And so, after watching this film, I sat on my bed and thought: why? I wasn't going to watch it at all! But as soon as Mary said: «Let's watch a great film!», I immediately said, «Let's do it!», and I wasn't sorry for the time spent watching it: it was a new experience – watching a film with a person, with a friend. After all, people often do this: for some reason they always need someone to be with them while watching a film.

Our bike was found quickly: I got a call the very next day after I filed a theft report, and it turned out that the bike had been stolen by a local naughty guy named Frank, who likes to steal other people's vehicles, especially two-wheelers. In addition to the bike, we got a «super-secure lock» from the police so that the theft would not happen again, apparently they were tired of looking for our bike all the time.

As cliché as it is, Mary never got round to running with me in the mornings: she'd wake up around eight o'clock, have a quick shower, eat, get dressed, run off to work and return at six o'clock in the evening. But this Friday she was given the day off and we were able to do our tour of Oxford and my college. Thanks to the fact that I had read a book about Oxford's history before I came here, I didn't need the repeated narration that Mary was so eager to tell me.

«The city of brooding spires» is what some singer Matthew Arnold called Oxford in England in one of his songs. Exquisite architecture and stately buildings – everything here holds history. From Mary I first heard the information that even Adolf Hitler during the Second World War ordered not to bomb the city while London was constantly under air attack. All because, my neighbour claimed, it was the city that Hitler wanted to turn into the capital of England in case of its conquest.

Legend has it that Oxford came to England thanks to Princess Freidswade. The beautiful girl dreamed of becoming a nun, but the obstacle to this was the king, who wanted to marry her. To avoid this, she ran away to a small village, and when the king went after her, on the way he lost his sight and gained it only after the princess forgave his persecution. For this he promised the girl her freedom, and Freidswade founded a monastery, around which the first collegiate colleges sprang up, and then the city.

The history of Oxford begins in the ninth century, when King Alfred the Great ordered the construction of fortifications in several English villages for defence against invaders.

The fortress built by the Saxons soon became a flourishing town, and its favourable location between two rivers was the key to trade.

The town was periodically attacked by the Danes, and in the eleventh century it was completely destroyed in a fire. After reconstruction, the city was taken over by the Norman conquerors, who built the first castle here. At that time the city was the second in England in population just after London.

In 1117, the oldest university in England was founded in order to give the clergy a more complete education. It was not until the reign of Henry the Second that Oxford became a true university town. Its students received many privileges from the government, which, of course, displeased the local population. There were constant conflicts between students and residents, and to resolve the situation, the university authorities diverted students to Cambridge, which became the foundation of the second oldest university in the English-speaking world.

During the Tudor era, the city's economy revolved around the institution: students became a Playboy source of income for local manufactures and industrialists. Oxford soon grew from a small town to a large wealthy city.