It's all Greek to me

In a week in which I've spent 8-and-a-half hours in church, rung a bell while wearing a cassock, parted with £40 of my hard-earned cash to purchase a bizarre outfit known as subfusc and eaten a kipper for breakfast for the first time ever, it's hard to know where to start...

Placement. Yes. I'll start with that.

I'm feeling both delighted and terrified, as I've got exactly what I asked for. You may remember me musing back in May that a large evangelical church on a Sunday and some form of Youth Group mid-week would provide me with a lot of learning opportunities. And so I have been instructed, for the next two terms, to attend St Andrews Church, North Oxford - http://www.standrewsoxford.org/ - which, from its website at least, looks pretty vibrant. For the mid-week element I'll be involved in its outreach to Youth in the neighbouring parish of Cuttislowe - the video on their website says a bit more about what they are doing in this area of the city, and is worth a watch.

I think the Cuttislowe project will be an immense learning curve, but I'm really looking forward to getting stuck in. Certainly, looking at the video, these young people's lives would seem to be a world away from my life here at college, living in a nice flat, eating free food and going to Oxford University. I'm getting comfortable in the friendly larkiness of Holy Hogwarts, and I have a funny feeling this is just the placement I need. These people have a lot to teach me.

In other news, I somehow found myself drawn to attend INTENSIVE GREEK on Thursday. Yes, it deserved capitals. The BA students have to do it, they are examined on it, but as an MTh I have no requirement to do Greek at all. However, as I managed to skillfully duck it in my first degree I thought it would be useful to sit in on the lectures, just to get some basic knowledge of the language in which the New Testament is written. I've only been to one session, but I really enjoyed it. It's a nice change from normal lectures, gets my brain thinking in a different way. And I actually shrieked in delight tonight at the kitchen table when I managed to write out the whole Greek alphabet correctly from memory.

It's been an incredibly intense week. It's taken all my energy to work out where I'm supposed to be and when! I've been into Oxford three times for different MTh inductions and it's been pretty tiring. Lots of information, new people. But it was nice to meet the people I'll be studying alongside in the MTh group - a healthy mix of Anglicans, Catholics and Baptists. I'm looking forward to some good discussions.

But thank goodness it's the weekend. Today we drove up to Leamington to have lunch with Ellie, which was lovely, and then came back here to do not-very-much all evening. From now on, Saturday is going to be my only completely free day. Hurrah for Saturday.