First stop was my tube ride to Paddington Station. There I was a few minutes late of catching the train to Oxford. Luckily they left every 20 minutes or so, so it was no big deal. In the meantime I picked up a small bagel sandwich to munch on for lunch. I then boarded my train and had a 1 hour and uneventful trip to Oxford.
From the train station it was an easy 2-3 minute walk to the hostel. There I had likely the warmest hostel welcome of my trip. I was even offered a full tour. I accepted but after the fact it seemed a bit unnecessary. Once checked in I dropped my bags, grabbed a map and headed across the tiny river to find Em.
And that meeting went swimmingly. It was less than a 10 minute walk which I reached without any mishaps (always a good start). En route, while I saw only small glimpses of the town/city/campus... it was quite lovely. With Emmy we discussed this further. It was great to see her again, and the fact that our current meeting was in Oxford, England made it all the better.
For a while we just sat and talked, recapping a bit of what we'd each done since seeing each other at New Years. We then talked a bit about potential activities for the next few days, as well as some opinions I'd had so far. Throughout the ordeal, I fear I may have insulted Emmy's darling Oxford without intent or malice, but she proved to be as difficult as ever. :) That said, despite our perpetual debate of belonging to a school with a more beautiful campus, I did at least concede that Oxford's campus is quite nice (this view was reinforced through the day). I will by no means rank it higher than by dear old Kenyon... at least not yet.
I also had a realization about Oxford itself and got a bunch of clarities to some aspects that confused me. First I got an explanation on the various Colleges and how they differed from the University at large. Post explanation, I understood it to be similar to the residential colleges of Yale. That said, I realize that Oxford came first, but to those familiar with US universities and not those of England, I thought this a fair claim. I am also a bit sure of where Oxford is a campus and where its a town. Regardless, I have so far greatly enjoyed the numerous old buildings and small alleyways that curve up and down hills. It is a quite lovely area.
That is of course... if you can ignore the weather. I continue to receive outlandish claims that the English spring is utterly beautiful, yet I have experienced clouds and cold and threatening rain. I am yet unconvinced of Emmy's claim about spring here... We'll see though.
I believe at about 5, we headed through the town to Pete's apartment (Pete being a friend of Em's). There we met Pete (clearly) who was at least as punny as we are, so that went over well. There I borrowed a suit jacket and a tie for the formal Oxford dinner we would be attending. We then got ready (Em wore the pink jewels my parents gave her. Thought you two would like to know...) and headed to a local bar for cocktails. There I met Jen(?) and Rob (if this wrong I apologize. Never was great with names...). Em bought me a mojito, which was awesome and one of the drinks I've been meaning to have so that I know what to mimic when I start making them. We had some fun talks and then headed to dinner.
This involved a brief tour through the quad and some buildings of Jesus College, which were nice. Unlike Kenyon, the quads are actually square. A bazaar (is this the wrong spelling of the word?) occurence indeed. The hall reminded me of Kenyon a bit as well. Long wooded tables with long wooden benches. On that front I felt quite at home. Also me ...Bob? there (again, I apologize for incorrect names).
The dinner itself was terrific. The first course was a soup, I would guess it was a potato leak. That was followed by trout and beans. No Japanese sushi but delicious all the same. Then the main course was chicken and mashed potatoes in some gravy, with broccoli and candied onions, topped with a strip of bacon. The dinner was concluded with a gooseberry pudding. For all that I compare it visually to Kenyon... we did not have formal dinners quite like these.
After dinner the group of us (and we were joined by 1 other person) heads over the the common room for a casual game of trivial pursuit. It was hands down the most competitive game of Pursuit I've ever been a part of. Usually I quit and play only to the first wedge. That said, there were two teams and much of it came down to Emmy vs. Rob. All teammates had an occasional bit of insight... but the majority was them. I had a personal highlight in my Trivial Pursuit life. With the question, "What did the Montgolfier brothers rise to fame in?" I forget what Emmy started suggesting but I said... "It could be a pun. Like... hot air balloon." We went with it and I was correct. It was awesome! The game actually got called a draw. Both teams had all 6 wedges and nobody was getting the final question right. So, as midnight approached we called it a draw.
There we bid farewell to the others and I joined Em back to her place. There We had some tea and I showed her my pictures of New Zealand and a few from Australia. That was fun for me because I had never looked at many of those. Before long we were both fading and called it a night.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.7
No comments:
Post a Comment