Hello, Goodbye

The last two weeks have been quite eventful: not only have I started my research project, but I also have had more time to explore in England. It's funny that after just three weeks this place, I feel at home. I love the natural beauty and quaint coziness of the city. Living in a college town has certainly been an exciting experience. 

Week 2: (5/28-6/2)
There's something calming about the rain. The rain during my second week was symbolic, as I started to become more acclimated to the Oxford life and the laboratory environment. Researching abroad truly provided me with an international experience: I met old members of the lab who were visiting to continue working on their projects from Italy, Norway, Finland, and Spain. Out with the old, in with the new... 

On Tuesday, I started working early, as over the weekend, I didn't have access to internet. I had much to catch up on as far as replying to emails and messages go. I discovered that there was a project in the works for me to join. The proposed experiment has to do with spatial attention in humans with relation to a person's gaze in which participants identify visually-or auditorily-presented letters following the presentation of eye-gaze and head orientation cues. The proposed project will use images of dog heads to analyze spatial attention. I remember learning about spatial attention in my NBB classes, so it was cool to see the research questions regarding understanding how it works and its implications on knowledge about cognition. I was excited to get a start: I spent much of Tuesday reading research papers regarding attention, visual orientation, and the like. Soon, I saw how all the concepts taught in those courses intertwined. Carlos, the DPhil (PhD) I was working with wanted to find higher resolution images of the dogs. With my photo editing skills (my Photoshop skills seem to be useful), I played with the given stimuli set to enlarge the images for the rest of the week. On Friday, I briefly met with an undergraduate, Jonathan, about another project I will be working on-it was interesting to learn about the differences in our educational systems. Since the Oxford students are still in term, I commented on how I had seen students in their full academic dress (students must dress up to sit for exams) and he asked about our GPA system. I also ran through the entire experiment myself on Friday to note any possible issues. Later that day, we went out as a lab to say goodbye to one of the other undergraduates, Gloria. We went to the "The Head of the River" pub, which had a beautiful scenic view of the river. 

With progress on my experiment and a busy weekend the prior weekend, I decided to spend the weekend being productive at home and enjoying the sunshine. After putting in a couple loads of laundry and going to the spar shop to run some errands, I headed to City Centre for lunch. I went back to my favorite part of Oxford: Cornmarket Street and the Covered Market. The Covered Market is the very definition of finding beauty in the ordinary: I saw bakers intricately cut icing decorations at the Cake Shop and chefs rapidly putting baguettes into the oven. I even finally decided on a milkshake at moo-moo's: chocolate fudge brownie-it was as delicious as it sounds. I spent the afternoon sitting on Christ Church Meadow and reading "The Emperor of all Maladies," a novel that details the history of cancer. It was a wonderful weekend to sit back and enjoy the beautiful weather.

Week 3: (6/3-9)
My third week in the lab was a bit slow, but I had fun getting to know the members of the lab better. The Crossmodal Research Laboratory members have intriguing life stories. On Monday, I grabbed lunch at Pembrooke College with Carlos. I chose a goat cheese and onion tart with some salad. I learned about how he has traveled around everywhere. We talked about our mutual love for Austin and the differences in the educational system. I told him about NBB and the educational system in the states. After lunch, he gave me a statistics book to read so I could better understand data analysis. I spent the rest of the week reading chapters of that book and an article on attention. I met with Jonathan again on Tuesday to run through the perceptual learning experiment. On Thursday, the lab members and I went out to the Open Market, which is Oxford's version of a garage sale. There were cool antique items and cheap clothes and accessories. We ventured to the Covered Market for some lunch at pieminister. While I had seen this shop earlier, I hadn't even gone in and had the impression that it was just a shop with a bunch of pies. Soon, I learned that a "pie" refers to a baked good with any sort of stuffing and what we call a "pie" refers to a tart. The things you learn while abroad...On Friday, I practiced going through the experiment and sent out an email to future participants about joining the study. So far, I already have 4 participants for next week! 

I spent the entirety of my Saturday in London sightseeing. I left home early, around 7am and headed for the bus station (also in City Centre) and was ready for the 1.5 hour bus ride to London. For those of you who haven't visited London, it is a very vibrant city. While it had its similarities to Oxford with the shops and architecture, it was much busier. It's like the equivalent of what New York is to the US-the city that never sleeps. I enjoyed finally seeing with my own eyes the famous landmarks in London: Big Ben, Trafalgar Square, London Bridge, and the Westminister Abbey. The ticket for the sightseeing tour bus included a river boat ride, where I learned more about the history of London. It was quite the long, eventful day and the beautiful weather was an added bonus. Sadly, my camera had died, so I don't have many pictures of these attractions, but I'll be back there soon! Next week: saying goodbye to some other members of the lab. 

Goodbye, Gloria

street artists on Cornmarket Street

a mime on Cornmarket Street