The Honorary Degrees Ceremony with Dr Shirin Ebadi

 I was lucky to be invited to the honorary degrees ceremony on the 23rd June. Sarah got me a ticket as Dr Shirin Ebadi was being given the title of Doctor of Law and Sarah knew I'd be interested to meet her.

The Combination room before the ceremony

I got there early, and among all the people with academic gowns and ceremonial dress, I didn't at first recognise Dr Ebadi. She was surrounded by a little knot of people speaking Farsi, and she was easily the smallest person in the room but she radiated strength and determination. Later, when I got talking to her for a while, she told me that she leads a nomadic existence travelling between her children's homes in the UK and the US. Despite that she doesn't feel like a refugee because she has a purpose: to inform the people in other countries about what is happening in Iran and continue her work for women's rights.

One of the younger women with Dr Ebadi asked me about myself, and as we talked we realised that we'd spent time together in Iran. She was Evaleila Pessaran, now a lecturer in Politics at Murray Edwards college who were hosting Dr Ebadi. She was a school friend of my sister Emma, and Emma had given her my number when Evaleila had come to Tehran for a year to re-connect with her Iranian roots after leaving school. I had introduced her to some Iranian NGOs and she'd come with us to Taleghan for a weekend. She was now expecting her first baby at the same time as Emma!

We walked up to the Combination room for tea before the start of the ceremonies. After a few minutes there was a stir at the door and the Duke of Edinburgh came in and made his way slowly round the room talking to the guests and the soon-to-be honorary doctors and their friends and relatives.

The Old Schools with Triumph Brass in the gallery

The ceremony was moving in a way that I never expected. Music was an important part of it - there were members of three choirs (King's, Trinity and St John's) directed by Stephen Cleobury on the organ, a solo cellist, and a brass ensemble.
 The pageantry and speeches were surprisingly interesting and entertaining. They've had 800 years of practice after all.  Most of the talking was done by the University Orator who makes a short presentation in Latin, laying out the achievements of each of the eight honorands. These included Trevor Nunn and Colin Davis as well as the retiring Vice-Chancellor, Alison Richard. All of them had made very significant contributions in their fields and the oration captures the essence of this in under 300 words! Amazingly enough there were people who laughed at the jokes when they heard them in Latin - the rest of us laughed when we'd read the English translation.

Prince Phillip (back to us in red) at the reception

It was the last time the D of E was to lead the ceremony as he was retiring as Chancellor. At the reception afterwards on the lawn, he joked that his qualification for being Chancellor was to have not been to University at all.

Reception on the Senate House lawn