Oxford has one of the most prestigious universities in Britain and is best known for its dreaming spires and beautiful architecture. The Sheldonian Theatre is a very famous building, designed by Sir Christopher Wren. Many of the buildings in Oxford have gargoyles which are well known throughout the county.
Thousands of tourists flock into the town centre every year, and Oxford relies quite heavily upon this trade. This means, however, that it can become over-crowded.
Tourists can visit the "Oxford Story", which explains the history of the city. Punting is popular in the summer and people punt down the river Cherwell. The University Parks are popular, too. People sit and have picnics. Keen, green-fingered gardeners enjoy the Botanical Gardens. May Day draws crowds; people jump off Magdalen Bridge, mostly students who are drunk! There is also Morris dancing which involves 6 men with bells attached to their ankles, waving their hankies and dancing around. If you prefer just sitting quietly in the pub on a Sunday lunchtime, there are Morrells pubs situated all over Oxfordshire. Morrells is a local brewery.
As well as the beautiful university and colleges, Oxford has many things to do for the residents. These include theatres, cinemas, art galleries and museums. The Pitt Rivers Museum is famous for its shrunken heads and the University Museum for its dinosaurs. The Ashmolean is one of the oldest museums in the world. It has just had a new entrance built and it has a large Egyptian exhibition.
There are lots of leisure activities available in the city, including swimming, ice skating in the rink on the Oxpens Road and numerous sports groups that you can get involved in.
Oxford has a good public transport system which means that it is very easy to go from one end of the city to the other with not a lot of hassle or difficulty. You can also catch a bus to London from Gloucester Green or other designated bus stops every 10 to 20 minutes. The main transport problem in the city is the amount of traffic. In the summer we quite often get air pollution warnings and people are asked not to bring small children in to the city centre. There are plans at the moment to make the centre a pedestrian area.
There is a pleasant train station five minutes walk away from the centre and a good electric bus service which runs every five minutes and takes passengers from the station to the city centre and back again. However, for those who are keen on health Oxford also has numerous bicycle paths.
Many famous people visit Oxford including Boyzone, East 17, Eternal, MN8, Dinah Carroll, PJ and Duncan, Louise (ex-Eternal) and Saracen from Gladiators. Louise and Saracen came to open the Virgin Megastore and signed autographs. The other famous people all came to do concerts at the Apollo Theatre.
There are other views on what's important in Oxford, too. The Rover car company is famous. In the 1970's the car factory employed over 20,000 people, but now most of those jobs have gone. People say there is a lot of unemployment in Oxford, but we think the truth is that there aren't a lot of un-skilled jobs available here, as the University provides most of the employment. It seems to us that quite a lot of the professions here relate to academic areas, including teachers, professors, lawyers and lecturers. The other jobs in the University, like cooking, cleaning and gardening are very low-paid. If you aren't doing a professional job then most of the work outside the University is in services, like shop work. This is also low-paid.
People from many different backgrounds live in the city. 13.3% of people aged 10 to 24 are non-white. Of the 9.4% of the whole community who are non-white, 1.9% are from a Pakistani background, 1.6% are Black Caribbean, 1.4% are Indian and 1.2% are Bangladeshi. Most visitors only see the city centre, but different parts of Oxford have their own character.
Most Asian kids in Oxford think you should have more Asian films to watch on television or local cinemas because most kids have to go up to London at the weekend to watch Asian films in a cinema.
If Asian kids get into a fight with white kids the police come along and automatically blame the Asian kids for starting the fight.
By: Men-wei, Joanne, Adeola, Carola, Katherine, Rachel, Yasmin and Meriam