Ready for my close-up

Back in January I was in London for a mini-conference, but of course developed a migraine, as my brain has a habit of doing nowadays. The idea of `networking’ filled me with horror (to be fair, it does at the best of times), and I came to the conclusion that the best thing was to make my way home early. However, as the drugs were kicking in, I remembered that I was around the corner from the National Portrait Gallery, which happened to be one of the locations featured in my Thirty Before Thirty list that was the original inspiration for this blog.

I have to admit that I’m not really a fan of portraits; some are interesting, but moderation is key for me. However, my partner has declared that this is his favourite gallery, so I thought I ought to look in at some point, and why not now while I have some illicit time to myself in London?

I was both pleasantly surprised and underwhelmed simultaneously; primarily, I was reminded that a portrait does not have to mean a posed oil painting. A particular highlight was a stunning life-sized bust of Betjeman which wouldn’t have overly surprised me if it had started to talk; it wasn’t exactly realism, but somehow something more real and meaningful than perfect photographic realism.

Bust of former Poet Laureate John Betjeman, by Angela Connor. Photo credit: National Portrait Gallery, shared on exploregram.com.

It was also nice to see the famous group portrait of the Bronte sisters by their brother Bramwell, who notoriously scratched himself out of the picture, having seen it on TV several times. It’s not a well executed painting with respect to technique, but interesting in terms of family dynamics.

Gertrude Elizabeth (née Blood), Lady Colin Campbell, painted by Giovanni Boldini, one of the most arresting oil portraits in the collection.  Photo credit: National Portrait Gallery.

Other than the odd highlight, well, it was just portraits. Interesting historically, but not to my taste. The earlier one looks back, the more posed and symbolic the portraits become, status symbols rather than candid portrayals of personalities. I’m more interested in the sitters’ internal lives, so journals and diaries are more riveting and revealing. In addition, census data has a particular attraction, both from my mathematical point of view and because such data help reveal the lives of those who wouldn’t have been able to afford to commission portraits. Above all, the NPG made me wonder what future historians will make of the selfie era we currently live in, where portraits are everywhere, and people are more than ever before in control of their own presentation.

Second time’s the charm

No one likes confronting failure, but add in my perfectionism and depression, and relative lack of experience at dealing with failure, and you have a potent recipe for plummeting self-esteem after my first driving test. My first attempt was scheduled for a few days before Christmas, and I was acutely aware that a pass meant I could hire a car for Christmas/new year 2016/17, a time of year when the lack of public transport means I lose what feels a significant proportion of my treasured independence while visiting family, so as much as I’d tried not to, I’d got my hopes up.

As so many other first-time candidates do, I failed. I felt most of the Christmas break feeling bitter every time I see someone younger than me allowed to drive (that’s a lot of people). My instructor praising me for being a very safe driver was a small comfort, but I could still feel the burn of that FAIL on my head.

I had to wait until January for the second attempt, and having already done it once and knowing the procedure, I was at least a bit less nervous. The examiner was very chatty, and we got on well, and I really warmed to him when he actually knew what an oboe was and said it had a beautiful sound, so the test itself went quickly, and it barely felt like I was being examined. However, I managed to firmly bump the tyres on the kerb when pulling over to the side of the road, and I spent the rest of the test with a niggling thought that I might have failed, but I was at least going to do it with the least number of minor errors possible; it turned out that I had accumulated four (examinees are allowed to pass with fifteen or fewer), one of which was the undignified pull-over bump, and a pass overall.

In my subconscious conviction that I was going to fail, I hadn’t bothered to ask what happened if I passed (but I do know the protocol if you’re involved in an accident during your test), so the examiner and my instructor had to repeat the result several times before I could be persuaded to hand over my green provisional licence to get it switched for a `proper’ pink one. On my way home I realised that as I’d also sent off my passport for renewal the day before, I had no official photo ID in my possession, which was an odd sensation and engendered thoughts about what I’d do if I wanted to buy alcohol (I don’t think I look anywhere near 18, but a fellow tutor mistook me for being one of her first year undergraduates last week, so perhaps I look a bit younger than I think) or leave the country at short notice (I’m not up to anything nefarious, I promise! And this isn’t the place for a rant against the Tory government).

I was rather chuffed when my pink full licence came in the post (and relieved when my new passport arrived a few days afterwards). I was expecting to feel like a proper grown-up at last but that lasted for all of about two minutes before I started worrying that I wasn’t ready to be allowed to have charge of a car, and how on earth are seventeen year olds allowed to do this?! [Yes, I am firmly in favour of more driving safety education, particularly for young people.]

I still can’t hire a car until January 2017, but at least I can buy one if I have a desperate need (and the emotional need for getting through the Christmas holidays counts if I can find something within my limited budget), although I dread to think what the insurance premiums will be like, despite being over the magic age of twenty five. At least my partner can finally go to Bletchley Park (inaccessible by public transport) for his birthday next year, which happens to be about three weeks after the earliest date that I can hire a car…

Jag talar svenska. Ja, verkligen. Jag vet som mitt uttal är dåligt…

On the Monday immediately following my graduation weekend, I got up very early, grabbed my backpack and the Travelling Lemon, and headed to the airport. Several weeks earlier I’d given in to the resurgent yearning for adventure and booked a trip to Stockholm, ostensibly with the aim of escaping the kitchen renovations and taking the opportunity to practice my Swedish. I suffered waves of guilt at leaving OH behind, but he didn’t seem to mind, and solo travel gives one the opportunity to do exactly what one wants.

The last time I visited Stockholm, I did go with OH (in fact, it was our first holiday together, nearly seven months into our relationship!), and we stayed with a friend out in Ålby, enabling us to save money both on accommodation and food, as we cooked for all three of us in her flat. This time, I was on my own, and finding my own food… If one discerns the national dish by what is most commonly available, Sweden’s appears to be burger/chicken/falafel + chips + salad, and it was delicious! After a day of wandering around in the somewhat blustery streets, it really hit the spot.

As for accommodation, the best trade-off I found between price and facilities was a boat moored near Fotografiska. I’d forgotten that on a large boat some machinery still has to run at night, and I’m very sensitive to low-pitched noise, so the resulting vibration was a bit of nightmare, even with earplugs, but I had my own room, and the view was pretty good.

View from my cabin shortly after dawn. The other possibility was a room facing the road, and I’m glad probability was in my favour this time.

Of course, no trip to Stockholm would have been complete without seeing F, and we spent a lovely afternoon catching up over fika^[1] and wandering Södermalm. The light is truly stunning at this time of year, and F informed me that Swedes have a word for it (of course they do): draljus, literally “drag(ged) light”. The sun is low in the sky for most of the day, and the abundance of bodies of water and the colours of the local stone create the perfect conditions for reflecting it for even greater effect, notwithstanding the contrast with the blue skies and colours of the leaves in the trees further adding to the spectacle. I thought Oxford did this pretty well, but Stockholm is something else entirely.

No filter. Honest.

Stockholm is a notoriously green city, both with respect to the environmental awareness of its inhabitants, and in terms of the cultivated (and unkempt) greenery within the city. However, if one takes Tunnelbanan for less than fifteen minutes, one ends up at Skogskyrkogården, otherwise known as the Woodland Cemetery, a UNESCO World Heritage Centre. Cemeteries seem to be a bit of (sometimes accidental) regular feature of my holidays, but I’ve never regretted taking the time to visit one. Wandering around Skogskyrkogården, I realised that I felt more peaceful than I have in ages. Although there were services taking place while I was there, there was never a feeling that this was a morbid place; it was more a reminder that life and death are closely intertwined, not least in the case of Skogskyrkogården itself, which is full of (non-human) life that is of course being nourished by the bodies of those interred. From death comes life, and all that, very literally rather than spiritually.

Skogskyrkogården

With respect to more worldly concerns, I really did try to practise my Swedish, but there were few times I wasn’t immediately replied to in English: I could confidently order kaffe och (kanel)bulle, although this took several tries; and when I ventured into bookshops to stock up on such edifying material as young adult fantasy novels, presumably because the staff assumed that I could speak Swedish if I was buying a pile of Swedish books… It might seem a slightly odd set of souvenirs, but I was using the opportunity to stock up on some ‘learning materials’ for language study as it’s nearly impossible to buy anything in Swedish here, even ordering online.

I ate at Corner Grillbar twice, and at the end of my second visit the barman gave me a lolly for speaking (what I thought might have been) understandable Swedish. I wasn’t sure whether or not to feel patronised, but I think he was trying to make a gesture of appreciation.

My (consolation?) prize for attempting to speak Swedish in Corner Grillbar.

I also visited several museums, and I was pleased to discover that I could read many of the panels without a translation! I thought that I did pretty damned well condering that I’d been learning for less than three months. Is it bad that I was hoping there would be stereotypical American tourists about so I could impress them?

Aside: I have a somewhat ambitious aim to reach approximately B2 level on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) by this time next year. At the moment, I’m probably at A2 for reading and writing, but speaking and listening practice is much more difficult to fit in, even for just the mundane reason that my laptop has no CD drive and my work computer appears not to have a working soundcard. I guess I’ll just have to persuade Julia to continue tolerating me. I’m hoping to get some sort of certification, especially as OH might be working in Denmark (hopefully near the Denmark/Sweden border) for a little while in the next few years.

My last day featured my paranoia about missing various means of transport and feeling exhausted owing to the start of my period, so after hitting Historisk Museet I spent most of the day hanging out in Stockholm Central Station. There was a Red Cross station staffed by volunteers greeting people arriving from Syria, which is a stark contrast to the UK government’s attitude; sometimes I really am ashamed of my country and its government.

I used the commuter train to get to Arlanda, and it wasn’t at all unpleasant! This was a bit of a surprised compared to e.g. London, and it certainly didn’t discourage my love of the place. I was sad to leave, and have had to restrain myself from planning my next trip. Very soon I’ll need to persuade OH to plan the holiday he wants to take after his DPhil, and of course I’ll be tempted to push for Skandinavien, despite the expense… Yes, I’m a fully-fledged, unashamed Scandiphile!

Citronen och jag vid Kastellet på Kastellholmen, nära Skeppsholmen.

[1] A few weeks ago, someone asked me what fika is. Fika is an event. Fika is a lifestyle. I want the UK to adopt fika; tea breaks just aren’t the same.

Am I a Proper* Doctor Yet?

*”Proper”, as opposed to “Real”: this terminology is mostly used by medical doctors, at least in the UK, to distinguish between the medically qualified and those with PhDs (although there’s a massive overlap between those categories as well). It is not at all meant as derogatory to either side, and is more an example of how everyone involved with academia and higher education feels inadequate and insecure.

I don’t actually have a photo from my matriculation as I wasn’t using facebook back then! This is the same garb, but with the addition of a carnation to mark the first day of my (first year) exams.

Although I’ve had the title for five months now, at least with respect to the paperwork, I had one final ritual to go through before it’s properly official as far as university tradition is concerned. I could have graduated in absentia, but seeing as I still live in the same city and actually enjoy dressing up in the ‘academic uniform’, I wanted to take part in the arcana in person – and yes, it really does feel like something from several hundred years ago, apart from the fact that women, and Catholics and non-conformists are allowed in now.

I had to meet my final set of conditions, which were to pay off all my debts to the university – thankfully library fines and the like, rather than a student loan, otherwise hardly anyone would ever graduate – and give in a hardbound copy of my thesis to be deposited in the Bodleian (“the Bod”). The Bod is one of five copyright (“legal deposit”) libraries in the UK, and the thought of my thesis being housed with every book published here in the last 413 years, as well as with all the theses is rather exciting. Okay, so mine is actually going to the underground warehouse in Swindon, but at least it won’t be lonely… Defying the stereotype, Oxford is also very enthusiastic about digital deposition and archiving, so it was compulsory for me to upload a zip file which just about fitted within the limit (science theses have a lot of pictures). My perfectionism had finally been overcome by just wanting to get it over with, so while I know there were still typos in the final version, I was so fed up I decided it was finished. Coincidentally, the person I handed it over to at Exam Schools was the same guy who received my examiners’ copies and had given me a high five, handshake, and a fistbump while telling me how wonderful I am for advancing human knowledge. One day I want to tell him how nice it is to be greeted by someone who takes the time to remind you that you’re doing something difficult and great at a time when you’re incredibly stressed and exhausted.

The day finally arrived, and despite being worried that my family were going to be late, everyone did get to the right place on time, albeit via my mother telling me I’m being too bossy to OH and I should be more deferential or something, I don’t know. A story for another time. While I was having my ‘briefing’ about what was going to happen during the ceremony, OH had to make conversation with my parents for several hours, for which I think he deserves a medal, or at least a lot of alcohol.

After trooping to the Sheldonian theatre, catching the attention of many tourists, we all filed in and took our places ready for the start. I had a lovely chat with a woman who is a friend of a former colleague through the Malaysian Society who had a baby a week older than my colleague’s, so they knew each through playdates, illustrating how Oxford is a very small, highly connected world. My colleague’s wife and one year old baby have been in Malaysia for several months as UKBA’s ridiculous policies meant they couldn’t stay and wait a few more months for him to finish his PhD. That’s right, recent immigration policies are xenophobic to the point of breaking up families, which is frankly inhumane.

Back to the topic in hand… the ceremony itself has hardly changed since the middle ages, and this is something of which the university is very proud. Apart from the initial speech by the Vice Chancellor (or Pro-Vice Chancellor at my ceremony, as apparently the VC himself was busy) explaining the history and solemnity, and begging for donations, the entire event was conducted in Latin, even down to the names of the colleges which were founded after the use of Latin as the lingua franca of the institute had died out.

At the lunch following my MPhys (undergraduate degree) graduation.

I started off dressed in the gown of my first degree, and popped out to get changed halfway through before filing back in to shake hands with the Pro-VC himself! This hand shake is to symbolise that I am now considered (something closer to) his equal, in academic circles: those receiving a BA (there are no BSc degrees here) bow to show deference and gratitude; and those being inducted into the lofty heights of the MA, or the mystical higher doctorates such as “Doctor of Letters”, get bumped on the head with a New Testament. Anyway, the Pro-VC was making brief comments to those receiving their DPhils, which I’d assumed would be something along the lines of “Well done” or even “Which subject?”

“Done in three years?”

This is the academic equivalent of asking a complete stranger their weight and bank balance. For many reasons, but mostly because you’re considered a failure on some level if you don’t finish on time, despite the fact that hardly anyone does, it is Not Done. I wish I’d had the presence of mind to make some sort of scathing reply such as “And what about you?”. Part of me wants to think that it’s because he thought I looked a lot younger than I really am and wondered if I was some sort of prodigy, or that he was just making a very misguided attempt at saying something more ‘interesting’ than plain congratulations but has the social awareness of a billy goat. I don’t want to believe that it’s because he’s just a bit of a dickhead…

The event was rounded off with dinner with my family, which was surprisingly unnoteworthy. I chose the most conservative place I could think of where OH and I still actually had a choice, which I think resulted in everyone enjoying at least most of their meal.

After a very draining day I was glad to be able to spend the evening in peace without needing to talk, something of which OH is luckily understanding, although I probably wouldn’t have kept him around very long otherwise. I also get to outrank him academically, at least for most of a year: he handed in the examiners’ copies of his thesis several days before my graduation, and is expecting to have his viva in early December. We will eventually have to deal with the implications of being an academic couple who both need a job, something referred to amongst physicists as “the two-body problem” — hopefully this will be a good, rather than bad, adventure.

Giving oneself a break

Last week was a busy one: I was winding up to a concert; getting the hardbound copies of my thesis made and then submitting one to the library (a prerequisite for having a graduation ceremony); and failing to adequately prepare for a fifty mile bike ride.

The absolutely non-negotiable thing – the thesis – was finished on Monday. I cycled to the other side of the ring road to collect it from the binder, showed off all three copies to my supervisor before giving him one for his office, and then headed to Exam Schools to submit the Bodleian’s copy, so now I’m all set for my graduation ceremony at the beginning of October (at least officially – I don’t think I’m ever going to be emotionally prepared to deal with my family at a formal event for an entire day…). While it’s very odd and kind of cool to have a hardback book with my name on the spine, the experience was rather anti-climatic, and everyone else seemed more excited than me. I mostly just wanted to get it all over with so I can clear the final hurdle before graduation. However, I did get to hand in to the guy who accepted me examiners’ copies – the guy who thanked me for furthering knowledge and gave me a handshake, fistbump, andhigh-five, and I got all of that again, which was very sweet.

A few hours after handing in the big blue book, we had a choir rehearsal in the concert venue. For some reason, I ended up as concert manager, and there was a lot of equipment to coordinate getting there and back (the conductor chose a piece where half the choir play tuned wine glasses: he never wants to see a wine glass again, which kind of serves him right), so I ended up not finishing until nearly eleven, well past my bedtime… Sounds not too bad so far? Well, I signed up for the bike ride without properly checking the dates, so of course it turned out to be the morning after the concert. I realised the night of that rehearsal that something was going to have to give, and it was going to have to be the bike ride.

There were several things I felt guilty about: I have wasted the entry fee because I couldn’t work out how to get a refund; I had borrowed a road bike from someone and so slightly inconvenienced them; and other people had been expecting me to come – I forgot to tell anyone about my change of plans so M very sweetly called me on the morning of the ride to check that I was okay when she couldn’t find me at the start! However, it was still the right thing to do. I’d been feeling under the weather the entire week, and if there’s one thing I can admit to being really good at, it’s being too hard on myself. As much as I don’t want to, I sometimes need to admit that I need to take a break and be kind to myself to avoid a bigger crash later.

The concert day itself was stressful: I went from rowing first thing in the morning (my first time rowing sweep in three months, although I have some immune-overreaction inflammation in my rib cartilage which will be bothering me for a while yet), to watching the Labour leadership election results while doing my daily Swedish practice, and then straight into sorting out the concert! I had a grand total of ten minutes to myself when I kept myself locked in to the empty church to have a chance to wolf down my pasta salad in peace, but it was all worth it as it was an amazing success. It was probably the best we’ve ever done, and it was certainly the winner for having the most people I knew in the audience – I tried to do the rounds during the interval, but had to prioritise those who I knew I wouldn’t be seeing in the next few weeks…

We even managed to get everything packed away in good time as so many choir members pulled together to get it sorted out – they really are a great bunch of people, and come without the politics that most choirs seem to have – and despite having felt slightly ill all day, I decided to take advantage of the lack of an early morning the following day and go to the pub. I felt horrifically guilty about this, what with missing the bike ride, but but it was a lovely evening and it’s rare that I have the mental spoons to socialise like that, so I thought that I might as well take advantage of it – I also got to witness twerking in real life… I’ll miss the people and the music, and I can’t believe we’ll have to wait nearly six months for regular rehearsals to start again; we rehearse in university vacations, but unfortunately Christmas just isn’t long enough to put something together.

The next day I had a well-earned lie-in and then an afternoon trip to London to visit E, who’s just moved back Down South after four years in Durham. I spotted something familiar to me from my trip to Corning in the V&A, and I got to say hello to Dippy for the last time before he goes on tour!

A Dale Chihuly chandelier. The first time I visited the V&A several years ago, I think I thought this was probably a temporary exhibit made of balloons, but thanks to my trip to Corning Museum of Glass, I know better and recognised the artist instantly!

Dippy the diplodocus in London’s NHM. He’ll go on tour and be replaced by the blue whale skeleton later this year.

Talar du svenska?

Ja, lite. Visste du min sköldpadda har en gul hatt?

Jag har inte faktiskt en sködpadda.

I have always wanted to be able to speak/read/use another language, but while I have a fantastic memory which has always worked well for reading and comprehension, unfortunately I feel like my brain doesn’t do so well with word retrieval when I’m trying to communicate, even in English, and particularly so when I’m having a week of many migraines… However, seeing as I do fine on the internet and when I’m writing, this might also be my introversion exerting a brain-freezing effect.

I took the plunge into another language six weeks and although the sensible option might have been to brush up my French (five years’ worth at secondary school), I decided to learn Swedish instead, starting from the very beginning (I don’t think knowing liking filmjölk counts as knowing any Swedish). People keep asking why I chose Swedish, and I have my ‘sensible’ excuses: my partner may have to spend some time working Denmark; Swedish is supposed to be the easiest Scandi language for native English speakers; I probably have good job opportunities in Sweden and Malmö is just over the bridge from Copenhagen… but really it’s mostly because I really like Sweden.

Taken during a trip to Stockholm four years ago.

I have several Swedish-speaking friends I can practice, albeit not as many as for French/German – okay, one native speaker and two continental friends who speak it as a second/third language (British languages education is shockingly awful). And a Finnish who may speak Swedish, but I may be confusing him with his EU interpreter mother (don’t ever suggest he’s Scandinavian^[1]).

It turns out that Swedish appears to suit me pretty well. I like not having a billion verb forms (unlike some languages I could mention…), and changing the suffix of a noun to show definiteness and plural is very elegant, at least in my opinion. The vocabulary is rather charming as well: “strumpbyxor”, or socktrousers for tights – how cute is that! I also successfully guessed the meaning of “resväska” as suitcase as it’s effectively a portmanteau of “resa” (trip) and “väska” (bag).

I have also come across such gems as “sjutton ocksâ”, which literally means “seventeen also” but also “confound it!”. Perhaps I’m not using the right search terms, but I can’t find an explanation of that, so if someone has one, please let me know. Another nugget is the verb “orka”, one which doesn’t have a ‘direct translation in English, but roughly corresponds to having the spoons for something: “Jag orkar inte”, “I cannot take it” or “I don’t have the energy”.

Most of all, this is the country that invented a non-offensive slang word for female genitalia (“snippa”) to try to level the linguistic playing field with male genitalia (“snopp”) – previously, like in English, one could choose from medical terms, or the Swedish equivalent of the c-word.

The primary tool I’ve been using to learn is Duolingo, and I’ve even got my partner to compete with me – he’s (re)learning German, and feels bad that I’m beating him in levelling up despite learning Swedish from scratch and not even having learnt a Germanic language before. However, Duolingo does feature some odd little scenarios, and I like to amuse myself by thinking that they describe one person’s life, where their parents are doctors but have a large farm, they have eleven siblings and sixty cousins, for some reason everyone is obsessed with turtles, moose, saunas (the latter two make sense as Swedish stereotypes, but turtles!?), and going to Finland, and occasionally dogs eat cats.

However, mina föräldrar gillar inte att du äter myror^[2], which I think is a reasonable excuse to for having reservations about somebody…

[1] Osku once got very drunk during a boat club dinner and ended up singing the Finnish national anthem while hanging out in the restaurant toilets, each verse interrupted by a chorus of “FUCK SWEDEN!” and the sound of vomiting. When he sobred up, his first question was apparently “What happened to my other bottle of vodka?” The second bottle was probably responsible for the performance in the loos…

[2] My parents do not like that you eat ants

Words, words, words… Part IX: books 56-65

56. The BFG, Roald Dahl

The BFG is the quintessential gentle giant: instead of hunting and eating humans like his bullying counterparts, he roams the human world at night distributing the dreams he has caught and bottled during his day in giant land, something I often think of when I see the dreamcatcher above my bed. This novel is probably also why I have a bit of a soft spot for the Queen, despite not being an enthusiastic royalist. I’m not waiting for the 2016 Spielberg movie to come out, as I love the world I built in my head, but I wish I had a copy with me so I could re-read it.

[57. Swallows and Amazons, Arthur Ransome]

58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell

I was horse-mad as a child, so of course I read Black Beauty… The novel was very effective at eliciting an emotional response, and the fate of Ginger still makes me sad, as does the kindness of the taxi driver and his son. However, its popularity is a good example of how the British population still seem to care more for animals than people.

59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer

As much as I enjoyed reading it at the time, I had a hard time remembering what the novel was actually about, so I had to read the wikipedia article carefully… That reminded that while the premise of the novel was fantastic, I didn’t really like many of the characters, including the antihero Artemis himself, although that might have been an artefact of him being an arrogant and freakishly intelligent teenager n the process of growing up, complicated by being groomed to be a criminal mastermind by his family; he did improve somewhat during the novel. However, it was refreshing to have a badass female character in the form of Holly Short, especially in a work of young adult fiction which was primarily marketed towards boys.

[60. Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky]

[61. Noughts and Crosses, Malorie Blackman]

62. Memoirs of a Geisha, Arthur Golden

This was clearly a well-researched novel, and I learned a lot, but more about the history of Japan than geisha. I took those aspects of the novel with a pinch of salt, rightly so as it turns out: Mineko Iwasaki, the author’s ‘source’ for his material wasn’t happy with the artistic licence he took. It’s a shame that despite twentieth century geisha often being financially powerful and independent women in their own right, a real rarity in Japan until very recently, Golden chose to sensationalise the idea of the women as commodities and playthings for men, with the geisha community full of bitchiness and backbiting rather than healthy business rivalry.

63. A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens

There are those who criticise historical fiction: guess what? This is a historical novel, from Charles Dickens, no less. So there.

This novel has one of the most famous opening section in literature, which sets the scene of social and political upheaval, but in typical Dickens style, this is explored through the tragic impact on individual people, with heart wrenching effect. Understandably, given the subject matter, this is the least humourous of his novels, and additionally served as a warning that the injustice in British society at the time was unsustainable and not far off that of revolutionary France, and that care should be taken to avoid a national revolution and protect the most vulnerable – a message that wouldn’t go amiss today.

[64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCullough]

65. Mort, Terry Pratchett

I’m still surprised that we’ve made it this far down the list without getting to Pratchett! I guess it’s a sign of when the list was made, as I have a feeling he’d feature more highly now. Pratchett had a wicked sense of humour and could apply it perfectly to social commentary, and he’ll be sorely missed. Indeed, I think he was a master of characterisation on the level of – or possibly even exceeding – Dickens.

Death is one of my favourite Discworld characters, and his exploration of how it feels to be human is both touching and hilariously funny, but thankfully, his amusing misunderstandings of human nature persisted throughout the series. I totally get what Pratchett meant about Death speaking in small capitals as well.

Driving [me up the wall]

Two months after restarting driving lessons, I passed my driving theory test this week. I was convinced I was going to fail the hazard perception portion for, ironically, being too aware of potential hazards and the system flagging this as over-clicking (‘cheating’); this is a common reason for experienced cyclists and motorbikers to fail as almost everything is a potential hazard when you’re not sequestered inside a safe(r) metal box. Speaking of which, at least three cars pulled out of side roads, causing me – on the major road, and therefore with the right of way – to have to brake to avoid hitting them, as if I don’t count as oncoming traffic because I’m just a cyclist, and also yesterday OH nearly ended up making a nice dent in a 4×4’s driver door when someone pulled out of a junction without looking at all. A minibus full of bus drivers on their way to work stopped to ask if he was okay.

Anyway, I did pass the theory test, so the next step is the practical test. My instructor didn’t mention it during this week’s lesson, so I assume that means he thinks I’m still not confident enough: he has explicitly said that I’m “a good driver, but [I] worry too much”. He may have a point as I dealt with a 70 mph road for the first time and hyperventilated and make squeaking noises for the entire stretch, but at least 30 mph feels better now… I’m determined to pass before Christmas, but I’m not allowed to hire a car until I’ve held a full licence for a year, so goodness knows how I’m supposed to get practice in the meantime and not be even more dangerous at that point seeing as it’s pointless to own a car here unless you have children or work in one of the science parks/industrial estates, and I can’t afford to keep or insure a car anyway. I could ask my dad if I can take out a one month policy for me on his car and have him come to fetch me (with the car, obviously) for Christmas, especially as my railcard will also no longer be valid.

As I was interested in the insurance issue, I had a quick look at ‘normal’ year -long policies as well: only changing the gender, my policy would be about two-thirds the cost of my partner’s, merely because I’m female and he’s male (our age difference is a massive eight months, and we obviously have the same postcode as we live together and our flat isn’t that big….). I’m not sure what I think about this. My partner was angry that the companies are discriminating based on gender, but quite frankly, that nowhere near makes up for the bullshit I have to deal with in the rest of my life on a daily basis that he doesn’t experience^[1]. There is a still a gender pay gap 45 years after the legislation was passed, there is still a glass ceiling (in a wonderful example of female-enforced misogyny, even women prefer male bosses…), there is a finals results gap at my university for a reason no one can fathom because girls are still outperforming boys in school exams, there are vastly fewer young women than men choosing STEM track careers, I and other women have to deal with intimidating catcalling on a daily basis, and women’s reproductive rights are being gradually eroded in apparently ‘first world’ Western countries (i.e. certain states in the US)… and that’s just off the top of my head.

If you want to start on statistics, men are a higher risk group for driving across all age groups, and are also thought to be more likely to engage in high risk behaviour such as drinking heavily and using (illegal, consciousness-altering) drugs. My major gripe with the Adaptive Squad is the parent who has a bizarre obsession with “women drivers” being unsafe, which he will mention at least two or three times a session – he had no answer when I asked why many women could still get cheaper car insurance if they were inherently less safe than him merely because of their gender.

Still, my savings on car insurance don’t outweigh the ‘female’ tax in other aspects of my life: women’s clothes are typically more cheaply made but cost more; I am expected to spend more time and money on personal grooming to appear ‘presentable’ and to be taken seriously as a functioning member of society; and I have periods. Yes, sanitary items are considered a luxury (I thought part of the definition of a “luxury” was that I could choose to engage in it, but clearly the government knows better about either menstruation or the English language…), so I (and all menstruating women in the UK) have to pay VAT on them, which is, frankly, a steaming pile of bullshit. Ontario abolished (province-level) tax on sanitary items as of 1st July this year (with an overwhelmingly positive public response), and as far as I’m aware, Toronto is still a major business centre and not a poverty-stricken ghetto just yet. Change.org are still running a major campaign on this issue.

So this went slightly off track… to return to my original subject, at least I don’t live in Saudi Arabia.

Whereas my links are not all original sources, I have tried to make sure they include links to reputation original sources. Unfortunately, much of original information about the Oxford Finals Gap is only accessible from the university network with a university user ID.

[1] Not that this makes any discrimination okay, but y’know… I’m afraid my little feminine brain has limited sympathy here.

I’m not a good person, I just really like rowing

I don’t want to parade how great I am for volunteering. I really don’t. I’m writing this post because it’s part of the fulfilment of one of my list items, but I feel very uncomfortable with parading how good I am, or that someone might think that I’m humblebragging (or outright bragging).

I am not a good person. Really, I’m not. One of my “thirty things” items was to do sixty hours of volunteering: at the time, I had a very low income, so my time was probably worth more than my money (although I know Effective Altruist groups would have something else to say about that). I’m also in favour of supporting local causes, and I’m a selfish person who wanted the fuzzy glow of knowing I was being helpful, a slightly narcissist trait which may help explain a little of why I like local charities. I think everyone has the capacity for doing and should a little something positive, and this seemed like the most effective way of doing it at the time, and was less nauseating and more effortful than pledging to give X pounds to charity. Wow, that sentence has a lot of “I” in it…

I’m a classic introvert, so I didn’t venture too far out of my comfort zone, and hence starting volunteering with the adaptive squad of the town rowing club (of which I am a ‘regular’ member); that was more than 65 hours of my time ago…

The current coordinator is trying to phase out the use of the word “volunteer”, preferring “coach” or, in the case of parents/carers who cannot row, just “member” (I consider myself a “member” of the squad). The reasoning is that this will assist the integration of the squad into the rest of the club, as well as provide a degree of normalisation for the rowers: indeed, one of the members of the squad has expressed how nice it is to be able to roll of bed and nip around the corner for his sport, rather than having to schlep to London or Stoke Mandeville. Through N and the other rowers, I’ve learned about the social model of disability: yes, they may have an impairment or difference, but infrastructure is what leads to a disability^[1]. For example, many of the squad don’t use the club’s gym, although it’s relatively easy to adapt exercises for their needs, as the facilities are on the first floor and there’s no lift access. At the regatta recently, the club had to hire an accessible portaloo because the ‘accessible’ toilet on the first floor is impossible to reach. Indeed, a major goal of the squad at the moment is to raise money for a lift to be installed.

My sessions with the squad, both with respect to the activity and the people themselves, have made me more aware my able-bodied privilege in everyday life, but also that we’re all human and it’s okay if my brain acting up sometimes means I don’t have the spoons and need to be selfish with how I use them. It may seem a little paradoxical that helping others would have this effect, but I can’t be effective when I’m drained, and as I’m incredibly introverted and this is a people-focused activity, I run out of mental energy very quickly. If I drag myself out to sessions, it’s because I’ve agreed to go and I’ll let people down if I don’t turn up, and it’s a very human desire not to have to deal with my guilt rather than altruism.

So, the members of the squad may not be ‘normal’ rowers, but they’re mostly ‘normal’ (whatever that means) people: often nice, sometimes a bit of a jerk like everyone else, and certainly not ‘inspirational’ in the sense of “Oh, aren’t you so brave, you’re such an inspiration” ‘inspiration porn’ you see around on the internet – I find that uncomfortably othering (I feel a bit uncomfortable saying these things for fear of appropriating the community’s voices, which would be a bit shitty of me, because I know next to nothing, really).

To get back to my point, in many respects I find the coaching relationship within the squad much more interesting and healthier than it is within ‘regular’ squads – it’s more of a partnership, and the rower is obviously the expert of their impairment and what sorts of adaptations we can try to help them row better. And of course, the basic principles of rowing technique still apply, even if you’re only using part of the stroke.

We got to see the fruits of our individual and collective efforts at the regatta a few weeks ago; everyone has shown an improvement since last year, and we all enjoyed ourselves, so a job well done, in my opinion. To me, it’s not about ‘helping the disabled people’; it’s about helping to break down the accessibility barriers so others can experience something I love as well. Because apart from being human, what we all have in common is that we love rowing.

[1] The strict application of this definition that the university uses would mean I would be registered with the disability services thanks to my migraine condition if I didn’t have the option of flexible working to cope with episodes. I’m not sure what I think about that. They don’t have a clue about my chronic major depressive disorder.

Words, words, words… Part VIII: books 46-55

46. Animal Farm, George Orwell

All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.

I think by now almost everyone knows that this novel is an allegory of life in Soviet Russia under the rule of Stalin: the changing commands of animalism reflect the malleability of political doctrine as a tool for propaganda and population control as the pigs gradually seize power to serve their own interests, and in the process become more like their hated former masters. The choice of the pig as the ruling animal is significant both in terms of the pig’s intelligence, and its negative connotations.

This novel left me with a profound sense of sadness as the animals’ hopes and dreams turned to dust, and they were developed a growing sense of unease and despair as a result of initially believing they had escaped exploitation at the hands of humans only to be turned into the slaves of those they originally thought were working in their interests. This is exemplified in hardworking Boxer, faithful and optimistic to the end, but it’s a major psychological turning point for the other animals when they realise he isn’t going to the vet to be taken care of, but is going to be brutally disposed of for Napoleon’s personal gain.

47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens

I first made acquaintance with this novella through The Muppets’ adaptation, and I have to admit, that’s still one of my favourite interpretations – and despite the muppets, reasonably faithful to the original text, although my favourite production for acting/production/textual fidelity is the 1999 adaptation starring Patrick Stewart as Scrooge… but I digress.

When I finally got around to reading it, I was a little surprised by how creepy the book is – there are some scenes, such as the door knocker, which are genuinely scary, emphasising that this is almost a morality tale told through a horror story. The Scrooge of the text is an even more odious person (yes, that is possible) than in many of the adaptations, making his transformation an even greater contrast, but Dickens also covers more of the background of his personal life, eliciting greater sympathy from the reader; while he is a nastier person, you also feel more sorry for him as he’s less pantomimical. Scrooge is also a metaphor for winter and springtime renewal, perfectly fitting with the original traditions of Christmas back in the days when the pagan festivals were first hijacked by early Christianity.

[48. Far from the Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy]

49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian

Like The Hobbit, this is another book I discovered through class reading in year six, and this also holds the distinction of being the first book that made me cry. I have come back to it many times, and I’m additionally very fond of the ITV adaptation (the one with John Thaw). The eponymous Mister Tom starts off as an apparently very angry man, but this is stubbornness and a self-imposed emotional isolation after the loss of his wife and child at a young age, and in helping Will recover from his experiences at the hands of his abusive mother, recovers himself, and uses his strong determination to literally venture out of his comfort zone to rescue Will. As well as inadvertently helping Tom recover from emotional hermitude, Will is exposed to very adult issues early in his life, and not only loses his mother and sister, but his best friend. He faces up to his grief with the help of the adults in his life – including a reclusive artist, whose contribution is cut from the TV adaptation – and the overall tenor of the book is that while death is an unavoidable part of life, it’s okay to feel grief, and eventually to realise that lost loved ones live on as part of others’ memories. Magorian’s writing does a brilliant job of combining the senseless tragedy of war with more ‘mundane’ tragedies such as family abuse and loss resulting from sheer bad luck to make a beautifully complex bildungsroman.

50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher

I read this last winter; my review can be read here.

51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett

This novel is another childhood favourite of mine, and its charm has not been diminished by the passage of time. Although all the characters appear to start as crude stereotypes at the beginning of the book, they all develop as the story progresses. This is particularly true for Mary, who has a kind of epiphany when she sees all her worst qualities in Colin, and loses them in trying to help him, with the help of Dickon; and Colin, who defies expectation and the limits imposed on him by his carer to resume the ability to run and walk like a ‘normal’ child. However, a notable disappointment might be that this transformation only occurs for the privileged children, and Dickon is consistently presented as the ‘sensitive peasant’ throughout. The eponymous garden symbolises the emotional and physical growth of the characters, and acts as a stark contrast to the desolate moor beyond its walls; in this respect, the garden may also represent the childrens’ development of a healthy mental refuge ready for when they have to face the harsh outside world as young adults.

52. Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck

Unlike many of my contemporaries I never had to study this novella in school, but it is very familiar to me from when I acted as technical director for a stage adaptation as a fourth year undergrad. Despite sitting through repeated rehearsals, the work never lost its power, and I was moved to tears during the final scene of the performance – although the guy playing George later confessed that he could only think about how he wasn’t sure that he’d remembered to load the sound pellet for the pistol and feared everything might end with an anticlimactic ‘click’…

Despite Lennie’s extraordinary physical strength, George performs the role of guardian within the relationship, protecting Lennie from the harsh world and the consequences of Lennie not understanding his own strength, including concepts such as death: Lennie is clearly developmentally disabled in some way, and it is unclear whether George is being solely altruistic or exploiting Lennie’s overpowering physicality to protect himself. Unfortunately, their story ends in tragedy when George realises that the only to protect a confused Lennie from a vengeful lynch mob is to shoot him himself, comforting Lennie by talking about their dreams of the life they will never share in a scene both touching and coldly reminiscent of a livestock owner humanely ‘taking care’ of a beast of burden.

[53. The Stand, Stephen King]

[54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy]

[55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth]