Stuff

So David, in a very professor-like comment, asked that I write more "substantive" stuff about the people I am living with. I will attempt to do this, but it's a little weird, especially cuz they're just normal Stanford students and they might be reading this (not that I'd write anything mean, I promise). But everyone is really nice and friendly. I don't think we had any like best friends coming into the program so we all hang out together. There seem to be two big groups. One group that goes out and one that doesn't, which is probably about normal. But that means there is a whole half of the house that I don't know very well at all. But I like how at least half the house likes to have fun. We went to "The Bridge" club last week and we had a group of 19 people!!! I was really impressed. More generally, we seem to have three academically-focused groups: the English majors, Social Science people (poli sci, econ) and Hum Bio people. So we're all interested in pretty different things, I think. Something I wonder about is how many of these people I'll continue to be friends with next year. I really like them, but at the same time, it's a little funny because we don't have each others phone numbers! We dont have cell phones here, so if I like wanted to call someone next year, I'd have to look them up on facebook, which is mildly sketchy. That's just a really random thought...
I can't think of more to write. But you can email me or comment me with any other questions. (I like getting comments, so leave me more!)
I'm leaving for Berlin on Wednesday, where I'll be till Saturday, so I'm super excited about that! It's a Stanford overseas conference on globalization, with people from all the other Stanford abroad programs, including Corie from Chile, so that will be lots of fun. This is actually my last whole weekend in Oxford because after Berlin, I'll be in Paris and Vienna for the last two whole weekends here. Kinda crazy. But I have no idea when I'll be in Europe again, so I wanna see EVERYTHING!
Oh, and some interesting things about Britain:
Their movie ratings are divided between 12 yr olds, 15, and 18. But unlike our system where you can get into an R-rated movie with your parents even if you're underage, they dont let you do that here! I heard this story about a mom who tried to buy movie tickets for herself and her son for some random 15-level movie and they wouldn't let her!!! I always thought Britain was more liberal than the U.S., so that was weird to hear.
Also, Oxford has a really strange practice where they'll turn your bachelor's degree into a master's degree five years after you graduate if you pay them a given sum of money. Sketchy, sketchy!!!

That's it for now. But next post will be in a week or so about BERLIN!!!