It seems in poor taste to start of
this account of my journey in England on a negative note but as I am writing
this first entry I cannot seem to think of anything else other than how cold I
am, and for anyone who knows me even remotely knows that I do not handle the
cold well. To put it bluntly if it is
bellow 75 degrees I am not a happy camper.
So, seeing as I am cold, less than
cheery and desperately trying to fight off illness I figured I would just
dedicate this first post to all my complaints about this beautiful country.
When I walked into my flat, yanking
my two massive suitcases behind me, I couldn’t help but be a little shocked.
The flat is on the older side and very reminiscent a camp I used to attend every
year with my Girl Scout Troop. The room is the size of my parent’s closet and
as one of my flat mates accurately stated, “This is like a real college. I
don’t like it.” However, to be fair, I do acknowledge that High Point
University has in fact spoiled me.
Despite the size of my room, the creaky
doors, and the string you have to pull to turn on the light in the bathroom I
have to admit the flat on a whole really isn’t that bad, especially once I got
some pictures up on the walls which made the room look a lot less depressing.
Back again on the negative side of
things, no number of brightly colored postcards can change the fact that the
flat has no heating. Don’t get me wrong; this flat isn’t straight out of the
dark ages. There are radiators shoved in every corner possible and even though
I have never been one for conspiracy theories I am convinced that there is a
man in a room laughing and saying, “I shall taunt them with radiators and then
never turn on the heat!” I am sure the man in the room gets an even bigger kick
out of the fact that to try and combat the freezing cold I tend to wrap myself
up in my blanket, go into the kitchen and then turn on the oven and sit in
front of it. I should really go out and buy a book of Sylvia Plath poems to
read while I do this to help pass the time while I desperately try and regain
body heat.
Before you look at me with raised
eyebrows and say, “Now Sarah, it is a widely known fact that England is cold
and rainy, you really should have been prepared for this.” I will combat by
saying, yes I did know England was cold and rainy what I didn’t know that was
that one week it would be a nice 75 degrees and then the next week drop down to
the high 50’s. I was not prepared for the weather to get this cold this fast; I
was expecting to wear shorts for at least another two weeks. This is not the
case. I have already become best friends again with my big, black winter coat,
which I haven’t even glanced at since January.
To be fair
there really hasn’t been a lot of rain. It seems England more likes to taunt
you with the idea of rain. So, basically for three days it will look overcast
and gloomy so you will bundle up, carry your umbrella around like a loser and
then it won’t even rain. You may think I am exaggerating by saying this but no,
I have a first hand account story.
What
happened was I needed to go shopping down in the city center because I wanted
to buy another blanket so I would not be so cold every night and one of my flat
mates had to top up his phone. When we left it was just drizzling out so I
thought, no big deal I will just put on my blue polka dot raincoat draw the
hood and I should be fine. I was not fine. The trip did not start out to great to begin
with. We got on the bus and that was fine, we really only had to wait at the
stop for about five minutes before it came but the second that we realized that
we missed our stop was when things really started to go down hill. I ended up
leaving my list in my room and because I have the worst memory ever I could not
remember everything that I had to buy so I just gave up on wracking my brain on
what exactly I had to buy. In a huff I just ducked into Boots, the British’s
version of CVS, bought make-up remover, mouth wash and gum, leaving as soon as
I could. Then it was the journey to top-up my flat mates phone. Now, because
Oxford is a big city center and there are ATM machines all over and of those
about half of them have this TopUp sticker on them. We stood at the ATM for a
good ten minutes trying to figure out how to TopUp with no luck and the line
behind us getting longer and more irritated. Giving up we just went in to the
Carphone Warehouse and just did it there. The entire day was cold and raining a
lot harder than I thought and the half hour that we had to wait under an awning
in front of a coffee shop for the bus to arrive did nothing for my mood or
impeding illness.
Contrary to
what the entirety of this post seems to direct you to believe, I do love
England. It just the weather, the lack of central heating, and the fact that I
am currently finding it extremely difficult to breathe out of my nose that is
weighing down my mood. It is beautiful here and despite the slight langue
barrier when I say certain things, which happens even in the states sometimes,
nothing here has made me even for a second wish to go home. To be perfectly
honest with you, I do not know how I am going to go home at the end of December.
