Matriculation

We had the matriculation ceremony for the 2008/09 freshers on the 18th of October - think graduation except in reverse! We have to wear sub fusc with our gowns which made us all look like penguins (and the girls look like some sort of errant country western singers with velvet ties).

Ok, this is all sounding a bit random so I'll explain the day as it unfolded. Matriculation is the ceremony whereby you enter as an official member of your college, and thus the university. It's normally held in the Sheldonian Theatre, which looks pretty splendid, but as that's closed for renovation at the moment we had ours in the Exam Schools (which was also pretty fancy). We all met at 9am at college (my college is St John's) and then signed the register to make it all official. One of the college Fellows (senior academic members of the college) gets to use his privilege of walking on the beautifully manicured lawns - which are strictly forbidden for the rest of us mere mortals! After that there was a whole lot of waiting around for our 10.30am ceremony...

Finally we were on the move and headed off down the road to the Exam Schools. Having my own personal paparazzi was brilliant - but he wasn't alone! Apparently Oxford on matriculation day is pretty popular with tourists and we had quite a few random groups of people wanting to take our photos! Bizarre...

The actual ceremony took about five minutes. One guy says literally two sentances in Latin and that's it! But, just to pad it out a little, we had a speech in English as well to explain the point of what we were doing. Unfortunately I managed to explode into a coughing fit as a result of my 'freshers' flu' so didn't really catch most of it...

And then it was over! Hope you enjoy the photos - there are heaps more here.

New photos of Oxford

Here are some new photos of the first few weeks in Oxford - enjoy!

Field trip to Dorset

As a way of the MSc class getting to know each other, the deparment organised for us to all go down to Dorset for the weekend (as I mentioned in the previous post). There are about 35 of us so it was good to get everyone's names sorted before we had to start debating things in class!

We went to the Isle of Purbeck and during the charming English rain, freezing cold, and horizontal wind, we visited Corfe Castle, Tyneham, and Kimmeridge Bay. It was all about how we conceptualise landscape and we spent many hours discussing things like 'what is nature' (ask yourself - it's actually pretty interesting, or that may just be the geek in me...).

It was all very quintisentially English, with lots of autumnal blackberries to munch on, and old pubs to visit. Anton Oliver is actually in another one of the MSc classes that the Geography department runs and so it was a bit of a shock to look up from my cornflakes to see him there the first morning! Tried not to be too star struck though...


The class is a good mix of people, about one third or a bit more from the UK, a decent sized group from the States and Canada, and then us odd balls, like an Australian, Russian, Indian, Irishman, and even a Mongolian! Considering that 63% of all postgrads at Oxford are from outside of the UK I think we're doing a pretty good job of sticking with the statistics.

Here are some more photos of the weekend!

One year as a student…

So, we’re here in Oxford. It’s as pretty as everyone says it is, although I have to admit my (Amelia) adventuring has only extended so far as my college (St John’s) and the supermarket! We will definitely have to go on a walking tour or something. I’m sure we’ll have all the inside knowledge before too long.

Autumn is in full swing here. The leaves are falling and swirling everywhere and are in every colour from deep greeny black through golden yellow and a rich ruby red. I’ve collected one every day so far and am hoping that they dry out and retain their colours. The lawns however are beautifully manicured and a lush, bright green. Probably because no one walks on them! These are the trees at the entrance to our flat but I'll take the camera out soon and see what other pictures I can get.
We moved into our flat with the extremely generous help of my friend Debbie who drove us up to Oxford on Sunday. It was pretty easy to find and is about 10 minutes walk from the centre of town. St John’s is on the way into town (as is our new local, the ‘Royal Oak’) so it’s perfect. The flat itself is really big, loads of storage and furniture galore. We’ll invest in an air mattress or something so come and visit! It’s a block of flats called Hart Synnot House and houses graduate students from my college. There’s a lovely communal lawn which should be great for next summer and is lovely to look out on in the meantime. It even has squirrels!

It’s funny thinking of all the things that you take for granted when you move into an established flat though – we have no chopping board, grater or sieve for example! Adrian’s all about trying to get things for free, so luckily there’s a great Freecycle group in Oxford that I’m checking out. Hopefully it has stuff we need soon! (Freecycling is basically listing what you’ve got that you don’t want and people come and collect it – and it has everything you could possibly think of!).
I got my uni ID card today too – so there’s no backing out now! I’ve also been inundated with information – only a day after thinking that I didn’t know enough about what was going on… There are all sorts of freshers events and whatnot this week and next week to keep us busy and meet some people which should be great.

I’ve also got a field trip on Fri-Sun with my class (the 29 other people who are doing the MSc in Nature, Society and Environmental Policy) down to the Isle of Purbeck on the south coast. I’m looking forward to seeing who else is in the course and meeting the lecturers etc. (how geeky does that sound…).

Adrian’s started the commute this week too – it took over three hours to get into London this morning! Yikes. Hopefully he can convince his work to let him work from home…

So there you have it, the first installment from Oxford. More reports as events warrant!

Wisiting Welly

It was like I had never left...

While Adrian was making the big bucks in London, I decided to make a short sojourn down to our nation's capital to see how everyone was doing. And I had a great time! Big ups to Kate and the (current and ex) Hataitai massive for welcoming me back; I would move back into that flat in a second if there's ever a room going and I'm in Wellington!

Kate and I went on an 'urban safari' to Cape Palliser to check out the seals (and the lambs, hawks, black cows, fat sausage dogs etc.). It was a gorgeous day and the fush and chups at the Lake Ferry pub rounded off the adventure nicely.

I also went back into work to say hi which was rather random - it was so similar that it felt as if I should be sitting down at a desk rather than just sitting in the kitchen drinking wine, but there were definitely lots of new faces that made me realise just how long I'd been gone. It also made me appreciative of my current job title, 'Lady of Leisure', and all the fun that having no plans on a Thursday entails...

The rest of the week was filled with wining and dining at various locations around town (including an absolutely delicious cassoulet, and tips on what the best thing is to order at yum cha, courtesy of Andrew). My bank balance is looking a bit poorly compared to my stomach!

Other highlights were the Rita Angus exhibition on at Te Papa at the moment and the swing on Mt Victoria that I had never known about! It was about time it was discovered though - it was absolutely HEAPS of fun (as Mark, Tom and Kate are showing).

Here are the rest of the photos.