The Twang, Drones, Whit Monday and Bound Feet

We went to see the The Twang on Friday night at the student union. Here's a link to their website: http://www.thetwang.co.uk/

It's been predicted 10 times over that they are "the British band of the year" and "the next big thing", etc. etc., but I think they might be a one-hit wonder... or possibly a two-hit wonder "Either Way" is a great song and "Wide Awake" is alright; you can listen to them if you go to the website. Other than that, they sound like every other British group at the moment. Oh well, it was a good night, the tickets were cheap, and it was only a 5 minute walk from home. What more can you really ask for??



Before we went to the Twang, we went across the street to our friends' place for dinner. Somehow it came up in conversation that Liverpool are now using Drones to spy on the public by taking photos of "anti-social behavior" and then sending them to the police as evidence. Aren't the gazillion CCTV cameras around the UK enough? It's a bit creepy, isn't it?

We also discussed the importance of this weekend's bank holiday (aka public holiday). While Americans are celebrating memorial day in honor of those who have died at war, Brits are celebrating "Whit Monday". Never heard of it? It's the day after "Whitsun" or "Whit Sunday", which is one of three baptismal days on the religious calendar. Whitsun is also known as the Pentecost. However, as with many religious based holidays, it's morphed into a sort of "spring break" in the UK. Interesting?

Not as interesting as these photos that were sent to me by Charlie's new mommy in Beijing. (Charlie is a very lucky bunny; she gets to go outside every day to play with her friends in the grass in the courtyard outside her apartment building).



Here are two pics of an old Chinese woman with bound feet. Can you imagine the pain she went through to deform her feet like that? And did she have a say in the matter? Before foot binding was outlawed, women without bound feet were seen as ugly and were unlikely to marry, which was not only shameful but also depressing, as what rights did a woman have then to work, to make decisions, to do what she wanted? How times have changed... or have they? Some of the high heels I've seen women wear...





Check out this link for more info on foot-binding: http://www.answers.com/topic/foot-binding

And this one for stories from Chinese women about their experiences with foot binding: http://www.josephrupp.com/story15.html

The End of the Parade

The Lord Mayor's Parade through Oxford city centre on Saturday, part of the Big Ox weekend festivities

Carol: Wouldn't it be funny if we arrived at the Park just as the parade was ending?
Rich: Yeah, that'd be funny.
Carol: It wouldn't surprise me if we missed it. That kind of thing happens to me all the time.
Rich: Like when? We never go to parades.
Carol: (as we arrive)... is this it?
Rich: I think this is the end of it. We've missed it.

QI and Rude People Queuing in the Post Office

Wednesday night Rich and I went to the QI bar (read: the letters Q and I, not the chinese word 'qi') (http://www.qi.com/about/) on Turl Street, run by John Lloyd, and John Mitchinson (and apparently Stephen Fry has something to do with it, too). They opened the cafe/bar because they realized that the world was indeed quite interesting (thus, the Q.I.) and realized that "... more needed to be done to address the lack of interestingness in the world. Or rather the general lack of awareness that everything is interesting if looked at in the right way...". Funny.

The pub, painted in deep red, reminded us of the wanna-be posh bars on Sanlitunr or at Hou Hai in Beijing... except that it actually was a posh bar. No peeling paint, scratched furniture, sticky floors, broken toilets, etc. Go figure.

Anyhow, that night, a number of bars took part in an event where they had a few bands playing and people could buy one pass and go to see whichever ones they wanted. Of course, we didn't find out about that ticket until we'd bought our 4 quid ticket to get into the QI bar that night. That's quite interesting, though, isn't it?

We saw three bands (and when I say saw, I mean heard two and saw one as we were sat behind a wall for the first two). They were: Joe Allen & Angharad Jenkins, Ape Has Killed Ape!, and Les Clochards (www.clochard.co.uk).

Enough about them... I need to vent. So, I went to the post office that day to send some wedding invites for our final celebration in the UK and I ended up standing behind two very posh oxford uni students who were insistent on reviewing all the theories, people, dates, etc. that they needed for their next final. The annoying thing was that the line was long and slow, and they were faced towards me, even though they were in front of me. So it was like I was in their conversation but not. How rude. What was I supposed to do? I had to divert my eyes and pretend that I wasn't listening in on their incredibly dull and obnoxious conversation (but obviously I was). I've never before heard of or seen someone standing backwards in line. What was that about?

That's all for now.

Happy May Day

Happy May Day!

I was all excited about celebrating this morning until I really thought about how it would feel to get up early to have a few drinks, watch some "crazy kids" jump off the Magdalen Bridge (which seems to have become a tradition of sorts in Oxford with Oxford Uni students... ), and watch some morris dancers on Broad Street. I decided I'd rather sleep and read about it in the paper the next day. I must really be getting old.

Because the river that the students end up jumping into is only about 5 feet deep and because in the past many students end up in hospital, the city got smart and decided to have some construction work done around the bridge around this time and put up some signs saying that the bridge would be closed from 3 am - 9 am on May 1st. I wonder how that worked out. It's not like Oxford Uni students are stupid. I'm sure they managed to find a way around it.

Here's a link about May Day around the world: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_Day

Hope the weather is as nice wherever you are as it is here today.