– OXFORD vs CAMBRIDGE –

Oxford is one of those places (and names) that immediately suggest a set of characteristics people usually associate to Great Britain. Of course it means tradition, culture, sport, colleges, but better still exclusivity, nobility, clubs.

The clubs, in particular, seem to represent what is considered the heart of British high class social life. And, among the clubs, one emerges for exclusivity and traditions: the Bullingdon.

The Bullingdon club is a socially exclusive student dining club at Oxford University. It originated as a hunting and cricket club more than 200 years ago and by 1875 it was considered an Oxford institution with many good traditions (Long, 1923).

Oxford 1987, The Bullingdon Club

However, year by year, cricket was merely reduced to a respectable front for the for the destructive and self-indulgent tendencies of its members (Davies, 2010), and the club became infamous for its members ‘ wealth and destructive binges. Membership was by invitation only, and prohibitively expensive for most, given the need to pay for the uniform, dinners and damages.

Already in 1913, The New York Times reported that the Bullingdon “represents the acme of exclusiveness at Oxford; it is the club of the sons of nobility, the sons of great wealth; its membership represents the 'young bloods' of the university”. Members of the club were, for example, Edward VII, Lord Randolph Churchill, Frederick of Denmark, Gottfried Von Bismarck.

Even today the Bullingdon seems a filter for successful personalities. Indeed during the last electoral campaign for UK general elections a black and white picture came into the limelight quite often. It represented Bullingdon’s member in 1987. Among them David Cameron (PM) and Boris Johnson (Major of London).

However, despite being quite famous the rivalry between Oxford and Cambridge as universities as much as sports team, it is not so well known the one between clubs. In fact, at present, Cambridge hosts a kind of dining club that seems to compete with the Bullingdon, if not for the destructive tendency, at least for the importance of its members and the probable high positions they are likely to occupy in the future. A further aspect is the range of different fields of economy the members represent and the international provenience of the students.

Those are characteristics that suggest a probable recognition of the club as a power maker.

Such a club is The BELLingdom Club, and its Grand-Master is Jim Carmichael.

Cambridge 2010, The BELLingdon Club.

In the picture: Top. From the left: Kim Kwango, Logistic Manager; Roberto Formenti, Investment Advisor; Ahmad Kezbari, Lawyer; Mohamed Abdelsalam, Logistic Manager; Ahmed Al Sayed, Financial Manager. Seated. From the left: Mian Lu, Lawyer; Francisco Toro Alvarado, Financial Manager; Ning Ma, Electrical Engineer.

Sources

Walter Long (1923). "Memories". http://www.archive.org/details/memories00longuoft. Retrieved 2008-05-08.

New York Times (1 June 1913). "Bullingdon Club Too Lively For Prince of Wales" (PDF). The NewYorkTimes.http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archivefree/pdf?res=9A03E5D9143FE633A25752C0A9609C946296D6CF

Mark Davies The Wisden Cricketer May 2010, "Drinking and Politics"