Sunday Brunch

Last Sunday (which seems like an eon ago), we went to brunch at Christ Church college. The head of the graduate students' society at St. Catherines was nice enough to suggest it and take us on a bit of a walking tour. Christ Church is where Harry Potter was filmed, and we got to eat in the dining hall with all of these ridiculously old pictures, including one of Henry VIII. This is another one of these cool things that non-Oxford card holders wouldn't get to see. There was a lot of good food too - bacon, sausage, eggs... full English breakfast. I also had scones and clotted cream. I think that's why I look kinda large in the picture.

Christ Church also has a cathedral, which is why Oxford is considered a city, as oppossed to a town according to British rules. Then we met someone from Exeter College, and we got to see the Fellow's Garden there, which is really nice (but probably nicer when the flowers start blooming). J.R.R. Tolkien went to Exeter, and apparently spent a lot of time in the garden.

Also, it has this ledge which overlooks the Radcliffe Camera and All Soul's College (the spires in the back). All Soul's is the most prestigious college - it only admits Fellows, and not undergrads.

There's no taste like home

So sometimes I'm really suprised at how familiar some things are here. Boston is only a 5 hour drive from Montreal, but I'm finding a lot of things here that I can't find in Boston. First is the obvious reappearance of the Queen on money, and then there have also been some familiar brands at the supermarket that I haven't seen in a while.

I was also happy to find Sleeman's Honey Brown on tap at the pub next door, a great Canadian beer you can't find in Boston. But last night took the cake. There are these little kabob vans that sit on the streets at night waiting for the bar crowd to get out, and there's one parked right across the street from our house (probably because of the pub next door).

But I was really excited to find that they had poutine (which of course he didn't call it), but it's a Quebec dish of fresh fries, cheese and hot gravy. This stuff is incredible when drunk, or alternatively when you have a horrible cold. I had it in New York last summer, but they hadn't got the gravy hot enough to melt the cheese. This guy served it piping hot - just right... Hussain's Van is so my new best friend.

All reading, part II

So this has been the worst week yet. My cold from last week got better, and then it got way, way worse. I went to the college nurse, but they seem to have a Darwinian theory of medicine here, in which they figure if you can survive the infection without antibiotics, you're worthy of living in England. I think the problem has been the rampant humidity, which is unlike the dry winters at home. Luckily, the English have seen this problem coming and have met it with an actually useful product - Kleenex FOR MEN. These things are huge. I don't know if I'll be able to go back to normal Kleenex again.

Also, I found really weird bruises on my arm. I'm going to hope it's from rowing again, and not some strange side-effect of this monkey virus I have, that's now moved from my chest to my nose. People have told me though that I should become immune to England in about 8 weeks, so just in time to leave.

The only good news this week was that "Pavel" the Russian tutor was actually nice today. Maybe because I was sitting across from him with the glazed look of someone with a high temperature. Or maybe he just got his revenge for losing the cold war out on me during our last session. In any case, I now have to do a ridiculous amount of reading and write another essay for my jurisprudence tutorial tomorrow. I'm meeting with the jurisprudence guy at Oxford, so I think I might be a little outmatched, considering I'm still not sure what jurisprudence actually is.

Formal Dinner

Last night we had our first formal dinner of the term. Every Friday the Middle Common Room (which is the association for graduate students) has dinner in the dining hall at a separate table. The dining hall has these long tables, with a high table at the front for the masters. The formal dinner is more expensive, but we get much better food, and don't have to eat as fast as the undergrads. I've gone to the normal, non-Friday dinners a couple times this week, and it's seriously like pigs at a trough. If you put your fork down for a second the servers grab your plate, and suddenly before you know it you're on dessert.

The dinners itself are a bit of a spectacle. You have to make it by 7:15 or they lock you out. Then the masters come in through a separate door, and everyone stands while they get to the high table. Then the head master says a little phrase in latin and smacks the table, and everyone can eat.

For the formal dinner (this one was supposed to be black tie), we got dressed up, took our time and actually had a good meal - I think I was eating venison, but you never know... the meat here all seems to look the same.

Other libraries

It seems like every second building is a library here, so I decided to try out a different one besides the law library. The law library is in a new (and hence) ugly building, so it's nice to be in an old one. I tried reading in the Radcliffe Camera. It's only open to Oxford students, so it's nice to see something tourists wouldn't be able to go to. However, the advantages of the new building were quickly apparent. 1st - no good internet access. 2nd - the bathrooms seem to have remained unchanged since 1749 when the camera was built.

Maclinovich

So I had my first tutorial today with the Russian. He basically grilled me for an hour on stuff I have no recollection reading. Maybe it was buried inside one of the eight books I was supposed to read for today. Or maybe I was supposed to have researched and known which Oxford philosopher came up with the idea of applying so-and-so theory to international law. Either way, I felt mismatched for his giant Russian brain.

So far I haven't heard from my other tutor, so I think she might have expired. But when she does come around, I'm hoping she's going to be a bit lighter on the interrogations.

Either way, I'll be spending a lot of time in the library from now on trying to figure out what the quiz master is going to ask me.

Night out

Tonight we went to a Lebanese restaurant. Altogether, in my opinion Montreal still has the best Lebanese food (outside of Lebanon I guess). But this place did have hookah. The skills at the table ranged from beginner:

To intermediate:
To expert:

Although Karen did get the hang of it:




Then we went to a "bop" at Keble College. This was supposed to be a schoolboy/schoolgirl themed party (we forgot our costumes). Everyone was young, British and really didn't need the costume to seem like a schoolboy - they all already look and sound like Harry Potter anyways.

Rowing

After watching all my friends do it in high school, I finally got to try rowing today. It's one of the clubs St. Catherines offers, and a ridiculous number of Oxford people do it. Of course it was pouring rain and kinda cold, but it felt like a good day to get on the river.

I really liked it - sorry no pictures. I figured I have bad luck with electronics and water, so I left the camera at home. As long as they keep doing it on the weekend in the middle of the day, I'd be game. The early morning weekday thing would be a little harder, but if I actually get down to working (tomorrow - really), I'll see how much free time I have.

All reading, no TV

After an unsuccessfully attempt at the library yesterday, Shahzia and I went to Blackwell's to cave in and buy textbooks for our class. It was suggested that we don't buy books, which means given the ridiculous amount of reading, that I would literally have to live in the law library (not much of a change from BU, I know). But now at least we have 3 of the 7 books we need for this one class, so I can spend some time reading elsewhere.

In a possible omen, the TV in the house doesn't work. I gave it another valiant effort yesterday, but it's still out of commission. I've never heard of the brand "Beko" - I think it might come from Latvia or something, but it looks like we won't be able to watch Big Brother. The British are obsessed with that show - right now it has a member of parliament and Dennis Rodman. I think I'll just have to settle for living in a Real World house.

Other neighbourhoods

Last night we went to see Dave (other BU person) and Liz's apartment. They live in a area north of downtown, more in the suburbs. Not much around here, but he's leasing from a Canadian who left his hockey equipment.
So far the only notable thing about that neighbourhood is the street signs. Apparently the elderly are a giant problem, kinda like deer at home. I think the sign on the left is what happens when they don't move quick enough.

English Food

Grocery shoppings here is an interesting experience. Mostly I can find what I'm looking for, but occasionally things are a little weird. Take, for instance the dead pheasants. Then there's the fascination with meat flavoured potato chips. As soon as I can find some that don't come in bulk size, I'll give those a try.

Jews for Jesus

I met my tutor for my tutorial in Public International Law yesterday. He's a fellow at Jesus College (that's me at Jesus on the right). He's also extremely foreign (he's from Georgia - the one in Eastern Europe). So it's going to be fun learning from him, and especially immitating his accent.

We got our reading list, and it doesn't appear too bad at first glance, although I seen to be coming in mid-way through a full year course, so I think I'm getting the condensed version.

After our little half hour meeting I went exploring again, and found more stuff that seemed old and worth taking pictures of. New College has a replica of the bridge of sighs in Venice. I was going to try to take a picture from the inside, but I couldn't quite figure out how to get in.

The nice thing is with my Oxford ID, I'm able to get in a lot of places that normal tourists probably aren't allowed to go.

I went to Christ Church, where I think Harry Potter was filmed.





But the real nice place was Magdellan College. It has a huge expanse of land with a deer park and incredibile buildings, cathedral and quads.

Pub crawl

Everyone had finally arrived today, so tonight we went out in search of some good food and drink. So I finally got my first taste of English pubs... which includes English beer.

So far, not that impressed over its Canadian counterpart, but I'll keep searching for some good ones.

Of course - there was some more culture shock tonight. First was the washroom situation. Apparently the standard in pubs here (I saw it in two of them) is the trough. I haven't seen one of these since the old Maple Leaf Gardens. But it appears to be everywhere, so if you're shy about peeing in front of others, don't go to England.


Secondly, never order a Brakspear Bitter Beer. It didn't taste bad, but it stank horribly. I had to hold my nose while drinking it.



















But on the better side, we did get to check out the Eagle and Child Pub. This is where C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien got together to have drinks weekly. We didn't come up with anything quite so literary tonight, but still a good place to hang out right down the block.

"It's the ugly modern one on the right."

After we got settled, we headed over to St. Catherines, which is where we'll be taking our classes. We got a little lost and asked for directions, which is when we got the response from this post title. The guy wasn't exaggerating - this building is like the BU Law tower turned on its side. Maybe they figure we're used to ugly buildings, but it really sucks since most of the colleges here are ridiculously old and nice. It was also a pretty decent walk from our house, so I'm not sure if I'll be taking the bus each day or not.



When we got back, Milena had arrived, and we went shopping in downtown Oxford.




















Then we came back to our neighborhood and looked for a place to eat. We really are in a great location, and it didn't take long to find a nice street with a bunch of really good looking restaurants.

Dave and his fiancée joined us for dinner... they had also arrived early in the day, so our group is almost all here. We have our first class on Monday, so not much time to explore our surroundings.

Jetlag and general British oddities

After the hour long coach ride, we arrived in Oxford. We took a taxi and checked in at Keble College, which is where our house is, even though we are studying at St. Catherines. Keble itself was amazing to look at, and I'm really disappointed that we won't be studyding there, in the old buildings with spires and quads.

We made our way to the house, and I was pleasantly surprised, since I had been preparing for the worst. The house is a small white lodge with six bedrooms. It's right next to the Royal Oak Pub, and really convenient to downtown Oxford.

However, while the house looked good from the outside, we experienced several hiccups at this point - probably due to the fact that we hadn't slept all night, but some of it was just British weirdness.

First it literally took us 15 minutes to open the door to the house. This was the weirdest lock ever, and it was really frustrating after travelling so long not to be able to just open the front door and put down our bags. But we eventually figured it out. The house was really spooky at first - there were a lot of locked doors, and we couldn't get to other parts of the house, like the kitchen and other three bedrooms. Eventually the maintenance guy stopped in and showed us that had we been trying to turn the door knobs on these locked doors counterclockwise we could have been enjoying the full house several hours earlier. So far it has been a real day for brainpower.

Trip to Heathrow

The flight from Boston to Heathrow was really good. I didn't sleep at all, but Virgin Atlantic had on demand movies and TV, so I was able to keep myself entertained. It was weird though - I landed around 7:00am London time, and the sun wasn't out. It was pitch black.

Once we got off the plane, we had to go through customs, which was my first experience with a British queue (see picture - I later noticed the sign that said no photography was allowed). It took forever to get through, get our bags, and walk the 20 minutes to the bus terminal. But finally we got on the coach to Oxford.