To be fair, these are Holly's pictures yet again...I have been going through orientation with St. Peters, while Holly has managed to take some great pictures. The above picture seemed particularly British.
Kari and Kelley, this one's for you...Harry Potter Hall! This is the dining hall of Christ's Church College, one of oldest colleges in Oxford University. Tonight, Holly and I went to Evensong in the college's chapel and heard a choir sing traditional hymns from the Middle Ages. The church dates from the twelfth century.
This is the Radcliffe Camera, which is a part of the Bodleian Library. Inside are reading rooms, which I can access this summer! What a place to study!
Here's a bit of Oxford seen from the top of the Church of St. Mary the Virgin.
I mentioned that I am living next too a medieval jail...here's a bit of it. The jail has been turned into an expensive restaurant/hotel ironically called Malmaison.
As I get some time to wander around, I'll add more pictures, especially of my college.
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I'm not sure how my tutor, Dr. Addison, managed it, but I've learned more in my first day as an 'Oxford student' than I have in entire courses back home... There are three other students in my program (Global Climate Change and Security)... Curtis (21) is from Oglethorpe in Atlanta and Kevin (19) and Kyle (37) are from different universities in Jersey. The differences in age, politics, and backgrounds within the group have created a great dynamic. I don't know how we managed to do this today, but after a two hour lecture (which felt like 2o minutes) and a list of ten books to be read by Thursday, we went to a local pub and continued talking/debating for two hours... followed by dinner, some other pubs, and some more conversation...you can imagine... I'm really excited to be working with these guys. They are (and this is completely random) from Business/Econ backgrounds, so we are all looking at Global Climate Change from similar perspectives. Dr. Addison has literally written the book on this subject (Fundamentals of the Physical Environment), yet he's a really laid back guy...not the stuffy intellectual I imagined would work here. I think it's safe to say that many of our tutorial sessions will end in pubs.
Last night we had our first formal dinner and the presentation on 'Prisons in the UK' I mentioned a few posts ago. In our dining hall, like in Harry Potter Hall, there is a 'high table' where the professors sit. Every Monday at our formal dinner, some students will have the opportunity to sit at high table and chat with the profs. I was in the first group to sit at the table and ended up sitting next to Prof. John O'Connor who casually mentioned his friend's impressions of the Golden Compass trilogy and the new movie that came out based on the first book. His friend was the author, and resident of Oxford, PHILIP PULLMAN!!!!!
So I am insanely happy here and will probably never leave...the intellectual lifestyle ain't that bad. I still can't believe I'm here, living in the midst of this unique community, studying something relevant to all of us, with a group of inspiring and brilliant students and professors.
Much, much more to come,
LOVE,
Emily
1 comment:
Holy Cow, Philip Pullman!
Oh and fyi, according a rule developed by myself and Kelley (thanks for the shout out btw), if you happen to run into Mr. Pullman, it is completely acceptable to approach him like you already know him. We call it the 2D rule (stands for two degrees).
it states that: If you know someone who knows someone. it is perfectly acceptable to approach the later someone in a familiar manner. It may also be referred to as the "its ok i know people" rule.
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