Hello and Happy Thanksgiving, that most anticipated of American holidays when the only demand placed on you is to eat as much as physically possible then fall asleep whilst watching football. We celebrated in style here at the house with a dinner composed of various family recipes contributed by the people on the program and prepared by an army of conscripted housemates. We were divided into three castes: those who gather, those who cook, and those who clean. I was fortunate enough to be one of those who gather. While it required quite a few trips on my bike, laden with cranberries or flour or parsley, it was much better than having to cook or clean. I spent most of the day at the faculty apartment that UGA owns in Summertown, waiting for a call to fetch one foodstuff or another. But after about 3pm, the calls stopped coming and my job mostly consisted of watching the Scottish version of "Legends of the Hidden Temple". Dinner was of course amazing, and I didn't even have to clean. For those of you who have read Brave New World, we've been joking that those who clean are the gamma minuses of the house.
In other news, it was great to see the family some more. Unfortunately I had lots of work early in the week so they kind of had to do their own thing, but on Wednesday we had the chance to see Oxford together. I'm not much of a tour guide, but I think we hit all the big attractions and even got to see some rowing. The Christchurch regatta is this week, meaning the novice teams from all of Oxford's colleges are racing each other in a double elimination tournament. I enjoyed watching the racing (especially since they're novices) but I would have like to have gotten a chance to race. Because I've competed before, I'm ineligible to race at Christchurch. Also, since I'm leaving next week I think our coach made a decision to leave the Americans out of the boat so that the real rowers have more practice together. Both the men and the women's boat (which, for the record, contains 3 Americans, including one that's raced before) advanced out of the first round and race again later in the week. Should be fun to watch.
Next week is the last of our stay here. In addition to being one last chance to impress our dons before they give us a grade, it also means that we have to deal with all of the little things to do with leaving your apartment at the end of the semester plus everything associated with a transatlantic trip. Just like the rest of the semester, I expect it to be busy, busy, busy.
Well, it's Monday again, so I'm doing the same thing I always do on Monday: slave away at a philosophy paper. Damn you, De Tocqueville!!!! But I had a fairly enjoyable trip to Cardiff this weekend, which was a nice break. That's the third weekend in a row I've been out of town.
As you will see when I finally get around to talking about Ireland, I thought I had found the least appealing place in the United Kingdom (namely, Crewe. No coincidence it rhymes with eww). How wrong I was! The first place I changed trains on Saturday was Didcot Parkway, and now I can confidently say that that is the most unappealing place in the country. The entire area is essentially one big switch yard overshadowed by a huge nuclear power plant (remember that Nuclear plant that looked so nice from far away way back in the post about Salisbury? yeah, not so picturesque up close). Needless to say, I was glad to get out of there on time.
And a good thing that the train was on time, since if I missed a connection I was hosed. The plan was to meet my family, who had just arrived at Heathrow early that morning and apparently experienced no small difficulties of their own making the train on time, aboard the train between London and Cardiff. If one of us was not on the train, there was no way for us to get in contact with the other. It's doubtful that we would have ever met up and I probably would have perished in the cold lying in a ditch somewhere near Dorking (yes, there is a town called Dorking). But happily, it didn't come to that. While I did meet the train at Swindon instead of Reading, I bounded aboard and literally ran into my Dad. After an emotional reunion ("hey Matt". "hey".), I settled into the luxuriant 1st class seats with the rest of the family and caught up as the train rocketed through the Welsh countryside.
Imagine our surprise to find the train getting progressively fuller of red-clad Welsh rugby fans. Turns out that there was a big international Rugby match that very day. New Zealand vs. Wales, which apparently is a somewhat bitter rivalry. In any case, that meant that 1. We finally had an explanation of why hotel rooms were so hard to find 2. Much of the city was closed down for the game and 3. there were crowds of very large sports fans of varying degrees of intoxication everywhere. We managed to find a cab (piloted by the most helpful cab driver ever, as we shall see) and rode off towards our lodgings. Because of the match, every hotel room in the city was taken, driving us to stay in an apartment that the owner lets out while he's not home. Sounds good, but the trouble is we had a hard time getting in touch with the company that was supposed to give us the key to the place. The first address we went to was a deserted storefront in a scuffy part of town. The cabbie hopped out of the cab and rang the doorbell (now that's service!) then tried the number on his cell phone with no success. The next address was indeed the apartment complex in question, but with no key-giver in sight. We eventually managed to get in touch with her (she just wasn't expecting us until later), but with every hotel in the city full, for a while it looked like we may have been spending the night in the aforementioned ditch near Dorking.
After a mediocre but perfectly serviceable dinner at a Thai restaurant in a newly developed pedestrian area by the waterfront jauntily named "Mermaid's Quay", we retired to the spacious apartment for bed at the ambitious hour of 8:30. Parenthetically, Wales lost the Rugby game 29-9, and given how British sports fans have a history of being somewhat sore losers perhaps it was good to be indoors. The rest of the family went to bed very early with a case of jet lag, while I stayed up to read for the very paper I'm ignoring now. Quite an evening. No seriously, it really was kind of nice.
I'm not precisely sure why I suggested that we go to Cardiff. I suppose it's because I enjoyed Conwy so much. And I'm quick to say that Cardiff is a very nice, cosmopolitan European capital city (its the capital of Wales, which is sort of its own country in a way that I don't fully understand and cannot explain. Bottom line is, the Queen is still on the money, so...). Perhaps that's just it: in many ways, it reminded me of Dublin, sans Guinness, James Joyce, shops selling stuff with Guinness logos/James Joyce on it, and Irish people. Which is to say, some of the good parts.
Our main event for the day was visiting Cardiff Castle. While very, very different from the castle in Conwy (Imposing Rural Ruin vs. Urban Well Maintained attraction) I liked it in a different way. Worst Part: the goofy,narrationless video depicting the history of the castle via scenes of a girl running through modern Cardiff bumping into reenactors in period dress. Best Part: touring the residential part of the castle. While the site had had a fortification on it since Roman times, after the early 19th century it was used as a residence by the Marquesses of Bute. The 3rd Marquess was an especially awesome gentleman by the name of John Patrick Crichton-Stuart. In addition to having a sweet name, he was also one of the richest men in the world. He owned the Welsh coal mines that provided 1/5 of the worlds coal in the 19th century, as well as the railroads, canals and docks used to ship it. In today's money, his yearly income was estimated at £3 billion, which is more than enough to spend some of it upgrading and redecorating your castle (even thought he only lived there 6 weeks out of the year). Bute's taste in interior design can be summed up as "let's get as much really expensive stuff going on as possible". Every flat surface in the entire house was lavishly decorated, including a significant portion that was gold leafed. There was a single room that would have cost £15 million. This guy used gold as wall paper. If there's anything more ballin' than that, I have yet to hear about it. Plus, like many of his contmporaries, he had an excellent beard.
The rest of the castle was not quite as impressive, even though it probably would have been better recieved by the hosts of "Trading Spaces". There was a museum about the Welch regiment of the British army, a Norman-era motte and bailey keep to explore, and not one but two giftshops. But the highlight was the tour of the apartments. While my visit to Conwy made me realize that it's good to be the King, my trip to Cardiff prompted the collarary "or at least a obscenely rich Scotsman". After the castle and a brief trip to see the self-proclaimed "World's largest Welsh Love-spoon", we dropped by a pub (curiously appellated The Goat Major) for a pint of Brains and then headed to the National Museum. While no Smithsonian, I thought it was a fairly impressive as museums go. In addition to an exhuastive display about the geology of Wales (I mean, really, you can only look at so many rocks in display cases before giving up and returning to the pub), there was some French impressionist pieces and a copious amount of ceramics.
The lady at the information desk recommended a nearby resturant for dinner. I really liked it, despite the fact that they were out of almost everything, presumably because the Rugby fans had rolled throught the day before like a plague of locusts. After dinner, we caught a taxi back to the apartment, where I collected my belongings and hopped back into the same taxi for a lift back to Cardiff Central. I had to much to do for the upcoming week to spend another night. Which reminds me; I have too much to do to sit around blogging! Back to work. My only real regret about the weekend is that on my return train ride, I unknowingly selected an itinerary that brought me back through Didcot Parkway. And man, that is one ugly town.
Sorry guys, Ireland's gonna have to wait a little longer. I've been working extra hard to make some time to hang out with the family, who's going to be here for the next week or so. Plus i've been having some problems getting pictures posted. All in good time. As for now, I'm headed to Cardiff, the largest city and capital of Wales. Be back late Sunday night. Expect more posts then. Until Sunday, enjoy this video. Cheers! (btw, if you haven't noticed, the second part of the post about Conwy is a couple of posts down the page. Can't figure out how to get it closer to the top...)
[note: because I started writing the 2nd part of my post about Wales before this post, it's been placed under this one. But it is new, as of Nov. 18th. Check it out, and more to come about Ireland]
I wanted to take a brief break from writing my latest paper to apologize for the lack of posting going on in the last week or so. Being away from the house for 7 of the last 11 days has been a lot of fun, but it also means that I am a good bit behind on my work, and subsequently on blogging. Come Tuesday afternoon, I'll finally get a chance to finish describing the trip to Wales and talk about my recent trip to Ireland. Until then, I'm just too busy. Needless to say, I'm looking forward to Tuesday afternoon...
Sorry it's been a while; I've had lots of reading and three big papers since I've been back in Oxford. Now that that's done with, I can sit out in the garden and enjoy the surprisingly nice weather while describing the rest of last weekends trip to Wales.
After visiting the castle, we hiked back to the bed and breakfast for a nap. And what a nap it was. The beds there were infinitely more comfortable that the ones at the house, and the fact that it was chilly outside made getting under the covers even better. The only problems were the occasional fireworks going off outside in celebration of Guy Fawkes weekend (who knew it was celebrated for a whole week?) and a small child somewhere singing Christmas carols. It was tough to get out of bed after only an hour or so, but we had a reservation at Conwy Bistro, a restaurant recommended to us by a housemate and our trusty Rick Steven's travel guidebook.
Dinner was one of the best that I can remember. Conwy Bistro is a fairly small place on Chapel Street. The prices were reasonable (much like most prices in Wales) and the food excellent. I had the pork tenderloin, while the rack of lamb and steaks looked pretty good too. Deserts were just as good. In the unlikely event that you find yourself in Conwy, I highly recommend it. After dinner we sampled some of the local Pubs, watched a little footie, and went to bed at the altogether respectable hour of 10:30.
After a luxuriant sleep under our down comforters, we enjoyed a full Welsh breakfast (which is suspiciously similar to a full English sans the puddings) and set of for the day's main event: scaling the nearby mt. Conwy. The town and castle sit at the mouth of a river at the end of a narrow bay. North of town, between the castle and the ocean proper, there's a fairly decent sized mountain. It's no Everest, but it looked impressive from sea level (you can see it here). We actually had some trouble finding the path to the top. We followed the directions Andrew gave us, and while they did lead to a path, it was only about 200yards long and terminated in someone's backyard. Hardy the day hike we were looking for. After consulting our handy dandy Rick Stevens book and some wandering, we slipped through a gate to a sheep pasture and headed in the mountain's general direction. Let me tell you something about sheep pastures: while all the fields look nice and green from afar, up close they're a tiny verdant film over about 2" of mud. I had the foresight to wear boots, but some of my sneaker clad companions were not happy about what happened to their nice white kicks. After dodging some inquisitive ewes, praying that the farmer didn't come shoot us for walking through his flock, hopping another gate, and climbing an impossibly steep mountain bike path, we finally found the path to the top. The rest was easy!
The thing about the hills in Wales is that they don't have any trees on them. In Appalachia, you academically know you're up high, but the forest pressing around you on all sides limits your vision to 30 feet in any direction. The only vegetation on Mt. Conwy was some low heather, meaning the entire climb included spectacular vistas of extremely fetching countryside. To the east, the bay with its ever present rainbow (seriously, this rainbow was there the entire time we were. By the end of the trip we were beginning to suspect that it was actually a giant cardboard cutout that the locals had erected to boost tourism revenue) . To the south, the town and medieval castle. To the west, green fields and dramatic rainclouds. And to the north, more hilltops. I can't really do it justice; check out the movie.
The climb certainly wasn't too taxing. Once you got up the hill a little way, there was actually a fairly level grassy path from peak to peak. The only concern was the strong wind (as you can hear in the video) and a little rain. But it was totally worth it, as we saw wild ponies. As a kind of special bonus, we found the ruins of a Bronze age hill fort at the top of the highest summit that we didn't even know was there. It was with reluctance that we eventually turned for the long walk back to town.
After retrieving our backpacks from the B&B, we decided to divide and conquer. The girls split off to do some shopping. Eric and I decided to try and hit the remaining pubs in town. What a splendid way to spend an afternoon! We started at the Bridge, where we befriended a Welshman that had apparently once been to Niagara falls. Eric managed to accidentally play "Beat It!" on the Jukebox, after which we decided to move on to less anti-Micheal Jackson pastures. The next place was The Malt Loaf (!) where the Wales-Australia rugby match was on TV. Eric and I know nothing about rugby, but by the end of our stay we were chanting "Go Big Red!" (which apparently isn't a traditional Welsh cheer, but it seemed appropriate at the time). Our enthusiasm was direly needed; there was no one else in the pub. We were contemplating purchasing the giant 19th century sailing ship's wheel we had seen in an antique shop earlier as a souvenir when we realized that it was time to go. We wobbled to the rendezvous point, met the bemused girls, and headed back across the bridge to Llandudno Junction to catch the train back to Oxford. A very good trip indeed.
If you ever find yourself in the UK with a weekend on your hands, I cannot recommend spending it in Conwy highly enough. You will not regret it; I certainly don't.
Conwy is a small city on the northernmost tip of the Welsh coast. From Oxford by train, it's around a 4 hour trip. Using the British rail system was a bit of a novelty. It's somewhat like a combination of air travel and riding the subway. Friday morning the five of us just walked up to the ticket counter and bought a round trip ticket from Oxford to Conwy for 70L. And that's all the tickets say: Oxford to Conwy. How you get from one to the other is somewhat up to you. Our outward bound trip involved riding from Oxford to Stafford, changing trains, from there to Crewe, another change, then from Crewe to Llandudno Junction. The inside of the trains look essentially like the inside of an airplane, but with the seats on one side of the aisle facing the rear (after some debate, we concluded this was to ensure that at least somebody got to face the front no matter which way the coach was hooked up).
Since there is no definite beginning or end to the train's trip, the reserved seats change after every station. We didn't have any reserved seats, putting us at the mercy of strangers who would unpredictable board the train, tap one of us on the shoulder, and politely inform us "Sorry, but I believe you're in my seat". The most desirable seats are the ones that face another row with a table in between them, as this allows more space and easier conversation with your fellow travelers. It is difficult to nap for any significant amount of time, since we changed trains every 45 minutes or so and the time on the train is punctuated by the rounds of the conductor circulating the train and examining tickets. These individuals have a remarkable knowledge of the railway timetables (The first time I surrendered my ticket to one he glanced at it and commanded from memory, "You'll want to get off at Stafford, take the 10:06 Liverpool L-Street to Crewe, and catch the 11:03 cross country to Conwy" or something like that). They also don't take any grief off of anyone and will not hesitate to throw the unfortunate ticketless travelers off the train, as a pair of dismayed Irishmen discovered at Wolverhampton. On his rounds the conductor discovered the pair had no tickets. One of them rather lamely explained that he had bought tickets but didn't have them on him. The conductor narrowed his eyes and walked off, prompting the ticketless guy to smugly grin at his friend, thinking he had talked his way into a free trip. The smug look quickly disappeared at the next station when the conductor reappeared with a pair of helmeted transit police, pointed, and screamed "J'accuse!" in a shrill voice before none-to-gently propelling the shell-shocked freeloaders onto the platform. Reminds me of the scene in "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade", where Jones throws a Nazi out of a blimp then explains to a surprised bystander "No Ticket". Needless to say, after witnessing this I resolved to always keep my ticket close.
Because the train from Crewe was, as the conductor explained to us, too long to stop in Conwy's runty station we would have to disembark at Llandudno Junction, which in addition to being hard to pronounce is about a mile outside town across a river. We were travelling light so the walk was not a big deal (actually it was a good way to enter Conwy, as there were great views of the town and it castle from across the bay) but could be regarded as one of those little unplanned minor mishaps that make travel so exciting. We experienced the second such mishap upon calling our Bed and Breakfast for direction from the station. On the advice of a housemate, we had planned to stay at the Castleview B&B. Somebody (Don't worry Elisabeth, I won't say who) Googled the B&B, saw it was full, saw an advertisement for a B&B half a mile from the original place, called and made a reservation, which she was only able to do after assuring the proprietor that we were all "reasonably well behaved". After getting off the train, we called for directions from the Llandudno Junction station, which surprised the guy at the B&B somewhat because Llandudno Junction is in Wales and he was in Northumberland, 230 miles away. Apparently, there is more than one "Castleview B&B" in this well becastled nation. Who knew? Quickly consulting our trusty Rick Steves Travel Guidebook, we found another B&B which, we were assured, was actually in Conwy.
Getting a room was a surprisingly informal operation. We never needed to sign anything and were able to pay in cash. The listed number connected us with the owner of the Bryn Derwen B&B, who suggested we meet him outside a downtown pub so he could show us where the hotel was. The voice at the end of the phone belonged to Andrew, a tall and friendly Englishman who owned the place with his wife Jill and their daughter Sophie. The rooms weren't especially large, but they were cosy and the beds were amazing. Having deposited our belongings in our rooms, the five of us set out for the town's most obvious attraction: Castle Conwy.
As part of his plan to tighten his control over newly conquered Wales, Edward I built a new castle and fortified town at Conwy in 1283. The castle sits on a rocky outcrop on the coast and commands a narrow point in the nearby river. Because the castle and town had easily defended access to the sea and the Welsh had no navy to speak of, the town could hypothetically hold out indefinitely under siege. Personally, I cannot think of a structure I would enjoy attacking with a ladder and sword less. The castle wasn't besieged until the English civil war in the 1640s, when the widespread use of cannon had rendered it practically obsolete. The attackers didn't seem to do much damage, since the stonework is all remarkably intact (all of the timber and metal was removed in 1665). Even though it's just a stone shell, the castle was a great deal of fun to tour. The best part was climbing the circular stairs up to the top of the watchtowers and looking out over the bay, town, and valley while trying to imagine what it was like to be on the lookout for a rebellious Welsh army 700 years ago. Pretty cool stuff. The awesomeness of the castle also reinforced my suspicion that it is indeed good to be the King.
Having realized how long this post already is and how much work I have to do before going to bed, I'm going to finish my account of the trip tomorrow. Until then, enjoy the pictures by clicking on here or on the "Photos" link at right.
Hey, short post time since it's late. I'm going to Wales tomorrow (don't worry family, I'm going to Conway, which is way different than Cardiff). I plan on making a more thorough post as well as describing my trip on Sunday. Until then, all is well. And as a side note regarding the election, Yes We Can! More on that later as well. Hope everyone has a good weekend.
First off, I don't want to talk about the GA-Florida game. We're just gonna pretend that didn't happen. But win or lose, Gators still wear jean shorts.
I hope everybody had a good Halloween. I certainly did. In addition to all hallows eve, Friday was also close to a couple birthdays, so we had a joint 80s themed Halloween/birthday party. I was pleased with my last minute costume which took inspiration from Don Jonson era Miami Vice. The mustache really made it, in my opinion. What did ya'll dress up as? We went out to the Duke of Cambridge, which is a fancy cocktail bar down the road, then tried to meet up with some Keble students at a club. The line was too long, so we instead attempted to get into our old favorite, the Purple Turtle. Fortunately (I say fortunately because despite what they think at the time, no one really ever wants to go to the PT) one of us lacked an acceptable form of ID and so the doorman wouldn't let us in, even though my mustache and I did our best to talk our way in the door. We called it a night, got a Kebab from Hussein on the way home, and watched Dazed and Confused.
Saturday was mostly spent preparing to watch the football game. We even had some Keble kids that had never seen American football join us. Oops. We told them that we had actually won, and I think that they may even have believed us.
Today it rained (surprise!). The Ultimate team had a friendly scrimmage against St. Annes, a college from down the road and a rival to Keble. Last year St. Annes (pronounced "Stann's) won Cuppers in Ultimate, meaning they were the best college team within the University. The game today was a lot of fun. Both sides were very evenly matched, and Keble ended up winning 13-12 after coming back from being down 7-9. Even better, I think we played much better at the end because we learned some. I was happy enough with how I played; I caught the first and last points and had some layouts on defense, for which I have curiously awarded a "flapjack". I'm not sure exactly what that is (I asked and it's not a pancake), but it appears to be some sort of foodstuff and I'm excited about it anyway. Next week is the Beginners tournament, and since I'm technically a beginner I can play in it. We'll be playing against lots of other teams from other colleges, and hopefully we'll do just as well as we did today. But I can only play if we don't go to Dublin.
The trip to Scotland that was supposed to happen this weekend fell through because it was going to be too expensive. Instead, a smaller group is contemplating a trip to Dublin. While the train to Edinburgh was going to be 110 pounds, the airfare to Ireland is only 10. It would be better for me if we go the weekend of the 15th so I can make the aforementioned tourney, but the trip would be a priority since 1. I'm really not a true beginner and 2. I've only got five weeks left on this trip. It would be a fun trip since I get along great with the other guys who are thinking about going, plus where else can you drink legit Guinness? I just hope we don't get beaten with a shillelagh.
Classes are grinding on. I got a B+ on my first paper for psychology, not bad but with room for improvement. Hopefully he's giving lower grades at the beginning of the semester, which is something some dons apparently do. Not a big deal, since our final grades aren't necessarily related to grades on papers. I'm reading my paper aloud in my other seminar again this week. Last time it went okay, but I want to do a little better. Rousseau here I come. Hard to believe that after this week we're halfway done with the term.
Happy Halloween everybody. Or should I say, Happy All Hollows Eve. As I'm sure all of you know, the GA-FLA game is tomorrow. Here's something to keep to busy till tomorrow afternoon. Go Dawgs!
It's been a while. But it's also been a solid weekend. For one, on Friday I briefly met Emma Watson, who plays Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter Movies. Apparently she's from Oxford. We were at a bar downtown and someone said something like "that girl looks like Emma Watson". Eerily similar in fact, seeing as she actually was Emma Watson. We didn't talk long, but it was still cool to meet someone famous. Now that I think about it, there are lots of famous people in England and not a whole lot of space for them to spread out in. You'd think they'd be everywhere.
Saturday was dominated by the UGA-LSU game. I was of course very pumped that UGA won, but on the other hand I expected it. The thing I couldn't get over was how all the LSU fans were gone by the end of the game. I always thought that LSU fans were the craziest in the SEC, which is really saying something. So I was duly impressed that the dawgs played well enough to empty Death Valley before the end of the 4th quarter. The offense looked good, which means that I'm going to go ahead and call the UGA-Florida game next week for UGA. You're not going to lose many games by scoring more than 50 points. Of course Florida can put some points on the board too. At the very least it should be a very exciting game, doubly so considering the winner will likely play Bama for the SEC championship later in the season. All I can say is Go Dawgs! And that Tim Tebow is wierd (I mean that in a good way! I like the guy).
Following a successful Frisbee practice on Sunday, a group of us began planning a trip to Scotland for the coming weekend. At the moment its not very well planned and I'll have to miss a Ultimate game, but if we do go it will finally be some of the travel I've been wanting to do. It's gonna be cold there. But hey, it's cold here too. As a matter of fact its snowing right now. I doubt it will stick, but still; snow? In October? Fortunately I am prepared. I finally found a sweater vest I like. It's navy and dorky, exactly what I wanted.
Perhaps because of cabin fever resulting from the inclement weather (or because we don't have Halo 3 here), a few of my housemates and I have started a rather unique game. We're calling it a slap bet. Last night, each of the four people playing split into pairs and flipped a coin. The winner of the coin toss gets the enviable prize of getting to smack the loser at any time 3 times before the end of the trip. In a uncharacteristic display of luck, I won both my tosses, meaning that Eric and Rob are both destined for some slaps. I've already used two on Eric (once in botched videotaped ambush and once after cycling back from dinner in the snow) so I owe him one more and Rob three. Now to bide my time till they forget about it...
With travel planned for this weekend and a growing weariness of staying up late the night before a paper is due, I'm finally determined to get ahead of my work this week. I've said it before, but this time I'm serious.
Tomorrow is a bit of a special occasion. Some members of the Georgia state assembly are coming to the house to see what exactly we did with all that money they gave the program (we've already hid our plasma screen TV). They get here tomorrow afternoon, so we've been instructed to clean our rooms and dress nice. There's going to be a catered reception, so I'm excited about getting a night off dining hall food.
It's 10:30 am and I've already been up for 4.5 hours. It's amazing how much time there is in a day when you don't sleep in till 11. The reason I've been up so long is that today was the first on water practice we've had for rowing. It was interesting, to say the least. We had planned to assemble at Keble at 6:40 and then ride down to the boathouse together. However, at 6:50 there were only 5 of us plus a cox'n and a coach. While the cox went to rouse additional rowers, the rest of us made the relativly brief ride down St.Giles and Cornmarket streets to the Christ Church Meadow, where most of the college boathouses are. It's not quite the Schuykill's boathouse row, but with 30 some colleges sharing the river the boathouses were numerous, to say the least. Unlike most colleges, Keble actually has their own boat bay, which was quite nice. The boats inside weren't new, but at least they weren't wooden. Apparently the really nice boats are up the river a ways at Keble's "training base" at Godstow. I'm not sure, but I think the 1st eight races a new looking M2.
The stretch of river we rowed on is somewhat confusingly named the Isis, even though outside the city the river is the Thames. It's about as wide as the hooch at SA's boathouse, and I would guess it's about 1.5k of rowable water from the locks at the south side to the bridge at the north. With 30ish colleges trying to share the same small stretch of water, it was very crowded, even this morning, and the general lack of boat handling skills on the part of the novice crews made for quite a few bumps and locked oars. Because of my height, or lack thereof, Julien (the coach for the day and captain of the team) put me in 2 seat. For some reason, I had it in my head that everybody was going to intuitively pick up the stroke more or less instantly and we'd be cruising the river all eight on the feather by the end of practice, blades barely skimming the water and taking the occasional power ten. This was, of course, not the case. We spent most of practice rowing by fours, finally making it up to full slide by the end of the morning. I'm not discouraged, since we made a lot of improvement over the course of practice. I got corrected for leaning away from my rigger at the finish. In my defense, the boat was rigged extremely low and the stern four weren't balancing the boat quite level. Plus there are some comparatively good rowers that have the same bad habit while racing (looking at you, 3 seat). Other than that it was a pretty successful outing.
Over the next few week I hope to move into the stern pair, but I won't be that bummed if that doesn't happen. We're only going to race once before I leave, at the Christ Church regatta close to the end of term. The format is different then anything I've experienced; its head to head racing in a double elimination bracket over the course of a week. With luck we'll get a good draw and advance through the rounds. We should have the personnel, seeing as some of the guys are pretty big. I just want to be in the top 8, and that should be doable. Practice today was a good start, and if nothing else it was nice to see the sun come up over the Thames/Isis and get back on the water. Now I've got 5 hours to wait until my tutorial. Amazing how much time there is when you get up early...
I may have slightly miscalculated how long my latest paper was going to take. I thought I would be up all night, but I'm effectively finished now and it's only 2:40! Unfortunately, I've consumed enough coffee that I may be awake (and twitching) for some time yet. And so, why not take a moment to blog? The weekend in review:
Friday- My psych tutorial was very relaxed. We turned in our notes, then discussed any questions we had for the rest of the hour. Much less stressful than my philosophy tutorial, but at the same time it places a lot of pressure on us to make sure we understand the reading. At least the assigned papers are shorter and fewer
Saturday- There was supposed to be a rowing practice on Saturday morning, but it got canceled. I was disappointed that we wouldn't get out in a boat this weekend, but not that bummed to miss the 6:30 wake up that practice would require. Further than that, I actually can't remember what I did all day...
Sunday- Got up late, went to Frisbee practice. Again "practice" pretty much means 15 minutes of instruction and drills followed by 2 hours of playing Frisbee. Altogether not a bad arrangement, especially since we're getting noticeably better at executing the stack offense. Our coach promised that our modest grasp of the concept would serve us well in competition: "If we can actually get good at clearing out of the open side, we're going to be far ahead of any other college team". I bough some cleats to enhance my game. They're Umbro's and they're cheap; I can feel the tops of the spikes through the sole of the shoe, creating the uniquely unpleasant sensation of running atop six rolls of quarters. But now I can turn on a dime, so I'll just wear an extra pair of socks for padding and get over it. We should be scrimmaging against another college team before the end of the month. I can only hope that I get one of the awesome Keble Ultimate jerseys before I leave. After practice, I took a really long nap.
Monday-All in all a fairly crappy day. First, I misplaced my keys sometime Sunday night. Since I need a key to go through just about every door in the house, this was a wee bit of an inconvenience. I looked everywhere I could think of, but just couldn't find them. Fortunately, in my infinite wisdom I kept a spare key to my bike lock and so at least I didn't have to walk to my meals. Second, the books I needed were checked out of the Keble library. Third, it was raining all day, and actually raining hard rather than the drizzle we've been getting. Fourth, and worst, I just could not keep my eyes open all day. Every time I wasn't standing up, I dozed off. I got 9 hours of sleep the night before, but I fell asleep reading for about an hour this morning, then felt compelled to take a 3 hour nap this afternoon. I don't know if I'm getting sick or something, but I'm feeling very fatigued. Fortunately, all these problems had solutions: 1. My keys were in Eric's nightstand, I don't know how they got there but at least I found them after dinner 2. I borrowed the books in question from Rose who had checked them out last week 3. I put on my jacket and got over it 4. Coffee! I feel much better now that I've got my paper for tomorrow done and am in possession of my keyring. However, I feel the caffeine starting to wear off, so I think I'll take the opportunity to retire before I fall asleep at this table.
I am getting so tired of eating potatoes. It may be insensitive of British culture to bash their cuisine, but this is getting ridiculous. I have consumed potatoes in virtually every meal I've eaten here. Yesterday alone, I had five different types: hash browns, french fries, mashed potatoes, boiled potatoes, and potato soup. I like a tuber just as much as the next guy but seriously, enough with the potatoes.
Feels good to get that off my chest. Other than eating prodigious quantities of a certain starchy vegetable, I've be busy this week. My first tutorial on Tuesday went fairly well. It's going to take some getting used to taking a philosophy class, seeing as we didn't do that great on the whole making-a-coherent-and-logically-valid-argument thing, but hopefully that will come with time. My next Tute (as the lingo goes) is tomorrow when I head down to the Psych building. This class doesn't seem like the workload is going to be quite so backbreaking. Even so, I feel pretty cool walking around with a textbook titled "Cognitive Neuroscience". Makes people think I'm studying to be a brain surgeon or something.
We've got a rowing meeting at 6.15, before our next potato dose. We'll be discussing safety, which means that we'll probably be getting out in a boat soon. The boathouse is quite a long way from the house, but as always I've got my trusty bike. My next Frisbee practice is on Sunday.
Besides reading about brains, a fair portion of the last few days have been spent trying to get things in order for my return to the states in December. I've been trying to work out a place to live, and after a great number of wheedling emails I managed to annoy my advisers into giving me the classes I want next semester. My schedule is exactly what I wanted; class from noon to 3pm solid every day. Also, today I submitted my application for an internship next summer. Hopefully I'll get through to the first round of interviews, which should take place in the next few weeks. Not exactly sure how I'm going to interview from here, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. As for now I need to get back to work, since its only a few hours until potato time. [not Bye! because this isn't a xenga!]
It has indeed been a busy couple of days. I suppose that won't really change very much from here on out, but this week has been especially dense since we've had a week's worth of work to do in 3 days. I still found some time for sports stuff though
Saturday was Frisbee day. We met up with the other freshers that had signed up and returning members of the team at about 1. Practice pretty much consisted of playing ultimate for about 2 hours, which is to say that practice was a bunch of fun. I was concerned that the returners would be insanely good, but I fit in pretty well as far as skill level goes.The level of competition was just a hair above Myers League, with the addition of stall counts and a stack offense. Plus there were lots of beginners. If I'm feeling particularly brave, I might go out for the University wide team, which is a little more competitive. Once I get used to actually having a plan instead of just running around, I think I'll be alright. The next practice is scheduled for this weekend. If nothing else, I'm determined to make the team to get the awesome Keble Ultimate jersey. It has a cow on it. Nice.
The running around on Saturday made my legs surprisingly sore, which did not bode well for my erg (rowing machine) test on Sunday. Rowing practice took place in the Keble gym, which is a room in the basement that is, to put it charitably, of decidedly modest size. But it does have four new model D's and a big mirror to watch yourself erg in. Why you would want to watch yourself erg is beyond me. That's like putting a mirror next to The Rack so you can watch yourself get taller. We novices took turns, 4 at a time, getting a brief crash course in erging technique from a few returning team members. I was very impressed at how student-run practice was (that goes for Frisbee too). Everything from recruiting to coaching so far has been other students, and they've been very patient and friendly about all of it. At least I thought so until they made me pull a 1k erg test.
As it was explained to us, the test was more "just to see how it feels at full pressure". Well I can personally attest, it feels a lot like pain. My tentative goal was to finish in 3:30, which would be about the same speed I would aim for in a beginning-of-the-season-after-sitting-on-my-butt-all-winter-eating-cookies kind of test back in the day. Of course, back in the day the distance was twice as far. My final time was 3:32. Yeah Matt, I know I know, but it's been three years and we can't all get recruited by Harvard. Cut me some slack. While I might not quite have a shot at The Boat Race, I was pleased that I at least got close to my goal. I'm not sure what the varsity rowers thought; my technique was rusty enough that I didn't have to try really hard to appear to be new. In the last 200 meters or so, I actually felt it more in my arms than in the lungs. Once I get over the muscle stiffness, perhaps I'll do some push ups or something. In any case, I couldn't go to the optional rowing tank session today since I have work to do for my first tutorial tomorrow.
This weekend I had to read an awful lot of Thomas Hobbes, the 17th century English political philosopher who holds a less than optimistic view about human nature. I finished most of the reading, but I'm actually writing this post mostly to avoid starting on my essay. I'm turning it in during class tomorrow, but it could be worse. Rose, my classmate, actually has to read hers aloud to the don and me. It's my turn for that next week. No pressure, but I want to make a good impression and represent my family, school, state, and country well. Now that I put it that way, I really must go write my essay. Wish me luck.
Oops, almost forgot. Desert at hall tonight was spotted dick. Many jokes were made. Delicious.
I've just returned to the house from our first formal hall dinner, freshers fair, and my meeting with my philosophy don. It's been quite a day. Dinner tonight was rather spectacular. For one, this is the first time we've had a chance to wear our robes. "Robes" however is a bit of a grand misnomer. As non-scholarship undergraduates, we wear "commoner's robes". They're black, about as long as a suit jacket, and sleeveless except for narrow streamer-like vestigial sleeves. As one moves up the ranks accumulating additional degrees and honors, your robe gets longer and sleeved. The next level up is for scholarship students (they're a little longer but still above the knee), grad students (longer still), and Doctorate holders (long and sleeved, like graduation gowns). Academic positions get additional accessories. For example, Dr. Archer once was provost of the University, which meant he got an ermine lined hood. The best gown goes to the chancellor, who needs a team of assistants to carry his train. Long story short, we ate dinner wearing glorified black vests. It was a step in the Harry Potter direction, but not quite there. Before dinner was served all the dons filed in in a bit of a procession to the high table on a dais and somebody read a prayer in Latin. We also got a soup course for the first time, which was nice.
After dinner there was a brief reception for UGA students, then it was next door to the Freshers fair. Anyone that's ever seen the Tate Plaza during activities fairs will know what it looked like. Each club and team had a table and was endeavouring to attract the attention and membership of the passers by. I signed up for the crew and ultimate frisbee mailing lists. We'll see if I have time for both, or either for that matter. Both assured me that it wasn't too much of a time commitment, but right now I don't really know how much time my tutorials are going to require. Speaking of, I met Dr. Peter King today, who will be teaching my political philosophy class.
Dr. King works at Pembroke College on the south side of the city. Seeing as the house is on the north side, it's a bit of a commute. Good thing I have a bike. We briefly discussed objectives for the term, and he assigned a paper due in our first class on Tuesday. He was very friendly, and the workload seems formidable but manageable. Before I worry about that though I have to finish my last paper for Dr. Archer. I got the last one back earlier this week. I got an A-, not a surprise since I didn't think this one was as strong as the last. That just means that I have to do well on this next one. I'm going to write it about witchcraft. And so, now I must go read about witches...
This week is Freshers (Freshmen) week here in Oxford, also known as 0th (pronounced "naught") week. The weeks of term are numbered sequentially, so next week will be 1st week, then 2nd, etc. Last week was -1st week. For my money, I'd prefer "the second week in October", but like a lot of things here this is the way things have been done for a while, and tradition trumps practicality. Anyway, the point of this being freshers week means that this is the week all the freshmen move into the dorms at Keble and there are a lot of social activities for them. Last night, for example, was freshers night at the Keble pub. We were able to talk the bartender into agreeing that we were essentially freshmen, this being our first semester at Oxford and all. Thursday is our first formal hall dinner (i.e. wearing our academic gowns), followed by a reception and then "freshers fair", where various student organizations try and recruit members for the term. I'm planning on talking to the Rowing team and maybe the Ultimate team as well.
I've done a little research, and Keble's first 8 has historically usually had an Olympian or, more impressively around here, a Blue in it. Blue means member of Oxford's crew in The Boat Race, for which an Olympic medal is essentially a prerequisite. Needless to say, I may go ahead and tell them I'm a novice and surprise them with my intuitive knowledge of erging technique. I am woefully, embarrassingly out of condition for rowing, but since I've at least done it before I hope I'll have a leg up on some of the freshers. As an added bonus, the lower boats sometimes race in themed costumes, so that might be fun. Ultimate is a good back-up plan, as it doesn't require quite as much pain as crew. I'm not the best frisbee player in the world (Adam can attest to this), but I can throw a little and I'm not sure how much the sport has caught on here. It might be fun, or it might be me scurrying around the ankles of giants. Lots of the guys here are pretty tall.
In academic news, I've finally heard from one of my tutorial dons. We're meeting Thursday to talk about objectives for the term. Actual classes start next week, also on Thursdays. The reading list he sent me is pretty intense, but at least I'll have an entire week between meetings. Still waiting to hear from my psych teacher. With any luck, he'll/she'll want to have tutorial on Wednesdays or Thursdays, which would leave 5 day weekends to travel on. That would be pretty lucky. I've been trying to get in touch with the advisers back at UGA to get cleared to register for classes next semester. After looking at my graduation requirements, I was surprised to discover that if everything goes according to plan I can finish my Poli Sci degree this spring and then I'll only have two Psych courses to take during all of senior year. Since I don't want to graduate early, that leaves 18 hours to fill (I have to take at least 12 a semester to get HOPE and, more importantly, football tickets). Perhaps I'll add a minor; history would do because I already have some upper division history classes and would only need 4 more for a minor. As you can see, I need to talk to an advisor.
For those of you interested in the weather, it's still raining.
Well it's time to get back to reading. If I finish this last paper before the end of this week, I'll be in good shape.
Remember all those times I mentioned how good the weather has been? Well, yeah, that's apparently over now. It's been drizzling steadily since about Wednesday, and the temperature has dropped too (although not quite as much as I sometimes think. Still haven't gotten used to that whole Celsius thing). In a way I actually like the weather now, since it's exactly what I was expecting before I left. I wish that I had another, more dressy jacket than my Northface. The one I have is plenty warm and more watertight than the Hoover era Justice department (is that analogy too much of a stretch?), but it looks a little weird with khakis. Even so, I'm pretty well equipped. Amazing considering the somewhat last minuting packing that went on. One article of clothing I'm on the lookout for is a v-neck sweater vest. My rational is as follows: Sweater vest in Athens=lame. Sweater vest in Oxford=scholarly and fashionable. Really it's a very practical garment and now that I'm consistently wearing my Sperrys, looking like a preppy d-bag is no longer an obstacle.
Moving along into what is only a marginally more interesting subject, I'm enjoying my seminars. They're more reading than I'm used to (and I certainly don't have the heaviest reading load) but its manageable and it beats sitting through lectures everyday. I turned in my second paper for Archer's class on Friday. This one was about the causes of the English civil war, and I afraid it probably wasn't as good as the last one. I'm determined to get a head start on the last one due this week, since I'll likely have to write more papers for my first tutorial next week. My other seminar, Common Law, has been a little less work but at least as interesting. Unlike 17th Century English history, the law stuff might even come in handy later in my academic career.
Went out to the Purple Turtle again last night. God forgive me. But no Macarena this time, so that's something. Till next time.
I'm happy to say that I got the first paper from my history seminar back today, and it had a good grade on it. For some reason I assumed that the first paper would be rather harshly graded, but speaking to everyone else in class it seems like no one really got reamed. So that's good news. I have another paper for the same class due Friday, meaning the pressure's on to be consistent. Tonight my primary concern is getting through the uncharacteristically heavy reading list for my law class tomorrow. I got to go to the law library today, which was pretty cool (but quite far away; not a problem on my bike!). Unlike most of the Bod, it actually looks like a library i.e. books on shelves. But as for right now, we're having breakfast for dinner at the house! The pancakes beckon...
It's Sunday afternoon in Oxford, and I'm finally getting a chance to sit around and relax for a while. Friday was mostly occupied with writing my paper for Dr. Archer's class (It was about changing contemporary perceptions of social order in 17th century England. Sounds thrilling, doesn't it?). After emailing my completed essay I watched Grizzly Man, which is the funniest movie about a guy getting eaten by bears ever made, ate a kebap from the van down the street then went to bed. Saturday was spent shopping. Sort of.
I don't know if it's just the fact that I went at a particularly busy time, but it seems the English don't really go shopping so much as they go pillaging. The retail experience seems to go to their heads somewhat. Every store I went into was an absolute madhouse with merchandise literally flying through the air and harried looking sales clerks dashing about. The funniest part to me was the queues for the dressing rooms and registers. Amidst the chaos, an absurdly long queue would snake through the store with everyone in it smiling calmly and quietly facing the same direction. I just happened to poke my head into most of the stores and I didn't end up buying anything. What I was really looking for was a bike.
Despite what I said about not getting a bike earlier, I've bought one. Honestly I just got tired of making the 20 minute trudge to and from meals while watching the my cycle-owning housemates whiz past then recede rapidly into the distance. I've rationalized that it will save me more than an hour a day on meal commuting alone. Once I decided to get one, I called on probably every cycle shop in Oxford, no mean feat considering I had to walk to all of them. What I was really looking for was a used, cool vintage road bike. Unfortunately, nobody had any of those, even the exceedingly sketchy store that I went to. This place was back in an alley in Jerico (a neighborhood NE of the city) and had a huge assortment of "used" bikes that I'm fairly confident were chained up outside their rightful owners house the night before. A sizable percentage of them were missing a wheel or still had a chain lock on them! The gentleman working there, who either had the most facial piercings I've ever seen or was the victim of a multitude of extremely unfortunate fishing accidents, politely informed me that he didn't have quite what I was looking for, but if I checked back tomorrow he'd see what he could do. I nodded, smiled, and backed up out the door.
I settled for a blue utility bike from the 4th place I went to. Several other people from the house have the same model, and they seem to work OK. It cost £100, but the store garunteed to buy it back at the end of the term for £50. The ride home by itself confirmed the value of my purchase, considering it took 10 minutes while the walk there took at least 40. The distance was paticularly irritating since I had to walk there yesterday, order the bike, walk home, then walk back today to pick up my assembled steed. But I've got it now, and that's the important thing.
The other important thing I did Saturday was sample a little bit of the local nightlife, in the form of a dance club called the Purple Turtle. Oh yes, the Purple Turtle. It may sound questionable (and it is...), but its popular with students and there's no cover charge. It was certainly an interesting experience. I don't know if it was 80s night or if the whole country is a few decades behind the States musically but the music made for some memorable moments, such as every American in the place belting out "Don't Stop Belivein'" along with Journey and later dancing the Macarena. I know, I know...but everybody else was doing it and to be fair my decision making was somewhat compromised at the time. Actually, I think the English patrons were impressed by the quality of the Americans' Macarena-ing.
I watched the UGA game after getting back from downtown. What a bummer. Oh well, at least Florida and USC lost too. And to weaker teams. Anyway, it's now time to ride my new bike to dinner. Away I go!
Hello and Happy Thanksgiving, that most anticipated of American holidays when the only demand placed on you is to eat as much as physically possible then fall asleep whilst watching football. We celebrated in style here at the house with a dinner composed of various family recipes contributed by the people on the program and prepared by an army of conscripted housemates. We were divided into three castes: those who gather, those who cook, and those who clean. I was fortunate enough to be one of those who gather. While it required quite a few trips on my bike, laden with cranberries or flour or parsley, it was much better than having to cook or clean. I spent most of the day at the faculty apartment that UGA owns in Summertown, waiting for a call to fetch one foodstuff or another. But after about 3pm, the calls stopped coming and my job mostly consisted of watching the Scottish version of "Legends of the Hidden Temple". Dinner was of course amazing, and I didn't even have to clean. For those of you who have read Brave New World, we've been joking that those who clean are the gamma minuses of the house.
