Last night, I experience an ecstasy formerly unkown to me, a pleasure and pure joy I had never felt in my nearly 22 years of existence.
Last night, ladies and gentlemen…I went out wearing boots and a coat. In August.
SHOCKING. I know. To be perfectly honest, I was a bit chilly even with the warmer layers and calf-covering leather footwear. Indeed, I have landed in the wonderful world of the Brits…and I am loving it.
I wore sweatpants to bed last night, too.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. How, you may ask, did I come to arrive in such a cool and brisk heaven? It all starts last Thursday, 12 August. Having gotten slightly behind schedule, as usual, I found myself packing the morning of the day of my flight. I woke up at 7 to the sound of my alarm, but was immediately out of sorts. Where is the daylight? It’s dark! Did I perhaps mistake a phone call for my alarm, and thus mistake the hour as well? Le boyfriend and I had made plans the previous night for him to call me in the morning to be sure I got my narcoleptic ass out of bed. But no, Le boyfriend had not yet rung, it was indeed 7am.
Thunder….BOOOOOM!
Massive thunder storm. Power flickered. And as I saw the lights grow temporarily dimmer, my soul flickered as well. Not today, dearest grid, not today: BE STRONG! I did not want to pack by candle light.
7 hours and much rethinking and repacking later, I was finished. My overweight bag was zipped, my new backpack was clipped closed, at which point I joined my magnanimous patrons in the car to begin the journey to Dulles International Airport. I said a sad farewell to Violet, fearing the judgment and scorn in her brown eyes—but she did let me rub her belly so perhaps there aren’t too many hard feelings.
More rain on the way to Dulles. It was a sign. What sort of sign, you might ask. A very wet and inconvenient one, that sort. And a sign of what, exactly, you might proceed to ask? And I would answer solemnly: that my flight would be delayed.
Which it was. After saying farewell to my honorable patrons as splashes of water mixed with the salty tears on my cheeks, I dragged my overweight bag inside and went up to the Virgin Atlantic desk. I handed the lady at the desk my passport and e-ticket, and then proceeded to use a cantilever crane to lift my bag onto the scale. The lady raised her eyebrows and hesitantly said “You know, ma’am, your bag is overweight.” I may have burst a blood vessel trying not to laugh. Of course, my dear lady, I know my bag is overweight. I am a measly 5’3”, do you think I can easily lift a 3-4ft tall bag that weight somewhere in the area of 65 pounds? I was well aware that my bag was overweight and told the lady so, at which point I was directed to another counter to pay the fee and get my boarding pass.
To the gate I went, stopping at the restroom along the way. I even took a picture of it. I mean, I don’t feel as though it’s entirely necessary to tell you just at which point I made my way to the restroom, but I’m pretty sure you’ve guessed that I went to one rather quickly—as I generally do—so I just thought I’d affirm your very correct assumption.
Sitting at the gate was relaxing, I spoke a bit to another lady on the flight, spoke with various friends and loved ones, including Le boyfriend who took the time and the joking remarks from his coworkers to wish me well on my flight. Really quite nice. I also watched an adorable 3-year-old boy run around making noise throughout the gate. We made eye contact a few times, at which point another whooping “WAAAAAAWAAWA” or “BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO” or something of that nature was uttered. Had it been any other child, I imagine a headache would have instantly installed itself in my temples and any urge to procreate would have been crushed by my desire for peace and quiet. But no, he was far too adorable. Really a quite energetic kid. A much younger child, named Owen, was crawling over the gate. Poor fellow, his parents kept setting him down and walking far away so he’s have to crawl back. I imagine he got pretty tired—which was precisely his parents’ cunning plot to keep him quiet on the plane, for which I am immensely grateful. For you see, friends, I was to find myself quite close to Owen, the loud little boy, and many other children in fact.
My seat was changed, as I had noticed earlier that day when I printed my boarding pass, but after assuring that it was still an aisle seat, I believed everything was all right. Wrong. I was moved to penultimate row of the plane, surrounded on all sides by children and their accompanying adults. I’ll admit my spirits were shaken, and as I vaulted my backpack into the overhead locker (not a compartment, mind you, but a locker), I hopes against hope that this would not be the flight from hell that it was rapidly coming to resemble. As I sat down, I went to shove my bag under the seat in front of me, and was hit with another disheartening realization: in addition to being surrounded by various minors, I was also sharing my foot and bag space with a large metal object of some kind secured onto the floor. I had less than half the normal amount of foot room for an Economy seat, which we all know is already not much. In any case, I was able to arrange the things in my bag to fit in the small section, and I spent the rest of my flight moving my feet about, trying to sneak some space from the lady next to me when she wasn’t using it.
I’ll tell you now, the flight really wasn’t that bad. The children were, for the most part, quite well-behaved. The little boy behind me kicked my seat a few times in the beginning, but I think I turned around enough times that his mother, who was sitting next to me, got the hint and gave him the proper incentive to stop. The loud little boy from the gate was in the row next to me. If he had been a less fortunate looking child, I would have perhaps been a bit less tolerant of his cooing, but it really wasn’t that bad. And just in case it seems like it, I’m not totally against ugly children. It’s just…when a child (or anyone of any age, for that matter) is misbehaving, it’s bad enough; add being ugly, and it’s just a double offense.
But I digress. Due to the thunder storms we were delayed, which wasn’t so bad except that we were all getting a bit thirsty and hungry. Long story short, though, we got going soon enough and it was a pretty smooth flight. I was very excited, this being my first flight with an individual entertainment center. I watched The Blindside, which, for a sports movie, was actually pretty good. I can see why Sandra Bullock got so many kudos for it. After vainly attempting to sleep for a few hours, I turned on my screen again and watched an episode of Glee. Turns out, I had never seen the pilot! So it was pretty exciting. Very fitting that they should sing a Journey song while I was on a journey of my own. Must have been a sign or something.
Anyway, as there is a lot more to get to, let me fast-forward a bit: landed about an hour late, had to find a different gate, got off, went pee, went to border check and waited in long annoying line, got through border check and couldn’t find my bag since it had long come off the best, found bag, got ticket to Heathrow Express, got to Paddington Station, found hotel nearby, locked up large bag. Phew. Shower needed. Hopped on tube to go down one stop where I knew there was a phone shop, and I got my mobile sorted out—Vodafone pay as you go—not great, but not bad either. Also found out that it would be cheaper to buy a low-end Nokia with a Virgin payg than buying a new charger for my Nokia phone—so I might do that, and get a UK charger AND another unlocked phone just in case. But that’s for later.
After wandering around for a bit and having no luck getting in touch with Jack, Sister the Elder’s beloved, for reasons that…aren’t worth discussing, but suffice it to say some people aren’t great at finding other people in small buildings…I sat around in Paddington for a bit, dozing off in a chair and then freaking out when the pigeons flew down right next to me, waking me up. They also really deformed feet...like...peg legs, and weird toes. Very strange. Later, I went back to the hotel, crashed on the couch, and then finally checked in a bit before 2. Since I had no where else to go and I was desperately trying to stay awake, I decided to expose myself to some British culture. So I watched daytime TV in a semi-conscious state. Went out later to try and find some food, not having eaten since dinner on the plane, but I couldn’t decide where to go—it’s hard eating alone in a new place! I didn’t want to be that weirdo eating alone in a pub or something, and I didn’t know what sort of take away (not take out) that I wanted. So I got a yogurt.
Then, I went on an adventure. A luggage-lugging adventure. Having made arrangements with Mine Host in Finsbury Park to drop off my luggage that night (this is Friday night, by now), I got my things together and dragged my bag back to Paddington. Wasn’t too fun having to switch lines—lots of stairs involved, and not many people willing to help. That’s something I was slightly surprised at. In DC, and even in New York, at least in my experience, you can generally find someone who will help you up the stairs or something. But here…not really. I got lucky, though, and got some help—from women though. It wasn’t until Saturday that a man actually helped me—though that was only to pull the bag up the 5 remaining steps. Um, thanks. Anyway, got to Mine Host’s establishment, dropped off my bag and chatted for a bit. It was nice!
Took the tube back, was starving, grabbed a pizza at the first open place. Then, walking back, I remembered I needed to go to a convenience store to get toothpaste, which I had forgotten. When I walked in, though, I was immediately confronted with a huge section of cold beers. In my weakened physical and mental state from not having eaten nor slept, I forgot all about the toothpaste, and bought a Stella. As I played it on the counter and got out my money, I asked the cashier if he happened to have a bottle opener since I didn’t have one in my room. He did, and, hesitating slightly, opened the bottle for me, then placed the bottle in a bag. I grabbed it by the neck, careful not to spill, and walked back to my room with an open bottle of beer and a pizza. As I walked out of the store, the man asked me if I was American…
The next day, Saturday, I woke up and readied myself to check out of the hotel before 11. I made my way to Tottenham Court Road to find Jack, the Beloved, and my other suitcase in his possession. We met up and immediately went in search of sustenance, as neither of us had eaten that morning, nor much the day before. We had a bit of trouble. Finally, we found a small Mediterranean place and had falafel sandwiches. Back at the hotel, we hung out for bit then went for a walk around town. Got to see some of the area around where I’ll be going to school, it was very pretty and really nice out—low 60s, brisk. We passed by some University College of London (UCL) buildings, and I have only one thing to say:
Suck it, Harvard.
I then headed over to Mine Host’s establishment again to drop off my second bag and meet the housemates. We had a fun time chatting, though there were times when certain things were temporarily lost in translation:
[as Alice picks up a white styrofoamy chip]
“Is that a shrimp chip???!” I asked, excited, as I have not had shrimp chips in a very long time.
“What?” was Alice, Sarah, and Steve’s reply, “What did you call it?”
“A shrimp chip?”
[excessive laughter]
Then something along the lines of “that’s brilliant! We call them prawn crackers!” Sarah, Mine Host, was particularly smitten with my American term, and continued to call them shrimp chips for the rest of the day.
I then met some of the other housemates, and I fear I gave them a pretty horrible view of the USA. They were horrified to hear about our health care system of insurance, sick days, our pittance of vacation time, and how other coworkers are asked to donate their own days off to help an ailing coworker. They were horrified. I felt sort of bad. But hey, I guess they appreciate their nationalized healthcare that much more, now! We also had an interesting discussing about moving to Europe in order to take advantage of benefits, such as healthcare. I mentioned that Le boyfriend is French, at which point Alice emphatically urged me to stay with him, and Maryanne (sp? French girl of the house, who doesn’t want any other foreigners, especially not another French person, to move in) explained that he can work anywhere in the EU, including the UK (thus solving the problem of me not speaking French) and that I could follow as a spouse with a special visa, and after a certain amount of time become a national. All in all, it was a very informative conversation on both ends!
Then some of the girls made their way to get ready to go out and I busied myself preparing to out and meet Jack at a pub to have some drink and get dinner. I made the mistake of communicating with Alice, as we both did our hair in the mirror, that Le boyfriend had mentioned earlier while online (we were video chatting while I was sitting with the group, learning about tiny adorable pigs and becoming a national) that I looked British—I was drinking tea and I had frizzy hair. At which point there was a slight pause and I hurriedly added that Alice’s hair looked quite nice, not frizzy at all—it was nicely straightened, actually. Oops.
Having dodged a potentially offensive situation (or perhaps it was and she just swept it away), I went out to meet Jack, though I walked right by him and went up to his room, where he clearly wasn’t, since he was at the pub downstairs. That being sorted out, I joined him and three others, one of whom works at SIA, his flatmate, and a mutual friend. We had a good time talking about black runners’ large penises, buying people for $200 in Uzbekistan, and Matthew’s little Japanese girlfriend who was very cross at him for drinking so much. Once they all left, Jack and I headed down to find some food, ending up at a really horrible place, that I think we knew was going to be horrible but for some reason went into anyway. We had actually passed a Chipotle but for some reason passed it up--I KNOW, idiot decision. We were both under the influence—just goes to show it really does impair your judgment. We got some nasty burgers and fries, then went to a pub across the street (where we should have eaten) and got some more drinks to wash it down with. We had a nice chat, nice little bonding experience sans Sister the Elder. It was the first time I had been introduced as a future sister-in-law, made me feel quite mature and all that. Good night!
I ended up back in Finsbury Park a bit after midnight, hoping to find Le boyfriend online to chat with for a bit. Alas, he had missed the earlier train, though, and was stuck in the city. I managed to find this out through the text function with Google Voice—really quite a useful toy. In any case, we did manage to chat for a bit, and then he admonished me strongly to go to sleep, which I grudgingly did. I was in need of a shower after having dragged a suitcase all over the tube again earlier that day, but I was quite tired, I didn’t want to chance waking anyone up, and I didn’t have a towel.
Today, Sunday, has been moderately productive! I’ve written this epic blog entry, learned some really useful information about housing from various housemates—I now have a bubble drawn on the tube map that I should stay within, and the name of a good estate agent that should have good properties for reasonable budgets. I also got to see Le boyfriend un peu as he washed dishes and I wrote this entry. Tres bon!
