May Day

The first of May is quite the event in Oxford. I hauled my arse out of bed at 5:30am so I could catch the Magdalen College Choir sing from the tower rooftop at 6am. This was followed by a whole lot of Morris Dancing down the high street. There are balls held the night before, so many of the people on the streets at dawn are students in evening wear who have pulled all-nighters. Years ago these students would hire out boats and go drunk punting on the river. Crowds would gather to watch them from the bridge because they'd end up capsizing or falling in. Hilarious. To prevent this, the boat companiess stopped hiring out boats that morning. So a new tradition was established: jumping off the bridge into the extremely shallow water. There have been years with up to 50 morons ending up with broken bones. The bridge was open this year, but unfortunately security and barricades ensured that no-one ended up going over the edge.