Gregory Mulholland

On Tuesday I began my journey home. At 8:00, I got up and finished packing. Then, I went into town to the College to get some things cleared up before I left, talk to the housing people to make some progress on finding a place for Kelly to live, then got the last of my Christmas shopping done. Finally, at 10:20, my taxi met me at my house to take me to the bus stop. I got to the bus stop about a half-hour early and waited.

The bus ride to the airport took about two and a half hours, but went without a hitch. Then, I got on the plane. The flight back took almost 8 hours: I didn’t sleep. I guess that is best to avoid the jet lag, but still, time doesn’t seem to pass at all. It was pretty uneventful. The only real excitement was when I filled out my customs card and put it in my jacket pocket, it put my passport with it. When I set my jacket down, my passport slipped out of my pocket onto the floor of the plane. About 4 hours later, when I moved my coat, I noticed the customs card was there, but not my passport. Of course, I was a little panicked. After about an hour of searching, I gave up temporarily. When the guy next to me woke up, I asked him to check around his feet. Somehow it had slid behind his feet. I was so relieved.

I landed at Dulles and caught my connecting flight to Norfolk without any problems. What awaited me there was the most exciting part. I saw my parents at the end of the terminal hall. I gave my parents hugs and thought I was done. But no! Much to my surprise, Kelly came out of nowhere and put her hand on my back. I turned and was absolutely speechless. For me, that is very telling, I am always able to talk. I gave her a huge hug. It was really nice to be home. It was great to see my parents. But that surprise was the best possible addition to the end of a long trip. It was so nice to see her sooner than expected. I could never thank her enough.

For now, I am going to see the family, visit Raleigh, help plan the wedding, see friends, and plain relax. Already I have had Bojangles (with sweet tea!) and tacos, and I think cookout in on tap for later tonight. This might be my last post until I return to Cambridge, or at least for a while. I hope everyone has merry Christmas and a happy Hanukkah.

Fairbairns: the biggest rowing race of Michaelmas Term

I guess this term really was the term of rowing in scratch crews (ie, ones that have never practiced together). For every race, it seems that something came up that we needed to change crews at the last minute. This time, rugby was the culprit. Ian, one of our bowsiders (starboard for those of you rowers from home), hurt his shoulder in a rugby match on Thursday afternoon. On Friday morning, he discovered that he couldn’t raise his arm above his waist.

Thus, with 30 minutes before we were supposed to meet at the boathouse to prepare for the race, the search for a sub began. Fortunately, a friend of our captain was able to sub. Unfortunately, he was a strokesider, so we had to switch one of our extra strokesiders to bowside. I guess all that doesn’t make much sense to those without rowing experience. Suffice it to say it would be like someone telling you that you had to take an essay final, using only your non-dominant hand. Switching sides race day is very difficult.

When we finally got on the water, everythign seemed perfect, it was sunny and nice, and it looked like we were going to have a solid tailwind. As we marshalled for the race (almost an hour), the wind changed and the clouds came in. We broke out space blankets we had brought along just in case, but the wind made them mostly ineffectual. Here is a picture of us marshalling:

Finally, we were off. The race began well, but since we hadn’t practiced as much as we should have, we didn’t maintain power as well as we might. Considering the circumstances, we did ok though: 19 out of 61 competing teams. Considering some of the boats had been practicing 8 times a week or more all term, that isn’t too shabby. Here is our boat on the racecourse:



I know it is a little blurry, but my little camera can only do so much. I should at this point thank Ian and Lucy for carrying it on shore and taking a few photos. Others took more on their own cameras, and as I find them, I will link them here.

After the race finished, we were as far from our boathouse as you can get on the Cam without going over a lock. Since the river is so narrow, we had to wait until our whole division of 61 boats finished before we could head home (we went off 13th). Remember that cold and wind? Well, it got worse. We were able to pull our boat to shore and get out, which helped a little, but not greatly. We basically all bundled up in those stylish space blankets and tried to keep warm for an hour and a half while the rest of the division cleared the course. Here are a couple of my boatmates doing just that:

Rob is also looking quite stylish in Zoe’s glasses.

The row back was cold, but we made it. It was really nice to get inside the boathouse to warm up. A group of us went to a pub near the boathouse for lunch. They have really delicious burgers, just what the doctor ordered after such a chilly day.

DId I mention that since it was on a Friday, I worked in the lab in the morning, then returned to the lab after? I guess that is the real Cambridge experience. Academics and rowing, living in harmony and totally integrated.

I depart for the States in 3 days. Between now and then: finish Christmas shopping, summarize my work thus far for my advisor, pack, have lunch one last time with a professor visiting Cambridge from State, buy a bus ticket, and get on a plane. It is going to be a busy 3 days.

I’m looking forward to getting home, seeing Kelly, my family, eating good old American junk food, and relaxing for a month.

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Boat Club Dinner

Well, the end of the term is here. For undergrads, there is a term system. Lectures are given for 8 weeks each term, and at the end, there is a big break (about 5-6 weeks). There are three terms yearly, and at the end of the third term, students take their exams and pass their classes. Even though there were no exams this term for most, people definitely were excited to have finished up for the Christmas holiday.

At the end of each term, we hold what is called boat club dinner. It is basically a black-tie team blanket. To come, you have to have rowed that term or graduated as a rower. It is a legendary event, so there are some people who only row enough to be allowed into the dinner.

When I arrived, it seemed like any other dinner. Everyone dressed up, and we went to formal hall. Once there, the fun began. First, our captain, Fergal, had the duty to read fines. These were basically offenses that people submitted to him that others had committed. If your name was read, you had to drink. Fortunately, the only one that applied to me was “I’m an American”, so I didn’t drink too much. There were others though who were being targeted or had just offended a lot of people. A friend of mine and I made it a point to target our captain (so we submitted these to the women’s captain so they would actually be read).

There were other traditions as well. We sang a number of easy-to-learn songs that insulted other rowers. We yelled chants against Downing, who were the last ones to bump us out of first place (headship) on the river. We even cheered “take off your shoe if you love Tit Hall (the nickname of our college)”. Thus, this happened:

You will notice that the Domus Bursar, the second in command behind the master, even has his shoe off. Obviously, even he loves Tit Hall. It is really nice that the college administration embraces tradition. There have been masters in the past that have not, which is why we don’t have headship right now (we held it for many years, our boat club is lengendary). Now, the boat club is becoming a fixture again. Before I move on, I would like to point out the white and black jacket in the picture of the guy on the right. That is a first boat jacket. You can only buy them if you make the first boat (or a slightly different one for second boat) for bumps. It is definitely distinct. I want one.

After, there was a party in J2, our sort of rowing headquarters at college. Our captain also lives there. I went ahead of time, and snapped some pictures.

You can see that there are lots of blades on the walls. That means that in that particular year, the boat bumped 4 times. This is no small feat. There is a saying around here: “Bump 3 times, you’re good; bump 4 times, you’re lucky.” Maybe that is true, but we have done it many times over the years. It is really cool to see all the history behind the club. One of these days, I will take pictures of the boathouse for everyone to see.

Christmas Formal

Apparently, when term ends, it is just about food. On Wednesday, instead of our normal formal hall, we had Christmas dinner. It was different in several ways: no gowns, port served with dinner, the master gave a talk. More like Matriculation Dinner than like formal hall. There were a number of funny things we did though. First, at each seat, in addition to our menu, was a little booklet with this title:

The best part about this? No organized singing. We all just broke into spontaneous song and people joined in. Even the guy from Singapore sitting next to me who had obviously never heard a Christmas song before joined in as best he could.

At each seat when we arrived, we had little presents. They were tubes that popped when you opened them and a joke fell out. They definitely added to the atmosphere. The jokes were really bad. Mine:

What do you get when you cross a skeleton and a detective?
Sherlock Bones
Fun though.

Then came the food, and what food it was! We had duck:

It was really good. Then, after a rousing round of “We Wish You a Merry Christmas”, immediately following the lyrics “bring us some figgy pudding, and a cup of good cheer”, out came the port and figgy pudding (actually the slightly more modern Christmas pudding, but very very similar). They lit it on fire before serving it:

And here is the actual treat:

It wasn’t the most delicious thing ever, but that is British food for you. Most of it is an acquired taste. After dessert, the Master spoke, and so did Scott, our outgoing MCR president. They all did a very nice job.

The dinners were lots of fun. I guess I have one more major post between now and returning home: Fairbairns. I will do that tonight. I have to get shopping for Christmas presents now.

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