thanks to all you who commented on the previous post. i found your answers interesting, and have a lot of thoughts but am not sure what to do with any of them.

in other news... this week i am doing some greek intensives, at a winter languages school. the morning class is advanced classical greek, looking at Euripides' Helen. We are meant to cover almost 600 lines, but I'm not sure that we will. I certainly haven't prepared anywhere near what I should have. There is a huge gap between reading a lot of Koine (I happily pick up the NT and read pages in Greek without a thought for the dictionary), and reading classical drama (which is painfully slow because every second word looks alien). Nonetheless, sitting in the first class today I felt more than competent, which is always a great relief. Our tutor keeps talking about Sanskrit and Indo-European linguistic principles, which is a great deal of fun.

the afternoon class I am taking is an introduction to NT Papyrology, which is slower going (due to the personality of the teacher I think), and promises to be a different kind of fun. We did a lot of talking about the production of papyrus and scroll-writing and archaeology and letter formation and evolution today. one of the things that was really interesting was just how freaking huge the collection of papyri from Oxyrhynchus really is, and how little they've managed even to sort through let alone publish

These little independent summer and winter language schools attract a certain cross-section of people. Here is my observed demographic breakdown:

- older students who studied greek or latin in the 19th century, and either never gave it up, or more likely have retired and now pass their years reading the classics. some of these are a great deal of fun, others are know-it-alls who have been around everywhere, suffered every ailment, and have an opinion on both.
- the students: young students in high school or uni who are in the throes of learning the language, eager for punishment, and not entirely sure what job prospects they can look forward to. almost universally these are women. okay, maybe 5% male.
- the oddballs. there are truly some weird ones who turn up for these things, and they are always repeat offenders. they have strange clothes, funny moustaches, and sometimes need a decent shower. often they have some crackpot theories, and would love to share them with you. sometimes they also pretend to be more knowledgeable than the tutor, which is especially funny in intro classes.
- the christians: there's always a few because their historical heritage is embedded in greek in particular, but latin a little too, and so you can be guaranteed to turn up a few.

there was a good representation of all these groups today, and i ran into at least 6 people i knew from different yet related contexts. it's always good to run into people one knows if vaguely...

anyway, should be a good week. also managed to pick up some course-notes from the uni that were out of date. $2 each for a massive booklet of notes and now i don't need to feel like i should have enrolled and taken those classes!