today England is beautiful!

Woke up to some of England's "finest" weather, as one native put it ... a rainstorm. But by the time we got out of our meetings the sun was shining and I didn't even need to wear a scarf! So I went exploring, and found out that our city street ends in a park. Park Meadows actually. My one flatmate said that there are horses and cows running around there sometimes but they must not have been out when I went visiting. It's basically some huge meadows that border a canal, and there are foot paths going every which-way for people to take. Some of them loop around, others (as I discovered today) will take you to the complete other end of town. Needless to say I've got my walking in for the week. Sarah invited me to try out a church with her yesterday evening, and it just so happend to be St Aldates, the one that the Firth's mentioned. The minister there knows Pastor John Mulinde. Anyway, the service was great, and the church is divine! Picture an old, stone English chapel, completely renovated and modernized. It was packed with people, most of whom were students, since the evening service seems to draw them more. Afterwards, we went to some International Students thing they have in a basement across the street. We met some British and American students. The one young couple was married. The girl had studied here for a semester like us, but had come back from her graduate work. It just so happens that her and her husband are from a little north of Harrisburg, and he used to go to My House Cafe in Milton before it closed. So we played Oxford Monopoly, where instead of Marvin Gardens or Boardwalk you purchase Oxford University or The Ashmolean Museum. They also had candy and cookies, which was great since none of us Americans include those in our limited budget grocery shopping. This morning we had a meeting on how our tutorials will work and how to write an Oxford essay. I'll only have two courses, one meets once a week the other once every other week, for one hour at a time. At the end of the day, our tutor assigns us a topic and we have to write a 1500 word essay on it for the next week. Sounds simple enough, but I'll have to get back to you on how it really goes. They recommend spending about 40 hours a week on your tutorials, reading, research and writing, which should still leave plenty of time for traipsing about the country. That meeting was followed by a little, old English man who spoke on the history of Oxford, which was extremely interesting. This man was exactly what someone would picture a veteran, Oxford professor to be. No one even knows the exact date of when Oxford began, sometime in the 1000s. And most of the students were "refugees" trying to escape persecution in other areas of the country. From what this man said, there's been more bloodshed at Oxford than any other war zone in England. Or something like that. So we have the rest of the day off, and now I'm off to rest my legs and read some more of Emma.