I'm Here!!

Well hi! I think I'm at a point now where I can take a breather and write to ya'll. Sorry it's been a while since I left. Things are going pretty well and I'll play some catch up to get us up to speed.

The trip went quite well. The whole Newark airport thing was mixed because I love flying but I knew saying goodbye to the fam was gonna suck…which it did quite a lot. But we won't go there cuz it makes me sad haha. But yea walking down to the gate (on the awesome moving ramp things!!) was difficult until I got to the gate and sat down next to an older British woman who was humming to herself! So cute! That cheered me up. Plus we started talking about the crying baby Indian boy & how babies sound so desperate when they cry, like the world is crashing down or something haha.

The flight was pretty uneventful. Quite long. I sat next to a couple from the Midwest who smelled severely of garlic powder, which made me worried haha, but then the woman apologized and said (without my prompting at all thanks) that they had meant to put on parmesan but mixed up the containers haha. It ended up that we had a seat between us so we all had more foot room and it was no problem. It was weird seeing a sunrise and sunset within like 6 hours of each other, but both were beautiful.

Sunset in Newark

Sunrise over Ireland (I think)

Once I got into Heathrow I made it through immigration without a hitch and got all my luggage within 5 minutes (I thought that was pretty incredible) and I met Lisa right away just as I was leaving Customs. Finding the bus station at Heathrow was a bit of a challenge, but Lisa had seen a map or something and knew that we had to take the airport train (that airport is HUGE) to get to the bus station, and we made it there with about 40 min to spare. Not a problem.

The bus was boring. About 2 and a half hours. Not really worth talking about except we were pretty excited and saw lots of cool cars on the highway while going in the wrong direction on the wrong side. Weird.

We got into Cambridge and off the bus to find a huge and beautiful green, and after some shuffling, much rearranging of luggage, and a stop for directions we found the university accommodations office. There we got our keys and they asked us whether we'd take a taxi or walk to the house. Looking at a map it didn't seem too bad, so we said we'd walk and they gave us directions. Note: If there's any question, TAKE A TAXI. It was WAY farther than we thought and with almost every bump in the sidewalk our wheely luggage toppled over. Kind of frustrating and most likely a very entertaining sight haha. But we did make it eventually, making a normally 20 minute walk into a 40 minute one. *sigh* oh well haha.

Then we got to the house, and it basically looked like the picture but once we got inside… whoa. Very VERY small. Like imagine a small row house, then imagine it smaller. We ditched our stuff in the opening hallway and scoped it out. Straight down the hall is a room on the right which would ordinarily be a living room but instead is a large bedroom, and straight is a very narrow stairway upstairs. A slight right from the opening hall leads to another bedroom on the right and the kitchen straight ahead, and a bathroom and half-bath through there. All very small haha. Upstairs, there's a slight turn in the stairs and if you go straight you find my room, left is Lisa's, and right are 2 more. The "rear garden" shown on the site plan we were given is more of a used-to-be-a-garden-a-long-time-ago-but-the-gardner-moved-away-10-years-ago garden. Which is ok cuz I dunno if we would use it anyway, but I was picturing like an English tea garden or the peace garden at LVC. We were pretty bummed out at the state of it, not being quite what we pictured. I don't want to complain, but being honest (since this is a blog) it was kind of disappointing.

While we were scoping things out we heard the door open and 2 of our housemates arrived: Frank and Julia from Germany. At that point we promptly got all our crap out of their way so they could come in haha. They had a similar reaction to the house but we let them explore it themselves and went shopping for some essentials (which was also an adventure). Lisa had heard that Asda is kind of like a British equivalent to Walmart so we set off to find it, which took some doing and some more asking for directions from a cute British lady at Starbucks.

COOL BRITISH PHRASE: "Cheers" People end conversations this way. While we were waiting for our bus these two guyfriends were saying goodbye and thanking each other for having such a great summer, and at the end of the conversation they said "cheers" and parted ways. So much happier than goodbye. So affirming. I might adopt it if I can get over feeling like a poser for stealing it.

Anyway this Starbucks enthusiast said "cheers" after telling us which direction to go. At Asda we found most of the stuff we wanted and headed to the checkout, trying to bear in mind that we had to carry all this stuff back. The kid in the checkout line was highly amused by our attempts to bag things appropriately and in a way conducive to carrying, and asked us about the
difficulties of being an American in Cambridge (of which we knew little since we'd honestly only been there a few hours). We hobbled out the door and made the long trek bag, all the while wishing we could've stolen a "trolley" (not cart) and that the milk (semi-skim, not 1%) wouldn't go sour.

When we got back we were unpacking and our other housemate, Johannes from Sweden came back. He'd been there since Monday (it was Wednesday) and another person from his school was staying at the YMCA (VERY common for Anglia Ruskin international students and MUCH closer to campus).

That night there was a Welcome & Quiz night at the Student Union Bar (yes bar haha) and we met up with Frank, Julia, Johannes, and the other students from their schools to see what it was about. The SU Bar, as it's called, is really cool—very colorful and modern-looking with glass wall-windows on one side and colored lights in the ceiling. That night was apparently Quiz night, which meant we had to break into teams and answer prepared quiz questions they had made about European geography, country capitals, flags, England trivia, movies, and sports. We tied for overall 2nd place thanks very much! Any by the way, I didn't order a drink cuz a) I was kinda scared to, not gonna lie; b) I'm cheap and don't wanna pay for something I may not like; and c) I didn't know what to get. Suggestions on mild and uncarbonated drinks anyone?

Now it's Friday and I can tell you more about what else has happened another day because this entry is very long haha. I miss you all!! Leave lots of comments and love please :)