Cambridge

I went on an excursion to Cambridge yesterday. I enjoyed it the best of the excursions I’ve taken so far. I used to think I would have loved to be a student at Oxford University, but after visiting Cambridge University, I changed my mind. The list of names of students who graduated from there is soooo impressive (John Milton, Charles Darwin, Christopher Marlowe, Thandie Newton, John Harvard, William Woodsworth, Lord Bryon, Isaac Newton, on and on and on the list goes.) They discovered DNA there and just one of the colleges has had 30 Nobel Prize winners. The caliber of learning and student is absolutely extraordinary I imagine. Their brains probably feed off each other! The place is also beautiful. The city is basically taken over by the university. The university is made up of 30 colleges. Like at Oxford, students have to apply to and interview with an individual college to become part of the university. An undergraduate degree takes 3 years just like Oxford as well. Tuition is the same as any university in the UK -- £3,000 a year. Unbelievable. It’s cheaper to go to an elite school in the UK than a state school in the US. Visited the college Henry VII established (still amazed how much history I have learned from Showtime’s ‘The Tudors’. Also, saw a tree that grew from a sliver of the apple tree responsible for Sir Issac Newton’s discovery of gravity. I visited the church with the pulpit that witnessed the first ever Protestant sermon in England. Visited Emmanuel College from which many Pilgrims that travelled to Massachusetts graduated. So much history.

In the afternoon, I went punting! It’s basically riding in a boat along the River Cam. Cambridge students push the boat along with a long pole by hitting the stone bottom of the river. Relaxing, beautiful, and our punter was very knowledgeable. Told us lots of fun facts about the University (Saint John’s College students are the poshest and snobbiest, Lord Byron thought it clever to find a loophole in the no domestic pets policy by keeping a bear as a pet.. . and other fun facts like that.)
I got myself a Cambridge University rugby shirt. I can’t wait to wear it to college days at school . :D