OWL & going green

I've spent the day in the University Club working. The university has a campus wide Oxford Wireless LAN (OWL) that you can access from most buildings and areas (including parts of the Uni Park). Its really interesting to further note the Oxford mindset of clearing up after yourself. I've commented in an earlier post that students do not clean after themselves after party nights. Same seems to go for lecturers and staff it seems. The place is a self-clear area, but it seems there are many who believe someone else will do it if left.

This rant comes after the concert in Hyde Park on Sunday. There were minimal bins in the concert area, but they were available. However people seemed to just leave all the left over beer bottles right where they finished them. I would hate to be a cleaner afterwards. It makes you wonder if all the British are brought up like that? Especially in a nation trying to be forward thinking and go green.

A last note on the green issue, shops have in the last month started pushing "enviro friendly" bags and making customers pay for plastic bags. Sound familiar? Apparently SA isn't as backwards as we thought. Anyone coming to the UK should note that enviro friendly bags are the new fashion accessory. Its like an instant good impression.

Counting Crows in Hyde Park

I bought a spare ticket off a friend of Carl's and went to O2 wireless in Hyde Park yesterday. There were 4 sound stages distributed around the park. Turns out that you could hear the main stage from anywhere including the other stages. Drowned out the other acts in some cases. The bands I ended up seeing were Magic Christians (they suck), Eddy Grant (its like an evening in Cool Runnings), Powderfinger (had never heard of them but the music is fairly decent), Bowling for Soup (v. cool), Amy Studt (shame she had a throat infection, couldn't sing properly), Ben Harper (legend), Royworld (weird), Goo Goo Dolls (my favourite, they were spectacular) and Counting Crows (they were decent in parts, but played a lot no one knew and they messed with Mr Jones).

Now i'm told that its not a summer concert without rain, well we had plenty. It came in large doses at regular intervals. Nothing like standing in an open arena soaking wet. I'll post some pictures later when I find batteries for my camera.

Drowning in Exeter

I am a drowned rat. Exeter is apparently very beautiful, I didn't see it though. All I saw was rain and clouds. I stayed at the Exeter YHA which is right on the river, I thought the walk into town along the river would be awesome, instead I took the bus. The cathedral is impressive and the number of crumbling remains of churches is considerable. I don't think I will be going back to Exeter again unless under duress.

Met Office

I boarded a train at 8.30 this morning for Exeter. What's in Exeter? The Met Office. The SAWS equivalent with more money. We got a taxi to the office, nice change to walking and trying to catch buses. The taxis wasn't allowed into the grounds until he identified the passengers. The Met Office is very tight with security. We were escorted to the bathroom!

The visit itself was mind-boggling. The place is huge. Has its own gym and cafeteria. Bruce gave a talk about ICA and stakeholder needs. Between all this I met a variety of researchers, all of which explained their research. I now have a massive task of trying to remember the content and go back to look it up when I have more time. Amongst this is: Land use change, snowpacks, perturbed physics, downscaling, ICA, DFID, fires in RCM, albedo from burning, vegetation feedbacks, splines, SOMs hierachies.

Culture at an affordable rate

Trafalgar Square played host to the summer sessions again on Thursday night. Don Carlos is Verdi's longest (I think) opera and is 5 acts. The music and signing was spectacular. The hosts pulled various people out of the audience for makeovers, which was amusing. The weather started off with pouring rain and ended with clear skies.

Learner punter

I have finally been punting in Oxford. I highly recommend it to any person who can get free punts from a college (its mighty expensive otherwise). I had a lesson on the fly teaching me and a few others to navigate the rivers (and trees). Sean learnt to duck out of the way of trees. We stopped for lunch in a field (or meadow...). Punting seems to take a lot longer than originally estimated. Started at noon and got back around 6pm. Very fun experience.

Police, protests and education

I was walking home today when I passed an animal rights protest happening in front of the science buildings. This isn't unusual apparently. There is a controversial new lab being built to test drugs on animals for cancer etc. The unusual thing was the ratio of people to police. It was 2 protesters to 1 police officer. The police officers even had cameras to record the event. Now i think that is overkill, obviously the miscreants of Oxford are not providing the police with enough work :)

On to my next discovery, the school and uni education system in the UK. At 16 you can leave school with O-levels, and learn a trade of sorts. Alternatively you can do your A-levels which is the equivalent of maybe halfway into our first yr at uni. Now this is when things get weird. At uni you pick a stream and stick with it, no dual majors in different faculties, the guys here were very confused how people managed lectures all over the city when they did business and science subjects. It just isn't done. No tailor-made degree programs here. I suddenly was very happy to have gone to UCT. The next is the exams. Turns out you write prelims at the end of first yr and then finals at the end of third yr. Prelims don't count and most courses only count the final exam, so the whole degree rests on 2 weeks worth of exams. That SUCKS.

Beaches in the UK are now called coastlines

I refuse to call the British coastline beaches. A beach has sand. Norfolk places have pebbles or cobbles or whatever its referred to. It did however have a nice promenade to walk along. I didn't have the prerequisite icecream though, did the pub lunch thing instead. I have also officially played in the arcades at the beach. Weird experience and a money waster of note.

On safari in Norwich

I have been walking around Norwich for the last 2 days with my cousins and aunt. St Paul's Cathedral is absolutely stunning with its sculpted ceilings and stained glass windows. There is a real sense of calmness about the place that is very soothing.

The Marketplace in the town centre is a group of now permanent structures with metal roofs, all painted to match the canvas of yesteryear. Very colourful though I'm not sure it works. Many of the businesses have been there for over 30 yrs.

After the conventional touristy things to do, I persuaded the rest of my family to come on elephant safari with me. I know, safari in Norwich, i've gone mad. Well, actually, there is an art exhibition called Go Elephants on that has decorated statues of elephants situated throughout Norwich starting today. There are 53 but I've only managed around 20+ atm.

Its the journey, not the destination

I arrived in Norwich yesterday after the most badly planned journey on my travels to date. I left Oxford at 5.10 in the morning, I was meant to catch the 4.10 bus but missed it by 10 mins. After being dropped off at Marble Arch I dashed to the tube station and practically jumped onto the tube as it was about to leave, I got to Liverpool St with 2 mins to departure time. After running to the correct platform (big hugs to helpful ppl) I made it on with 30 seconds to spare. Turns out I sat next to an Alzheimer's person. I think I was asked the same thing about 10 times.

All train/tubeworks tend to happen on weekends so my supposedly direct train detoured to a coach and back onto a train between Witham and Ipswitch. Arriving in Norwich was quite anticlimatic after that.

Oxford from above

If anyone has the chance to be in Oxford on a nice clear day (I know these are rare) I recommend doing the Tower view from St Marys behind the Radcliffe Camera. It costs 3gbp, but it is really worth it. Rob Garlick and I trekked up the twirly never ending stairs to see it for ourselves. Too bad I forgot my camera. I might go again and get pictures.

Bohemian with a side of goth

Camden Town seems to be a collection of bohemian market stalls with a few goth stalls thrown in for variety. I had a fantastic time wandering through the various markets on Chalk Farm road and meeting some of the truly eccentric store workers. One lady asked me my birth month before i looked around the stall and then chose a selection of clothes that i should like. It seems freaky that she was right.

Regents Park is very green and I had a great time watching the various soccer games that were on. Regents Park Football Club officially operates out of a tent pitched in between sectioned off pieces of park.

Liverpool Street and Petticoat lane was like going through Green Point Sunday market. Lots and load and touristy. One interesting thing to note is that this section seems to have the only fabric stores in London (and Oxford). A haberdashery seems to be a foreign concept. The theory(complements of Lily) is that the English have the disposable income to buy clothes and not make or repair items. Any other suggestions will be gladly welcomed.

Freud's

For those of you who appreciate the irony, I went to a cocktail bar/restaurant in a converted church over the weekend: Freud. Due to a clash of accents, mine and the waiters, my order was a bit different from what i thought i ordered for lunch. nm. Ordered a Lady Boy cocktail. Rose tequila and grenadine and stuff. Lily has a picture on her phone. The thing looked like pink froth.

Rain go away

Its pissing with rain outside, has been all day. My supervisor sent me a message about something at uni and had to reply I was still in PJs and trying to work up the effort to bundle up and walk to varsity. He called it a Snoopy day - drink tea and stare out of the window - seems apt. I braved the weather and arrived here to be told they are forecasting floods in Oxford. charming.

Ballet for All

Sunday dawned nice and gray, but not raining. This is important for all intrepid explorers of London. Warrick went to tennis and I wandered trough Covent Garden properly this time, looking at all the shops and watching the acts. Jubilee Market was packed.

Wandered down through Chinatown for lunch and then on to Trafalgar Square to grab a seat for the ballet. BP have this summer program where they set up big screens throughout the country with a live feed from the Royal Opera House. Sunday's was Romeo and Juliet. The organisers handed out inflatable pillows and rain covers. Beautiful performance, all 2 1/2 hours of it. Trafalgar square was packed to capacity for it. Needless to say I was late getting back to Oxford and dancing.

Leaving on a Jet Plane

I have arrived! After a bit of a currency issue and walking the whole of the Cape Town International airport, I managed to exchange my money for pounds. In future, I will do all this prior to the airport. I booked in and got on the plane, and then waited 1 hour because of strong tailwinds meant we would land too early in Heathrow.

The flight was awful. The SAA dinner was a choice between fish babootie or chicken and pasta. Though they are quite prepared to dish out copious amounts of alcohol on demand. Settling in, I went through the movie list, it was abysmal. Either seen or had no wish to see. Turns out there was not 1, but 2 babies on the plane! When they finally settled done around 12ish the turbulence from a storm over West Africa caused more unpleasantness. We arrived at Heathrow at 6.10 and to 11C weather. I was very glad for my new winter(SA winter) coat.

The tube was my next adventure. As a girl who doesn't do public transport it was quite a change. Nice people helped with my luggage and i made it to Russell Square without incident. Got off and then the trouble started. I was earlier than I told Warrick and the people couldn't direct me to Goodenough College. One WAP google lookup later, I headed off.

Warrick apparently went partying the night before and wasn't particularly awake when I arrived. Anyways, we dumped my stuff and did a walk of London to the river and caught a bus back. I am very impressed with the transport system. I think the oyster card is awesome. I'm still having trouble reading the bus maps though. I will improve.

Grabbed Subway (their options aren't nearly as interesting as ours). We trudged back through rain (it had to start raining again when I arrive after sunshine for a week) and crashed. Little sleep on a plane does not a happy Hayley make. Supper was Nando's (I know, I come to London and eat the same as in South Africa). And so ends my arrival to England. Next stop Oxford.