Greetings, England- Day 13: A Day of School Activities and Just Keep Faith

The experiment for today also gave me a hard time. It was about soils. We first got a basic understanding of soils from a video and some handouts, then we as a whole class have to see if different kinds of soils with different textures have a direct influence on the rate of infiltration, percolation, and the amount of water retention.

It is true that this experiment was giving me a hard time due the restriction of time, with all the papers and graphs we need to draw, but so was everybody. We all did our parts; the time simply wasn't enough. And I enjoyed the rush.
In the afternoon, I participated in an arts and crafts activity, and I made a bracelet from three cotton strings. There were no other boys there (well except the leaders) but I enjoyed it nonetheless with the girls.
After dinner, I went for another activity, which is the ice-skating I signed up today.
We first took a bus to the center of Oxford and walked to a rather remote place for the ice rink.
To be honest, I have no idea how to ice skate. Sure, I have been to an ice rink in Taiwan once. Sure, I had managed to make some steps in the rink. And sure did I have a good time. But I fell a lot and most of the time I was watching my cousin and her friends having fun. I decided that this time is going to be different. This time has to be.
While we were walking to the ice rink, people were talking and blasting with their mother tongue, and digging our group unnecessarily long. However, I did notice a girl with a tidy black braid, also quietly following the leader.

The Oxford Ice Rink

Before we can set our feet in the rink, we could already see that there were a lot of people inside, having fun. There were people tentatively stepping out, and slowly skating; there were people falling down, but laughed as they stood up once more; and there were also people putting the hands in the pocket, skating at an unusual fluidity, as if taking a mere stroll on ice.

Sorry for the ghost-like skaters.

Photography was prohibited inside the rink, so I could only take pictures from this angle.

Apparently, 20:30-22:00 is disco ice-skating time.

I was far worse than I thought, it turned out. I slipped and slipped and struggled. My feet hurt, with every strain of my leg muscle (which I don't have many) just for attempts to stand straight.
Well, I was having high hopes.
However, I did not feel defeat. Instead, unlike the volleyball I went to two days ago, this was a lot more enjoyable. I thought maybe I was too focused on the "not falling" part (hey but sometimes I HAVE to. It hurts!), so I started spelling "keep faith" to distract myself from minding if I was going to fall or not. (Such a nerdy thing, I know) But strangely, it worked, I managed to half-walk-half-skate round the whole rink! Maybe it was the rhythm of the spelling that steadied my pace and made me better. English helped me once more, and I couldn't be any more grateful.
I fell for about ten times in total; it hurt dearly, but if there is ice-skating next week, I will be sure to sign up again!
And for the girl who was quiet for the whole trip? She was awesome at skating! Maybe not a professional, but proficient enough to go smoothly and avoid crashing with the others.
There was a young man, who had been there before we arrived. Throughout the whole session, I didn't see him stopping. He was there, going round and round. He had his obsidian-colored hair slicked back, maneuvering himself in and out of flocks of people with a trained ease, occasionally rushing at the speed of a diving eagle. Unlike others, who were just doing tricks for the sake of showing off, he wasn't; he was simply relishing it. (just decided to try some descriptive writing)
I decided not to take a bus with the whole group, so I went along with the group only until the bus stop. On my way, I got acquainted with the girl. Her name is Amanda, from Brazil. Turned out that we had a lot to talk about, about cultures and so on, so she walked with me back to the dorm. We were chatting so intently that we practically walked on the wrong road and far past St. Clare's! We got back to our dorms at 22:30, thirty minutes before curfew. But we indeed had a nice time.
This is all for today.
07/13/2017