Ira Math­ur

I'm here as a sum­mer stu­dent on a cre­ative writ­ing course. I'm lodg­ing at St Catharine's Col­lege. I be­lieve places have a feel­ing, the ghosts of hope and learn­ing. A thou­sand years ago, schol­ars found­ed this city and stayed here. There is a sur­re­al con­ti­nu­ity and a sharp feel­ing of the mo­ment. It's a slice of life I could get used to.I've cut up this slice in­to vi­gnettes.

I wake to the peal­ing of bells. My win­dow faces the uni­ver­si­ty's old­est col­lege, 800-year-old Cor­pus Christi Col­lege. A sign on the door says my tiny room, with a mi­nus­cule bed (I've fall­en off twice on wak­ing up), be­longs to M Healey (one of 19,000 Cam­bridge stu­dents in this town of 120,000). M will be glad to know I like his or her view from St Catharine's Col­lege. I see me­di­ae­val chim­ney tops; the au­tum­nal colours of this city–sandy, choco­late; fad­ed red brick through slant­ed rain; bright ris­ing and dip­ping sun­shine.

We are shown around by full-time stu­dents. They are study­ing physics, pure math, lan­guages I hadn't heard of, yet they will­ing­ly car­ry our bags to our tiny rooms.I walk out of the din­ing hall in­to a square quad in the soft­est of rain, rimmed with bright sum­mer flow­ers, soft ros­es, a re­fresh­ing edge of chill.

http://www.guardian.co.tt/dig­i­tal/new-mem­bers