May Day in Oxford

Tomorrow is May Day in Oxford. It's one of those celebrations of spring that goes back ages. Currently, the city gets up at 6AM to hear a boys' choir performing at Brasenose College, followed by Morris dancers (looks like men in leiderhosen waving hankies and banging sticks together). I read a story about the Morris dancers a couple of weeks ago, and I guess membership is dwindling, so they're now bring women into it.

After much debate, Paul and I decided we'd rather have a good night's sleep than participate in this, especially since I've got a lot going on at work right now and I don't want to be wiped out by lunchtime. However, I found a great video on YouTube of the May Day festivities from last year:




Also, we did see some Morris dancers the other week. Here's some pictures of them...

Dancing with Sticks (also note the woman to the right of the dancers, in the black coat. You may notice she's about to step on what looks like a pothole in the pavement. It's actually there on purpose to mark the spot where Protestant Martyrs were burned alive back in the day. You can read more about that here.)


...and Dancing with Hankies


PS. We're going to Brussels on the train this weekend! Going through the chunnel, and arriving in just over 2 hours from London!