Moving to Oxford (UK)

[Dinkleberry]

I've just bagged a nice year long work placement as part of my course down in Oxford, and I'm due to start in August. Apart from waiting for a bus outside the trainstation to get to my interview, I've not got a clue what the place is like. Soooo, I'm wondering if anyone here lives/works/studies/[?] in Oxford, and if you do, please could you give a heads-up on what it's like? Things I'd be interested to know about...
- Live music scene (good venues, good nights? - The weirder the better)
- Places to live where you might get stabbed
- Record shops (please tell me there are some nice indie record shops around here (dance, rock, classical))
- Any areas to avoid walking/jogging around if you don't want to get stabbed (nighttime?)
- Could you get away with just walking everywhere, do you need a bike to get stuff (supermarkets and the like), or do you rely on buses/cars?


I am very much looking forward to getting out of here and exploring somewhere new

 

[Solaris]

Sulk does

 

[Beerdude26]

There are like 10 million parks because of all the unis, so those are pretty good spots for jogging/walking. Can't give any hints on which ones will get you stabbed though lol

 

[Shift]

Its the UK, you will get stabbed anywhere.

 

[Druckles]

Well you're bound to think that, you live in Manchest'oh!

And yeah, challenge Sulk to that tiddlywink match while you're down there. I know several people who've gone to Oxford, but don't actually know what it's like myself

I think I went once. And it was like Cambridge. But not quite as good...

 

[Viperidae]

Say hi to Sulk, you lucky bastige.

 

[Dekstar]

I hear they still ride horses down there, because cars are so cheap to run in comparison.
Also they all wear waist coats and top hats.

 

[Iron Kat]

I was born in Oxford, I can't remember what it was like, though. I only lived their for about five months after I was born and haven't been back there since. i'd love to go back though and see where we used live. it was called Regents Park College, in case you see it or know about it.

 

[Sulkdodds]

y helo thar.

I wish I could be more help to you; I've been a year in Oxford and hardly seen any of it,because I've been living in a university college (one could stay there for years and never leave) and because I've had a lot of trouble, stress and diagnosable-learning-difficulties-related drama which has taken up a lot of my time. This coming year, when I'll be living out with friends, is really the one in which I'll be trying to get the town under my feet, having managed to get on top of my studies.

Music: the Carling Academy, while enfranchised, have a lot of good acts going through, and there's always something decent on each month - I saw British Sea Power there recently and was going to see Hayseed Dixie. They get some really damn good bands in. Weirder and smaller is The Cellar, which may well tickle your fancy for live music and specialised club nights. Afraid to say that the club scene in Oxford is not hugely varied; there are several big venues that all the students visit, a Po Na Na, and a few smaller and more interesting venues that are often one-offs organised by various colleges or student unions. For all I know a lot of these are restricted to uni students - if they were, I would not have had the opportunity to notice. As for record shops, good luck. I haven't found any in the centre of town, but then I haven't been looking all that hard. I tend to just get such stuff in my hometown of Brighton, because it's more diverse and more bohemian than Oxford, and I already know where everything is.

Nowhere to live is very dangerous. The most likely candidate is Cowley, a student area, the main road of which goes across a bridge and directly into the High Street in the centre of town. The district is often pretty loud, raucous or unpleasant late at night - but I wouldnt' say it's particularly hazardous, and it's regularly policed (don't walk around obviously carrying drinks, because police will take them off you). On the other hand, there's been a mystery figure called the Cowley Sex Pest in the newspapers, so maybe it's not so great.

If you're with the university, you have an advantage, because you now have what is in essence a free pass to get into most university facilties and colleges (which surely comprise half the town centre). Similarly, if you live in the centre of town, you will never need to do anything but walk anywhere. A bike will be useful, but there will be few places which you can't reach within half an hour. Living further out in places like Cowley or Dale or Headington, it would be a good idea to get hold of a bicycle for getting around. There is a Tesco and a Sainsbury's within 30 minutes of the Magdalen Bridge; a railway station and most clubs and bars within the same radius; you could very easily get away with never having to travel anywhere on anything other than your feet. If you do want to get a bicycle, you need to be pretty serious about your road safety hand signals and so on, because a lot of streets are extremely narrow with tight, winding corners, and they are all crowded with students on bikes. Helpfyully, it is around this time every year that graduates or foreign students will be leaving town, and they will be selling their bikes.

Good places to jog are the University Parks, and along the bank of the river that runs down to the west of the town centre island. You could also probably go for a pretty good run in the grounds of some of the bigger colleges - Magdalen and Christchurch are absolutely enormous - which are usually open to the public during the day.

I hope you end up liking the place, anyway. Maybe we could meet up some time, and find a record shop together.

 

[Viperidae]

diagnosable-learning-difficulties-related

!?!?!?!?!?

 

[DEATHMASTER]

I am very much looking forward to getting out of here and exploring somewhere new

but..but the fire gang!

 

[Septih]

Probably best to listen to sulks about the music scene, never really got into it growing up there.

Nowhere to live is very dangerous. The most likely candidate is Cowley, a student area, the main road of which goes across a bridge and directly into the High Street in the centre of town. The district is often pretty loud, raucous or unpleasant late at night - but I wouldnt' say it's particularly hazardous, and it's regularly policed (don't walk around obviously carrying drinks, because police will take them off you). On the other hand, there's been a mystery figure called the Cowley Sex Pest in the newspapers, so maybe it's not so great.

Greater/Blackbird leys. Icky place, lots of chavs

I grew up (1-10) on iffley road which is quite quiet but still near enough to cowley for shops, etc. (The suburban structure of oxford is like a claw with the town at the centre, then st. clements, cowley road, iffley road leading away from it). From 10 i've lived at the far end of cowley near headington. It's a bit of a walk away from the shops and town but nothing too bad and there are regular buses.

As for record shops, there used to be a nice one on cowley road called polar bear, think it got shut down though.

Sorry for not being a great help, i've been at uni for the last 3 years, so a bit out of the loop