Trip to Oxford

I'm getting a little behind on blogging! I guess if I'm updating often enough to remember what I did since the last time I wrote, I'm doing okay.

Wednesday after work Ian and I went for what turned into a pretty extensive evening cycle ride. (Side note: Everyone here is so attentive to my needs to the point where I almost feel badly about it! Carrie and Ian are constantly asking me if I have everything I need, which is great and I guess perhaps should be expected since I'm paying a fairly pretty penny to stay here. I keep forgetting that part, but besides that, I know they are genuinely concerned that I'm happy. Ian asking me if I was bored is what brought about the bike ride.)

Oxford University Museum of Natural History

Yesterday (Thursday) was the day at Oxford. I feel bad saying that I wasn't excited about it at all and was honestly not really wanting to go. I'm not sure why--I think it was a combination of nervousness and not having anything particularly exciting to do while there. The whole point was to meet Peter Quinn, John's equivalent at the University of Oxford. John drove us to Oxford, which was my first driving experience for a decent distance. It took about an hour and a half. There are a lot of roundabouts!

Pete's office and the Equality and Diversity Unit are right near the city centre market, so Pete bought us some falafel from a fellow who was quite passionate about his culinary endeavors. I'd never had falafel before and it was actually pretty good. Lunch and the meeting after mostly consisted of unstructured discussion around my project and the issues around the work that Pete and John do on a daily basis. I felt special to be just casually chatting with (really only listening to) these two dudes from the two most distinguished universities in the world. I'm so glad that they are both down to earth.

One thing I didn't expect that I'm sometimes experiencing is trouble discerning what people are saying! They're speaking English (obviously), but it's often so fast, accenty, jargony, and filled with what I'm guessing are cultural sayings that I'm confused. During much of the conversation with Pete and John I found myself just trying to keep up and not really taking in what they were saying. I started feeling really stupid and slow, and was sad because I wasn't able to ask questions since the pace of the conversation was way beyond the pace of my brain function. I'm going to explain this to John and hopefully he can kind of recap for me what happened!

The Radcliffe Camera is Oxford’s most iconic building

After the meeting, I set off in Oxford on my own to explore a little. On Wednesday I had asked several people what I should do and see while there, but no one could really give me good ideas. I ended up going to the Ashmolean Museum, which is the world's first university museum. I also found the Museum of Natural History, but literally could only stay for about 20 minutes because the place was closing. It was really neat to see bones (or at least castings of bones) of dinosaurs (see above). After that, I found a tiny bakery and bought a giant chocolate chip cookie. I walked around and got a little lost in the really touristy area of the city centre, and I didn't like that at all. I was hoping to find an old bookstore and find a really sweet copy of the Oxford English Dictionary, but had to settle for what I think is a chain bookstore here in England (Blackwell). By then I was tired of walking and went to the bus station. I had very good timing--the coach was leaving at 5:35 and I arrived at about 5:28. The ride back to Cambridge, though long at just under 3.5 hours, was actually very pleasant. I had a lot of time to just sit and think and read and write and work on homework a little. I didn't have to worry about feeling like I had to be doing something, which is what I've been experiencing quite a bit lately.

Today after work I went to a lecture on Oliver Cromwell, who I knew nothing about prior to the talk but would now like to learn more about because he was a pretty prominent figure in English history and is quite controversial. After the lecture, I was killing time and came across Fitzbillie's, a bakery that I've been wanting to get to that's apparently famous for Chelsea buns. So I bought a Chelsea bun for later. (Good, but not totally fantastic. I'd have another, though.) Today was Charlotte's birthday at the DRC, so we met at Brown's for a few drinks and snackies. Fun times.

Tonight I should've been researching London because I'm going tomorrow by myself. I know there a few things I want to see and do, but I mostly need to know how to get around. I'm not too worried about it; I'm sure I'll figure it out. I guess you'll know tomorrow or on Sunday how it went!