Cambridge

Mood: Excited Health:Good Weather: Cold

Sighs... it was raining heavily as we made our way to the bus stop for our 4am coach to London. At London, the weather was not optimistic at all and it was cold at 8 deg. What was the matter with UK in the summer?? We filled our hungry stomachs with early breakfast before our next coach to Cambridge.

After arrival, Woon picked us up and drove us to the venue where Ling had her meeting. It was great to see her after so long. Shortly, the three of us parted for 'dim sum' lunch at 'Charlie Chan' :)

One prawn dumpling missing (Jeff was the thief)

As a 'siew mai' critics, I was glad that it tasted better than the previous ones I had in other restaurants.

After such a great lunch, Yan Qin, a Taiwanese postgraduate in Cambridge University (Ling's friend) brought us around the school. The highlights of Cambridge were the prestigious Cambridge university and its 30 over colleges!!

The bridge of Mathematics

The colleges are also hostels to the student there. Wow... I would love to stay in such antique centuries old buildings!! The following features some of the beautiful colleges there.

A clock with a bug that strikes many controversies

Ooo... seemed like a butcher stall!!

In most of the colleges, there were signboards to inform visitors to keep their volume down due to exam in progress. Hmm... even on a Sunday?? And also signboards to ask people to keep their feet off the neat 'carpet- like' grass except the birds.

Continuous stream of lake and boats rowing is evident in many areas of the colleges.

An engraved stone dedicated to a China scholar.

The significant of the poem and information about this poet were quite puzzling as there was no signboard for explanation. Guess I have to do a 'google' search then.

Antique clock

Standing on the wrong side of the sun!

Jeff acting cool on a sunny weather... hmm...

Flying hair...

This man was always mentioned in my course - Newton's law

Sculpture of famous scholars

One of the chapels (name can't remember :X )

Flowers blooming beautifully in Summer.

Notice anything about these flowers? The petals seemed to be the other way round!

The bridge of Science in the background

Yan Qi and Woon told us that this bridge is also nicknamed 'the depressing bridge or stressful bridge' as all students need to pass this bridge in order to get to the examination hall.

Boat rides are common around the university.

Nice town

Anyone fancy Peking duck or roasted duck? I was joking about if the students can be so poor that they captured the white ducks and slaughtered them for food!

With more than three hours of walking, Woon brought us to have tea and some rest at the orchard tea garden in Grantchester, which was around 10 minutes of car ride from the Uni. It also has a small museum dedicated to a good looking WWI hero - Rupert Brooke. He was a graduate of Cambridge University and was a famous poet, who stayed around the orchard. He died of food poisoning at a young age of 27 years old during the WWI while traveling to war site.

The tea garden was started by chance when a group of Cambridge students asked if they could be served tea beneath the blooming fruits trees instead of the front lawn of the house, which eventually became a popular spot for many famous people and scholars including Brooke.

Grantchester tea garden where drinks and cakes were served

The tea garden was over a century year old and its originality was maintained. Woon treated us afternoon tea and after that, we met up with Ling, Yan qi and Song Hee for dinner at a korean restaurant. Dinner was a complimentary from Woon. Thank you.

We had their chilli and sweet chicken wings and seafood pancakes for appetizers. For main, we had rice, hotplates of beef, ginger pork, fried chilli rice cakes, dolsot bibimbap, and tofu and kimchi. The outcome of our dinner ... empty dishes...

Finally, it was dessert time! We had tofu ice- cream!! Special right?

Tofu ice- cream which doesn't taste like tofu to me

Then we had complimentary mint ice- cream from the boss :)

The day was almost gone. We ended our dinner after 8pm and travelled back to Cardiff at 9.15pm. We have to thank a few people for making our Cambridge trip so pleasant; Yan Qi for being our colleges guide, Woon for driving us around and bringing us to places and food, Ling's for her hospitality and snacks on our way home. Also, thanks to the weather for stopped raining once we stepped our feet in Cambridge.