The good news is that Fresher's Week is finally over. Less hi- so- where're -you -from's, less exulting over the exoticity of people's parentage (some unusual ones: Welsh-Lebanese, Polish-Arab, Corsican-Thai and Turkish-German), less mad rushes, less hurrying around finding things... but this also means less alcohol, less excuses to postpone work, less doing bizarre things like hall parties where you can do the laundry in between two venues, a wine glass precariously balanced in your hand.
Also less chance of being bullied into signing up for a random society at the Fresher's Fayre. Like, um, Sikh instruments (?!) and the Trotskyite one, bubbling over with Dark Motives already. "Can you believe," the lady at the desk hissed indignantly, "that SOAS has asked me to remove these pamphlets in other languages because they're not sure what they're saying? What next? Will they try to stop us speaking these languages?" "That would be a pity, especially at SOAS," I muttered before exiting quickly. But. I still get the Trotsky-ite newspaper, in case anyone's interested.
Spent part of the weekend down at the South Bank where my favourite part was a participative orchestra laid out in the open near the Royal Festival Hall. Each little stool was one instrument in the orchestra so when you sat on the stool, that instrument began playing its part in the symphony. Especially lovely to see these old couples just about managing to stand with their walking sticks but still diligently shifting seats to get different instruments to play!
Not much else has been happening: attending the first few lectures, begging to be allowed to take another that I'm technically not allowed to and not least of all the lovely, lovely SOAS library. 1.5 million books and although M insists part of it looks like a detention centre, you can borrow all these lovely music CDs from across the world and it has a huge South Asia books collection. Very yummy.
Day after A and I hope to see In Extremis at the Globe, but it's a five pound stand-in-the-yard ticket for a three-hour show, so if I survive I hope that'll be my next post!
