I've had the most lovely weekend so I thought I'd record it for posterity here. The sun had come out for the first time since I'd arrived in England, and actually managed to remain in the sky for a solid four or five days. I was revived from my seasonal depression and genuinely enjoyed myself every single day. I still can't believe that some people are like this every day - just content, with no random indescribable feelings of sadness following them around and no sudden bursts of crying. I've promised myself not to cry this Trinity because it's summer and I really need to show my gratitude to the weather. It's gotten colder now, but my good mood still hasn't dissipated.
I returned to Oxford on Monday of 0th week, a full week before term was supposed to start, because I expected to be researching and writing an essay on top of revising for collections (mock exams to be taken before the start of term). Wearing both my heavy-duty St. Catherine's College fleece and my huge denim jacket, because I couldn't fit them into my one check-in suitcase, I lugged my stuff back to college, set up my room all over again, collected my mail, and saw my friends. I hadn't done a large amount of work over the vac so I began studying almost immediately after getting a celebratory burger at GBK, my favorite (I just went again today) because of their sweet potato fries, which come with a baconnaise dip.
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| My brother showed me this app that makes the photos you take look like they were done on a disposable camera, so I've been using it a lot. Here's El-Amin at GBK. |
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My Tuesday outfit: Topshop crop top, Tally Weijl
trousers I copped on sale years ago,
and a Zara suede trench coat that I bought in Madrid
last September that I was finally able to
wear for the first time! |
Tuesday was still relatively cool, but I whipped out a cute outfit that did NOT include my winter jacket (which both protected and plagued me throughout Michaelmas and Hilary). I studied in the morning, and spent the afternoon at the Radcliffe Camera (or, to be more specific, the Lower Gladstone Link which connects the RadCam and the Bodleian Library through underground tunnels) where I read a book for my essay. I went shopping to get myself some breakfast foods and fruits. It was a quiet day as not many people had returned yet. To be honest I don't remember what I did – it was just a typical day spent doing work by myself, which is very common at Oxford.
Wednesday was when the sun decided to come out. I was so excited because I'd brought a ton of summer clothes, and as I was unpacking I'd been worried that I wouldn't be able to wear them. Even though it was only a little more than 20 degrees celsius, I couldn't wait to crack out my summer wardrobe. I wore an outfit that my mom's cousin used to wear back in the early-2000s, these black traditional-style top and pants with flowers and ornamental frog fasteners. It was super cute, but a bit small, except in the chest where it mattered. There it was too big. Sigh. I also ate a whole punnet of blueberries in the morning, which I was so proud of that I probably told ten people. I usually never eat fruits and it made me feel so incredibly healthy. Snacking... but on fruits? It was revolutionary.
For dinner we went back to our often-frequented, vehemently-hated college canteen, but the regular chips, green peas, and fried meat that we received was made better by the fact that we got to sit outside. The silver tables reflected the setting sun's rays back at us, reminding me of lunches spent on the terrace back in high school. I noticed that everyone sitting outside was drinking something orange. "Is that Aperol Spritz?" I asked, ready to indulge in my favorite wine mom beverage. "What?" was the reply, so I asked, "What are you drinking?" The answer changed my life:
Pimm's.
I'd obviously heard of Pimm's before. It was this quintessentially British, nay, quintessentially Oxbridge,
nay, quintessentially Oxonian drink that I associated with punting and posh accents. I finally got to try it and I haven't turned back since. It's sweet and refreshing, and just tastes like summer. Sipping it while talking to my friends and watching the sun illuminate the sides of their faces was wonderful. In fact, I had Pimm's three days in a row. I still have two empty cups on my desk because I took it back to my room to finish, and honestly it's starting to smell. I should bring it back to the bar.
Thursday. I was awoken at 7:30 in the morning by blinding sunlight, and the sound of someone cleaning my windows with a long stick. It would bang against the glass, and then I would hear the soapy water dribble down the windowpane. My room faces the east, which means that I have a horribly hot morning, but a cool and calm afternoon.
I wore a silk skirt that is very flowy that I think was handed down from my mother, and a crop top (what other piece of clothing says "SUMMER!!!!!" as well as crop tops?) I spent the morning studying more, but the sunshine outside was killing me. That's when I turned British: I messaged my friends and asked them to come sit on the quad with me – I couldn't bear not to take advantage of the rare sunshine. We spread out a blanket (the two things I got from Harvard: a blanket, and a rejection) and sat in the shade of the off-center big tree that dominates St Catz's central quad, talking, studying, and chatting with people who walked past. Eventually we were kicked off the grass and told to sit on a different patch. The afternoon was passed peacefully. I obviously wasn't as productive as I would've been if I'd locked myself into the library, I had no regrets. I got to know a friend much better, ate a box of strawberries, and met my tutor, who told me that the essay would actually be due in Week 2. So that was that and I no longer had to worry about writing it.
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| With Gaby and Frances on grass patch in front of Staircase 12. Next to us were some Computer Science guys who sat around making jokes and hanging out. One was fixing his bike. |
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| The light coming into the dining hall. |
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| El-Amin looking happy at golden hour |
Friday morning was my collection. I think it went okay - at first I thought it was going to be extremely difficult, but then I realised that, to do well in your exams, you just have to predict what they might ask, write the model essays, memorise them, and then regurgitate them in exam conditions. Which is a shame because it's completely different, perhaps even the opposite, of what we learn throughout the term. And it's so boring that I can't bring myself to do such a thing. I'll need to learn how to do that, though.
I came out of my three-hour exam and went to pick my up boyfriend almost immediately as he got off the bus from London. We spent the afternoon at University Parks, reading books and drinking prosecco out of the bottle.
There were geese near us. They walked around, honking with what I could only assume was pure joie de vivre, and occasionally flapped their wings in the water, making a great deal of noise. Frank Ocean was playing, obviously. Along the river, people drifted by in their punts, sometimes getting stuck. I messaged my friends and we decided to go punting the next day.
While waiting for my friends to be done with their collections on Saturday morning, Gabriel and I had breakfast at Turl Street Kitchen, treating ourselves to hot chocolate with mini marshmallows and a full English breakfast (for him), and an avocado and poached egg toast with yoghurt and granola and tea for me. We loafed about on the grass back at Catz, and then went to G&D's for ice cream with my friends. On the way back, we stopped by Blackwell's and I couldn't help but buy a new book: Ponti by Sharlene Teo, set in Singapore. What can I say, I gotta support Sino arts. [HTTP:///WWW.SINETHETA.NET !!!!!!!!]
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| G&D's. |
When I was chilling on the grass, my friend Gaku, who was one of the first people I met in Fresher's week, had come out of his collection and asked me when we were going punting. 4pm was set. I was shocked because Gaku's life is pretty much just Engineering and tennis – I hadn't seen him properly in ages because he literally never does anything. Punting definitely had to happen. Unfortunately, after 10 people had gathered at the porter's lodge, we realised that we needed to book punts on the Catz website and it was taken. So a time was made for an hour later, but with only one punt, and people split up. It had also begun raining, a small, light drizzle coming out of an overcast sky, which deterred some people. The time finally arrived, though, and a few of us showed up again. But the boat that we'd booked hadn't come back, so the porters told us to wait by the riverside for them to return. We waited, and waited, and waited. Other punts came and went – from other colleges such as Merton and Balliol. The Balliol boat parked itself near Catz and those inside went to pick up some of their friends, who'd brought boba to-go and boxes of takeaway food. Finally our punt returned. We were disgruntled, but once we got onto the boat we realised how difficult it was to actually steer the boat. Perhaps it was so hard because there were 6 of us and we were all trying to contribute somehow with our paddles. The person standing up with the giant stick was supposed to steer, but we kept on bumping head-on into the river-bank. This meant that the person sitting at the front of the boat – Joshua, and later Gabriel – would get viciously scratched by twigs and would have to use their paddle to push us away from the shore. Finally, after constantly switching the punter, we were able to get a hang of it. We rowed into the part of Uni Parks where Gabriel and I had been sitting the previous day, but then turned back because we didn't have much time. On our way back, we were going so smoothly that we started to see the idyllic side of punting. Just after I said "We're getting the hang of this!" there was a splash as El-Amin fell into the river, losing his glasses in the process.
It was hilarious. Thankfully his phone, along with everyone else's, had been in my backpack, so the damage wasn't too bad. When we got off, El-Amin left to shower and we made an appointment to meet again for dinner and a movie. Half an hour later, we met again but El-Amin was wearing the same exact outfit: it turns out he has 3 identical shirts. We feasted at Edamame, the tiny, family-owned, heavenly-tasting Japanese restaurant that was the closest place to eat to Catz.
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I love this picture I took on Holywell St while
we were in the queue for Edamame |
After that there was still around an hour until we were supposed to go see Isle of Dogs, so Zach, who actually lives in Oxfordshire, took us to Christ Church Meadow, where we walked as the sun set and everything turned dark. We encountered a deer grazing peacefully on the other side of the river, and a tree that had been hollowed out. We got to the head of the river and decided to leave, but the gate was locked, so we slipped under it and returned to central Oxford via St. Aldates and went to Westgate for the movie.
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| A bridge in Christ Church Meadow, with Zach, El-Amin, and V standing on it. |
Sunday meant another brunch, this time at Vaults and Garden, the café inside the University Church that Gabriel and I love because they do wonderfully fluffy scones. There were no scones at breakfast, but a salmon and eggs on toast (for him) and a full vegan breakfast (for me) and some green tea (for us both) was a fitting substitute.
I had a busy afternoon ahead of me so we spent the rest of the time back on our spot at Uni Parks, sitting on the same blanket and finishing off the same bottle of prosecco. Gabriel watched Goodfellas on his phone (he has 40GB of data!) and I prepared for the meetings I had ahead of me. I then met up with Sanaa, my friend from St. Hilda's, and showed her my favorite library, the Social Science Library, which I love because of the combination of its proximity to college, its café which served cheap hot meals as well as snacks and breakfast, and the fact that it had air-conditioning. I skipped out soon after to go to a meeting for The ISIS' non-fiction team where we discussed the current pieces that were being written for us. After that we all relocated to the St Catz quad and had a really fun picnic while the sun set and drenched us in shadow.
So that was basically my fun weekend. I was in a good mood the whole time and I'm really optimistic for Trinity Term. I suppose I better start doing some work now. Thanks for reading all this liushuizhang!
