Tuesday December 7th.

A cold, crisp sunny day spent in elegant red brick/white collonaded campus of the University of Virgina (UVa).  We travelled in by bus, having returned the hire car yesterday.  Opposite the Rotunda with its huge white domed roof, we espied a quaint looking trolley bus, which temptingly advertised that it would take us all around the town for free.  Too good to miss so we jumped aboard.  Although a modern bus, it was designed to look oldy worldly, with brass grab rails and slatted wooden seats.  The ride took us past shops with striped awnings, selling Univeristy t-shirts, antiques and pizzas, through streets with wood panelled, painted houses on either side, most with

large porches supported by spindly columns.  They look and, Mary Carolyn tells us, they are southern  houses, as this is one of the southern states, something I had not realised.  But then, given my shaky grip on geography, this is not a surprise to me.  My grip on history is a little better and improving, in respect of American history, every day.  For example, the University was founded by Thomas Jefferson in 1819, and the campus has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site. 

The University is also associated with a number of secret societies, which have operated within it more or less since the outset.  What do they do?  How would I know - they're secret!!  I do not approve of secret societies anywhere - I consider them to be breeding grounds for privilege, discrimination and misuse of power - but hey, there they are.  The picture shows the logo for one of them painted on steps outside one of the main buildings

 In the afternoon, we walked the Lawn - a large area of  grass surrounded by what we might call cloisters, with buildings off which are used as very prestigious student flats.  At each door there was a substantial pile of logs - the accommodation depends on log burning stoves in each flat for heating.  Beside the logs there was often a high backed rocking chair.Easy to imagine folk gently rocking in them in the heat of a summer's evening - a very Deep South image.  And everywhere the students, walking, running, staring anxiously at scribbled pages of notes (it's exam time), cycling, and clipping their bikes to the front of the University buses to cover longer distances.  Students here and everywhere create much the same atmosphere of energy, bustle and colour. There are around 40,000 students here, and the university dominates the town both architecturally and economically.  Gradually we are getting to understand a little of how this town ticks.

In the evening, we came back to the University to attend a 'Messiah Sing In'.  To get to the hall, we again walked through the 'cloisters' beside the Lawn, but now all the Greek Pillars and collonades were lit by ropes of tiny white lights.  The sing-in proved quite a laugh.  As we entered the hall, which was decorated liberally with classical-style murals in every direction, we were handed musical scores .  Assured that nobody, not even the orchestra, had rehearsed, we took seats in the tenor and soprano sections. After a few breathing exercises we were off, and in fact we managed not too badly, apart from the twiddly bits.  As you may be aware, Handel was deeply committed to inserting as many twiddly bits into his music as possible, and as I spotted them marching relentlessly towards me along the page I turned to emitting only sporadic squeaks as quietly as possible.  None the less, as we left early to catch the last bus, the quality of the sound that followed us out into the night was impressive, and was no doubt improved by the loss of our squeaking accompaniement.