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 :)