Oxford, this time with 3o ducklings

So this is out of order. So sue me. I'll talk about my friend Warnaby's guest lecture another time, which is actually the chronological way to go.

Had a stunningly successful trip to Oxford on Friday the 10th, despite missing the first bus at Marble Arch which just blew past us despite my pounding on the door. I did, I'm afraid, say a Bad Word, in front of some kidlets. Quietly but unmistakeably. [Why were we taking public transit? Because for the price we were quoted for a coach and driver we could pay for all 30 students to make the bus trip (at varying times depending on what they wanted to do) AND pay for a punting excursion on the Cherwell in the afternoon AND make a donation to Oriel in lieu of a guide / entrance fee!] But we got the next bus, and all was fine. I should add that any and all of such moves that we make as a group have to be previewed and prepared for, sometimes by little half-page notes or cribsheets slipped under students’ doors, after having gone through the outlines of the trip in class; part of my panic here is that I never seem to be ahead enough to distribute stuff in advance—some things change the afternoon before the trip, and there’s no other way of reaching everyone reliably, especially since we cannot count on hotel Internet routers. One is constantly playing chicken with chaos….

Despite the slight glitch getting up there, by the appointed time of 11 AM (well, 11:13) the group was gathered on the cobbles of Radcliffe Square, looking in at the same place where I spent sooo many of my days studying away. Well, we were the group minus one: since she had complained of a sore stomach and wanted to nap or got to the doctor, so I left Andrew behind and told him to look in on her in an hour. I later learned that she had had too much to drink the night before. Welcome to my nightmare—that someone would jeopardize the day’s activities in this way, and not even apologize for the monkey wrench thrown in the works; as it turned out, she felt better, and she and Andrew only missed our little swing by 4 Alfred Street, where Oriel had located the American Graduate Ghetto back in 1979-80.

In stark contrast to my own time there, the porter at the college gate was friendly and well-informed, and though my original contact had been called to London on business unexpectedly, I got a wonderful surprise: my old tutor Glenn Black was around and helped squire us around, as did the development director's assistant Hannah. Introducing Glenn to the group after all these years kind of got me choked up: after all, it was his encouragement (in his incredibly low-key way, I might add) that led me to apply to graduate school at Oxford after my Semester Abroad my senior year at Pomona, and it’s likely that it was his recommendation (that I could hang with the program) that helped to get me in when I applied for my place a year later.

After some lemonade / orange squash in the Hall, which elicited some remarks in the key of “It’s like Hogwarts, only smaller!” we were then led around the quads, finishing in the narrow hallway with stairs leading up to both the undergraduates’ study area and the much less accessible Senior Library.




Much to my surprise we actually spent a half hour in this tremendous room, twenty feet high and modeled on a country-house library by an Orielensis who probably did a Grand Tour of his own, and the librarian couldn't have been nicer and more accommodating. I overheard one of the whispers as we entered: “This smells like learning!” Unless I am completely clueless, the chillin's was blown away.

In the late afternoon after our lunch break I walked most of them through the colleges and the Parks and into North Oxford (except for four who inexplicably wanted to hurry back to London for some inane thing called the Ice Bar) so that we could spend a chunk of our gray but not rainy afternoon punting on the Cherwell. With five people to a boat and many of them relentlessly not listening to the directions or explanations of me nor the punting station captain, there was a certain amount of spinning around and weed-catching before we successfully made our way up to the Victoria Arms for a quick light refreshment on the lawn. Please do not tell the UC but some of them drank a beer (as did I, a small one).

After that it was home, in my case a purgatorial coach ride with six refugees from Bridget Jones "friends" reject pile, but in the end I think everyone was truly tired but satisfied.

Next up, Cricket lowlights that began with a phone call: "Stenzel. Warnaby. File this one under "Your college need you."

Shakespeare at the Globe, Indeed

After Wednesday’s class (July 8th) I worked on marking, then made my way to the Globe Theater in Southwark to distribute thirty-one tickets to a touring production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The fact that it was a touring production (limited cast) meant the tickets were cheaper than budgeted AND we could finance some other group activity with the excess. This is my life.

Harrowing to wonder about timing and possible tube maintenance, since I had all the tickets; not unsurprisingly I was there in plenty of time, then waited and waited as my students started showing up in varying degrees of lateness for the 7 PM rendezvous. The last of them trickled in at 7:27 for a 7:30 show, having conveniently ignored both of our admonitions about eating near the theater—I just finished reading some journal accounts of them leaving some pub near Piccadilly at 6:55, not having read that Blackfriars station is closed until 2011. So I was fully prepared to leave Andrew outside with the remaining tickets, but they all got in.

The show was great—flapper era costumes and seersucker, little swing band set-up and deck chairs, and the added enjoyment of eight actors playing 21 roles, using the music and dance to make the transitions utterly entrancing. Puck being played by a stunning dancer done up “Cabaret”-style complete with garter belt and derby hat definitely made the guys pay close attention, and from what I can tell the whole class found themselves much more able to follow the action and get the jokes than they had ever expected. Hard seats (but boy was I glad not to have made them stand—GT’ers would never have stood, would they?), some minor pissing and moaning about blocked sight lines (though of course that was covered in the warning), but overall a great experience. Especially pleasurable to watch these talented folks work out problems that I had written about in my dissertation, and have my facial muscles sore from smiling.

Also glad I found the John Cleese fundraiser / supporter stone in the courtyard: he actually paid for two, just so he could mis-spell his friend’s name for perpetuity next to him—and there it is, “Michael Pallin.”

--sent in from Paris on Bastille Day after marking papers all afternoon. Will try to get an update on Friday's Oxford trip soon.

OK, Teaching. I can do that.

Each evening I checked e-mail, spoke to various folks via Skype or my cell phone, and prepared / decompressed. My sleep was often very spotty, which disturbed me, as the morning light woke me at 5. Every time I thought I was done, a bunch of new lists or planning tasks would pop into my mind, and sometimes the wireless connection would make sending an e-mail into a ten-minute struggle of logging out, waiting, opening a new window, logging in again, and waiting some more as the message dribbled out byte by byte; moving the computer around the room sometimes helped find a sweet spot, but sometimes it would crap out altogether.

Monday was the first day of class: we had to get 30 students across town and into the classroom building at Kings College that’d been arranged for us by our none too accommodating agents in London. Being told by one that “I’ll meet you at 9 at the entrance to Waterloo station,” I was unimpressed when the time came: she was nowhere to be seen, the rush of people was unbelievable, and after several orbits of the complex station I was secretly relieved to get a call from a couple of students who had arrived early, bailed on the assembly point (bad) and navigated over to the building (good). “Stephanie” showed up in my classroom at 10 AM, fifteen minutes after we had arrived 15 minutes later than our 9:30 official start time (and of course we had to ask the security guard to unlock our classroom). Not having gotten her cell number nor insisted on clarifying the meeting point, I chalked it up to “live and learn”—and I trust that there won’t be a “next year” when it comes to these agents who shall remain nameless but not blameless.

A portion of each class has to be given over to organizational matters, and I'm also making them journal informally every day; I sit in a cafe, usually, and quickly mark and comment on their short pieces; generally the quality isn't too bad, and there are occasional insights and gratifying breakthroughs. Walking across the Millennium Bridge afterward, I felt as I belonged here a little bit--I had a function other than tourist--which was a good feeling. I'll be curious to see the new Harry Potter movie, which I am led to believe has a scene on this bridge.

Next up: teach, walk, mark journals, eat cheaply, mark, plan, sleep, wake up, sleep, make lists. Repeat until done.

The ducklings have landed--now what?

Sunday 5 July—We had a coach tour in the afternoon followed by a “welcome dinner” at an “English” restaurant in Covent Garden—ultra Brit food (steak and Guinness pie with “spotted Dick” for afters). The coach tour started inauspiciously, as the volume level was deafening and I had to quiet them down; visions of high-school disciplinarian routines flashed through my mind, but I worked to chalk it up to first-day amplification of chatter. Abby and Brian, our guide and driver, did a beautiful job of coordinating an efficient trajectory featuring a good balance between stops and movement. We were abetted by it being Sunday AND the day of the epic Wimbledon final: streets that normally would have been clogged were flowing well, and both of them seemed to work together in predicting the closures and detours that are a daily part of London driving.

I’d been worried that this would be boring for students who’d done a tour already, but I was mistaken: their previous sightseeing outing had been on a doubledecker with headsets and recorded commentary / music that they could barely hear, and there was no stopping to explore on the ground; I was happy to see many of my students jotting notes on places they wanted to visit on their own!

It was interesting to undergo unexpected little trials-by-the-unknown: since I never had been in this position, I had no idea whether or how much to tip the driver and guide, who I know had been paid for their services. Luckily Andrew had overheard them talking amongst themselves, and slipping them each a 10-spot seemed the right thing to do. On the other hand, after the dinner I elected to take the direct approach and simply ask the servers of our meal whether a tip was expected, and they said the service charge was included, they didn’t expect anything extra, and so I left it at that: their service was nothing special, in a downstairs dining room with food flung quickly and with a certain brusque efficiency. Here and elsewhere I am disconcerted at not knowing what the appropriate custom is, neither wanting to be a boorish skinflint nor a stereotypically profligate Yank.

Walking back through the still-bustling streets and again through the park, I had a nice call from Amelie on my cell, and further on, an unexpected great little contact with a trash-picker-upper with whom I commiserated about the Slobbovian nature of too many park-goers (stretching near Round Pond later in the week, I marveled at the sheet number of cigarette filters and plastic caps and wrappers and twisties that I inventoried in the square meter around me): touching on the “music,” our conversation diverted to his old favorite, Captain Beefheart, and migrated to none other than Frank Zappa. An unexpected pleasure to break into “Cosmik Debris” and have him fill in the chorus! Yet more evidence of why one should occasionally walk alone, and make eye contact…

Living in a Shoebox--at first

I thought blogs were supposed to be “web logs” like “Captain’s Log—Stardate: 7.8!” This has been such a week that I haven’t had the energy to share a bit. So here’s a quick hit, typed as I sit in a coffee house near the hotel. My goal is to devote 10 minutes to each day and catch this up, go back to the hotel, upload it, and then fill in some details as time allows.

Saturday 4 July—I did something unusual for me that morning after my meager breakfast in the café downstairs: I saw the maid cleaning the room next door to mine, saw that it looked like a single, and then asked whether it was; turned out it was. The unusual thing? I went downstairs and asked if I could change rooms from my glorified closet to this comparatively spacious squarish layout, where I could actually not touch two walls from my desk chair. Amazing how that improved my mood!

The first students (and Andrew) started arriving around 9, dumping their luggage and going off for adventures despite their exhaustion, as they couldn’t check in til 2 PM. The routine of the day became established: I’d be tapping away on my computer in my 3rd-floor room, get a call from the desk that another arrival was waiting, I’d walk down, introduce myself (trying desperately to match face to name to photograph on the mug shot I’d been given), briefly orient them to the various streets and shopping possibilities, given them their 7-day transit cards, and tell them to come back later. The luggage room became ridiculously cramped and I stored several suitcases in my room; as the afternoon wore on they were checking into their rooms, becoming roommates pretty randomly, and getting roughly settled in.

By 7 PM all my ducklings had landed and we had our brief orientation in the far end of the café, and I passed out directions for getting to the Waterloo campus of King’s College for the first class next morning, as well as the roughed-in schedule for readings and activities that I had been cobbling together all day. After that, I elected to light out for a long late-evening run around Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park, threading through the mass of humanity gathered for the outdoor concert (who the hell is “Blur,” anyway? Loud, that’s for sure. Bruce Springsteen had been there the week before, and Neil Young…). Strange to see the mini-shrine along the fence of K. palace, where Lady Di had lived “in happier times.”