3 posts tagged “party”
So yeah, May Week has officially begun.
What is May Week, you ask? It's basically a week-long party that takes the colleges by storm. It is so named because it traditionally took place before exams began, which is toward the end of May, rather than after they finished. Having the festivities after exams makes way more sense, but the name stuck.
What goes on during May Week? Garden parties. Loads of drinking. Punting. Fancy dress. Oh, and May Balls, of course. It's basically the light at the end of the tunnel for the undergrads and most of the M.Phil students as they doggedly revise for exams and work on dissertations throughout Easter Term. The colleges explode in a waves of euphoria as everyone finishes. It happened in a sort of staggered fashion. Some people finished two weeks ago; others wrote their last exam just a few days ago. But now they're all finished, and it's time to cut loose.
For King's, the party began on Sunday, which was our annual FUNDAY! And oh what fun it was! All of the activities took place on the back lawn, which was very nice. The weather was perfect: brilliantly sunny for the first few hours, and then some nice (not depressing) cloud cover set in but it was still warm. They set up sumo suit wrestling, bouncy jousting, bouncy boxing and......A BOUNCY CASTLE!!! I hadn't been in one of those for years, and it was quite a lot of fun (though it did leave me surprisingly winded). We played a game of rounders, which is like baseball except they've perverted everything that is good and pure about the sport. When that debacle was over we tried our hand at the punt races. I'm a pretty skilled punter, but I couldn't handle the short distance and the underhanded tactics of the other teams. We ended up coming in second in our heat. Later we joined in the wacky races (egg & spoon, wheelbarrow, etc.). We also played some (British) Bulldog.
In between all of this stuff we just chilled out on a blanket on the grass, it was awesome. Tons of people came out. I brought my juggling stuff and ran a bit of a clinic. And then there was a free barbecue in the evening. This country has a lot to learn about barbecues, but it was alright anyway. We ended the evening with a game of capture the flag. I was pretty bushed so I served as a line judge.
Robinson College kicked off the May Ball season on Friday, but tonight was the first night that any of the heavy hitters came out; Clare and Trinity both had their balls. Clare are our immediate neighbors to the north, so a bunch of people always try to crash by going through the Backs at King's. The balls are truly decadent affairs, and very expensive (if you want to go to the Trinity Ball and you aren't a member, a pair of tickets costs 235 pounds, double that and you have the price in dollars). Entertainment includes live music, DJ's, fireworks, jugglers, bumper cars, casino games, and whatever else the ball committees think of. Trinity also has unlimited free champagne all night. Nuts.
I wasn't willing to drop dough for any of the balls (King's has the Affair, which is totally different and goes down on Wednesday; watch this space), so I decided to try and catch the Trinity fireworks from the river. Of course, all of the King's punts were take by the time I checked at the porters lodge. So I went to Plan B: kayak. I ran into Kevin on my way to get the kayak key, and he eagerly joined in on the adventure. Some of our friends were at the Clare ball; we saw them as we raced under Clare Bridge with the fireworks going off above and the light reflected in the water just below. We managed to paddle up to Trinity just as the finale touched off. It was really incredible.
The river between King's and Trinity was amazingly clear on our way there, but afterward a huge armada of punts came toward us. Practically every punt on the Cam had pulled up to Trinity to watch the show, and we watched them all go by in an amazing flow of humanity. Some of them had candles at the stern. Kayakers were darting between them. I felt like I was in the middle of one of Canaletto's scenes of Venice.
I still marvel at the power of this place. May Week has only just begun, but it is already shaping up to be one of the greatest experiences I've ever had. The city feels so full of tremendously positive energy. The nights are magical, and the people are wonderful. Must this end?
....there will be an ostrich burger stand at King's Affair. I will be stuffing myself with flightless bird meat on that night to end all nights. Holla.
That's the kind of thing that gets me excited these days. Exam One of Two tomorrow at 1:30, with Number Two the following day.
A good end to a good week.
This week: On Tuesday I turned in my third assessed essay, which was sort of an evaluation of the online Arctic exhibition we're working on. I was pretty happy with the essay; we'll see what the examiners have to say. That evening I watched a few BSG episodes with Liza. Thursday saw a visit from a delegation of Zunis from New Mexico who are here to examine the museum's holdings from their territory. They're filling large gaps in the catalogue and correcting mistakes (for example, one piece of hollowed bone with a hole in it was marked as a bead; it is in fact a whistle that used to have a piece of deer sinew in the hole, which helped amplify the sound). This is great because it fosters a better relationship between the museum and the Zuni people. They also get to take a closer look at what we have, and there's a good chance that we might repatriate some material. Today was the last day of term (hooray!); we had a dissertation meeting and did some more work on the exhibition.
And then, the mighty mingle. What a night. Five hours of dancing and revelry in the various rooms of King's College. Cambridge kids really know how to cut loose. As I mentioned earlier, the affair was jungle-themed (basically an excuse for Kingsfolk to walk around in leopard prints, face paint, and lots of skin). I've already spent a fair amount of cash on costume elements this year (viking and old man outfits), so I wasn't keen on dropping anymore for this. I still didn't have any ideas for a thrifty costume roughly an hour before the mingle, and then I ran into Aileen and Helen.
The event itself was pretty tight. Lots of music everywhere. Mostly electronic dance. My favorites were the (brief) "indie" set in the bar and the crazy old school rave breakbeats in the Keynes hall. That was pretty awesome. The room had a huge projector showing what looked like National Geographic films of monkeys picking fleas off one another and other jungle scenes. Pretty trippy stuff to dance in front of. Unfortunately, to get to that room I first had to pass through the drum 'n bass room. I DESPISE drum 'n bass. It's so mind numbing, and it tires me quickly without bringing much enjoyment. And this particular brand of d'n'b featured a live MC on a mic yelling random crap over the already terrible beats blaring through the speakers. Awful. The other rough spot was the cellar. I usually enjoy the cellar, even though it has the charm of an armpit, but the place wasn't in its best form tonight. The other three venues were all loud, sweaty, sticky, crowded, and had rather dim lighting. But the cellar is like that all the time, so that atmosphere became intensified with all of the extra people. Going down into the cellar after checking out the other rooms was like descending into the ninth circle of hell. Pitch black (with black lights), wall to wall with people, floor positively covered in sticky dried beer, and HOT. And the music made me feel like I was in a really bad science fiction movie. Very strange Other than that it was a pretty good night. King's was packed, and everyone was in high spirits.
And now I am amazingly tired. Must sleep. Cambridge science fair tomorrow, helping out at museum. Hundreds of children. Much mayhem. And babysitting. Goodnight everyone.
