I come from this place of beauty. My great grandfather Ernst Trier founded what was to become the Oxford of Denmark. The great and beautiful Højskole of Vallekilde.

Vallekilde lies at the brink of the sea, and when you look out of the windows at the top of the school, you can see miles and miles on.

In the main hall, there are frescoes of Thor and Odin, hunting the orm of Midgaard. This place is so filled with memories and magic you would sometimes think it in a Harry Potter film. It is not the same, but yet in a profoundly Danish way, it is.

Each generation of Triers, especially those who are leading in their time, are supposed to expand the school. This has been my dream. It never really happened, I tried and failed.

That is why I knew, when I was called to Oxford, that I could not fail that school too.

At the surface, you could say, that I was just a passersby, not really invited, not truly a part of Oxford. But when I came to Oxford, it all really spoke to me. Not like Vallekilde, because Vallekilde is in my veins, literally. But because I could see a great and proud school vaning and I could see that it needed repair. Not in the structural sense, but in a deeper sense. Its soul needed repair.

This has been my work ever since I came home from Oxford, to try and repair the soul.

English people know, that there is such a thing as magic. Not as you might expect as a superficial thing. But a much deeper thing. Something about miracles and light.

We, Oxford and I, just delivered such a miracle. Isn’t it crazy? We came from nothing, and left everybody reeling. I hope, that Oxford, in the deeper sense, will rise again. And not like Vallekilde be snatched away from me. Once again.

Schools are living things, especially if they are as old as Oxford and my own Vallekilde. We need to tend their souls to really make them blossom.

Let us all do that in the coming years. Tend the souls of those great living, magical entities, so that they may deliver us.

G-d bless Oxford and its valiant knights, standing there in the morning sun, to fight another day, for her honour.