They started it off by asking what I thought of the phrase "turn on-and-offable", getting to the point we don't normally add the suffix -able to something that looks like a preposition, and that's why it sounds odd to us. Other questions were arguably more straight forward: what do you think are the similarities and differences between maths and language; I see you wrote this essay on 'falsification' - what are your views on absolute truth; tell me a difference between Spanish and English; what were some of the difficulties you faced trying to teach English in Korea; etc. At one point they actually asked, "You said that this word describes something. What do we normally call that?"
It went all right really. My confidence has certainly increased since doing my Oxford undergrad interviews all those neons ago, and even though I didn't know a lot of their answers straight up, I was pretty honest about what I knew and let them go from there. It's just a one year course so if I don't receive funding it hopefully won't matter too horrendously; I'll just be interested to see whether confidence and honesty will be prevailing factors over knowledge and preparation when they make their decisions (^.^).
The main thing of the day was really that wandering round Cambridge didn't spark any burning desire to study there (as I'd feared that it would). Ultimately I did practically grow up in the area so any romantic notions of "Cambridge" were cut from the start, but the two year MPhil at Oxford sounds like it'd give me more of a chance to explore my interests. So despite a beautiful day amongst the beautiful architecture and quaint tea shops, I'm rather emotionally free to take my place at Oxford (a visit pending just in case).
-- The Mathematical Bridge --
-- Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages --
-- King's Parade --
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