I'll Take the High Road

Scotland! Okay, I know, that was ages ago. Where's the post?? Well folks, *hint hint* you'll get more posts out of us if you demonstrate you read the blog. That means, *hint hint* we want you to leave comments.

So Scotland was quite amazing. We started our journey by meeting Alex at the trainstation in Birmingham. From there was a direct train ride, four and a half hours, up to Edinburgh. We got great seats and just enjoyed being together after what I maintain felt like AGES apart.

We got into Edinburgh at night time. It was about 6:30 or so. Dark. WINDY. We went to Scotland and met weather. We laughed basically the entire way to our hostel because the wind was blowing so hard we could barely walk into it. We found the hostel with little issue. It was a cool place. A converted 19th century church, which meant it had all kinds of character. It also meant that the individual rooms did not have their own roofs. The three of us were in a room with six beds and there was no one else for the first two of our three nights. Sounds perfect, yes? Well unfortunatelly the no-roof situation meant that we heard every little sound that everyone in the hostel made. Now this might not have been a problem if it hadn't been for some very noisy people. Most notable of them was the guy who shouted out every few seconds "Has anybody got a joke?" along with a few other sundry comments.

Well the first night there Alex and I stayed up chatting until a silly late hour (made more silly because we knew we had to wake up early) and we kept up later because of the yelling guy. And the laughing obnoxious Italians. And the chipmunks. Well those were Italians too, but they were doing this *tch* *tch* *tch* sounds that as bizarre as it was annoying. Well we all got up early anyway, and headed out to our first tour.

We took a tour from Rabbie's Trail Burners called Highlands Lochs, Glens, and Whiskey. Click the link to see exactly where we went. We had a chance to go on a little nature walk in the low lands, which was a little unnerving because it almost felt like we were in Lynn Valley or something. The scenery was very familiar to home. We were at a place known for it's salmon jumps for goodness sakes. But it was neat anyway. A highlight of the day was definately the tour of Blair Atholl whiskey distillery. We're now whiskey experts. We know how it's made, we know how to drink it (never put ice in a single malt!!) and it was generally very cool. There was then a scenic drive through the highlands, which were spectacular.

That night we were pretty bushed and we happy to go to bed fairly early. It's a good thing we did, because at our early bed time there weren't that many people in the hostel. It wasn't until later when the people got back that things got noisy. "Anybody got a joke?" *the hostel grumbles as one* "Anybody got a joke?" *We turn over and try to ignore obnoxious guy* "Anybody got a joke?"

Pause.

"I'LL SHOW YOU A FRIGGIN' JOKE!!" In steps angry scottish man.

We hear doors opening. We hear general threats, not all of which are PG-Blog rated. We hear some furnature. We hear joke guy say "Holy **** you're like twice my size!" We hear some running. Yelling. Oh the excitement. By now the three of us are kind of sitting there hoping they just don't come near our room. We kept hearing doors open and didn't know why. Was joke guy trying to hide? Was scottish guy systematically looking for him?

Well after a couple of thoroughly exciting moments we hear the distinct sound of police walkie-talkies. The commotion is broken up. Somehow all this excitement made both Susan and I have to pee so we go out to the washroom and on the way see police talking to various people. Commotion over. The next night was nicely quiet.

So the next morning we had another tour. This time it was through Scottish Tours and went to Loch Ness & The Highlands. Yes, we went up to Loch Ness. How very... legendary! The bus ride was a bit longer and both Susan and Alex grabbed a few moments to nap. Loch Ness was beautiful. The monster, they say, comes twice every day: five minutes before you get there, and five minutes after you leave. We also went into Urquheart Castle, which at one point was held by the Grant clan. Grant, of course, is Susan's born surname. When we found out that the Grants were suck ups who literally blew up their own castel, it became something of a joke for poor Susie who was glad to have abandoned that clan for the Curries who are known in Scotland as the "Warrior Poets" -- at much better fit, I'd say.

We also had a chance to see the capital of the Highlands on this tour. Inverness was very cool, though we spent most of it in a pub eating appetisers. Yay.

That night, when we got back to Edinburgh, we did a ghost tour of the city. It was a fun nighttime walk. Amusingly, the tour was given by a Canadian. We got to go into a really old cemetary, climb a faerie mound, and go through some neat areas of town. The tour ended at a pub where we got a free drink. We took advantage of that drink as well as a few more, occupying ourselves until the establishment closed at 1:00 -- what kind of pub closes at 1am? Really now.

We went back to the hostel, had a slightly better night of sleep, and checked out the next morning. When we got to Wannaburger for breakfast we were surprised to hear that daylight savings had just gone into effect. Cool, another hour in Edinburgh! We did some casual shopping on our way to the train station.

The train home was less fun than the one there. We had a really long ride on a train where we were only able to sit for a small portion. Then we changed train, and there was a grumpy guy. Travel wasn't fun that day, really. But we got back just fine.

Alex spent a couple of days with us, and has now gone off to flitter about the country again. We'll see him next week.

Overall scotland was a blast, and I'd love to go back to Edinburgh some day. The city was beautiful with so much history and so much that we didn't have a chance to see. Who knows, maybe one day we'll go on a 100-mile trek through the highlands.

The End of the Asterisk

Alright so I figured it best to do a small schedule for various people on here before I conclude the last two weeks of my trip.

These dates are subject to change.

Tuesday 28: Leicester
Wednesday 29: Leicester -> London
Thursday 30: London -> Liverpool
Friday 31: Liverpool -> Manchester
Saturday 1: Manchester -> Sheffield
Sunday 2: Sheffield -> Leicester
Monday 3: Leicester
Tuesday 4: Leicester -> Bath
Wednesday 5: Bath -> Cardiff -> Bath
Thursday 6: Bath
Friday 7: Bath -> Bristol -> Dublin
Saturday 8: Dublin
Sunday 9: Dublin -> Bristol -> Bath -> London
Monday 10: London
Tuesday 11: London
Wednesday 12: London -> Vancouver

I STRESS subject to change. I need a whole day just to contact people and look at hotels! URGH!

Love
-Alex

We'll tak a cup o' kindness yet

Oh it's exciting times here across the pond.

Tomorrow the three of us reunite! Susan and I are quite stoked to see Alex after what feels like AGES of being apart. We have so much to talk about! And of course, not only are we going to be together again, we're going to SCOTLAND!

That's right folks, the three of us are off to discover the Highlands. Clearly there will be more to be said about this when we get back.

Just thought I'd leave you with this tantalizing teaser.

... I'm so excited!

Glastonbury and Stonehenge

Ok, so as I promised... a while ago... Stonehendge and Glastonbury. Now, I knew that I was going to adore Stonehendge, but Glastonbury. What the heck did Glastonbury have to offer me, now really! It had a lot of nerding out is what it had!

This little town in England, for one, is adorable. It seems as if it was designed with the word "quaint" in mind. But beyond that, the Abbey, the Abbey of Glastonbury has some beautiful runes, and with a tour guide as great as ours, they really came to life. This is the misty and mystical England that Marrion writes about. This, my dear folks, is Avalon *Sqeal!*

So we went to the Abbey where Joseph supposedly stuck his staff in the ground and made a thorn tree pop up. Yay Christianity. But more to my interest was the tomb/grave of King Arthur. How outstanding. From here we made our way to the Tor, yes the Tor, and got to walk all. the. frigging. way. up. it. Now, for me it was tough, but for poor Beth who had just gotten quite sick... well I believe she describes the process as "Death with every step and breath." Poor girl. She could have done it with way more ease had she been able to... breathe. A fairly important function when climbing up a miny mountain. A very steep miny mountain.

So, we climbing down from there, and it was to the Chalice Well Gardens. This was simply fantastic. The story behind the Charlice Wells Garden is that, in the well resides the Holy Grail, and all the water of the Well passes through it, thus, it is a garden of reflection and peace, tranquility and healing. Once again we're confronted with "Healing" waters. Well, after the climb that felt like "death with every step and breath" Beth was more than happy to take on some healing waters.

This garden was everything it advertised "I wonder, if you live in Glastonbury, if you could get a season pass" Beth ruminated, and I certainly hope you can, I know I'd want one!

Next it was on to Stonehendge. Well, not much to say, you KNOW it was amazing. Those stones radiate mystisism. And, to once again quote Beth "Those stones much know the their primary contemporary purpose is to have their picture taken. They're really good at it." Are they ever. I think every picture I got of those stones turned out quite well.

The gift shop wasn't as horrendously priced as I thought it would be, and the lines not nearly as bad.

On our way home we passed through Oxford, which looks like a beautiful city to go visit, though I don't think I'll get the chance. Hey I could be wrong though, Beth and I do have rail passes after all!

After all this was home, and some serious crashing. It was a long trip.

We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed

Alright, time for my weekly update.

I left Lincoln last wednesday and went to Liverpool. When there I met up with my friend Lee who I wasn't planning to meet up with originally, but ended up doing so anyways. We went to a concert (Los Campesinos!) which I was supposed to be going to with Nathan, but he was busy getting a job...

We ended up having... a few too many... and I can't really recall all that much of the concert! How terrible!

Spent the night at a hotel and then met Lee and his other friend Lee (yes too many doubles in the world!) for breakfast. Got lots of pictures and whatnot and had English Chinese food... which is mostly the same as Canadian Chinese food but with more English things like Fish and Chips... Asian style...

Went to the Natural Museum across from the train station because it was free before leaving for Manchester.

The train to Manchester was the worst train ever! It was jammed so full of people I had to squish like 5 people just to get my bag on. I was standing at the door... which is NOT allowed apparently but I really needed to get to Manchester... Nathan would be waiting and the next many trains after that would be as busy. The ride was only an hour.

Manchester was amazing! My favourite city in the trip so far (Liverpool being a close second) Nathan was so much fun to spend a weekend with! He toured me around and took me for cheap cheap drinks! (yay £2 cocktails!) How alcoholic this part of the trip seems...

... I may have accidently gotten a body alteration...

Anyways, he was rather sick so I buggered off later Saturday to return to Bath. I was planning to go to Leicester, but I'm going to have to be in Bristol on tuesday anyways for a concert so I figure I'd save a train pass day (which I've used half of now)

The train from Manchester to Bath was MORE hell! It was 7 hours long and it involved me ''accidently'' going to Wales (I didn't have a pass that let me to go Wales, but Wales wasn't a destination so... I was planning to play dumb tourist)

By the time I got to Bristol it was already really late, and it turns out the reason I couldn't take a more direct route to Bristol and thus Bath and had to fake my way through Wales was that half of the south western stations were like under construction or something. I had to catch a coach from Bristol to Bath. Joy. A fifteen minute train ride becomes a ninety minute bus ride UGH!

Anyways made it here. All is well. Tomorrow (Monday) will be a laundry day. Tuesday we go to Bristol to see Los Campesinos! so I can remember them. Wednesday will be... something restful... and thursday I take a lovely seven hour train ride up to Edinburgh. I shall be meeting Beth and Suse in Birmingham, but their journey shan't be nearly as long as mine.

We were going to go to Dublin, but we decided to hold off for pricing reasons. Edinburgh is a train ride whereas Dublin requires a plane. Just made sense.

Till next week

Alex

Susan, after drinking the healing waters of Bath

I just thought I'd share that.

Bath and Bristol (Glastonbury and Stonehendge soon to come)

"This is so bizarre, the order of our Stonehendge, Glastonbury, and Bath tour is going to be completely oposite!" I thought I'd mention that right off the bat. You see, poor Beth was thrown for a momentary loop when this happened. Honestly she didn't know what to do with that "It's completely backwards!"

I laughed.

As you know, Beth and I went on a tour of the above mentioned places and we had a fantastic time. You may not have known the fantastic time bit, but I bet you guessed it! We took about a million pictures, soon to be placed on facebook, and well... had a great time lol.

Bath was our first stop. We got picked up by our coach at about eight in the morning, threw our stuff into the back and promptly met the nicest bus driver we've ever encountered and our absolutely lovely tour guide. John and Susannah. The trip to Bath was three hours with a break inbetween to stretch our legs. Boy did we need it! The bus we were on was comfy for discount, I suppose, but ment for people with much shorter legs than either Beth or I possess. We forgot that we owned knees after a while. Eek.

But yes, Bath was lovely. On our drive in we were told all about the specific lime stone quarried and used in the city. All houses and buildings that are errected in Bath MUST be faced with this stone. It leaves the city looking ancient and spectacular. We went into the Roman Baths first, had a tour of the ruins and enjoyed the hokey audio guide. I quite liked looking into the different rooms and noting the decimated structures, but this wasn't my favourite part of my stay in Bath. An amusing part though, was when Beth and I both tried the healing waters of Bath. Normally you have to pay fifty pence to get a glass of this stuff, but because Beth and I were with Procentium tours we didn't. Beth got her glass, and I got mine. She drank hers first. Then I mine.

It was tasty... seriously... I love the taste of sulphur. Thirst quenching really. Beth and I were amused at least. She had a cold, so we were waiting to see if it worked on her congestion (we're thinking it didn't, I insist that it's because she didn't believe enough in the powers of Minerva Sulis).

After this we were both hungry for lunch and thus pulled out our pre-made lunches and snacked down. We did a bit of self-exploration and shopping after lunch, but it was a bit dull when we stumbled out of Bath's main city core. After a bit of this it was time for the walking tour. I enjoyed this part the most. We got to see the city and be told all about the interesting stories and such associated with it. My favourite was about the way three of Bath's city streets were named. Aparently this guy was really trying to get a council to agree on a name for these three streets, but they felt they had better things to do. Eventually one of the council members got so frustrated with him that he stood up and shouted "Be quite John [whatever his last name was]" and thus this fellow name his streets Quite, John, and his last name. I thought that was pretty great. To finish off was my favourite part of Bath, which was the Abby.

Queen Elizabeth called it the "Lantern of the West" when first she entered it, and Beth says it's a much deserved name. Without too much interior lighting this Abby is very bright and sparkly. Beth, who has been to far more Abbies than I have, says it is by far the best lit. The outside face has beautiful carvings and stonework of angles climbing up and down a ladder. Aparently this image came to the creator in a dream--as do many such things for artsy people.

I love going into old places of worship, or areas where there is true meaning instilled into the very air of the place. It's calming, or emotional... whatever it is, it makes you feel and that is spectacular.

Overall I think Bath is a beautiful city, but better explored by people with larger budgets than either Beth or I have. For instance, I'd love to go to the spa at Bath. Oo lala.

From Bath we got the surprise of going to Bristol! How cool is that? VERY! We didn't know that we'd be going to a different city for our overnight stay and found it to be a bit of a bonus. So once we got settled into our rooms at the Holiday Inn Express Beth and I went out in search of food. We'd decided that since we'd spent time hanging around Roman ruins all day, we should go for Italian. Thus our quest began.

We learned in Victoria that a good way to get recomendations on how to find a quality meal was to ask the front desk. We did so and were directed to Baldwin street for our dining needs. Unfortunately we ended up on the wrong street when trying to get past a roundabout and had to find our way back to Victoria street which would then lead us to Baldwin. We asked a nice looking couple where to go and they gave us directions that seemed a bit strange, but we followed them. We didn't have a lot of hope as we found ourselves behind a bunch of buildings, looking around (in a well lit area) and thinking "Aren't we just walking around this tower here?" Well, that's what we thought, but aparently if you walk in a semi circle/circle around this building you end up on a different street. Mind boggling.

We found our way just fine from here. One of the highlights of my night happened around the time as we were crossing over the Avon and saw a bunch of swans floating on it in the light of the walk way paths. So picturesque. Unfortunately in the pictures I tried to take, this scene is not at all portrayed.

So, now that we're on Baldwin we find a few restaurants, but only three that were Italian. The first looked shady to me, and thus I opted against it. The next looked fabulous, cozy, and reasonably priced... but we wouldn't be able to get in for an hour. That was fairly disheartening, but we set out to search again and found a nice place to rest our feet and fill our stomachs. I don't remember the name of it, which makes it hard to give you a meaningful review, but, I would say it was more Southern Italian and catered to the idea of Italian restaurants. It's decore was exactly what you would expect of a smaller Italian restaurant.

We were told that we'd have to wait for our food, but I didn't really feel that was the case. The food was nice, but nothing special even though both Beth and I ordered dishes that should have been something special. It really felt like something I could do at home with a tinned sauce, but then, I'm a good cook! Again, I sound negative, but I don't mean to be. My standard for Italian at an Italian resturant is quite high after being spoiled a year ago at Il Teratza in Victoria. Hard to beat that. I just felt the portions and quality were out of sync with the price. Doesn't mean it wasn't good, just mediocre. It sure hit the spot though, and as usual Beth and I had a lovely time dining out together. At the end of our meal, just as we were going to pay the bill our waiter stopped at another table first and dropped off their dessert... dear god.

He was about to hand us the bill, but asked us first if we'd like anything else. "Um..." we both said, sending covetous looks towards the amazing mystery dessert handed to the couple across from us "Uhhh... you know... giving them that dessert before handing us our bill was a clever move... uuummm..."

He told us to take our time, laughing, and we asked him to give us a dessert menu. Oh dear. We ordered what we thought it was the other couple had ordered--though we were between the tirimisu (eek spelling) and the chocolate thing we ordered. Well turns out that their monster AMAZING dessert was the tirimisu, but that's ok because what we had was AMAZING as well. It was a cake with milk, white, and dark chocolate mouse layered densly over a chocolate truffle crust and dusted with coco. Now, you all know my feelings on chocolate, and that is that less is more, well this dessert was perfect. Absolutely perfect. It was high quality, rich, and lovely. It's not often I say that about chocolate desserts, but this one earned it.

As we walked back to our hotel room, hopefully burning some of the calories as we went we noticed something a little odd about Bristol... the youth dress up as super people and myth figures and roam the streets... We're not kidding. On our evening out we saw a few Super Men, Spider Man, Bat Girl, Nacho Libre and three drunken leprochans... I'm sure we saw more than that, but those were the most memorable. We were trying to figure out the occasion but it escaped us and we still don't know...

Well it was back to the room to enjoy some television (which will likely be the last time till we're home) and get some rest. We were both foot sore and Beth was fighting off a cold--I was as well on a lesser level--and thus we both took some Lemsip (neocitron) and had a lovely drugged sleep.

The conclusion of our tour will be written toot sweet, but I have homework and a day to start!

Leisure Suite

Okies so my second week of England is now coming to a close so I figured it'd be best to update.

Bath was grand fun. Less touristy mind, and more living like a Briton; which isn't terribly too unlike Canadians.

I left Bath on Monday and took a three and a half hour train ride to Leicester. I had to kill some time in Bristol -- which I adore -- and Birmingham which is like chav (think gangster but less intelligent and more chaotic) territory; not too fun.

Leicester wasn't touristy either. Beth, Suse and I more just did living type things such as grocery shopping and laundry. Days were very centered around meals (which is fine by me ;) ) and involved some out and about, but not in excess - which is good because I was sick for half my time there!

I left Leicester friday afternoon and took a very painful train journey to Lincoln; the place Alex is from. His place here is so much fun! It's in the country (Lincoln makes Bath and Leicester look like huge party cities) and it's rather large. There's really like two houses on this one really giant plot which has a huge garden! There are cow fields around us which is totally a strange change of pace for me. Mind I could never live somewhere like here no matter how much fun it is.

Alex's family has been very kind and hospitable. Alex's mother started to do my laundry pretty much as soon as I got in the door! This was a bit odd since I feel strange with other people doing my clothes, but it just seems to be what Alex's mother likes to do. I got glared at for trying to do some myself...

I've been bad... I've now purchased a few too many series of English television on dvd! I've got series 1 and 2 of Skins, series 1 to 5 of Shameless, series 1 to 3 of Little Britain, and now series 1 to 3 of The Catherine Tate Show is on it's way over! HMV does it to me... I enter the store and there are like boxes of sets of series for like £5! I mean like the entire of Little Britain was only £5! I spend more on lunch at subway than that!

Ohhh! I also bought tickets to French and Saunders (Absolutely Fabulous, Vicar of Dibley, Jam and Jerusalem -- the list could go on for ages!) and I am SO excited! This is like their farewell tour thingie since they are going to go retire for a while (they are getting a bit old...) I cannot express this excitement enough! Bethany saw how I lit up when I got the email about these (very reduced in price) tickets! I'm also searching for tickets to see David Tennant and Patrick Stewart in Hamlet, but that shall be a bit trickier to do... I WILL PREVAIL I SWEAR!
Hmm... not much to tell. These haven't been big touristy weeks, but those begin as I travel from here to Liverpool in a day from now! I am very excited to get the bigger cities going! The camera is charged and ready for mega photoshoots!

Talk to you all later! HOPE YOU VOTED/WILL VOTE!

-Alex

PS. I predict Conservative Minority which has a 35% of being forced down at the throne speech leading to a Liberal coalition with someone else.

Dispersing for the weekend

Hello all,

Just a super-quick update on what's going on with us. Alex departed this evening in order to spend the weekend in Lincoln. In the morning (the eeeeearly morning) Susan and I get on a bus headed for Bath. We spend all day there touring about and then on the way home on Sunday we're stopping by Stonehenge and Glastsonbury, returning to Leicester around 7pm Sunday night. Alex will be rejoining us here on Monday.

I'm sure we're all going to have much more exciting things to say about all this after it actually happens.

As for this week, we had a good time. Susan and I made it through our first week of classes. We had a great time with Alex. My voice has been scratchy all day and we think I'm coming down with something, but great amounts of citrus products are being used to try and avoid that.

As we're leaving so early in the morning, I'm going to get ready for bed now.

Brandy Alexander

Hi. Alive.

I was without the internet for a whooooooole week. I thought it would be tricky for me, but apparently I can live without it afterall. Who knew?

So where to begin...

Well the flight was a bit of an annoyance. Not as bad as Susan's domestic flight to JFK, but still not glamorous. The flight was delayed an hour, which wasn't great, but I lived. The demographics seemed to be old and french. I don't know why the retirees of Paris all chose my flight to come to England, but they did. I ended up sitting beside someone interesting; Lubka, my old boss from Sears. Not just Lubka... but Lubka's hideous, horrid, noisey, smelly, stupid looking, scrunched up faced, icky, potentialess, spoiled, child. Apparently shortly after I left Sears she had found out she was preggo. woops. Poor mister lubka. Fortunately we did not converse too much, and mostly pretended that neither of us existed. Also BA gives a LOT of freeeee wine.

I didn't sleep on the flight as I had wanted to. When I got to heathrow I felt like crap. Then the evil lady at customs decided that Bethany didn't deserve noodles. Fortunately I changed her mind; they had travelled with me across and ocean therefore I was not parting with them yet! They also found it odd that I wanted to go to Leicester. I suppose it isn't the most thrilling English city, but it seems fairly nice.

I first went to Bath where I met Alex who I have known for 5 or so years. He didn't show me too much of Bath because he was still moving in (I had to sleep on the floor cause the spare bed had not come yet) but we still tiddled about. Went to eat quite a bit. Had me some wine... and stuff... We'll do the city later.

That friday night we went to what I call Bethany's perfect club night; allll sappy power ballads. It was disappointing that Bethany wasn't present, but I'm sure the club will do it again; there seemed to be a feel of sappy night regulars.

Saturday I went to Bristol to go shopping. I bought the first and second series of Skins since we can't get it at home and I thought it fitting to get that series seeing as it was based in AND filmed in Bristol. We went to a GIANT shopping centre. Not giant because of it's ammount of stores, but because of how spread out it was; an observation I have made about pretty much all structures and urban planning in England so far.

Sunday I went into London really late for a birthday present! (yay) We went and saw The Noisettes in concert. We really only went there, watched, and came back, so I will have to do London again later before I leave or else my trip will be very very very lame.

Monday I finally came to Leicester. We've really only gone to the grocery store, but it seems nice. We got three bottles of wine for 9 pound. They're sitting right behind the computer. They're watching me type, comments Bethany from behind.

Umm... not much else to really say. I swear things have been more adventurous than that. We've already made cultural observations! Most working class people seem to want to be dead as they move at a snails pace when working, and look like zombies; particularily the ones Morrisons (grocery store). It reminded me of watching Jenn work at safeway before; and made me nostalgic of Sears.

Tomorrow we're having a traditional English breakfast that Bethany will be making before her and Susan go off to class. I'll likely watch the leaders debate in English and mayyybe in French if I so please; I've gotten so disconnected from Canadian news and politics the last week that news of the English cabinet shuffle made me giddy - even though it was just quackery.

This weekend while Beth and Suse are in Bath, I shall be in Lincoln with Alex to see his family. From there I'm off to Liverpool and then Manchester to visit Nathan. Should be good. I'll blog and have photos then.

Lots of love

Pear jelly bellies remain the best

A little more in depth

So, as has been noted, Beth and I are pretty settled in. I'm getting to giving my room a clean up from my sickie carelessness. I'm not completely better, but I'm getting by on nearly better. I hope to be CURED in a day or two. Mornings have been good.



But, what have we really been up to? Well, we've been on a few walks through town, today through a park, the other day... through a graveyard. Yes yes yes, how very strange. But, you see, the British, they know how to do death.



Beth and I discovered this graveyard as each of us made our respective ways to the main campus, which is right across from the graveyard. You walk along side a fence which has graves practically kissing the iron bars. They are beautiful and ornate, old, and heartfelt. Full of character. Normally I wouldn't be so thrilled about this graveyard situation. At home, in Vancouver and the surrounding area at least, graveyards have such superficial characters. There's nothing unique about them, they are shiny and devoid of history. But, something I've found about Britain is that, everything has history. And thus the appeal of this graveyard, which I can see from outside my flat's window. It is my scenery.



Morbid? No, not really. Beth and I wandered the paths, and occassionally went somewhat off the paths to get to some of the more unique sites. We read what they said, and we apreciated the art, and the love, and the loss. It was nearly a tragic parody of poets on the wander. So very... Shelly.



But, it was a nice walk. After that we headed over to a party being held by my flat, just a small one with the people who lived there and Beth. We got to meet everyone, chatted about what we're all doing, got to know eachother, ate, drank, and eventually got into some very in-depth discussions about the music that we share/don't share.



Beth's right, my flat mates are all quite nice, a few in particulare... but... they are also kinda messy. There are a few in particulare that are making me begin to feel as if I live in a swimming pool. Something drastic may have to be done, because I refuse to CONTINUE mopping up after everyone.



The next day was a poker night with our new friend Simon (lol, poor kid never saw us coming). He has a poker set with the chips and cards and the like. I would like to say that, if we had been playing for money, I'd have cleaned them all out! I didn't mention that I'm decent at poker to the people at the table, but I am. Didn't want to talk myself up and turn out to be morbidly out of practice. As it stands we had pleanty of laughs, lots of practice, and ended up losing track of time and going to bed around one thirty in the morning.



But Beth has told you all this.



What I would like to share is the sheer fact that Leicester is so QUAINT. I mean this utterly. I mean it thoroughly. Everywhere I go is a house or a building that, at home, would be qualified as a heritage building. I've taken a few pictures now of things that British people would consider batty to take a picture of, but heaven help me it's just too cute.



So there it is. We are settled and having a blast, in a quiet, toned down manner.

Settling In

So we've been here for a while now and I'm happy to say that we're starting to settle in quite nicely. Our rooms are livable, with all the amenities we'll need for the next couple of months. We've located the grocery store and visited it a few times. We're beginning to think of things like meal planning. As you read, we've accomplished laundry.

The registration thing is still rediculous and we're still working out little kinks in our time tables. Susan just found out she has a conflict with two lectures, and I had a seminar conflict and need to track down my other seminar. We have some books to get us started. We've both picked up Middlemarch.

We're even starting to meet people. The people in my building are oddly ghost-like. I almost never run into them. There were a couple that I saw for the first time today. Very strange. I know all of Susan's flatmates though! They're very nice.

Last night I learned how to play Texas Hold'em. Woot poker. Now I really am a university student. We were playing for fake money and it was quite fun. It was Susan and I plus a couple of guys from her flat. It was nice. Today Susan and I went for a walk. We went through Victoria Park and made our way into the fringes of town and then came back. It was a nice brisk day and the walk was nice.

Overall we've kept things fairly low key, but that's okay because it's like we're establishing a liveable pace. Had Susan been less sick this past week we could have gone to all kinds of parties and pub nights and bar crawls and all kinds of things, but then we'd be broke and exhausted and we wouldn't be able to keep it up. So it's been nice.

Alex gets here soon and we're excited to meet up with him. I just wanted to do a little post to let y'all know that we're alive and well, and that we're pretty well... settled.

Suds

You know what I've never done on my own before? Laundry. You know what I did on my own... kinda... the other day? Laundry. You've all been wondering, don't deny it, how Bethany and I would get along sans mommies. Well, I can safely say that we're doing pretty well: we're fed--with healthy food, we're clothed--in clean clothes, and while our rooms may not be up to firecode standards, when have they ever been?

Yes mums and pops we're succeeding in existing quite well, quite frugally, on our own.

Of course, that doesn't mean that there haven't been shennanigans...

So, I've never done laundry, and do you know why? Why not laundry when I've successfully proven that I can do just about every other chore they throw at me? My mom, she likes doing laundry. She gets stressed, she does laundry. She can't sleep? She does laundry. As well, I've been told that I don't fold properly... pah. Me? Not fold things to standar? Never.

But, that's why I've never before done laundry. UNTIL RECENTLY. This Tuesday Beth and I trucked on down to the laundry room. We had previously sought it out, and spent some time looking through the nooks and crannys of Freeman's Common calling out softly "Laundry room, laundry room where are you?" But it would not reveal itself until such time as a very pixie like Asian girl showed it to use, darting and speeding around corners at speeds that we never thought we'd be able to keep up with. It felt vaugly like a quest in a Zelda game. But, we found it, and we were ever so happy. We didn't do laundry that day though, too sleepy, and I was too sick, and Beth was too unmotivated.

But, on came Tuesday and Beth was down to one outfit and no underwear. Unfortunate. So we found the laundry room, and little miss traveled Ireland and then came home to Leicester with limited resources was delighted to finally have the option of cleaning her clothes.

We sorted, and we paid the machines, and quite suddenly found ourselves stuck. We were both used to a liquid soap, and in a front loading (not top loading) laundry machine, where the heck do you put the soap? We found the flap on the top of the machine, and we read the instructions on the box and very quickly we were back on track.

Three machines full of just our clothing later (mostly hers) we were rolling... for thirty eight minutes. We didn't really feel like leaving the machines, so we looked around and came to the conclusion that, hey, the laundry room is the place to be. We're not kidding, there were two german boys, a german girl, a British guy, and later on, two more German girls... ok... maybe Germans just like hanging out in the laundry room.

Anyways, all this company, obviously, meant conversation. Socialisation in the laundry room. Unfortunately, the only person who could understand our rapid conversation was British boy. He started conversing with us when he realised what laundry dunces we were, mocked us, read his paper, we mocked him, continue and repeat as necessary.

It was actually quite fun, and boarded (in a way that boardering means completely was) on flirting. Beth and I had a great time harassing this poor kid, but he held his own in a way that only the British could against our awesome powers.

Interesting note--emergancy condom machine, tampon machine, and tylonal machine, all kept in the laundry room next to the folding table. Try folding a piece of lengerie next to the thing and not get mocked... oi.

So, we're doing just fine, we're starting to raise hell, and we have clean clothes sullied by shameless suds.

Registration Day

Before we were allowed to leave SFU we were forced to attend a lecture about culture shock. All right, I'm in England. My family is quite in tune with the culture of the UK. We knew what we were getting into. We're not exactly in Zimbabwe. We're not feeling culture shock. We're experiencing...

CULTURE BITCH

This mostly has to do with registration. Perhaps it is an unfair reflection of the British culture, but we feel the need to bitch. Because -- seriously??

We applied through SFU International. We filled out a lot of paper work. Really, we did. We picked out classes. We had them approved by advisors. We sent them to Leicester. Leicester said no, special topics can only be taken by Leicester students, so we had to pick from a comparetively lame list of only a couple of courses. Fine, whatever. We'd mostly come to terms with this, but were harbouring a hope that we could change that when we got here.

We get here. We have to go through an online registration process. Okay, fine. Then, then we get to the really annoying bit. We have to register with our department(s).

So to the English department it is. There is a specified time and place, we follow directions. There's a bit of a line, but not that many are in front of us. We're optimistic. We're in the line up for ALMOST TWO HOURS because they only take people in two at a time. They literally sit down and discuss it with you.

I'm going to take this moment to point out to those who don't know, that SFU does all this online in a perfectly civilized time efficient and convenient manner.

We get into the little room with the little advisors and are told that it's not that we're not allowed to take special topics, it's just that we can't take them. There are so few spots that they're always filled with Leiecester students. I kinda thought that by doing this exchange thing I am a Leicester student for this semester, but whatever. I ask when we'll know if there will be any spaces. There won't be, I'm assured. Fine. Growl. Moving on.

The reasonably friendly lady asks for a photo of me. "Uh... don't you have one? I've sent a tonne of photos to this school" Because I have. International kept saying to send them, so we kept sending them. Well no, apparently the department hasn't got one. We have to aquire those.

Then we get really annoyed. Because the next part of this registration shennanigans? We have to pay them ten pounds (approx $20.00) for a photocopying fee. Excuse me? I can take care of my own photocopying thank you (Susan: we did buy photocopy cards afterall). Somehow I doubt you're going to go through twenty bucks worth of photocopying on my behalf. And have you people never heard of the internet?? Because it's remarkably easy and cheap to send us information through that dandy online format. Seriously.

So we leave this rediculous office a little more than annoyed. We've now "registered" with the department, but do we have timetables? No. Have they told us what books to buy? No. Have they given us our library cards yet? No. Have we accomplished ANYTHING through this rediculously archaic ritual of registration? No.

Leaving the Attenborough building, we head back to the international office so they can at least give out library cards (well for Susan anyway... I got to repeat this rediculousness the next day with the History of Art department -- at least they didn't charge me money). International is at least able to give us some pictures of ourselves so we don't have to deal with that. The friendly lady there, in response to our frustration, assures us that it's the British way: they're a grumbly people and they feel obligated to give us something to grumble about. That, and they just really like to queue.

Well we were certainly grumbling. We were calling ourselves "The Huffy Canadians" -- you should have seen us in the elevator. We were huffing about the talking elevators and how at home we don't need to be told that the doors are opening et cetera. (Susan: oh yeah, and we ended up being the huffy Canadians because we relayed our annoyance to an elevator stuffed with people, I think I literally stomped my foot).

An entire day was devoted to this process. We still don't have a timetable. Classes still don't start until next week. We've at least mostly figured out what books we'll need, but are kinda unsure because at least one of the reading schedules literally looks impossible.

At home this whole thing would have been done in about fifteen minutes online. We'd have built our own schedules. We'd have registered ourselves. It all would have been nice. As it remains, it looks like I'm going to have a Friday class for the first time in my undergraduate career. Even that I could get over if the rest of the process hadn't been so... rediculous!!! (Susan: also, I was sick and in uncomfy shoes throughout this whole process)

And that, my friends, is the

CULTURE BITCH