An introduction to The Academic Blonde
Before I start this blog and journey, I thought I’d tell you something about myself and who I am.
I’m Marielle, or Mary, I’m 21 years old, I’m Dutch and I’m starting my English Language and culture course at the University of Groningen this September. It’s a bit of an unusual start with Covid-19 so the classes are probably mostly online, which is a bit of a pity since I actually like going to lectures alot.
Studying English at the University has been my goal for the last 3 years now. In my last year of middle school I actually auditioned to study Classical music at the Royal College of Music in London and jazz and pop at ArtEz in Zwolle, to which I both got accepted. I realized that I wanted to keep music as a hobby and a few days before my graduation I looked into studying English.
Because of my middle school level (HAVO) I couldn’t go straight to unirversity so I signed up for the course middle school teacher in English at NHL Stenden, a university for applied siences in Leeuwarden. After 2 years I got almost all my subjects for my bsa/propedeuse except one, grammar, because I have a learning dysability (Dyscalculia) which makes everything that has to do with math, numbers and formula looking things hard- like the grammatical tenses. without this bsa I wasn’t able to get accepted into University but because of Corona I got accepted while having to finish my bsa in the same year to move on to year 2.
This means I’m practically doing 2 studies at the same time.
While studying Teacher in English I realised that teaching is not my thing but English literature and culture very much is. It’s not really surprising since I’ve always been reading, writing and sometimes speaking in English since I was about 9 or 10 years old. My mum decided to raise me mostly bilingual, in both dutch and English. She always let me watch English kids shows and later on let me explore our bookshelf full of Jane Austen, Shakespeare and books about English history. I love history and English literature and I really enjoyed going to lectures, especially British studies and American studies.
Besides my school journey, I have been in a English/anglican church choir for 10 years (from when i was 7 years old until I was 17) because I liked singing and went to Cambridge university , Oxford university, and lots of cathedrals in England to do evensongs and I enjoyed the culture alot.
I still sing but it’s just a small hobby right now. I do also do modelling jobs every now and then and love taking pictures, fashion styling and painting. Which I post on my instagram (@mariellecspelde) I always get the question if I want to make modelling or making music or my instagram my full time job but I always say no, I would rather have it as a hobby and creative outlet.
So that was all about me! (feels a bit selfish writing all this) Don’t worry, I promise the rest of my posts won’t be that much about myself
