Bangers and Mash!

Or sausage and mashed potatoes. That was our lunch menu for today. Quite lovely, in fact. Bangers and Mash with a side of cooked cabbage. I hear the English are known for their food.

I spent most of my day in the library. I spent the other most of my day walking around the city on various quests. The first quest was to find the Theology Faculty Library. It is a more modern library located on St. Giles Street not terribly far from campus, but far enough to be a commitment. It's a few doors down from a place called Eagle & Child. There's a picture of an eagle holding a baby like the stork usually does only I get the feeling an eagle isn't thinking of dropping it off to a lovely set of expecting parents...Anyway they seemed to have decent breakfast prices and they serve until 10 so next week when I'm on my way back to return the books, I'm going to stop in for a good, hearty English breakfast!

My second quest was to find a post office and get some international stamps. Luckily I was less than a block away from one when I left the Theology Faculty Library. They're not as expensive as I thought for postcards.

That was this morning, all before 10 a.m! Last semester I never even left my room until 11 at the earliest.

My 3rd quest came this afternoon, around 4. There's a tradition at Oxford that at formal meals your academic gown is to be worn. Everyone has a specific style depending on what stage they're at in their academic endeavors. Graduate, undergraduate, etc. I'm supposed to have a special gown because I'm not an undergrad at Oxford, but a visiting student. The way it was described to me was calf-length with mid-length sleeves. The regular undergraduate ones are sleeveless and jacket length. I was assured I could rent one.

So I set out looking for a shop that took me ages to find, even thought it was really on the main strip rather close. I went in and asked the gentleman for an academic gown of mid length with mid length sleeves. He assured me there were only 2 kinds of academic gowns: Graduate and Undergraduate. Undergraduate was what I should get and I had to purchase it. No no, I'm sure that's not what I want. He even took me up to his office and showed me the pictures of them online. This was a man who knew gowns. He pointed out the different aspects of each. The sleeves. The cut. The length. The shoulder things. Whatever. He was really nice and even wrote stuff down for me.
I walked all the way back to campus to tell them they didn't exist. Oh! No, you need a Scholar's gown, not an Academic gown. Duh. Right. Of course.
I walked all the way back to to The Varsity Shop established in 1846 and said: "I need to rent a scholar's gown with half sleeves and mid length." The young girl was like...Oh, riiight. Well, you aught to just buy one, renting is 15 quid per day. How many times will you wear it? twice a week? yeah, at that you're already practically at price. How much are they? 42 pounds. silence. Well I can't get one now.

So I walked out of the shop, for the first time since I've been here, mad. 80 bucks! 80 dollars to wear a black drape for dinner! Tradition! Back and forth to find this stupid gown to find it's gonna cost me a small fortune. I sat down out side the Sheldonian Theatre where some punk kids with tattoos and skinny jeans were doing bike tricks. I brooded a bit. I weighed my options. A) Never go to dinner on Monday and Wednesday nights. I did the math. Roughly 7 pounds per meal, twice a week...at 3 weeks I'd have spent over 40 BP on dinner avoiding dinner. But, I could try a different place Every time and make it a game.

At least I'll get to keep it. Sure it'll hang in a closet for years until my first born is old enough to find it and ask what it is. Then I'll be able to say, "Well, dearest, that's from when I went to Oxford and had to have a scholar's gown for the formal dinners we had. I bought it with you in mind."

Dinner was delightful. It seems like the first meal I've had here that was filled with comfortable chatting, not just that awakward, still don't know everybody and everybody's only talking about classes chatting.
After dinner comes dessert and after dessert comes a cheese platter. Not many people stick around for the cheese, which I don't understand, so me and Sebastian from Sweeden and Sebastian from Austria took the remaining cheese and grapes and saved them for an 11 p.m. pre-bedtime glass of wine.

It was lovely.

I also read an entire book and a half today for my theology class. Going well.