May Day Weekend
It was a pretty interesting weekend indeed for two particular reasons - firstly it was May Day with all its Oxford traditions and trappings, and secondly, I took part in a wonderfully interesting quiz match as part of the Trinity 450th Anniversary celebrations against the Trinity University Challenge team from 1971.
For the quiz match itself, it was certainly a fantastic experience, but also quite nerve wracking. It was held in the dining hall and over 100 people came to watch it, though the fact that Anne Robinson, who is well known as the host of the Weakest Link was the question master probably had something to do with that. Our nerves were not helped by the fact that we got off to a rather poor start and were trailing by at least 100 points around the midway stage. We did fight back strongly though, and by the end, we had pulled within a pretty close margin.
Things were not helped by the fact that the scorers weren't sure about the rules, and did not realize that you only lose points for interrupting a starter incorrectly and not when the starter question has been completed. There was also a bit of confusion when Anne Robinson, instead of giving a set of bonuses after the first question had been answered, went onto another starter instead. But there was little doubt that the 1971 team won, though by a very small margin - probably about 20 points, 210 to 190. All in all, it was fantastic fun and a wonderful occasion, though I will not soon forget answering incorrectly to the question of what Trinity's sister college in Cambridge was. Things got even better afterwards, when there was a wonderful buffet dinner.
It is an Oxford tradition to stay up on the entire evening of May Day morning, not that students need much of an excuse to stay up the entire night partying and drinking anyway. However, this year I had a much quieter May Day morning, though not necessarily any less fun - me and 3 other Singaporean friends played Mahjong from about 12.30am to 4.30am after which we proceeded down to Magdalen bridge, where hundreds of people gathered to hear the Magdalen choir sing madrigals from the top of the tower to herald in the beginning of May. I hadn't played Mahjong in a long while, so it was greatly enjoyable doing so, and I definitely had a really good run of luck. We used chips to keep track of the score, though we weren't playing for any real money, but I calculated that I would have won in the region of 16 pounds if we had been. Overall, I though that the whole May Day experience was overrated - the Magdalen choir was certainly not very impressive. Walking back from Madgdalen bridge was definitely quite an experience though - the whole high street area was turned into quite a carnival atmosphere - there were lots of groups in costume doing traditional english dances such as Morris dancing, and some Irish folk dancing.
In the evening, I attended a party celebrating the birthdays of Douglas and Graham, just slightly belatedly since their birthdays were actually in the Easter break. Kudos to Vicky and the rest of the 'biochemist' gang for organizing the party and for getting all the food ready, not to mention baking the two wonderful cakes, which was in the shape of a viola in the case of Graham and that of a medieval manuscript (with all our names written in icing on it) for Douglas. It was definitely a nice party, but I left after about 3 hours, because I just felt tired and needed some time alone.
For the quiz match itself, it was certainly a fantastic experience, but also quite nerve wracking. It was held in the dining hall and over 100 people came to watch it, though the fact that Anne Robinson, who is well known as the host of the Weakest Link was the question master probably had something to do with that. Our nerves were not helped by the fact that we got off to a rather poor start and were trailing by at least 100 points around the midway stage. We did fight back strongly though, and by the end, we had pulled within a pretty close margin.
Things were not helped by the fact that the scorers weren't sure about the rules, and did not realize that you only lose points for interrupting a starter incorrectly and not when the starter question has been completed. There was also a bit of confusion when Anne Robinson, instead of giving a set of bonuses after the first question had been answered, went onto another starter instead. But there was little doubt that the 1971 team won, though by a very small margin - probably about 20 points, 210 to 190. All in all, it was fantastic fun and a wonderful occasion, though I will not soon forget answering incorrectly to the question of what Trinity's sister college in Cambridge was. Things got even better afterwards, when there was a wonderful buffet dinner.
It is an Oxford tradition to stay up on the entire evening of May Day morning, not that students need much of an excuse to stay up the entire night partying and drinking anyway. However, this year I had a much quieter May Day morning, though not necessarily any less fun - me and 3 other Singaporean friends played Mahjong from about 12.30am to 4.30am after which we proceeded down to Magdalen bridge, where hundreds of people gathered to hear the Magdalen choir sing madrigals from the top of the tower to herald in the beginning of May. I hadn't played Mahjong in a long while, so it was greatly enjoyable doing so, and I definitely had a really good run of luck. We used chips to keep track of the score, though we weren't playing for any real money, but I calculated that I would have won in the region of 16 pounds if we had been. Overall, I though that the whole May Day experience was overrated - the Magdalen choir was certainly not very impressive. Walking back from Madgdalen bridge was definitely quite an experience though - the whole high street area was turned into quite a carnival atmosphere - there were lots of groups in costume doing traditional english dances such as Morris dancing, and some Irish folk dancing.
In the evening, I attended a party celebrating the birthdays of Douglas and Graham, just slightly belatedly since their birthdays were actually in the Easter break. Kudos to Vicky and the rest of the 'biochemist' gang for organizing the party and for getting all the food ready, not to mention baking the two wonderful cakes, which was in the shape of a viola in the case of Graham and that of a medieval manuscript (with all our names written in icing on it) for Douglas. It was definitely a nice party, but I left after about 3 hours, because I just felt tired and needed some time alone.
posted by Caleb Liu | 1:27 AM
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