“It’s beginning to look a lot like Oxmas,
Everywhere you go…”
What was that, Oxmas? That’s right, folks, “Oxmas” is Oxford’s very own Christmas celebration. It takes place a month before Christmas, on the 25th Novermber, and it’s basically Christmas come early. Every year students don their Primark-bought festive jumpers and come together to celebrate the season in all sorts of wonderful ways.
As part of the traditions, many people sit down to a Christmas dinner. This year, some of us prepared our own meal (although I managed to avoid the cooking!), with Yorkshire puddings, roast potatoes, and the lot. We decorated a room with Christmas trees and tinsel, pushed all of our coffee tables together to make a dining table, drank Buck’s Fizz, pulled crackers and had all the best Christmas songs playing while we ate the fab home-cooked food (see photos). There is also a Christmas dinner in our Dining Hall during the last week of term, which is always delicious and usually features a loud chorus of carol singing towards the end of the meal – when everybody is trying to avoid eating the Christmas pudding. Of course, you could always also just pop to Wetherspoons for a full Christmas dinner at £6 a head, which many of us did – yo
u can’t turn down a bargain!
There’s loads of other stuff going on. For the past couple of years, we have had an “almost-midnight Oxmas” carol service in the chapel. Anyone is welcome to come along and sing carols by candlelight, and it’s such a lovely chance for everybody to celebrate together. Our wonderful Welfare Reps also host several Christmas-themed welfare teas: this is where all students come together and wind down while feasting on delicious treats. This year the teas featured all the most Christmassy treats you can imagine: mince pies, chocolate Santas… you name it - we probably ate it. It’s also become somewhat of a tradition for everybody to watch Love Actually in the common room on the last day of term, as it’s clearly the classic Christmas movie. The Oxmas uniform is Christmas jumpers, and it’s strictly enforced. Once or twice you may find yourself in the slightly awkward situation of having bought the same jumper as somebody else, but it’s all in the Oxmas spirit.
The Christmas Party is always a highlight, as we all dress up and move en masse to Brasenose’s favourite party location: Freud’s cocktail bar. At Brasenose we love to come together for a celebration – and what better way to do it than with Jazz bands, cocktails, and terrible dancing all round? By far the most unique of Brasenose Christmas celebrations, though, is the annual pantomime. The production is written by Brasenose students, and performed by Brasenose students to Brasenose students on the last day of term. It’s always a great laugh, and makes for a hilarious representation of all the interesting, controversial and funny happenings at our college over the past year. This year’s pantomime featured dictatorial rowing captains, rap battles and much, much more, all tied to 
the Christmas theme as the characters all travelled towards Bethlehem.
All in all, Oxmas is a wonderful excuse for us to be able to celebrate all of the best parts of Christmas with our other little family, the Brasenose family, in a home away from home. Secret Santas, Christmas dinners, parties, pantomimes.... Celebrating the festive season with your closest friends is so much fun, and that’s what Oxmas is all about! It’s also encouraging to know that, in a university famed for its many old traditions, new traditions are always being formed – and we students are leading that.
By Elisabeth Jenkinson (Second Year PPE student)