3-19-05 (the second day)
today starts our first offical day of classes. i woke up womewhat early so that i could make sure i would catch breakfast. i got downstairs with plenty of time. i arrived to find a good group of BSU students eating breakfast. as i enjoyed my egg, granola and orange juice we had a good time talking aobut anything and everything. i had attempted to make toast in an English toaster. instead of pushing down, you lift the lever up, after you push the "on" button and set the timer. my bread somehow got stuck to the inside of the toaster and i was only able to rip out half of the slice, leaving the rest as i did not want to stick a fork in it - for obvious reasons.
at 10 am, Dr. Chpaman entered the lecture room, complete with lecture cape - which is black and from the front looks like a vest but is a cape int he back and has long sleeves but has holes haft way through so he can stick his arms our and can let it the rest of the sleeve hang down. he talked about the english inthe 1600's - from queen elizabeth I to king james who came from scotland. he talked about how great britain came to be great britain and social class and order to their diets and professions. after our break he takled about how the civil war in britain had started and came to be and how history actually lead to their civil war. i hadn't taken notes for classes in awhile (design tech students don't usually need to - or it will be printed off for you already), and i leaned over to show laura at one point the indentation in my ifnger from my pen.
after our extremely long lectures (what can i say? they made my butt hurt) we had a lunch of baguettes and ham with other meats offered too. it was really good.
jill and i took off after lunch and some journal writing to run some errands before her next class we first went to the post office where we foundthat some of the best deals can be obtained there: phot cards, maps, stamps, crayola, and my little phony to name a few. i will go back there at some point to buy a phone card and stamps.
we also stopped at some osford apparell shops. i know i would like an oxford sweatshirt and now that i know where abouts the pool is, i would like to find an oxford swimming shirt and swim cap.
jill then had to leave for go back for class so i then headed towards an internet cafe. i ran into some bsu students and they had said that the place we thought was 1 pound an hours was actually 1 pound for 20 minutes. i didn't really care at that point so i went in to catch up on my email and website. from there, i just walked around, trying to familarize myself with oxford. i looked at all the little shops, went in a few. i then went and ran into the covered market, which is like any other market, yet it's inside. it was really strange as people even brought bikes inside. i found lots of little treasures but none that i would be able to afford or take home for that matter. after walking around the stores there i began heading back but decided to find the bus station for which i knew the where abouts of it and followed to where i was told to go. on the way i found public toilets, which i thought was odd - out in the middle of an alley way - not what i expected. i eventually found Gloucester Green, which is a big open square where they have markets on Wednesdays. i eventually found the bus station and talked to them about tieckets to London and told me to purchase them on day of departure. i then found a little convienence store that sold phone cards and - ahh! - Dr. Pepper! which wasn't as cold as at home but was cold compared to the other stores that didn't refridgerate, although the label says best when cold. when i was buying my items the lady who was ringing me up asked how much i wanted with my phone card. i replied,"5 dollars." she started to get it, stopped, and i immediatly corrected myself. "i mean, pounds!" "that's ok," she said, "i knew what you meant anyway." "yeah," i told her, "i'm still getting used to it."
on my way back i ran into louise and explained what i had been up to all day. she told me, "good for you." as i told her all the places i had been. i then took a different way back to wycliffe hall - i was disoriented with not knowing my exact location but knew i was close to the hall. eventually i made it back, clickbed the stairs and grabbed a chair, threw it out the window to the balcony and climbed out there to catch up on journal writing before supper and just enjoyed being outside in the city of oxford.
at 6, i went down for supper only to find that supper was at 6:30. so, finding kent standing there (he's louise's wife , and louise is our trip supervisor) i pointed out the oxford swimming poset and told hime i wanted to go there but didn't know where Iffnely Road was. He then showed me that there was a map inthe next room and i was quickly able to find it, though it would be a good walk there. i'm all excited to go now once i get a break. i really want an oxford swimming cap.
supper was then served - it was chicken curry, which was in no comparison to the stuff we tried in our workshops in bemidji. it was really good actually. i was impressed watching Nic, kent and louise's son, eat. you could tell he had been to england before or may have mistaken him for an english person. he was squirting brownsauce on his potatoes and wasn't all cautios at first glace aobut his food.
after supper i had convinced myslef i wasn't going out, although the group had already declared an outing to the infamous purpel turtle. but when i made a journey across the hall to tell stephanie this, her and Laura R. convinced me to come with.
the purple turtle is a union bar here in oxford and is widely spoken about by one eurospring generation to the next as it is quite the funky underground bar and dance place. when we finally found where it was cleverly hidden in some back alleyway, we made the descension downstairs and were all carded and then let in. we found a majority of the group int he back on circular booths. i decdided to do a "when in Rome" and ordered my first drink from the bar - a half pint of strong bow, a type of apple cider that seemed to be what the other girls seemed to like. but i quickly remembered why i hate drinking as i barely finished half and then gave the rest to laura and steph. i really do not like the taste of alcohol and i really cannot drink that much of any type of beverage as i get way too full. plus, i really do not likethe thought of myself getting drunk. so there i sat - and the sad part is that all that was really going on was drinking, no actual conversation. so at one point, carly looked up at me and said, "want to go back?2 and i was so glad she asked. we had a great walk home, talking about all sorts of random things, it was great.
that night i called my mom (mum), gave her details thus far (the 6 hour difference really is no fun) and then did a bunch more journal writing before bed.
at 10 am, Dr. Chpaman entered the lecture room, complete with lecture cape - which is black and from the front looks like a vest but is a cape int he back and has long sleeves but has holes haft way through so he can stick his arms our and can let it the rest of the sleeve hang down. he talked about the english inthe 1600's - from queen elizabeth I to king james who came from scotland. he talked about how great britain came to be great britain and social class and order to their diets and professions. after our break he takled about how the civil war in britain had started and came to be and how history actually lead to their civil war. i hadn't taken notes for classes in awhile (design tech students don't usually need to - or it will be printed off for you already), and i leaned over to show laura at one point the indentation in my ifnger from my pen.
after our extremely long lectures (what can i say? they made my butt hurt) we had a lunch of baguettes and ham with other meats offered too. it was really good.
jill and i took off after lunch and some journal writing to run some errands before her next class we first went to the post office where we foundthat some of the best deals can be obtained there: phot cards, maps, stamps, crayola, and my little phony to name a few. i will go back there at some point to buy a phone card and stamps.
we also stopped at some osford apparell shops. i know i would like an oxford sweatshirt and now that i know where abouts the pool is, i would like to find an oxford swimming shirt and swim cap.
jill then had to leave for go back for class so i then headed towards an internet cafe. i ran into some bsu students and they had said that the place we thought was 1 pound an hours was actually 1 pound for 20 minutes. i didn't really care at that point so i went in to catch up on my email and website. from there, i just walked around, trying to familarize myself with oxford. i looked at all the little shops, went in a few. i then went and ran into the covered market, which is like any other market, yet it's inside. it was really strange as people even brought bikes inside. i found lots of little treasures but none that i would be able to afford or take home for that matter. after walking around the stores there i began heading back but decided to find the bus station for which i knew the where abouts of it and followed to where i was told to go. on the way i found public toilets, which i thought was odd - out in the middle of an alley way - not what i expected. i eventually found Gloucester Green, which is a big open square where they have markets on Wednesdays. i eventually found the bus station and talked to them about tieckets to London and told me to purchase them on day of departure. i then found a little convienence store that sold phone cards and - ahh! - Dr. Pepper! which wasn't as cold as at home but was cold compared to the other stores that didn't refridgerate, although the label says best when cold. when i was buying my items the lady who was ringing me up asked how much i wanted with my phone card. i replied,"5 dollars." she started to get it, stopped, and i immediatly corrected myself. "i mean, pounds!" "that's ok," she said, "i knew what you meant anyway." "yeah," i told her, "i'm still getting used to it."
on my way back i ran into louise and explained what i had been up to all day. she told me, "good for you." as i told her all the places i had been. i then took a different way back to wycliffe hall - i was disoriented with not knowing my exact location but knew i was close to the hall. eventually i made it back, clickbed the stairs and grabbed a chair, threw it out the window to the balcony and climbed out there to catch up on journal writing before supper and just enjoyed being outside in the city of oxford.
at 6, i went down for supper only to find that supper was at 6:30. so, finding kent standing there (he's louise's wife , and louise is our trip supervisor) i pointed out the oxford swimming poset and told hime i wanted to go there but didn't know where Iffnely Road was. He then showed me that there was a map inthe next room and i was quickly able to find it, though it would be a good walk there. i'm all excited to go now once i get a break. i really want an oxford swimming cap.
supper was then served - it was chicken curry, which was in no comparison to the stuff we tried in our workshops in bemidji. it was really good actually. i was impressed watching Nic, kent and louise's son, eat. you could tell he had been to england before or may have mistaken him for an english person. he was squirting brownsauce on his potatoes and wasn't all cautios at first glace aobut his food.
after supper i had convinced myslef i wasn't going out, although the group had already declared an outing to the infamous purpel turtle. but when i made a journey across the hall to tell stephanie this, her and Laura R. convinced me to come with.
the purple turtle is a union bar here in oxford and is widely spoken about by one eurospring generation to the next as it is quite the funky underground bar and dance place. when we finally found where it was cleverly hidden in some back alleyway, we made the descension downstairs and were all carded and then let in. we found a majority of the group int he back on circular booths. i decdided to do a "when in Rome" and ordered my first drink from the bar - a half pint of strong bow, a type of apple cider that seemed to be what the other girls seemed to like. but i quickly remembered why i hate drinking as i barely finished half and then gave the rest to laura and steph. i really do not like the taste of alcohol and i really cannot drink that much of any type of beverage as i get way too full. plus, i really do not likethe thought of myself getting drunk. so there i sat - and the sad part is that all that was really going on was drinking, no actual conversation. so at one point, carly looked up at me and said, "want to go back?2 and i was so glad she asked. we had a great walk home, talking about all sorts of random things, it was great.
that night i called my mom (mum), gave her details thus far (the 6 hour difference really is no fun) and then did a bunch more journal writing before bed.
posted by andi at 9:51 AM
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