Month One of Who...

I flew Auckland to San Francisco and then on to London. Unfortunately my clothes decided to stay in San Fran. I arrived therefore in London sweaty, and irritable with no choice but to go down to Oxford Street to pick up some temporary fill ins- naturally I am now a fashion icon.  However, this has underlined that most Cameron of disabilities, one I share somewhat with my brother. It seems we have been blessed with no discernable hips on which to hook our trousers on. In simple terms, whenever I breathe in and engage my abdominal muscles, my trousers fall down. So far, so funny. Without my bag I was ok….

The next day I travelled to the University of Hertfordshire to the Walking in Eternity conference. My clothes followed a couple of days later. At the conference were gathered many of the most important academics in the field of television studies including my supervisor Matt Hills. However there was also a sociologist and a lawyer and exciting for me a theatre director/academic. All of these people work in a sense trying to make clear what the media and our interaction with it tells us about our world and culture- it was wonderful of course to also find out just how geeky fan we all could be as well. I met Kim Akass and James Chapman, Stacey Abbott and David Butler, David Lavery and Lorna Jowett, Billy Smart and Ross Garner, Christopher Marlow and Richard Hewett, Bethan Jones and David Cottis, Laura Black and Eric Hall. A wonderful, colourful cavalcade of characters, full of inspiration and challenge.

Some of the papers given covered such topics as how characters in culture often reflect the medium in which they originate, how women are represented within the form, how this defiantly English form translates across the ditch in America, how anniversaries are celebrated as part of a legitimising process, and other fascinating subjects. However we still had time to play with K9.

This is where the fun began. As I left UH I realised just how awkward my luggage was, heavy and awkward. I would need two hands to manhandle it and if I needed to lift it anywhere then the inevitable would happen. To make a long story short let us just say that I managed to moon the station at Hertfordshire, the taxis at Paddington and the reception staff at Bankside while making a grand entrance.

I then had some time to visit London- and managed to have a little word with one of the citizens about his behaviour. Not that I think it will do any good. I managed to enjoy a play at the globe, a musical (SF) at the Union Theatre and became very well informed about the stock at Forbidden Planet and Fopp. After that I headed for Phillip's house in Didcot, just out of Oxford, for some rest and relaxation. Phillip is one of my dearest friends and the son of Holly and Geoff Debnam, who will host us at Christmas in their new town of Torquay. They kindly offered to drive me from there to Aberystwyth, though we did detour for a morning ramble in Hay-on-Wye. There are forty Bookshops in that tiny village so a good time was had by all.

Finally I arrived in Aberystwyth. This week has been very busy meeting important folk, like my second supervisor, Sarah Thomas, and we have suffered five inductions- International, Postgraduate, Departmental, Union and Residential- so that we have a pretty good idea of what is in store for us. I have also been able to have a look about the village, finding the comic shop and the cinema. I have fallen in love with the Arts Centre and expect many wonderful hours to be spent there and this weekend I walked over to the Meeting House to discover Welsh Friends. Their Meeting House felt like coming home with the meeting operating almost exactly as ours does in Wellington.

All in all, a terrific experience.