Day 2, Being Pretentious

Edit: I'd like to add that Oscar Wilde holds the record for entering and exiting the judicial affairs office at Oxford.

Half this post concerning the dinner is dedicated to Kai. You should've been there. You would've enjoyed it immensely.

After sleeping for a blissful 10  hours, I woke up at 8:59 (right before my alarm rang! take that!), had breakfast, and went to the mandatory orientation session where they briefed us on academics here in Oxford. I won't say much about that until classes actually start, but I am sad that I've been put on the waiting list for the architecture class. On the other hand, that means I may potentially have a 6-day weekend, considering how all the classes I'm interested in meet on Wednesday, and the architecture class would've been on both Tuesdays and Thursdays.

This was followed by a brief tour of part of the university. As you guys may or may not know, Oxford University is composed of 38 independent colleges, most of which have both undergrads and grad students. I think 6 colleges have only graduate students (or only undergrads? I forget which), and another school in particular, All Souls, hosts only fellows. Basically, fellows are the cleverest people--to the point where we haven't even heard of some of them probably--on the planet and can only be admitted via invitation. The other way in which you can enter is if you take a 12-hour examination, and if you pass, you have to be grilled by the entire faculty of the school. If you get in, however, you get a very, very large stipend to do anything you please. Apparently, one girl is now living in a cottage in Scotland writing a novel.

All Souls also have a really strange tradition that takes place every 100 years. It involves a huge dinner and chasing a duck around the building, hahahah, and I've completely forgotten the legend behind it. I'd like to see this. Oxford has many strange traditions and legends. Another is Mayday, where people get drunk and jump off the bridge into the river at night.

The buildings are also really interesting in that there is a story behind every grotesque (gargoyles stick out of the building, grotesques are stuck to the surface). For example, the boar on the Sheldonian theater represents the legend in which a student, who couldn't go home from Christmas, decided to go to the park to study Aristotle. He was so engrossed in reading his  book that he didn't notice a wild boar stalking up to him, preparing to attack and eat him. When he finally noticed the animal, he stuffed the book down his throat, causing it to choke and die, and he returned victorious with his own Christmas boar. Great story. See how useful it is to study Aristotle?

Anyways, I've been sorted into Corpus Christi, which is now one of the smallest of the oldest colleges in Oxford. When it was built, it was meant to house the students that "worked like bees" in their study of religion. Indeed, in the shield of the school, there is a pelican stabbing its breast, because it was said that the pelican would sacrifice itself to save the young. NOT MORBID AT ALL.

However, out of the three I could've been sorted into, the other two being Magdalen and Brasenose, Corpus has the best food. That's fine by me, too.

Finally, the highlight of the day: the welcome dinner at Corpus Christi. Everyone dressed up smartly for this occasion, and we were led to an old study that you really only see in the movies now, or at Ivy League schools: carpeted floor, dark colored walls, butlers/porters standing around handing out glasses of sherry. It was really impressive, and really pretentious. All the men standing in dress shirt, slacks and ties, holding a glass of sherry in their hands in the setting we were in. It was perfect. (Sweet sherry beats dry sherry any day. I had one sip. Andrew kept making fun of me for not finishing it. Whatever.) The one thing I do regret is being outside when the head porter came in and announced, "Dinner will be served shortly...you are invited to enter the dining hall..." in a British accent. Noooo!

We entered a room with a 40-foot ceiling, and three long tables were arranged with name-cards for us to sit at. It was awesome: three-course meal, followed by tea or coffee. Dinner should be served like that every day. Scratch that. Every meal should be served like that every day, and each should be preceded by its occupants laundering around in formal wear with a glass of sherry. Kai, you should've been there.

Anyways, that was that. Sadly, most dining hall meals will not be like that. At least I found an Asian supermarket so I can cook for myself before the halls open.