Having reached the end of my internship, I have a confession to make: I think I’ve fallen in love with Oxford. It’s a unique place, where city and university seem to have merged into one magical organism. The education system deviates significantly from the way the university works in Eindhoven.

In Oxford, the role of the university can be seen as an umbrella uniting a multitude of colleges, which in turn can be compared to the houses described in the Harry Potter series (with 38 colleges instead of 4 houses). As a student you are a member of one of these colleges, and they provide your tutoring, which makes up for an important part of your studies.

As in Harry Potter, there’s long-standing rivalries between the colleges. For instance, two colleges are still quarreling over the claim which college is older! The similarities with the famous book series don’t end there. Every day, students can dine in grand halls lined with long tables, dressed in dark gowns resembling a wizard’s robe, and every college has its own common room for members to hang out in. Rowing would be the non-imaginary version of Quidditch, where students go crazy supporting their college-team.

Little is left of my respect for J.K. Rowling: the main difference between Harry Potter’s world and Oxford seems to be the absence of true magic in the latter case (though money can make magic happen, and if anything, there’s money in Oxford).

Renée Koolschijn, PDEng program Design & Technology of Instrumentation bij Applied Physics