Christmas Part I (and and birthday in the mix)

On Wed 14th, I left for a week away at Hungerford with the Frenkels. Myriam is also studying at Oxford so I got a lift with her from her father, Louis. Three of Averil’s nephews and their families were coming over for an early Christmas celebration on Sunday so they had invited me to spend some time with them and join them for the Christmas lunch. On the way to Hungerford we drove through some sleet which was very nearly snow, except that it wasn’t settling on the ground. The next morning I woke up to more sleet falling, but by the time I was dressed and could get outside to investigate, it had stopped.

On Friday, Myriam invited me to join her on a river barge for which she is a volunteer. The barge raises money for charity and so they were running a trip for parents to bring their children to “meet Santa”. The children all got a gift from Santa and we served hot drinks and mince pies. I got to be one of “Santa’s helpers”, and had find and pass him the named gifts for each child. It was quite fun watching them come in to “Santa’s grotto” with their parents to chat with him, though many of them were rather frightened of the strange man in the red coat with a white beard; and some even started crying. They were all under 4 years old, so I imagine he was a little intimidating. He was very good with them, though, asking them if they’d been good (which somehow every single one had – even the parents agreed) and if they’d sent him their lists. Those who hadn’t, he invited to email him, since the post might not get to the North Pole on time. The most interesting gift requests were a vacuum cleaner and a “kitchen”, from two separate little girls.

The Barge - Rose of Hungerford

Interior

Rev Andrew Sawyer - Cap'n

Santa's Grotto

I spent much of Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning helping Averil get things ready for the Christmas lunch on Sunday. Somehow we managed to fit everyone around the two tables though there were times when it seemed an impossible task.

The lunch itself was lovely. As they are vegetarian we had a vegetable pasta dish, roast potatoes, broccoli and carrots and vegetarian “sausages” and “turkey”. There were 6 children under 9 including a three-month old baby boy. They were all very well behaved and adorably cute.

Table setting

Starters - melon

Happy family

Main course

On Sunday evening I went to town to take some photos of the Christmas street lighting. Then we went to the Church next door for The Mayor of Hungerford’s Carol service in which Averil and Myriam were singing in the Choir. I got to shake the Mayor’s hand (nearly walked straight past him >.<) and  sat next to a lady who told Myriam afterwards that she was sure I was going to die of pneumonia because I’ve come all the way from South Africa. The fact that I started and couldn’t stop sneezing during the service may have had something to do with it.

Shop street decorations

Town tree

Town hall

The Church

 

After we got home, Myriam asked me if I watched Doctor Who. I told her that I’d never seen any but only because it’s rather hard to get hold of in SA and has never been shown by SABC (not even the old episodes). I mentioned that I do have a lot of Narniac friends who love it and are forever talking about it, and that I probably would enjoy it when I eventually got to see some. Turns out she has the whole first season of the modern series on DVD, so we watched the first episode together and she had lent me the rest to watch in my own time.

On Monday, I spent time in town looking at a large second hand book shop in the “Arcade”. I put my handbag down in one of the antique stores and spent a good half hour trying to retrace my steps to find it. I did eventually. Averil had woken up with a sore neck on Sunday and it was worse on Monday, so she spent most of the day lying down. Louis ordered some very nice take-away Indian food for supper. On Tuesday Averil was going to take me back to Oxford, but she was in no condition to drive so I took the train back.

In all, it was a really enjoyable week, though I was glad to be back in Oxford for my birthday yesterday.

It’s been much warmer here (and elsewhere) since I got back. We’ve even hit double digits the last two days. Although that dashes my hopes for a white Christmas, at least it’s predicted to be a warm one, perhaps even with some sunshine.

Yesterday, I got to open my birthday presents with my family over skype, and then some of my linguistics coursemates (Maryanna, Lara and Patrick) came over for tea, puff-pastry mince pies and hedgehog cake. I was going to buy one of the Hugo Hedgehog cakes from Sainsbury’s, but both the nearest branches were out of stock so I got Harry the hedgehog from Marks & Spencers instead (thanks to Maryanna for pointing out that they sold them).

               

I had thought of going out for dinner for my birthday, but decided to get a pizza instead. Looking at the pizzas at Tesco’s (I figured I’d rather spend time cooking it in the comfort of my own house than waiting in a crowded take-away joint which would cost double and was further to walk and would be cold by the time I got home), and found a Quiche Lorraine instead. It was really yummy and was finished off with some more Harry the hedgehog cake and custard while chatting to my friends on TLC.

Tomorrow I leave for London (my first time in London :-D) and I’ll be spending my second Christmas weekend with Sarah Docksey (a friend of Pamella Thabete’s, a friend from my home church).

While I’ve gotten over the sneezes and runny nose I had in Hungerford, I’m coughing quite a lot, so prayer would be appreciated.

MAY YOU ALL HAVE A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Oxmas Part II

I can’t believe I’m already one term down into my studies at Oxford. Being used to the 14 week terms (with a mid-term break) at UKZN, that was by far the shortest term in my university career. 8 weeks and it’s all over. I feel like I’ve hardly started.

Eighth week was fairly quiet and laid back after the busy Monday evening I mentioned previously.

On the Wednesday, I had a meeting with my supervisor to discuss the terms past and future. I’m quite excited to be starting more specialised study next term in the form of tutorials in which I will be given set readings and work each week. I’ll also be more at leisure to attend lectures directly related to my fields of interest. I’ve decided to take syntax as my third topic (the other two being Historical Linguistics and the History and Structure of a Language – Classical Greek). I’m still not sure which type of syntax I will be focussing on so prayer about that would be appreciated.

On the Friday of eighth week we had our college graduates’ guest night Christmas (or Oxmas) dinner. We were allowed to invite two guests to join us. I had invited William and Bethany from TLC to come, but they couldn’t make it so Maryanna, one of the girls from my course, came instead. 

That night was also the night of the annual Night Light festival during which there is a lantern parade put on by various schools in the area, the street lights are switched on, certain shops stay open late and there is a Christmas Fair in St Giles St. I went to watch the lantern parade before the college dinner. Each school had a large lantern representing one of the gifts from the Twelve Days of Christmas along with a number of smaller lanterns. The lights were to be switched on by Sir Rodger Bannister (of “four-minute mile” fame). Unfortunately, it was so crowded I didn’t get to see him, but it was nice to see the Christmas lights come on.

A partridge in a pear tree

A turtle dove

A lady dancing

A piper piping

Queen Street

Queen Street

Cornmarket Street

High Street

After dinner, I went to see the Christmas Market at the Oxford Castle. Although it said it would continue until 10.00 pm, most of the stalls were closed when I got there at about 9.30. There was however a stall open with small cheap Christmas decorations which I bought for the Christmas tree I was planning to get for my room the next day.

As planned, I went shopping on that Saturday for Christmas decorations. I found a nice 40cm tree at Boswells and some decorations at Poundland (the shop at which everything costs £1). I even got from there a string of Christmas lights and a string of gold beads and bells. Between those and the decorations I had bought at the market, there was little need for any additional decorations. I got some red and white paper to make a Danish woven heart (I would have made more but there was hardly room on the tree) and used left-over wrapping paper to make a Danish-style cone. I also added some of the small wooden hedgehogs Nicola gave me for my 21^st for scrapbooking by attaching a paper clip.

In addition to the tree, which is sitting on my desk, I also got a piece of tinsel for my curtain rail, a wreath and some “Christmas hats” for my hedgehogs (they are actually supposed to be bottle hats, but don’t tell the hedgehogs that). The latter two items also came from Poundland so in all my Christmas decorating wasn’t too expensive. I didn’t get a nativity scene ornament as such, but I found an Advent Calendar and window sticker set with Nativity pictures so those make up for the lack.

Nativity scene window stickers

Tree decorations

Tree lights

Tinsel on window

Christmas hedgies

On the Sunday evening of 9^th week (Oxford weeks start on Sundays for any who are wondering) Robin, one of my coursemates invited us over to his place for “Advent Drinks and eats”. He didn’t mention that the real reason for the celebration was his birthday, but I guess he had a happy birthday never-the-less. 

I met up with the linguists again on that Tuesday evening for my third Oxmas dinner. We went to the Jericho Tavern (a far more reputable establishment than the name may suggest) for a Christmas dinner. It was a great evening in which we played “guess the name” and “broken telephone”. I didn’t do very well with guess-the-name since I was the leader of Germany whose name I am embarrassed to confess I had not heard before. I blame the South African media for never mentioning anything about her. Broken telephone was rather interesting considering the mixture of language and accent groups we represent.

Tucking in

Yummy food

Cheese

We three kings

The rest of 9th week was spent doing a bit of relaxing, walking around town and some of the further out areas I hadn’t visited yet like Summertown and Cowley Road. I also started on my holiday reading of Greek language history and other historical linguistics books.

The Sunday of 10th week we had carols-by-candlelight at Church. Monday and Tuesday were spent getting ready for my trip to visit the Averil, Loius and Myriam Frenkel in Hungerford.

Tuesday was rather exciting in that I saw falling sleet for the first time in my life. It only lasted a couple of minutes and I wasn’t quite sure what I was seeing, but there was definitely something white and wintery falling among the rain.

Week 6 Update

 ~ 18/11/2011

The term is fast coming to an end, only two more weeks left after this, and I still feel like it's only just begun. The last four weeks (since my last full post) have been very busy. I'm still trying to get used to the idea of living on my own and doing my own "housekeeping" (which involves buying groceries, keeping my room in order, cooking and washing clothes, all of which, bar the second, are relatively new to me). This in addition to keeping up with my workload.

A couple weeks ago, a friend of Pamela Thabete's came from London to take me to the Hebron Gospel Hall in Bicester. They are a brethren assembly and were holding a special service that Saturday evening. We had a great afternoon and I got to show her around Oxford a bit. Carfax Tower, the iconic view-site from which one can look out over Oxford, was closed for maintenance so we instead climbed the lower but older Saxon Tower at St Michael's at the Northgate. This is the oldest building in Oxford and dates from around 1050 AD. After that, I took her to see the Radcliffe Camera and associated buildings which form the iconic architectural centre of the city.

The work has been plodding along. Still lots of lectures with various homework activities. From fifth week onwards, I've been able to go to some undergrad lectures on Indo-European and historical linguistics (the compulsory lecture that prevented me from going before was only for the first half of term). Last week's lecture was very interesting since it looked at attempts to reconstruct Proto-Indo-European grammar and semantics. This week's was on more general dialectology, which is an interesting area, but pretty much a repeat of what I learnt (and have been teaching in tutorials) in first and second year at UKZN.

Some elements from the last couple weeks reminded me a lot of my childhood. To be specific: Guy Fawkes and Poppy Day!. There were big Guy Fawkes celebrations the first weekend of November and last Sunday was Remembrance Sunday.

The day before Guy Fawkes, someone nearby put on a beautiful fireworks display which I could see out of my bedroom window. While I don't like the loud bangs, it was really pretty. I'd forgotten how pretty fireworks can be because the selection we see in SA at Diwali and New Year are generally rather limited since the ban on selling them in supermarkets was enforced. On Saturday 4 November I went with some of the people from St Ebbe's to the annual Guy Fawkes celebration at Headington Hill. There must have been thousands of people there. There was a lovely display of which I managed to get a few nice photos. They also have a huge wicker man that gets burnt as part of the bonfire. I think there's a design competition every year so see who can create the best wicker man. This years was actually of a woman with a rather African-art type look to her. I actually found the whole watching her burn thing a little disturbing, as did some of the others with me, but the evening was worth it to see the fireworks.

Last week the weather started to turn. Monday and Tuesday were miserable and rainy. I was assured by those who know that this was the weather to expect for the next three months. Apparently they were wrong. We had wonderful weather last weekend and it even reached a warm 15 degrees on Sunday. (I'm not being entirely ironic, we're bordering on an average of about 11 degrees daily at the moment, so it really was a warmer day and I could tell. Also it was nice and sunny which made it more cheery). This week has been cooler again with a little rain, but not too bad. On the whole I'm hearing it described as "an unusually mild November".

Last Friday I got to observe the 11.11.11, 11:11:11 moment three times. At 9:11 am here, I was chatting to my mum and brother Keith on Skype and so got to celebrate the moment as it passed in SA. Then I marked it two hours later that morning and again at 11:11 in the evening.

On Sunday morning, I overslept (for the first time in my life I overslept on a Sunday, meaning I was late for church). I blame it on the fact that my neighbours two-doors down were having a rather loud party at 1.00 am and that my alarm didn't ring to wake me up (I obviously missed the final "okay" when I set it). It wasn't the end of the world though, since St Ebbe's has one a second service at 11:45. 

In the end I'm actually kind of glad it happened. Shortly after getting up, I heard one of the nearby churche's ringing it's bells in a special remembrance-day tune continuously for about 15 minutes. I turned on the computer (we get TV stations broadcast on the internet here) and watched the royal Remembrance Day celebrations at the Cenotaph over breakfast. At church we had a special part in the service to remember those who died in war and a minute's silence bounded by The Last Stand played by the church trumpeter. In the earlier service they had placed a wreath between the two plaques listing names of Church members who had died during the two World Wars.

 

Last Saturday, I took a walk to Headington, the suburb of Oxford where CS Lewis lived and that my dad and I visited our first week here. They have lots of charity shops all together in the main street. I was going to the only remaining Christian Book Shop in Oxford which was pretty much half way there anyway. I had a great time browsing the shops. I saw a number of hedgehog things (which you can read about if you click here), found a really nice clothes shop and just had a nice relaxed day in general. I caught the bus back to Oxford in the afternoon.

This week's been a bit tough for me. There's a phenomenon here called "fifth week blues" because fifth week marks the second half of the term. I think it was delayed for me and I've had "sixth week blues". There's nothing wrong in particular, I've just been feeling a little down and a little homesick, but I'm already feeling better than I did earlier in the week.

Thanks again to everyone who reads my blog, supports me in anyway and prays for me.

My Room and House

It's taken me some time to get these pictures up, so here they are finally. Some shots of my Oxford bedroom and other indoor pics. Hope you like them. Some of them are from when I first arrived, so the placing of things has changed slightly.

My bed

Bedside table

Drawers

Bookshelf and "pantry"

My wardrobe

Hooks

Sheets - set 2

Looking down stairs to room

Stairs from ground floor

My dinner set

My desk

View into my room from door

My notice board

The kitchen - stove and sink

Fridge and cupboards

Toaster and microwave

The working shower

View towards front door

 And last but not least...

My Hedgie Display

My two new Oxford hedgies