Goodbye, my lovely Oxford.

What a year!

I was just looking back at some picture from when my family visited me for my 21^st birthday. I can’t quite believe that it’s only been 10 months.

It feels like so much has happened since then:

Another round of cancer for my mom (praise the Lord she's doing great!)

The World Journalism Institute

Oxford

My older sister moving to an apartment. . .(that's the goob's normal face, hence my great love for her)

Lining up an internship for next summer

Learning kung fu (just kidding)

Displaying newfound maturity

Now I’m about to head back to my home country after being out of the country and not seeing my family for the longest time ever.    

Going back to this!

So since my last blog post, I’ve had a few adventures (I’m depending on my "diary"—English for "planner"—to remind me what I actually did, so you’ll get a nice dated outline again, as I clearly exhibit an addict-type dependency on lists and bullet points):

November 17^th

Had my first experience at Fire and Stone, a great pizza place with 5 pound Thursdays and pizzas named after major cities from every continent (except maybe Antarctica?). And no Matt, I did not order one of the American pizzas. Afterwards I got to hear Ravi Zacharias (such a wise man!) speak at St. Aldates student night.

November 19^th

The number one thing on my “to do in England” list was see a Premier League game, and some of the lovely people from Azusa Pacific University planned at trip to see a Manchester City game. Although the team colors are girly (light blue? Really? That’s almost as bad as Cambridge’s mint green…) and the team is hated by Manchester United fans, the day was great fun, capped off by a visit to a Manchester pub heralded as “Pub of the Year.” We concluded that the rating was heavily rigged.

November 24^th

Thanksgiving brought a lovely ball at St. Aldates—our first exposure to Oxford’s famous balls (and this was one of the much less extravagant ones, we’ve been told)—and it was magical. It was masquerade themed, so while most people wore fancy Venetian masks or at least costume shop masks, I used my 5^th grade art skills to make a pink cardstock mask. (I didn’t really need it while I was dancing anyway.) Another American taught me a bit of swing dancing, there was a FANTASTIC jazz band and an open bar (at a church function?! The drinking culture is so different here!), the Oxford all-male acapella group Out of the Blue performed, and there was a gondola in the middle of the room (to make it really feel like Venice). Lovely!

November 26^th

I started my day helping at Livewires (one of the children’s ministries at my church). The children were lovely and it was a great way to meet more people at Woodstock Road Baptist. I’ll miss that church!

After Livewires I went to Erika’s house—she’s from the States but is married to an English guy—for Thanksgiving dinner (again!). Delicious and relaxing. I love her family and will miss them dearly.

Later Claire and I went to the RAG (a student charity organization) ball to volunteer in the casino/eat our lives away (our neighbor is part of RAG, so he got us spots working at the ball). It was incredible: so much food and music, so many fancy dresses…so many poker chips to count….

November 28^th

One of the other George Mason students set up a tour of the Oxford University Press museum and kindly invited any others along, so I got to go see the company that publishes the books we all have to spend hours reading. I now know where I will be applying to work.

Printing the old-fashioned way

  
November 28^th and 30^th

Christmas dinner here is like our Thanksgiving dinner, complete with turkey or chicken or duck, potatoes, veggies, gravy, stuffing, and of course mince pie (which, to my relief, does NOT include mincemeat) with cream or brandy butter and sometimes even Christmas fruitcake. We had our first Christmas dinner (complete with Christmas poppers, which pop when you pull them open and have a little toy and a paper crown inside!) at the Jesus College dinner dance, and two days later our gourmet-chef neighbors invited us over for a delicious Christmas duck dinner.

December 2^nd – 6^th

I got to see Hannah Young again! This time it was in Paris. We stayed at a hostel in Montmartre, hung out with our hostel mates, and raced around Paris to see the Eiffel tower (we went up it at night!), Notre Dame, Shakespeare and Company, the Champs-Élysées, the Arc de Triomphe, the Louvre, the mini Statue of Liberty, the basilica du Sacre Coeur, the catacombs (a visit inspired by this article! Don’t worry, we went the legal way), Versailles, and the Orangerie (where Monet’s water lilies are displayed—a highlight for me! I LOVE impressionism, and I read a book about the water lilies when I was little girl—and found out one of the girls in my hostel had read the same book! If I get to go back to France, I want to visit his gardens at Giverny.).    

Crêpes by Notre Dame

Catacombs

Paris is a sparkling city. A lot like New York and London, I think, except more sprawling and iconic.

December 8^th to 14^th

Said goodbye to Claire. (Said lots of goodbyes.) Be warned, all ye future traveling students, this is the most miserable part of studying abroad. The English, Americans and other internationals I’ve met have been wonderful and it is so hard to say goodbye to the people and the town.

Before I fly home today, as a final memory, here’s a list of 5 of my top study abroad memories. Thank you for reading along! 

·         Balls (St. Aldates, RAG)

·         Buckingham Palace

·         OUAC (track and field)  

·         Paris

·         Evensong at Westminster Abbey

Track Meets and Johnny Depp

It’s been an exciting, fast-moving couple of weeks! I made it through the “5^th week blues”—although I’m sad because that means it’s already 6^th week. Here are a few highlights from the past two weeks:

November 2^nd

Besides being the birthday of a friend back home (Harriet you better read this!), I got to meet up with a woman from church. She’s from Oregon but married to an Oxonian, and they have three adorable little girls and a lovely little home that they open up to all sorts of people from the church. After that I met up with Megan, the friend of a friend back at Mason, who is now coaching lacrosse at Exeter University. Before her team played the Blues, we trotted through the city for a little tour—without her, I never would’ve snuck into Christ Church.

(On a side note: I’ve decided I am too much of a rules-keeper. I’ll let you know if I successfully break any rules—maybe I’ll touch the grass on the quad at Jesus College….) 

November 5^th

Remember, remember! Remember Guy Fawkes’s foiled attempt to blow up Parliament we did, but not until after a visit from Johnny Depp. He came to the Oxford Union, and I was fortunate enough to be drawn to go see his latest film (The Rum Diary) and attend a question-and-answer session with Mr. Depp and Bruce Robinson, the director. Unfortunately the event was not miced (miked?) and, despite repeated pleas from the audience, Mr. Depp was not in the mood to speak up. The questions, rather than what I thought would be astute Oxford-worthy questions, were People-magazine-worthy questions like, “Of all the leading ladies you’ve kissed, which one was the best?” (I think he deferred and said, “All of them.”)

Then, after a “family dinner” at our flat (Azusa Pacific, or APU, one of the schools on my program, has a big potluck every weekend, and flatmates are invited!), a few of us headed to the fireworks, bonfire and wicker man burning. So savage.

The night was capped off with a swine-themed birthday party at our neighbor’s. Where, you ask, did the swine obsession come from? Well, there was that flu a few years back….and the theme stuck around….

November 6^th

Four weeks of training with the Oxford University Athletic (track and field) Club (OUAC) did not prepare me for the Fresher’s Varsity match, but it was a great day nonetheless. Varsity = Oxford vs. Cambridge, so we headed out of town at 8 a.m. and went to the home of the light blues (actually more of a minty green). The girl’s team was a little scant, so between ten girls we all had to do quite a few events. I lost miserably in most of my races and jumps, but did well in the 100m hurdles—my favorite event! After the meet we headed to a pub where I got to meet some of the illustrious past presidents and captains of OUAC, and then to the Cambridge Union for dinner (we were about to eat the tables by the time we got to go through the buffet line!). photos unscrupulously lifted from the Facebook of our fearless captain, Elle 

(center: Matt, club president, and Elle, women's captain)

The 4x100m team

November 9^th

Well, this isn’t specific to November 9^th, but at 8 a.m. every Wednesday I go to a group called Christians in Sport—it’s a fantastic group of students who love Jesus and sport. Such an encouraging hour in the middle of the week (plus it gets me out of bed at a reasonable hour). Also, several Mason students had lunch at a BURGER place with our faculty advisor from Mason—as Sonia, one of the other Mason girls, said, she was CRAVING American food. Fix!

November 12^th

Visited Bath and Stonehenge with the OPUS study abroad group. The circle of stones, while squished much closer together than I imagined from the illustrations on our Geo-Safari game (one of the benefits of being homeschooled was getting to play educational games—and yes, they were actually fun. Think Jeopardy except the timer is a beeper and, at twelve, you can actually win), were impressively large. The Roman baths at Bath are amazing—the hot spring is still flowing, and it’s crazy to be in England thinking about ancient Romans living out their culture up north. Bath overall is a lovely town—I’d like to go back.

With Emily (APU) and Claire

One of our other flatmates, Kim

Still-springing hot spring!

Only still-filled Roman baths in the world

Shamelessly picking up on spoiled American tactics?

Bath Abbey

November 13^th

Went to church (love Woodstock Road Baptist!), went to another family dinner (love APU!), had a dinner with Claire and our friend Matt (love entertaining!). He told us to watch the nature show Frozen Planet—“It’s not extreme. It’s just nice” (a word that is, in keeping with British reservedness, a very moderate modifier). I would highly recommend the “Spring” episode (even though I haven’t had time to finish it yet) for any fans of white cold-weather animals, stunning panoramas and classical music. A narrator with a British accent and a touch of dry humour makes it a must-see.

xoxo (American)

xx (British)

P.S. With all this culture-comparing, I think I need to start making sure that my friendships don’t solely rely on the common denominator of difference-finding! So xxoo, love from both sides of the ocean :)

Musings of a Delinquent Blogger

So I should be going to bed, but I’m working on internship applications and I started feeling a little guilty for neglecting my blog. If there’s anyone who has actually checked this to see if I’ve posted anything, I’m so sorry it’s been so long! This is a rambling post, since I wrote it in bits and pieces, but it will hopefully give you an overview of what my time in England has been like.

In mid-September the George Mason section of the study abroad group went to London for the weekend. Highlights included the museums (London has so many free museums—it’s my favorite form of cheap tourism), hanging out with other Mason students, and walking along the Thames past Big Ben at night. 

"Yes, Prime Minister" from our seats on the millionth floor

One of the Trafalgar Square lions (much harder to climb than I thought!)

 

 

 

But far and away the best part was Evensong at Westminster Abbey. My friend Bruce even got us introduced to the Very Reverend Dr. John Hall, Dean of Westminster, who (to Bruce’s delight) welcomed the Pope on his visit to London last year and (to my delight) conducted the Royal Wedding service this April. Dr. Hall took us behind the altar to show us the shrine of St. Edward the Confessor. My confession is that I hadn’t heard of St. Edward and had no idea what I was seeing, but I know it was a privilege and a rare moment in my London adventures!

The Royal theme continued after a trip to the Canary Islands for our travel break (the closest I’ve ever been to Africa—sniff), when Molly (from Catholic University of America) and I headed back to London to tour Buckingham Palace. It’s only open for August and September while the Queen is in Scotland, so we scooted in on the last tourist day and got to see the beautiful palace (it’s HUGE inside, and so lovely) and Kate’s (tiny) wedding dress.

In the Queen's backyard (no photos in her home)

The Royal Mews (horses, coaches and really expensive cars)

 

Exercising the Queen's horses

Since then I’ve gone punting (flat boat, shallow river, long pole—it’s not my calling in life, but I stayed dry), tried rowing (again, not my calling, but it’s nice to say I’ve rowed on the Thames—also called the Isis around Oxford), and joined the track team (“athletics”—also not my calling, but it’s fun and if I mess up I don’t have to swim). Really, sports are one of the best ways to meet people, and since everything is a club here, you can join a lot of sports without being very talented. That’s a major difference between American and English universities.

Last weekend my friend Hannah visited—we grew up together, and she’s studying in Italy this fall, so she hopped over during her break. It was so encouraging to see someone from home, and really fun to get to show Oxford off.

Oxford Castle

Rowers practicing on the Isis

Hannah!

Slightly unnerving...

Getting to be a tourist :) Alice in Wonderland was written for the daughter of the dean of Christ Church

What happens in Primark (a cheap, British Forever21) when the shoes don't come in boxes...

She was right! (It's a Norman castle.)

Whoops (escapees...)

Also, October brought tutorials, which I love. Since I have to do my own research, exploration and writing throughout the week, I find myself much more invested in my learning. It’s like I get to write two mini theses every week, except with much lower stakes. I want to stay the whole year, but sadly I need a couple more classes at Mason that aren’t offered here, so it looks like I’ll be back in the states for the spring.  

Random observations, English and otherwise:

• Many of the ambulances in Oxford are station-wagon sized (hearse-like?), while the police cars are like little vans. You’d think they would switch that up. But on the topic of vehicles, the bus drivers here are a marvel. I think they have a segment in their training titled, “How to fit your bus through a space narrower than it is.” Haven’t seen a nicked rearview mirror yet.

• I also now know that I weight approximately 11 stone. I stumbled across this odd archaic weight term from seeing tabloids boasting things like “Pauline went from 20stone to 13stone!” I can just see myself running around America, gleefully shouting “I just lost two stones!” I’d get some stares.

• I wrote a book proposal for one of my tutorials (the tutorial is called “Writing for Publication”) and learned that if you’re ever trying to learn about something, pretend you have to write a book on it. You will discover resources you never knew existed. For me, that was a little disappointing, because I discovered someone else already wrote my book. But in the future it should be helpful!

• Lastly, when I’m walking alone at night down dimly lit streets (sorry Mom and Dad), I have a new strategy for looking intimidating: hold anything I have that looks like a weapon (key, umbrella) menacingly, pick up shoulders, and walk with arms dangling slightly away from my body, meathead-style. The upside is that in my attempt to make my arms look muscular I actually feel quite thin. The downside is I probably look like too uncoordinated to fight. Life is a tradeoff, as Dr. Smith (college professor and author of A Freepress in Free Hand) would say.   

Well, enjoy your extra hours of daytime back home (I know we get exactly the same amount, but somehow I always get jealous when it's dark out here and still sunny back home). And sorry the pictures are a little lacking, I think I may need to get a smaller camera so I won't be so lazy about carrying it around!