Life in Oxford

Well I have been hearing for years now that Oxford (city centre) is not a fun place to live or work in the Summertime. Now that I have lived through an Oxford summer, I would agree. Basically, the city centre area in particular, is completely taken over by thousands of tourists and travelling student English language program students.

What I mean by taken over, is literally just that. They fill the streets, shops, pubs, clubs, buses, trains,and just about anything else you can think of. I worked at Disneyland for almost 4 years and I have seen thousands of tourists before. However, here the streets are narrow, the shops are small, and group guides tend to leave their groups for a majority of each afternoon, so that people can go shopping and eat on their own. Fun times.

As for life here as an American, well that is interesting as well. I would say that many of the Americans that seem to make it here for a visit, are either university students, or pretty wealthy people in general. From what I have experienced, they do tend to speak loudly on trains and buses, and don't seem to know much about England or political issues, and don't really pay attention to other people.

I had always wondered where the ignorant American stereotype that many British people seem to hold true, came from. Now I am getting a better idea of where it comes from. Of course, the United States government and their foreign policy right now, definitely works against us here as well. Understandably.

So, it it definitely an interesting experience to be living and working here right now as an American. Not easy. I do have to just know that I will be prejudged and stereotyped in ways I havn't been before. For instance, since I am working in retail right now, I am constantly being expected to be a pushy salesperson who has the attitude of always being right and that I know everything, by many customers. If we don't have a certain size in stock or something, I have had customers say to me that "someone like you should always have everything in stock. What's wrong with you?" However, the comment wasn't a joke.

It is definitely an adjustment and taking some getting used to. As for the people I am working with, they seem to be getting used to me, so they are warming up to me. I certainly have a lot of proving myself and what type of person I am, to do. I think that I have an even harder time of that due to many people's preconceptions of what Americans are like. For instance- I did make a comment in conversation to another coworker the other day that received a reaction that was surprising to me.

I stated that I was impressed with the other person's music collection. He asked why. I said that I was surprised that he even knew some of the groups whose music he had. He raised his voice and said: "You're not going to be one of those Americans who thinks that the only British bands are Radiohead, U2, and Cold Play are you?!" I had to explain that I was just surprised that he had some not very mainstream heavy metal band albums from the United States, that weren't even necessarily well known in the states, and that as far as I knew- heavy metal isn't really popular or mainstream here. I had only been trying to make conversation.

Things like this seem to happen quite often. I guess time will help as well as patience and an open mind. Once summer winds down - life in the city centre will get back to normal I am told. i am looking forward to that.