Brighton Graduation

Yesterday I travelled to Brighton with my Mum and daughter to attend my Open University graduation ceremony. Mum picked us up at 6.50am and we drove to Ryde and caught the Island Line train to the end of Ryder Pier; I love this train! It is a retired London Underground train and is rather old with modernish upgrades cobbled on to it. We then caught a Wightlink catamaran across the Solent to Portsmouth Harbour, where we caught a train to Brighton. We arrived in said city about an hour and a half later and walked at high speed through the town (downhill, luckily) in search of The Dome. We found it, behind the Pavilion, with gardens full of tourists and bemoaned OU students.

 

Once we had found the way in I collected our tickets, then went in search of my robes. These were provided by Ede and Ravenscroft, who were jolly good. The chap who helped me don my robes was suitably soothing, told me I looked lovely and congratulated me on my success. Bless him! Mum and daughter were seated upstairs, and I was downstairs with the graduates.

 

The ceremony started with a procession of University dignitaries, followed by a speech by the pro Vice Chancellor. Research students were awarded first, followed by an honorary degree for Ewart Wooldridge (who gave a speech), then Masters degrees, Bachelors degrees (Arts, Engineering, Law, Science), then foundation degrees and certificates. Another speech by the pro Vice Chancellor, then the dignitaries recessed followed by the graduates. Free fizz was provided in the bar, photos were taken, robes handed back, then off into Brighton for the rest of the day.

 

We had  lunch at a delightful restaurant called Pinocchio's; I had spaghetti with anchovies and black olives on a tomato sauce, followed by lemon sorbet. Very nice. We then had a mooch around North Laines and found some interesting shops. We had an encounter with a silver seller who started to rant about his year long holiday on the Island at her Majesty's pleasure, due to criminal activity with cannabis ("It's not like there's any victims, so the law's all wrong!"), at which point we moved swiftly on. We were all tired so we headed back to the station and back to the Island. A good day.