I had chosen Oxford as the place to continue my education, or had Oxford chosen me....
What a shit statement. I can't believe I just wrote that.
Oxford University
Oxford Earth Sciences
Oxford Tourist Info.
Daily Information
Nightshift
Scumzine
Earth Sciences is a wide and varied discipline, which makes it difficult but enjoyable - you also get to go on holidays to places all over the world and call it "research" or "fieldwork". So far I've been to Montanta (USA), Greece, Scotland, Wales, The MEndips, and Weymouth. Ok, so i've been slightly stiffed, but things'll get better....
Oxford University is supposed to be one of the best in the world, and I really think it deserves the reputation. It seems to attract the best researches and academics, which in turn attracts the best students, where they have access to the best libraries and fairly average facilities. Like all Universities it suffers from the problems that the best academics aren't necessarily the best lecturers, and like all British Universities it suffer from being horrifically underfunded. I'm not going to go into the ins and outs of that now though, relax...
The students it attracts are an eclectic bunch, mostly far removed from the stereotypes portrayed by press and film.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I've had fun here, I've met a lot of cool people, made some great friends, had some fun times and (at the risk of sounding like an episode of Thomas the Tank Engine) learned a lot about myself. However I guess there's always the naggin though in the back of one's mind saying what if, what if I went somewhere else where I didn't have to work as hard, where there was no Park End, where indie kids were respected, where the streets weren't covered in vom. every Sunday morning....oh well, let it go...
Having worked for the Tourist Information Centre all summer, I think I know Oxford better than most. Oxford really is a dump. I mean, it's very pretty to come look at for an afternoon, but to live here with the smell, the rain (it rains more than Belfast...) the cold, the coffee shops, the residents and the students is just too much. I live in a rented house off the Cowley Road, one of Oxford's more interesting neighbourhoods, and though we have fun, it just seems that 4 years is more than long enough to spend deciding between Park End, the Purple Turtle or a quiet night in. The nightlife is fairly appalling, the people worse and there is no hope - unless you're really drunk, when you can be happy, secure in the knowledge that you are instead ruining someone else's night. If you can't beat 'em, get really drunk and join 'em seems to be the idea... Although, is any city really that different?