Anyone for tea?

The internet has not been working very well around Cambridge over these past few days and it's starting to get very annoying. Hopefully it will be fixed soon. So the Tuesday night I went to the Town Bumps. Alot of city clubs participate in this event and many of these city clubs are made up of Cambridge rowers. One of our PA's, Alex, rows for Pembroke so we were cheering for the city club that his Pembroke friends were on. Bumps races are a type of rowing competition in which the boats line up in single file (the order is the same as the finishing order from the previous year) and each boat attempts to bump the boat in front of it. The competition lasts over several days so if you manage to catch the boat in front of you and bump it then you move up to their starting position during the next race. Obviously, if you're the front boat you just have to try not to get bumped. Cambridge (the Lent Bumps and the May Bumps) and Oxford each host two of their own bumps races each year. Despite the fact that it took us over an hour to walk to where we were going to watch the race from, it was a great experience. It didn't last very long, but I'm glad I went to see. It was especially fun to cheer on the Pembroke rowers. We even got to see some bumping! I'll put up some pictures and video once the internet is back to normal. That night was Cassie's birthday as well. Unfortunately, I missed her birthday dinner because I didn't know it would take so long to walk to the bumps, but I did meet up with everyone for a bit later and watched a movie.

Nothing very interesting happened yesterday except that I realized the internet was not working properly. Today two PA's, Ruth and Emma, brought us on a literary tour to Grantchester. Dr. Grace had suggested I go to Grantchester for tea so I was happy to join the tour. We walked along the river through Grantchester Meadows until we came to The Orchard. It was a lovely walk and I was excited to go to The Orchard (another place Dr. Grace suggested) because it's quite famous. The Orchard is a tea garden that had been popular with Cambridge students (many of them are very famous) since 1897. The Stevensons, the family that originally owned the Orchard House, took in Rupert Brooke as a boarder after he graduated from King's and he attracted many of his friends to the Orchard. This group of friends became known as The Grantchester Group and includes Rupert Brooke, E.M. Forster, Virginia Woolf, Bertrand Russell, Augustus John, Maynard Keynes and Ludwig Wittgenstein. One of Rupert Brooke's most famous poems- The Old Vicarage, Grantchester- is about afternoon tea and life in general at the Orchard. After the May Balls at Cambridge, there is a tradition in which students punt up the river to Grantchester for an al-fresco breakfast that includes strawberries and champagne. There have been many other famous visitors to The Orchard as well including Watson and Crick, Alan Turing (inventor of the computer), Rutherford, Sylvia Plath, Salman Rushdie, King George VI, Prince Charles, Hugh Laurie, Tim Rice and, my favorite, Stephen Hawking! Also, just as an FYI, Cambridge has won more Nobel Prizes than France or Germany. It's a completely overwhelming feeling to to realize just how many brilliant people have passed through the gates of King's (or other Cambridge colleges) and The Orchard. I was pretty much freaking out when I learned that Stephen Hawking has been to The Orchard (although it wasn't as exciting as the time I thought I actually saw him and had a mini stroke until I realized it wasn't him). I also learned that someone from our programme saw him right outside of King's! I'm glad to know that he is in Cambridge and that there is a possibility that one day I may catch a glimpse of my scientific hero.

Tomorrow is going to be a busy day. I have my Gothic Architecture final which I'm not worried about and then our entire class is swarming the Union Bar and having drinks with David (Dr. Oldfield). Tomorrow night is the Brit Bop which is a costume party. I don't think I'll be going since I don't have a costume, but I don't know yet. Then over the weekend I'll be in Oxford and Bath. Katie and I also bought tickets to Prague for next weekend and I bought my ticket to Germany for the following weekend and I'm really excited for both.

I'll leave you with a quote from The Old Vicarage, Grantchester...

I only know that you may lie
Day-long and watch the Cambridge sky,
And, flower-lulled in sleepy grass,
Hear the cool lapse of hours pass,
Until the centuries blend and blur
In Grantchester, in Grantchester...

Cheers!