i had a huge blog post with tons of highlights of the past few weeks and hit backspace which sent my broswer back, losing everything i had spent writing for the past 30 minutes. i’m sorry i suck at updating but at least you know i’m trying. i’ll make a second effort tomorrow. love and miss you all.
xoxo
So since I suck at posting updates, I’m going to try to give a quick run-through of all the high points (and the very few low points) of my first week at Oxford.
Shopping
One of my first chores in Oxford was to get out and shop for all the essentials. I didn’t bother packing toiletries, shower stuff, and the like, so I had to make my way to the local drug store, “Boot’s,” for all that. Unfortunately, the American dollar is much weaker than the UK pound sterling (1 pound = 1.58 American $), and I also think that things are more expensive generally, especially since Oxford is one of those “jack prices up” places which seem to be so common where there are poor college students who don’t need that kind of financial woe. Luckily, as part of the program’s budget, each student receives a weekly cash stipend to cover the cost of meals. I think it’s something like 7.15 pounds per day, which really isn’t too bad, but still not really enough for a nice dinner. Still, at least it’s money, and I just feel fortunate to be getting that kind of handout in the first place. I also went grocery shopping, since for the first week we had to cook for ourselves until our colleges’ dining halls reopened for the year (Oxford students don’t officially start until Oct 11). I was unpleasantly reminded that I really REALLY need to learn how to cook properly, since when I finally lose the convenience of college dining halls I should be eating something other than fast food, sandwiches, and instant meals. =/
Orientations, Orientations, and more Orientations
As should be expected, our first week at Oxford was filled with mandatory orientation sessions. They just drill us with the usual boring, administrative things and the obligatory warnings to “be safe” and “use common sense” and such. Anyways, lots of repetition, lots of reference to how great a community the Stanford House is, drink responsibly, blah blah. You know the drill.
Of course, I shouldn’t be entirely dismissive. Some of the information IS somewhat useful, like when they explain to us Americans how some things work differently here in Europe. Still, having to sit through an orientation at 9AM when you’re still jet-lagged and enjoying your post-firstlegaldrinking morning, it’s hard to be enthusiastic.
One orientation of interest was our Bodleian Library orientation, where we received our “Bod cards,” which are basically the equivalent to a Stanford ID. The Bodleian Library is Oxford’s largest library, and they make it their job to purchase a copy of every copyrighted book in the UK, including a vast amount of materials from outside the country. The library is also reference only, meaning that patrons cannot check books out. This may seem counter-intuitive and inconvenient, but it’s actually kind of nice since when you go to the library for a book you need, you have the guarantee that it is on the shelf or at least somewhere within its walls. You just have to get used to note-taking and studying in the library, which doesn’t seem a bad trade-off.
Oxford Tours
We organized into groups on Wednesday so a few Oxfordian “experts” could take us on guided tours around the main part of the city. Oxford University is actually a conglomerate of 38 smaller colleges which are interspersed throughout the actual city of Oxford. Because of this, you get a little more of the “city” experience than you get at Stanford, but the city itself is still quite a bubble since the vast majority of its population is students. Anyways, the guide walked us down cobblestone streets past fluted columns and building exteriors ornately decorated with carvings while he told us a little bit of the University’s history. As he said, 900 years of history is quite hard to fit into an hour-long tour, but what brief introduction he made was amazing in itself. It’s kind of surreal to realize you are walking the same streets and entering the same buildings as so many historical giants. Tim Berners-Lee (who invented the Internet, not Al Gore), CS Lewis, Tolkien, Oscar Wilde, the list goes on and on. There’s something about the history of figures in this place that lends itself, I think, to the intellectual energy that pervades it. It truly does have a tradition of excellence and a legacy of greatness, and one feels that quite intensely when they sit in oak-paneled halls in which portraits of past kings and queens and famous alumni look down on them. It’s not an exaggeration to say it feels like Hogwarts (and in fact, a lot of Harry Potter was filmed here!). I had to laugh when the tour guide described one of the buildings as “fairly new.” It was built in 1859, older than every single building on Stanford campus by nearly 50 years.
I’m going to cut this off for now because I’m very sleepy after a full day of reading for my tutorial (and the bus leaves early early tomorrow for a Bing-sponsored trip to York!), but I promise to catch you all up soon. Look forward in the next post to:
Pubs!
Clubs!
London: Tower of London, St. Paul’s Cathedral, and Shakespeare’s Globe
Cheers! xoxo
Stephen
Anonymous asked: So, Stephen - I (your friendly neighborhood high school English teacher) neeeeeed to know if you've had time to find a Tolkienesque tree under which to sit and contemplate the universe or at least the literary world! You promised, remember?
Svob! So happy to hear from you!
I have toured the colleges and the yards in which literary greats such as Tolkien, CS Lewis, and so many others have walked before me. I’m affiliated with Magadalen College, which was where Oscar Wilde attended! :D Unfortunately, I have not yet sat under a Tolkienesque tree, though I have visited some of the pubs he is claimed to have frequented. I will fulfill my promise though, as soon as I find a few minutes of dryness outside haha. This place is so alive with history, it’s like the spirits of past geniuses contribute to my own intellectual energy. I’ll have so much to tell you about when I return for Christmas break!
I miss you and hope that things are going well!
Post with 2 notes
Yeah, I know, I’m a full week late. It’s been a crazy week, though, so you’ll have to give me a break. I’ll try to be more prompt about updates from now on. (and that way the other posts won’t have to be as long) ;)
A Journey Begins: From Audubon, MN to Oxford, UK
I drove up to the Fargo airport with my dad on Sunday morning around 10. It was a trip we’ve made together quite a few times by now, albeit not so early in the morning this time around. I always enjoy that last hour of one-and-one time with him, especially when it’s in the wee hours of the morning. It’s always very calm, very peaceful, and this time wasn’t any different. I kept trying to get used to the fact that I wouldn’t be flying to San Jose for the first time in two years, but knowing my destination was east and not west didn’t seem to make much of a difference. There were still the same feelings of excitement, anxiety, and sadness that always accompany any departure from the place I called home for 18 years.
As most of you probably know by now, I came down with a nasty cold the day before I left for Oxford (just my rotten luck). Because of that, the trip was pretty rough. Airplane cabin pressure isn’t conducive to misbehaving sinuses, and the ascent and landing were especially painful. Still, my head did not explode and my eyeballs stayed in their sockets. Good thing, too. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to enjoy my thrilling 7 hour layover in Chicago O’Hare (note: sarcasm). But with my newly bought copy of Infinite Jest (which is FABULOUS, by the way) and a $7 dollar shitty internet connection (not so fabulous), I survived, and soon enough the plane rolled up and the fact that I was going halfway across the world really started to sink in.
My well-traveled friends will have to excuse me for a minute while I comment on HOW FREAKIN’ BIG it was. Understand that the planes I usually fly on en route to Cali are tiny, sometimes with only 15-20 rows of 3 seats each (where there’s no distinguishable first class, even). This one had TV’s, two aisles, MULTIPLE BATHROOMS, a fancy-shmancy business section, friendly stewardesses, full meal service, blankets and pillows, everything. Of course, this was pretty close to what I was expecting, but it was still a fun experience to travel in a REAL jet for the first time in my life. Here’s a picture of the type of plane it was.
The flight was a red-eye to Heathrow, and unfortunately that label was all to apt for me. Even though I was fairly comfortable, I could not sleep for the life of me, whether it was the nerves, the cold, or just the desire to experience the whole thing awake, straight through. I feel like there’s a certain magic to overnight travel. I’ve experienced it in the car, on the Greyhound, and now on a plane flying over the Atlantic Ocean at 33,000 feet. The reading lights go off, TV displays dim, children stop fidgeting, and all you can hear is the dull roar of the twin jet engines gently broken by the occasional whisper. It feels rather sublime knowing you’re just mere feet away from hundreds of other people’s dreams, and the night takes on a gentle, reassuring quality. Add to that the realization that we’re nothing more than animals travelling seven miles above endless expanses of mountains, oceans, and plains, completing a 4,000 mile trip in just under 8 hours…the entire situation takes on something of the truly stupefying. Such smart monkeys, we are…Even though I was exhausted afterwards, I’m glad I stayed awake for it because the memories of my first Trans-Atlantic flight are now tinted with that fuzzy warm nostalgia (colored the soft orange of sodium lights) that’s such a treat to look back on.
Finally, the day woke up and so did the plane and it was time to land in London. Customs were virtually painless and finding the right bus wasn’t hard thanks to a handy guide from Stanford-Oxford Program Alums. I did look like a crazy person in Heathrow, though, because my sinuses finally gave in to all the abuse they’d taken over the last 24 hours and my nose started gushing blood. It wasn’t anything too serious, luckily, and a few tissues later I was on the mostly empty coach bus to Oxford, spending an hour alternating between fitful dozing and admiring the picturesque, hilly meadows of the English countryscape (think The Shire from Lord of the Rings).
It was raining in Oxford when I got off the bus (a common occurrence, I would soon come to learn!), and after finding my delightfully cozy (but tiny) single room in the absolute MAZE that is the Stanford House (seriously, there are like 5 different doors and 5 or 6 staircases between the entrance and my room), I didn’t have the energy to do much else. And so it was that I passed out for 16 hours (which actually seemed to mostly cure my jet lag), my first sleep in another country!
I’ll cut off the first post there to keep reading manageable, but I really wanted to highlight the journey there as my first travel to anywhere always leaves an indelible impression on me. I’ll recap my first week in the next post or two and hopefully post a few pics (although I do keep forgetting my camera everywhere we go =/). After that it will be mostly boring, I’m afraid, unless you’re all actually interested in hearing the random thoughts pertaining to or inspired by Europe’s effects on a small-town Minnesota boy. Anyways, I hope you’ll read!
Cheers,
Stephen
