More orientation

Saturday evening marked the start of the time where activities stretch over a good proportion of my waking hours. Saturday evening was an Open Doors night, where approximately 30 rooms around SP hosted parties. I enjoyed some chips and dip, cake, desserts, omelette, etc. at various rooms. The physics students continued our habit of moving in packs. I don't think we sought each other out, but when we did run into each other, we stayed together (sounds like some kind of chemical reaction). In fact, many of them partied on in Boston after the formal part of the evening finished. I didn't join them: I prefer to keep my socialising north of the river.

On Sunday morning I went to the Welcome Mass, which was celebrated in Kresge, the main auditorium of the university. I think it was the first time I'd been to Mass in such a venue. I hung around for a while afterwards, chatting with people, most of whom I'd met at Taize on Tuesday. I think several of them spend hours there some Sundays.

I went to brunch at Ashdown, an event that takes place with a frequency that Americans like to call either bimonthly or biweekly, but we would call fortnightly (I know that bimonthly and fortnightly aren't exactly the same, but I'm not sure which is more accurate). We actually spent approximately an hour waiting in line (I looked at my phone at 12:52, having arrived very close to 12, and still hadn't entered the room), but it was simply an opportunity to talk to a couple of people I already knew and meet a couple of new people. We continued the discussions, including a comparison of American and British or Australian pronunciations (the strangest word in my opinion is defense: Americans seem to think of deFENSE and DEfense as being different).

After a quiet afternoon (reading and napping - I had decided I wouldn't study on Sunday, being the day before the exam) I returned to Ashdown for the Thirsty Ear welcome barbecue. Some of you may remember that the Thirsty Ear is the MIT pub. I took advantage of the free soft drink, having already consumed my biennial beer there the previous Monday. We played some frisbee in the courtyard and then in the park on the other side of SP.

I spent the end of the evening back at Ashdown at what I believe is a semi-regular movie evening with a few of the aforementioned people from church. We watched The Sound of Music: two of those there had never seen it before! I believe I last watched it on 1 October 2005.