Week 2 of Hilary Term

It's been another very busy week here in Oxford, but I'm feeling much more on top of things than I was last week and finally am feeling like I am doing readings and able to understand lectures... that said, I’m also exhausted and need a night that involves nothing but a few episode of Girls followed by 10 hours of sleep.  It took me all of first week just to readjust to the workload and how quickly everything moves here and last week it was full steam ahead.  I feel like I need a breather.

Last Sunday was a work day for me.  I spent the day reading and attended a short study group/reading group Sunday evening.  It was a helpful review session for my favorite class (CEM) and afterwards I walked home, had a warm dinner, and called it a night. 

Last Monday the whirlwind began again.  I had class from 11-5 and then went to Greens (a favorite café) for tea and lemon drizzle cake in the pouring rain with friends to do more reading.  I read all evening, made soup for dinner, and had a quiet night.  Tuesday I only had one lecture and then I spent the day running errands- I needed new batteries for my bike lights, to get money out to pay rent, to go to the grocery store,  then do more reading, and buy a ticket to Keble’s Ball in May (which I thankfully snagged one and now the tickets are sold out!)  

Wednesday is when my week really started to pick up.  I had 3 hours of class, both a reading group and a lecture with a cool debate about GM foods/crops in India and then rushed over to interview another student for Penn.  The interview went really well and it’s actually just nice to get a coffee/tea and have a chat with someone at such an exciting life juncture.  From there, I hurried home to cook dinner, ate quickly and then rushed off to latin dance lessons where we were learning the bachata.  Even more NSEPers showed up this time and we are starting to take over the class- I think there were 9 or 10 of us with more planning to join next week.  Whenever we would change partners the guy would ask my name/what I’m studying and when I’d say my NSEP they’d say, “Oh, another one.” 

After the lessons we stayed for the open dance and then decided that we all still really wanted to dance, so we headed to Freuds.  We were the only people there and they have a huge amount of space so we hung out and danced a bit until they closed.  It still wasn’t enough for us so we headed to Angels, which was small and about to close and so we headed on to Thirst for more dancing.  After that we headed to one more place, but couldn’t get in, so we walked back, stopping for food along the way and eating together at GTC before all getting home to bed around 4 or 4:30 in the morning… much too late a night but so much latin dancing and good music and fun with friends.

Thankfully I didn’t have class until 2 on Thursday so I went to that and then joined the other 2 year MPhil students in the department (only about 7-10 of us) in meeting with the head of the department for tea and cupcakes and a chat.  It was a nice afternoon and I met a few other interesting professors which is nice.  Afterwards I was still pretty worn out so I had a quiet evening doing some reading before Andreas came over to cook dinner and we chatted until about midnight when he headed home and I headed to bed.

Friday I stayed in my room all morning and was very productive in preparing for the coming week.  Then at 2 we had an alumni workshop where we met with NSEP alum and heard all about the jobs they have now and how they got them… everything from environmental economic consultants to working for U.N. Climate Change organizations to working at DEFRA (similar to USDA in England), and all sorts of other cool things.  We stayed until roughly 6:30 doing some networking and then a group of current NSEPers went out for Japanese food. 

From there I went home for a bit and discovered that there had been a barn fire in Bishop that day and 18 horses had died, including a horse I used to compete against (still owned by the girl I grew up showing with).  It’s the first time a huge horse related disaster like this has touched me/someone I know and it’s hit me harder than I expected.  These animals are our friends, our partners, our teammates.  We tell them our secrets, we invest in them emotionally and financially and temporally and it costs us so much (on each of those levels).  To have that taken away and to lose that connection in such a terrible way is just heart breaking.  The past few days I’ve just wanted to be home to give my ponies a hug, a carrot, and a good grooming.

Despite feeling pretty shocked and sad, I had plans to meet my friends around 10:30, so I headed out and biked over to Freuds for an electro swing night.  They had themed cocktails from the 30s and 40s, electro swing music, lots of people had dressed in era pieces, it was really, really fun.  I spent the entire night on the dance floor and had so much fun.  It was also a fun night because so many NSEPers were there, and not just the ones I normally hang out with but a whole group that I don’t see super often, so it was a fun night with classmates.  When the night was over we were all so wound up that we decided to head back to my place to play some music and wind down.  After a few hours we finally were all exhausted so people all headed out and I went to bed. 

Saturday I slept in and then went to get brunch with Andreas and then headed home to get some work done.  Even though I was exhausted, there was a 90s bop at a college near me that night and I’m a sucker for 90s music.  I dressed the part, Saved by the Bell style, and met Louis and Andreas to head over.  Soon, others had joined and we hit the dance floor to show off our lame dancing and boy band moves.  I had so much fun- I really believe that nothing is better to dance and sing along with than Spice Girls, Hansen and the likes, so for me it was just about the perfect night. Also, the BOP was named MmmBOP which is the best name for a 90s themed BOP ever. When the BOP ended the group was really indecisive about where to head next and I was exhausted so I cycled home and called it a night.  

 Katherine and Andreas

Lisa, Louis and Denise

Louis and me

Sunday I slept in and then got up and did some work before trying to do laundry (fail. No open machines) and then meeting up with Katherine and Louis to answer some of their finance questions.  From there we went to the store to stock up on super bowl snacks and we bumped into Andreas so the 4 of us headed to dinner.  I then headed home for a bit before meeting Brittany, Katherine, Cato, Ben, Rob and others (not in our program) to watch the Super Bowl.

I was cheering for the seahawks so while happy with the out come, the game was pretty disappointing.  The Broncos didnt really show up to play and while I was rooting for the seahawks, I'm also a fan of good football.  Still, it was a fun time filled with lots of skittles and snacks and friends.  Since we are 5 hours ahead over here, the game started at 11:30pm and ended shortly after 3am.  I biked home as soon as it was over but I was too wired from all the sugar and the game to sleep so it was 4am before I was in bed. 

Today I've been exhausted and was in class most of the day and I (of course) have another busy week ahead including a lecture on global financial security, another Penn interview, lunch with my college advisor, latin dancing, a meeting with our course director about my dissertation, starting my elective (global environmental change and food security), helping lead a mini conference session on corporate environmental management/financial reporting and regulation, hopefully yoga (I haven't made it to any of the classes yet which is bad... but I sure do go dance a lot), and of course, more social events.  

Hope things are good wherever you are reading this!