Harry Potter & other sightings

Things in Oxford have been quite eventful since my last posting. I won't attempt to relate all the goings on.... long story short is that I'm now an official member of the university (more on Matriculation in another post), I've had a great birthday in the UK (thanks for all the messages from home!) and I've now completed my first two weeks of classes. Considering that there are only 8 weeks in the official term that means I'm 1/4 of the way to Christmas! Time flies at Oxford.

As mentioned previously, last week was 'Climate Change Boot Camp' a series of lectures on the topic presented by experts from a wide variety of disciplines. We learned about a) how serious the problem is, b) what changes we've committed to regardless of how much we cut back now, and c) how much further we're going to be in trouble if global negotiations don't work out. Heavy stuff but it was a thrill to learn from some really excellent thinkers on the subject.



The best lecture of the week was from the right-hand man of economist Sir Nicholas Stern whom some of you may be familiar with. The most outrageous talk of the week was from music composer Burt Bacharach of Austin Powers fame, "Raindrops/GHGs keep falling on my head...."....and "What the world needs now, is Carbon Offsets/Love sweet love......"....... so I may have embellished that story a little bit. His talk wasn't about climate change and wasn't an official part of the course - but I did see him at the famous "Oxford Union" debating society last Friday night and he did play a song on the piano.


One of the best parts of last week was attending lectures in Christchurch College. That's the site on campus where the Harry Potter films were made. See the photos - no Quidditch games were going on unfortunately. Although, my friend Simon did invite me out to dinner in the famous dinning hall. Aside from hosting Hermione, Harry, and Ron for 200,000 British pounds a day (the fee Oxford University charged the film production co.), this dinning hall was also briefly used to convene the British Parliament during the 17th century civil war. There is a massive portrait of Henry VIII at the far end above the high table where the important people eat and speak Latin still to this day. 13 British Prime Ministers, Albert Einstein, and Lewis Carol (who penned Alice in Wonderland) have at some point studied here......don't expect my name to be added to the list, perhaps it may be written in graffiti somewhere on the walls built in 1546.


Above is a photo of some of my classmates from the course at Christchurch, they are from Australia, Italy, UK, Mexico, Canada, and UK from left to right. The pond behind them is a tempting swim - except for the fact that your degree from Oxford will be withheld if you jump in - there are some very expensive fish in there donated by some Japanese emperor or something.....

In other news....rowing is going well. I had my first 7am practice on the Thames earlier this week and successfully managed to stay in the boat. Also, I think I saw Richard Dawkins, author of 'The Selfish Gene' and 'God Delusion', on a bicycle the other day.......lots to see in Oxford!