Not So Neighbourhood Watch
SOAS played UCL in their first round match, and I estimated their proximity to be among the highest of all non-collegiate University Challenge teams, with the walk between their campuses coming in under a breezy ten minutes.
If you wanted to walk from SOAS to Imperial, however, you'd need to remember your bottle of water. Now, London is big, so the hour and nine minutes it would take to trek between them isn't close to as far as you could walk between universities in the capital. In fact, it is pretty average. For example, walking from St George's to City University would take three hours and twenty-five minutes.
ChatGPT reckons it would take one hour seventeen from SOAS to Imperial (it doesn't have access to Google Maps, the poor mite), which puts Imperial just inside the top 10 in terms of proximity to SOAS, assuming that my Artificially Intelligent friend hasn't been playing pranks on me again.
| # | University (main campus listed) | Distance (km) | Walking time (5 km/h) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Birkbeck (Malet Street) — very near SOAS | 0.30 | 3.6 min |
| 2 | UCL (Gower / Main building). Rome2Rio | 0.60 | 7.2 min |
| 3 | University of Westminster (Regent St / Cavendish Sq area) | 1.00 | 12.0 min |
| 4 | UAL — Central Saint Martins (Central campus) | 1.10 | 13.2 min |
| 5 | LSE (Houghton St / Aldwych area) | 1.20 | 14.4 min |
| 6 | King’s College London (Strand campus). Rome2Rio | 1.61 | 19.3 min |
| 7 | City, University of London (Islington / Northampton Sq campus) | 2.25 | 27.0 min |
| 8 | London South Bank University (Waterloo / Borough area) | 2.70 | 32.4 min |
| 9 | Imperial College London (South Kensington). Rome2Rio | 6.44 | 1 h 17.2 min |
| 10 | Queen Mary University (Mile End). Rome2Rio | 8.05 | 1 h 36.6 min |
| 11 | St George’s, University of London (Tooting / medical campus) | 8.50 | 1 h 42.0 min |
| 12 | Goldsmiths, University of London (New Cross). Rome2Rio | 11.27 | 2 h 15.2 min |
Onto the quiz - here's your first starter for ten.
Actually, before we start, I'm trying to get 100 subscribers on here by the end of the year (my plan was actually to get 100 subscribers on my other newsletter, but that looks unlikely, so I'm pivoting to this one). Twitter used to be my best distribution vehicle, but we all know what's happened there. So, I'm going to go old school and ask you to share this with a friend who likes University Challenge. You can even tell them I forced you to, which they'll also know if they end up reading it (if that's you, hi!). You can use the button above.
Anyway, apologies for the self-promotional volte face, here's your real first starter for ten
Dina kicks things off for Imperial with rust, and they managed a single bonus on the National Portrait Gallery. The first of these, they didn't get, but Keung displayed some excellent knowledge, asserting that Vermeer's 'Girl with a Pearl Earring' wasn't housed in that gallery. Good job they didn't go with that, the answer was Shakespeare.
A neg from Keung allowed Graham in for SOAS, and they took the lead with wormhole. They missed one of the bonuses on Gone With The Wind, guessing The Wizard of Oz when told that the answer was a film directed by Victor Fleming in 1939. They were right on that front, but unfortunately for them, Victor Fleming directed two of the most famous films of all time in the same year. The original 'Steven Spielberg's 1993', it seems.
Another for Graham won a bonus set on umbrellas in novels, of which they took two. O'Flanagan hit back for Imperial with coal on the picture starter, and they took a hat-trick on energy source graphs. Thirty-five each.
O'Flanagan takes the next starter too, on bats, though both sides leave the question hanging (upside down) for a very long time after hearing (or echolocating) a line about a flying animal being able to navigate in the dark.
Davis-Aladren keeps SOAS in touch with adventure, and O'Regan gave them the lead with Benjamin Zephaniah. Unfortunately, they missed all of the bonuses. Even more unfortunately, by the time they score another point, Imperial will have scored 115. The points delta is slightly worse than that, too, as SOAS racked up a pair of incorrect interruptions over that time, leaving the scores at 170-55.
Any hopes of an unlikely comeback are kiboshed by a supreme buzz of Botswana from Imperial's Tong, before they took a hat-trick on water polo, of all things.
SOAS rally towards the end, but only in service of a three-figure score, with Mozayen taking a starter on Lincolnshire. This means that I can talk about his suit, which is fantastic. A shame it was worn in a loss.
SOAS 115 - 220 Imperial
A crushing performance from Imperial, who perhaps felt a bit overawed on their debut. A formidable opponent for anyone in the second round.
Rajan says that SOAS were amazing on the bonuses, but this is not borne out by the numbers. They managed 11/21 (thanks to Jack McB for the stat), which is not terrible, but not amazing by any means, and makes me question the authenticity of the platitudes he offers the losers at the end.
Imperial have brought a jar of kimchi with them, in honour of the question that gave them the high-score needed to return in this repechage match.
If you made it this far then you may as well share it with a quizzing friend. I know you're out there, quizzing friends. See you next week.
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