't think of this right from the start. Like, this is such a good idea, sitting here and just studying. Like, perfect. But you guys, just look at this view. Like, it's so incredible. I'm so grateful to be living in an area like this. I just finished with a workout. While I was working out outside, I was like, wait a minute, I have a backyard I could be studying in. So I brought over this chair and I'm going to be just going through my flashcards. It's really all I need, my phone to go through, through flashcards and just make sure I have these words down. Because you guys, I'm starting to get really nervous for this. My exam is in 2 days, not even, pretty much 1 day if you don't count this day. I'll have 1 day left. I calculated my average and I'm currently sitting at a 60%, which, um, that is actually insane. And if I— like, insane in a bad way, like, that is very low. And if I want to pass with at least a 50%, I need to get at least like 35 on the exam. And I'm at this point, I'm really nervous that even a 35 is undoable. Like, I've been studying, but I just don't know if I still— I still have what it takes. So if I get a 35, then I will pass the course because that's all I really need to do, just need to pass someone up. Hey guys, so I'm currently on a walk. I've been walking for maybe like 30 minutes now, and I've just been studying on the flashcards. And guys, I don't know, this is so challenging, this is so tough. I don't know if I can I can do this. Like, nothing's working. Like, I'm not remembering any of the words. And look, I'm just kind of thinking about the exam and how am I gonna like type everything up? How am I gonna like write everything out? Like, if I don't have a word bank, there's no words. How am I— I just, I don't know how, how it's going to be possible, guys. I'm so nervous. So nervous, guys. I'm back at home. So I ended up walking for about 2 hours. The first hour or so I went through flashcards. I went through about like over 200 words. I feel like maybe it helped. I was a little disappointed during the walk because I feel like I wasn't really making any progress, but now looking back, I feel like I remember some words. For 30 minutes, I was kind of just chilling, watching YouTube, and now we're gonna have dinner with my family. And I also just printed my French practice exam, another one, because I finished the other one. So this is— printed this one out, so I'm actually gonna go through this exam. I'm gonna try to like work on this exam without like looking at anything, and then after that I'll check. And then if any— if I make any errors, which I will, I will definitely be making so many errors. I don't even know half these things yet. Oh my God. And also, I don't know what I'm gonna do, guys, with the last section where you have to write an essay. Guys, I did not practice writing in French all this time. So embarrassed. So I don't know how I'm gonna write I like a 200-word essay. I don't know how I'm going to do it. Good morning everyone! I'm in my sister's room right now so don't tell her but it is the next day. It is Thursday, the final day before the exam on Friday and today is going to be a very, very focused study day. I'm going to be heading to campus actually like pretty much right now. It's going to be like full-time on campus day. Because today I'm meeting up with my friend. We met through rowing and she's back in town, so we're gonna catch up. And then I have Socratica in the evening, so I might as well just stay on campus all day. Yeah, I'm about to head out. I did my workout today. I did another at-home workout, second day in a row, which is crazy because it's really been a— it's been a bit since I've done follow-along weight workouts at home. So I'm really proud of myself for waking up and doing another weight workout. I want to try to be a be a little bit more consistent with those. But I want to show you guys kind of what I'm bringing to campus. I have— yeah, so I'm gonna be studying all day. So first thing I'm bringing is this laptop, which I'm gonna show you guys because I usually always bring my huge like editing laptop, but it's so heavy and I'm not editing at all. So I thought I'd just bring this little small laptop that I've been using. I'm gonna actually gonna be vlogging on this camera, guys, on the Pocket 2. But you guys know I've been using. It's just a little bit easier to bring and carry around than like this big camera here. It's super cute, it's like a Wii remote. The white color is actually a little bit more rare. Usually you see a lot of black of these, but white is pretty rare. And I want to show you guys because I recently got— my dad recently got me the— this lens right here. It's the, the wide angle lens, which I've seen people use it and it just makes such a big difference. So I'm going to start using this wide angle lens. So From here on out, I'll be vlogging on this all day. I brought this little pouch which has all the chargers. A downside to this is that it dies really quickly, so I need to bring a charger for it. And then I have my water bottle, of course, which I freaking love this one. I need to fill it up. And then I'm just bringing— I'm bringing a lunch bag. So I had breakfast, I had a smoothie bowl this morning, and I'm also going to be bringing me a lunch because I'm going to be on campus all day. And I, guys, I hate campus food so much. Like, I'm so indecisive when it comes to buying stuff on campus because I'm always trying to find something really healthy and there's like no— there's no— even the salads there are like, like, what? They're just— it's just so bad. I hate campus food. So I decided to make myself a sandwich and bring some veggies. This is just so much better. Um, and then I have stuff for French. I have this notebook I'm gonna be using, and then I have all my notes in this. I printed out another practice test for French, guys. I love to carry this around. It's kind of like my wallet, guys, because I don't really have a good wallet. Like, you— my driver's license is in here, my student card, my credit card, and I also— my like AirPods are in here. I have like lip balm. I have some money money. And I'm bringing this floss, this makeup floss, because I love to— like, I need to floss my teeth or I need to brush my teeth after I eat. So bringing this is going to be handy. And then I have— this is just kind of my pencil case, I guess. You have my mouse in there, all my pens. So yeah, this is all I'm kind of bringing. So let's head to campus right now. I'll be there until like 10 PM, but hopefully I can be productive. And of course I'll be in my favorite Velocity Digital study area. Also, this is what I'm wearing today. I'm wearing this shirt that I thrifted and then this really comfortable skirt that again, I love to just like wear all day because it's just very easy. It's very comfortable to sit in all day and it's just so flowy and free. So yeah, this is the fit. Okay, let's go. Hello guys, I'm on campus. I'm in the washroom right now, but I'm about to head to Velocity the Doodle to drop off my backpack, and then I'm gonna go and head out and meet my friend. We're gonna just chat for an hour, and then after that I'm gonna be grinding away in French because guys, I have one day left, so I really have to make sure I get all my studying in today. So it's gonna be— yeah, but anyways, um, also I'm using this wide-angle lens. Hopefully it is wide-angle enough, but yeah, let's go! 我买了一杯草莓抹茶。I got the strawberry boba tea. And he got— I got a coconut milk. Okay. Too sweet. So for mine, I put in honey instead of sugar this time, and I actually really love it. I want to try that. Let's try each other's. This is nice. Hey guys, I just finished hanging out with my friend. It was really fun, lots of tea was spilled, but now it's time to lock in and study. It's almost 4 PM and I haven't studied at all today, which is really bad, guys, but we're gonna really focus now and try to get lots of things done. Because I have Socratica at 6:30, but even at Socratica I'm gonna probably continue studying anyways. So yes, anyways, let's just head to my study area and we will just— we're gonna cook. We're gonna do some French cooking. So I'm on my way to Socratica right now. I'm a little bit earlier. It starts at 6:30. I'm going to be 30 minutes earlier. I just feel better coming a little earlier just because I usually help host the session. So I like to get there, set everything up for people. And also I just couldn't study in Velocity Digital. I just— it was a bit— sorry guys. It was just a bit like very dark. I couldn't— it was a hard time for me to concentrate in that area, so I kind of just wanted to move locations. So I'm going to study in that area, which it's a little bit more comfortable. And but in general though, I feel like I haven't really gotten too much progress. Okay, there's people coming, so I'm just gonna stop here. I made a landing page, so, um, it's just like based on a real website and I just copied it, but coloring. So if you look at this original clip, it's hard to see because I can't I can only show the small version. This is my attempt at doing it. I have two versions. One has her slightly more zoomed in. Finish. So I still have to include like pictures or something? And then just another one. I'm trying to set up like the colors that appear to be most likely to draw attention to them. So that's why I have it. Guys, today is the day! So it is Friday, I finished with my workout, I had breakfast, and now it's time to finish off with a few more hours of studying before I have to take the exam. I don't know, I don't know, I don't know if I'm ready. At this point I'm just gonna be like, screw it, whatever, I'll just try to my best. I don't even know what I have left to study. I want to probably study the vocab, and then I will also do a little bit more writing practice because I don't know if I'm prepared for the writing aspect. But it's going to be crazy, guys. I don't know what's going to happen, but We're doing this now? You have orgo? I do have organic chemistry, but it'll be okay. If I finish early, I'll stay until maybe like 6. You set up the camera while doing project work sometimes. Yeah, I dance because it's kind of one and done. Yeah. Easy, like— Uh-huh. Thank you, you too. See ya. Hey guys, so I just finished with my exam and to be honest, I don't know how to feel. I genuinely think I failed. I nailed it. It's actually kind of embarrassing.