So by far one of my favorite places that I have visited in my 2 weeks in London has been the City and University of Oxford.
Today would be the one and only day that my camera decided to die 10 minutes into us arriving. But that was no surprise seeing as how my morning went. Friends have offered to let me steal their pictures from the day so pictures will be uploaded soon!
For our field trip to Oxford we were supposed to be boarding our coach at 8:45 to leave. I woke up at 8, checked my email and accidentally fell back asleep. At 9am I get a phonecall from my flatmate, everyone is waiting on me. I literally get ready in 2 minutes and run outside to be the last one on the bus without an umbrella nor a raincoat. Today was the FIRST day is has rained since we've been here in London... just my luck. Friends took care of me though and made sure I stayed somewhat dry on our tour through the city.
Oxford in itself is a gorgeous university town as expected. What I didn't expect was how the University is set up. There are 38 individual colleges that all fall underneath the umbrella of Oxford University. Each college is self-owned and pays for their own expenses. Many own houses, flats, stores, and pubs in order to fund the expenses that they use. The different colleges, unlike those at NCSU, do not specialize in one particular subject. Some are stronger in others but they do not specifically encompass one subject. When applying to Oxford University you in fact apply to a college, not the University itself. The University is full of tradition which I absolutely love. Once in your college, you live, eat, pray, and study with your fellow peers within the college. It is fact like the different Houses in Harry Potter except on a college level. In some classes you interact with other colleges but you remain loyal to your own. I would LOVE to become apart of a school system like this. It adds so much more to a college experience. Unfortunately they do not offer physical therapy as a graduate school option (yes I've already checked) because I would love to study there. They do offer a Rhodes Scholarship program, which our tour guide recommended we apply to, but it is extremely prestigious and I do not have close to the credentials I would need to even think about applying. Apparently the school itself is not that hard to get into although it has the very tough reputation. According to our guide, 1 in 4 applicants gets in.
During our day in Oxford we got to see majority of the different colleges on our walking tour and learned some history about them. We got to go into a few and tour the Christ Church College and its Cathedral.
A lot of Harry Potter was filmed in Oxford:
The Bodleian Library on campus was the School of Hogwarts in many of the scenes, particularly those where they are actually in a library in the movie.
The Christ Church's Great Hall also was used in the movie. It is where they eat as well as where they are sorted.
During my stay in London I have also visited the Bank in which Harry Potter uses in the movie, Kings Cross Train Station (where we departed for Scotland) was the train station used in the movie, Hagrid's house (In Scotland), as well as the scenery and the train tracks used in the movie while they are traveling to Hogwarts. It is also in Scotland.
We ate lunch at a local pub called the Lamb and Flag. Writers J.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis frequented the pub as apart of the literary group "The Inklings" after they became tired of the pub across the street "The Lamb and Child." Both are very famous in the town and are highly respected as the frequent spot of both writers.
After lunch was our walking tour of the Christ Church College and Cathedral. We had about an hour left after the tour so we visited the Ashmolean Museum. It is the world's first University museum (founded in 1683). It recently has gone through extensive renovations and was pretty interesting. We didn't get to go on all the floors but instead focused on early Chinese, Arabic, and England cultures dating back to around 50 AD.
The bus ride back to Seething Wells was long. It only took us about an hour and a half to get there this morning but it took almost 3 hours to get back due to traffic. Everyone was exhausted so we went and picked up some Chinese food (which I was not impressed with) and I have been working on my paper that is due for Shakespeare in the morning.
Tomorrow we have class in the morning and then we have to meet in London at 2:30 to go on a private tour of The Globe Theatre. We will be a 'groundling' in the performance tomorrow of Henry the IV Part 1. I still have to finish reading it so I know what is going on tomorrow.
****Mom, Dad, Leslie, and Mike just landed in New York at JFK after some delays getting out of Raleigh. So far their flight to London has been delayed about an hour which works well since they would have probably missed it otherwise. Keep Mom in your prayers, she has completed her first flight and is now on her way to her first International Flight. I'm proud of her! ****
I plan to meet them tomorrow in between my classes to say hello! I'm excited to get to spend time with them in London this weekend as this is my last free weekend here. Time is flying by way to fast! I dread leaving London and everyone here to go home although I do miss everyone! I would rather ya'll be here!
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