Week Two: Electric Boogaloo.

22. January 2010.

It's Friday night, and Matthew Ranger, the student president of New College, the school within Oxford to which I belong, brings us out to the New College bar. The itinerary phrased it as an “induction,” but it is really just a night out. The bar is sparsely peopled: besides our group, there is a smattering of other New College students, playing pool and chatting.

An observation: there is a frustrating amount of good-looking, dashing men here at Oxford. They’re well-dressed, well-educated, and well-spoken. In my head, they sit around discussing Proust or modal logic, drinking expensive red wine and laughing at witty jokes I don’t understand.

In other words, I have low self-esteem.

A man walks into the bar who matches this description exactly, except he has the added bonus of being exotically foreign (he’s from Lisbon, it would turn out). I spot him just as I’m going through that self-deprecating rant in my inner-monologue, and I think, “See, that’s exactly what I’m talking about! In comparison to a guy like that, I’m the most vanilla person you could meet.”

About twenty minutes later, I notice that the man is sitting on couch near the pool table, by himself. As I am similarly alone, I approach him and ask him what brings him to Oxford.

He tells me he was here to give a presentation on climate change and that he’s returning home to Portugal tomorrow afternoon. His name is Louis (with the s pronounced); he’s 31; he’s married; and he works for a company that invents in carbon-based processes. He’s an impressive fellow: he speaks five languages and does things like give presentations at the University of Oxford.

I start telling him how the bright, good-looking men of Oxford are intimidating and discouraging.

He says, “It is not about good-looking. It is about confidence.”

“I know,” I say. “That’s my problem. I lack confidence.”

“You see that girl over there,” he says, nodding in the direction of the bar.

 I do.

“You could get off with her if you wanted.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“You just have to approach her.”

“Well, this isn’t even about sex, so much. It’s also just about meeting people to hang out with. I literally have no friends here and my apartment is starting to get to me.”

“Let’s meet some people, then.”

It’s about ten, and the New College bar is beginning to close. Most of the British students left a while ago.

Louis asks Matthew where those kids were heading, and he tells him he’s not sure. But he says there’s a bar not far from here we could go to.

So, Louis and I head out into the Oxford night.

* * * 

We arrive at a pub called The Half Moon. Pub is a very appropriate word for, not just because that’s the English parlance, but also because of its décor: everything’s wooden and old-timey; there are a bunch of loud Englishmen talking about rugby; and there’s a fireplace and an upright piano in the front.

A man gets up and reads some lousy poetry. He’s a local, and he clearly hangs out at this pub all the time. Probably knows the owners. He reads a poem about his cat shitting all over his house and one about rugby and another in Spanish (which Louis says is terrible).

Then two young guys play some acoustic music, and they’re not half-bad. They covered Joe Dassin’s “Les Champs-Elysées,” a song I love.

Then, another poet reads, except he’s a fucking treat. He orates boisterously and proudly, reciting poems like one entitled, “Mediocre Man,” a poem celebrating the fact that he’s completely mediocre in everyway. He is hilarious.

Louis and I decide that this place, while fun, is not what we’re looking for. We finish our drinks and head out again.

 * * *

As we walk down the streets, Louis convinces me to ask a few different groups of girls about places to go.

“You see, that way, if they are at all interested, they may invite you come along with them.”

I ask two groups and get two completely different replies––one groups says to go back the way we came to find some clubs; the other tells us the center of town is what we want––but both share one thing in common: they were not interested in continuing the conversation beyond politely pointing me where to go.

Undeterred, we press on.

Finally, we find a club. There is a short line out front––a promising sign––so we stand in it. Inside, after checking our coats (1 pound per coat, thank you very much), we get some drinks and find the dance floor. There are about forty or fifty people dancing and probably another forty or fifty standing outside the dance floor staring at the people dancing. After some boasts of confidence (by which I mean shots of whisky), I step onto the dance floor.

Now, I must preface the next development with some comments about my dancing. For those of you who haven’t seen me dance, let me just say that when I was younger, I inadvertently adopted the Michael Jackson-style of dancing. I would not say that I’m particularly good at it; it’s just how I learned to dance. I’ve noticed, over the years, that not that many people dance that way. As a kid, I didn’t realize that. I just liked watching Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo.

So, anyway, I get out there and start dancing. Eventually, people begin noticing my dancing and give supportive nods and gestures to me. Nothing extremely complimentary; just people being nice.

Then, this guy comes up to me and kind of challenges me through dance: he does a few similar moves and nods to me, as if to say, “So? I can do that shit, too.”

Now, I’m drunk. So I take him up on the challenge. As if they understood, people cleared a circle in the dance floor and we go at it. I go first, essentially doing what I was doing before he interrupted me. Then, he goes, doing comparable steps to what I just did. Then, we it comes back to me, I do a few little numbers and then jump into “the worm,” a move I used to do all the time at 7^th grade “Teen Nights.” Then, I get back up and pointedly made come-on gestures at my competitor. At this, the crowd applauds and then turns to my challenger, as if to ask what his response will be. His answer? He bows out.

Applause for the winner!

Next, I go to the bar to get a drink, which literally takes me a half an hour. When I come back to the dance floor, Louis is waiting for me.

“Nice moves,” he says. “But you did not end up with the girl.”

He points to my challenger, who is dancing with a number of attractive women.

“Well, that’s okay,” I say. “I had a blast. That was fucking awesome. I can’t believe I was in a dance-off!”

We start dancing again, and, after a song, I end up dancing next to this beautiful girl in a white dress. I move a little closer, testing the water; she doesn’t push away. After a few more tests, we’re officially dancing together. For about thirty seconds.

Because suddenly, the loser of the dance off pushes me away from the girl and says something in a harsh tone, but I couldn’t hear him.

I start to walk towards him, but Louis grabs me and says, “Let’s go.”

I nod in agreement and we split.

 * * *

We arrive at the corner of George St. and Cornmarket.

Louis says, “I’m going this way,” pointing towards New College.

I say, “I’m going that way,” pointing towards Hythe Bridge.

“Well,” he says, “then must part.”

We shake hands.

“Thanks for taking me under your wing,” I tell him.

“Jonathan,” he says, “You do not need my wing. You did very well for yourself tonight.”

“Thanks, Louis.”

“It’s nothing. Remember: confidence. Now go make some friends. Just try not to dance with their girlfriends.”

We laugh and part ways.

It’s raining now, and I have quite a walk before I’ll be back to my flat. But as I begin the journey, I realize that I couldn’t care less. I am happy.

The Very Definition of Auspicious.

7.JAN.2010

I’m sick. And tired. But not sick and tired the way my mother used to say she was sick and tired. I’m not fed up with anything. I’m not at the end of my rope, as it were. I am literally sick and tired. I have the nastiest cold I’ve had in years, and I got about an hour of sleep last night. From the looks on the faces of the other passengers, they aren’t doing too well, either. When the captain comes on the intercom and perfunctorily announces, “Welcome aboard flight 238 with service to London, England,” an infinitely cheerful man near me claps. No one joins his merriment. 

Now, I don’t mean to suggest that I’m not utterly excited about my travels. No, no, no. In fact, I’m more excited about this trip than I have been about almost anything in my entire life. But there is a point of ailments and exhaustion that pushes any excitement into the background. As the plane takes off, all I can think about are my mucus and my eyelids.

The flight is uneventful. I read a little, eat a little, sleep a little.

About an hour before we’re scheduled to land, the captain announces that, since England has been hit with the worst snowstorm in fifty years (!), our plane has to be reverted to Newcastle, a town which Google Maps tells me is 283 miles from London. A collective groan goes through the plane. I, though, am unbothered. As I had not made any hostel arrangements in London and as I don’t have to be in Oxford until the next day, any diversions in the mean time are actually quite welcome. So, I’ll get to see Newcastle. Cool!

Then, after 20 or so minutes, the captain comes back on to tell us that, in fact, we’re being reverted to Glasgow, Scotland, which is about 10 hours away from London. People are pissed. Even the cheerful fellow seems pretty angry. Still, I’m unmoved. For some reason, I simply don’t care. Whatever happens will happen.

We land in Scotland and, after a lot of standing around, are driven to a Marriot Hotel at about one in the morning. At the airport, I get a drink at the bar. As I’m standing there talking to Swedish woman about the weather, a young English guy approaches us and says, “Hey, they’re loading us onto buses, now.”

I thank him and say that if he hadn’t told me, I may have missed it.

He says, “Well, I saw the board,” pointing to my skateboard.

His name is Adam, he lives in London, and he skates. We become instant friends. At the hotel, we order pizza and get a drink. Then, we watch this strange English reality show called “Raise It, Kill It, Eat It.” The premise: people experience the world of meat, learning how animals are slaughtered and processed. In the episode Adam and I watched, they showed a pig being castrated. It squealed vociferously. It was horrible.

The next day, we’re awakened at eight AM to go back to the airport. Once there, we wait in a prodigiously long line for hours. Then, we are told that there is no flight. Then, we are told to get back in line. Then, there is a fire alarm and the entire airport is evacuated. It was a comedy of errors. The Glasgow airport has an inexplicable slogan posted on its walls everywhere, and its enigmatic weirdness perfectly captures the experience: Pure Dead Brilliant. No one (even some Scots I talked to) knows why an airport would want to have the word “dead” associated with it, but there it in big, bold letters. This phrase encapsulates the mix of fun and misery, of wonder and bewilderment, of excitement and annoyance of this travel experience. On one hand, seeing Glasgow (albeit through the bus window) and having a storied journey is wonderful and amusing. On the other, I’m fucking sick and tired and would like to get to Oxford.

Then, finally, some progress. We board the plane and take off after having spent approximately 5 hours in the airport. The flight to London is short. When we finally arrive, the captain announces “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to London,” and this group of strangers––who, by this point, have developed that kind of camaraderie people in such circumstances often develop––are truly happy. There is a we’re-all-in-this-together vibe on this plane. I’ve met some great people: the Swedish woman (who’s name I never caught), Adam the skater, Carrie, an American at Cambridge College, and a few others. We’re strangely close.

When the cheerful man claps at the captain’s announcement, everybody joins him.

 * * *

At Heathrow, we sit on the plane for an hour because ice has frozen another plane to the runway. When we finally de-board, it takes them three hours to deliver our luggage to us. When all is said and done, it’s 9:30 PM, and I haven’t been able to get in touch with the people at Oxford to let them know I’ll be late, which means I don’t have a place to stay there. Of course, I could find a hostel, but it’s late and––I’ll say it again––I’m sick and tired.

Adam, thankfully, offers to let me crash at his place, which I immediately accept. The serendipity of skateboards.

Adam’s flat (oh, let me use the nomenclature) is in East London. It takes almost 45 minutes to get there by the Tube. The London metro system is enormous. Like New York, London makes Boston feel like the metropolitan equivalent of training wheels. Boston is a big city and it can be navigated by public transit, but it is an easy city. The fact that I was once intimidated by Boston shows how much I’ve progressed in the last few years and how much Boston has, in fact, prepared me for other cities. For instance, the next morning, as I attempt to make my way to the bus station, I figure it out very easily without the slightest bit of anxiety or confusion. Boston has not shown me how other cities do things (as London’s system is quite different: you have to tell them where you’re going and they charge you based on that, then you use the ticket to exit the station), but it has prepared me to learn quickly.

Adam’s flat is perfect. It is the place of a young Londoner, exactly the kind of place I hoped to see while here. I want to see the tourist sights, of course (the Globe, the London Bridge, etc.), but I also want to experience what it’s like to actually live there. And Adam is the sort of dude I might know if I lived in London.

I meet his roommate Fran and a couple of his friends. We walk to a club called Catch, for which we wait in line. I’ve never waited in line to get into a club. Outside, we drink cans of beers because you can drink on the streets there. It is a very liberating feeling. The club is densely crowded and, for the most part, typical. If I were not in London, it might even be annoying. But as I am in London, it’s wonderful.

The next morning I snap awake, hungover and tired. I call Oxford and finally reach someone, and, to my great relief, the man at the Study Abroad office says that I haven’t really missed anything. I tell him I’ll get there in a few hours, which he says is fine.

I say goodbye to Adam (who was supposed to accompany me, but, alas, is too hungover), and head to the bus station.

I see London in daylight. It is incredible: the ornate architecture, the different phrasings (like let instead of rent), the cars on the opposite side of the street, the equivalent companies, and the coaches. This is my first time in a foreign city. It’s a remarkable experience.

And again I’m sick and tired.

* * *

The ride to Oxford is, thankfully, unencumbered by difficulty. I’m on the bus essentially alone, on the second level in the front. I get to see a lot of non-contextualized London (which I’ll see more of in the future), and the English countryside (which, not surprisingly, looks like most countrysides, with the exception of the profusion of sheep).

When I arrive at the OSAP (Oxford Study Abroad Programme), I am immediately plunged into a walking tour and a party, during which I meet the other students in the program. Before I even get to my apartment, we go out for dinner and drinks. By the time I get to my room, I’m drunk again.

The next day I rest.