Oxford - observation

There is a hint of inertia as I leave the enclosed safety of St Hilda’s College. When I pass through the imposing gates it is almost like leaving one world to enter another, though St Hilda’s is saturated by the atmosphere of the city: the academia, the dilapidated (yet still sickening) wealth and, particularly, the self-importance. I still find those gates ominous. The iron bars, covered in peeling black paint create a cage for us, and shriek hideously on the tarmac when they are opened or closed by the porters. I know they are there to keep people out – to keep us safe – but I can’t help but imagine sometimes that it’s us that are being kept in.
Perhaps this is why I feel liberated and unconstrained every time I exit the gates into Oxford. I love this city, with its eccentrics spilling out from their dusty libraries onto the streets each night. You can be anyone in Oxford, even yourself.
Oxford starts at the roundabout near Magdelen Bridge. The traffic recklessly careers around it in a terrifying, chaotic war. It is funny how close this example of hectic modern life is to the relative serenity of the city. Oxford’s roads, I know, are a nightmare for drivers, but the city is largely pedestrianised and those places that aren’t are ruled by cyclists, with buses relegated to a secondary consideration, and cars barely daring to show themselves at all.
Over the bridge, and a few minutes walk, and I reach the exam schools. I cannot pass this building without being reminded that I am here, in Oxford, living out my everyday life against the thrilling backdrop of the most historically academic place in the world. The stone, once golden, I’m sure, has faded with the sun in its old age and the squat pillars look wizened and reassuring from being chipped away by weather and students, hoping to be immortalised by carving their initials. The steps have acquired shining dents from centuries of shuffling feet passing over them. I join the ageless multitude now, and walk up to the warm brown door to pull its gleaming handle. It is, just as every other time I have opened it, heavier than I expect and I must take a step or two back to balance myself before entering. Usually, when I’m here, the entrance hall is moving with the amount of bodies packed into it, all jostling, gossiping or, occasionally, jogging towards the door or their next lecture but today it is empty. I am late, but it gives me an opportunity to revel for the briefest moment in my surroundings.
The hall is at once dark and airy. The ceiling is too high for me to see without craning my neck, but the towering walls are panelled with a dark wood that softens the stone pillars supporting the balcony. The marble floor proclaims the university’s wealth and history, while its wornness speaks the busy nature of its students’ minds. It is patterned with black and white squares, giving me the impression that I am on a chessboard, especially when I enter the square room I must cross to reach my lecture. The sunlight here comes more from the open door to the lecture hall to my left than from the windows onto the alley outside. There are window-seats under these, cut away into the white wood panelling of the far wall. The rest are still made of stone, and reach up to the ceiling to form a three-dimensional arch above my head. The daylight does nothing to warm this cold room, but the plastic chairs stacked neatly against one wall drag it into the present in a way so incongruous with the rest of the place that it is almost comical.
On the other side of this room is the staircase to my lecture theatre. The stairs are so wide I feel like a child in a giant’s house when I climb them. These steps, too, have been tramples by herds of minds until they are smooth and tip downwards, so that I must concentrate on not falling. The pale, speckled marble banister is clearly there only for show, as it is too oversized to hold onto. But these stairs have been built to withstand an onslaught of youths, eagerly trampling down them to reach the various sandwich bars outside and their width is just another proof of their stability.