On Cellular Telecommunication Devices

Loo.  Biscuit.  Slip-road.  Bin.  Liner.  Lamp.  Trousers.  Full Stop.  Inverted Commas.  There's a whole slew of words that change between American English and British English.  I'm trying my hardest to learn the differences and cater to British English.  When someone holds a door open for me, I say "cheers" and when I hold a door open for someone else, and they say cheers, I say "ta."  I call "compost" "food scraps" and paper recycling "card."  Electrical outlets are "plug sockets" and after we have dinner, someone does the "washing up."

But the one thing I will not change, is that it is called a flipping cell phone.  Here, everyone else calls it a "mobile" or mostly just "phone."  I can deal with "phone."  "Phone" I can manage.  Slowly, with practice.  But whenever I forget my phone upstairs or at home, I inevitably say, "Oh shoot, my cell phone."  It's driving my roommate insane.  Every time I say it, Rob gets annoyed and corrects me.  I have informed him, to seemingly no avail, that I will make almost no effort to stop calling it a cell.

When I first arrived, I had a bit of a struggle with the phone situation, mostly because I was so sick upon arriving.  I didn't even really bother until the beginning of my second week, when I went to a shop called "Phones 4 U" and bought a fairly cheap, but supposedly still good Samsung Y.  The nice thing about this store is that they sell their phones unlocked, so you can put any sim card in.  Since I was planning on getting giffgaff, with which I can load a £12 plan giving me unlimited texts and data, and 250 UK minutes, this was the best option I had.  I spoke with the salesman for a bit, and settled on the samsung while my roommate ordered my sim.  It was going to be a few days, which was fine since you have to pay for a £10 top up (read: its a prepaid phone, you have to load it a bit when you buy it) when you buy an unlocked phone anyway.

Great.  I was happy.  I chatted a bit with the few friends I had already made, and burned through my £10 in the blink of an eye.

Then my GiffGaff sim arrived.  And thus began the drama.

In order to activate my sim, I needed a credit card with a UK postal code.  I tried changing my address on my credit card to my address here, but my credit card needs an address in the US.  I was still sick, so I sat on my hands and waited until Monday to open a bank account.

Monday rolled around, I opened the account, and the woman told me it would be about 3 business days until I would receive my debit card.  Great.  I tried topping up again with the first sim card, same problem.  I called them, to explain, figuring that if I got through to a sales clerk, they would be able to manually enter the information.  Except, in the UK, automated systems don't recognize "Moreno" as a surname.

Automated phone system: "Did you mean "Reynolds?"
Me; "No, I meant "Moreno"
Automated phone system: "We're sorry, we didn't catch that.  Just your surname, for example, 'Smith."
Me: "Moreno."
Automated phone system: "Did you mean 'Morris?"
Me: "No, I meant OPERATOR."

Which then led me to the problem that there were no minutes left on my phone, and I couldn't actually speak to an operator without minutes.

So I just waited, using the internet at my house and at cafes to check whatsapp and facebook until my Debit card arrived.  Finally, I loaded my sim card, figured everything out, and had an operating phone.  Sort of.

See, here's the thing that the salesman didn't tell me.  The Galaxy Y is a fine phone if you're texting and calling.  Not so great if you want multiple apps. Apparently, he didn't feel the need to tell me this, despite the fact that I had said specifically that I needed one I could run whatsapp on.  After a single day of using the phone with my new sim, it began having issues.  The memory card was full.  Facebook was seriously slowing it down.  Nothing was working.  I gave up, pulled the sim out, popped out the micro sim, and am now using my unlocked American Iphone.

Now to convince the phone people to refund or exchange my phone... this could be fun.

On School, Lectures, and Roommates

So this “term,” I'm taking three classes, which is a bit odd for several reasons.  Firstly, I have never taken fewer than four classes, at times even as many as six.  Secondly, all of my roommates are taking at least five, and those are classes that meet several times a week, giving them around eighteen hours of instruction per week.  I have eight hours of instruction per week.  Its nice, since the coursework will in general be a bit more difficult once exam time rolls around, but annoying because it means I have a lot of spare time and not a lot to do just yet.

Because of this, I have joined a two societies, the film society and the English society, though unfortunately they both seem to meet on Tuesdays at the same time, so we’ll see how long the film society manages to keep me. 

Anyway, I was talking about classes.  I'm enrolled, or “enroled” as they spell it here in Wales, in Arthurian Adaptations, Shakespeare and the Idea of Comedy, and Debating texts: Theory in Literature. 

Arthurian adaptations is the only class on that list that I requested, and it also happens to be the only class that I am not sure about.  The teacher is willing to cater to the classes requests as to what part of Arthur we look at, so it appears we will mostly be looking at origins which pertain to Welsh characteristics, the feminine, and supernatural aspects of Arthur legends.  The problem is, he doesn’t write lectures ahead of time, so he just sort of talks about what he knows, ad nauseum, while we frantically try to take notes that will later make sense to us. 

Shakespeare and the Idea of Comedy is supposedly about the origins of comedy and how they pertain to Shakespeare, but right now it seems to be mostly about several of Shakespeare’s plays. 

Debating texts is both the most difficult and possibly the most interesting.  We are reading three books for it, Hard Times by Charles Dickens, Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Wolfe, and (what I'm most excited for) Beloved by Toni Morrison.  Then, we have three sets of three lectures for each book.  Three lectures on Realism, three on Sociolinguistics (they say language, but its sociolinguistics, which is now the bane of my existence), and three on “Subjectivity” or the idea of selfhood and identity.  So far we have finished the linguistics lectures for Hard Times, and this week we will be looking at the Subjectivity in it.  Which basically means by the end of the week I need to have read all of Viriginia Wolfe.  Goody. 

In general, I'm happy with my lectures.  They’re between 50 minutes and two hours, depending on the class.  Mostly they are in the morning, which is great because it means I get up and actually use the day, although so far I’ve been pretty lazy.  This last week I finally dragged myself to the shops to buy things for my room, to make it seem a little more homey. 

But here’s the weirdest part about classes here: people dress up for them.  And I mean it- they really dress up.  They dress nicer for classes than I would for an evening out.  After attending Chico for a year, this is not boding well for my wallet.  I'm used to rolling out of bed, pulling on a tank top or a tshirt, a hoody sweatshirt, and a pair of jeans, but here, everyone goes all out.  Hair, makeup, skinny jeans, heels, sweater (or jumper), scarf, nice jacket.  The problem is, I own nothing but jeans and tank tops, and I don’t own any skinny jeans. 

So after a week of dealing with people giving my boot cut jeans dirty looks, I gave up and bought three pairs of skinny jeans, two cardigans, a few colored undershirts to wear beneath said cardigans, and a few nicer tops.  I also bought a pair of black ballet flats, a pair of heeled boots, a pair of grey platform heels, two necklaces, and two scarves.  The game is to now keep my eyes peeled for more tops, and I think I need one more jacket, something lighter than my coat, but heavier than my cardigans.  I think one more green or grey scarf and I will be happy.  Unfortunately, all this money spending means I have to skip my first excursion, so I don’t get to go see the wilds of Wales until next month. 

You're probably wondering how I'm doing everything while I'm over here.  Well, mostly I am on foot, which is why my legs feel like overcooked spaghetti noodles.  That’s what happens when you're breaking in three pairs of heels at the same time.  My toes are probably going to fall off soon.  But I’ve also had a lot of help from my roommates.

So here’s a bit about my house.  It’s three floors, six bedrooms, two bathrooms, with a tiny little living room and a tiny little kitchen and a truly disgusting backyard.  We’re fifteen minutes from the school on foot, a bit more than that to the city centre, and three minutes from the beach.  We have a washing machine, but no dryer and no dishwasher.  We take turns making dinner, so you really only need to worry about what you're making once or twice a week.  There are six of us living here as of last Thursday: Rob, Sasha (read as “Sash-uh” rather than “Saw-sha”), Ross, Jeremy, and Osa (the only other girl in the house).  Aside from Jeremy, who is also an exchange student, from Canada instead of the US, everyone is English.  I find it both fascinating and hysterical that during my study abroad year in Wales, I am living entirely with people who are NOT Welsh. 

We’re all pretty supportive of each other.  We do shopping together, they all help each other with homework since they are all engineering students, and we all cater to each others culinary needs.  There’s not really a lot to say about them, other than the fact that they keep their jam in the cupboard rather than the fridge, which is slowly driving me to insanity.  I’ve bought my own jam and put it in the fridge and threatened the lives of anyone who tries to remove it.  I am also quite protective of my Hobnobs, which are crumbly biscuits (read: cookies) covered in chocolate, which one dips in tea and eats until they are sick.  They are delicious, I am addicted, it is a problem.  I may need help. 

Other than that, things are going quite well.  I’ll be posting periodically from now on, but for the most part, I'm going to be posting after exciting trips and adventures.  The day to day minutae may get a bit boring, but I’ll try to find interesting things to tell you about.  In the meantime, if you have questions or want to know about something specific, feel free to put it in the comments!  I’ll try to answer as in depth as possible.  Pictures of London to come soon!

T-49 Days

Holy crap… did I just write that?  Forty nine days?  Really.  Excuse me, I’m going to go have a panic attack while screaming with excitement.

Nothing much to report, I’m basically in the inbetweens right now.  And by inbetweens I mean that I have submitted my visa application and my application for accommodations, but haven’t heard back from either.  But it had been awhile since I wrote anything, and for my fearless followers, I thought a bit of a progress report was in order.  

So that’s it, that’s my progress report… I’m waiting.  The progress bar is loading.  Give it two weeks, then we should be golden.  Provided I get a visa.  And accommodations… 

In other news, I got a job, so I hopefully won’t be nearly as broke upon arrival and might not have to feel horrifically guilty about the fact that I’ll be spending as much as I will be in London.  Yay!  I might even be able to pay towards my credit card bill a bit so I won’t be traveling abroad with massive credit card debt!  DOUBLE YAY!  

Just got a postcard from my friend who has been traveling in Scotland, so that was fun.  She gave me a few ideas about where I should visit while I’m there for Christmas.  And… yeah.  That’s about it.  Working, trying to get money, will hopefully have shoes to wear while I’m in London, which is currently the biggest thing I need.  Part of me wants to wait to buy them there so I won’t have to transport tennis shoes, the other part of me wants to buy them here so I know what I’m getting and how much I’m paying.  Also I want converse… Gotta rock the one good thing the USA is good at doing… even if we send out to china to get them……… oh America.  

I’ll check in again once I’ve heard from the Consulate about my visa app, or from Swansea about my accommodations.  

Until then, farewell my fearless followers, which I shall henceforth call you. Also I’ve been watching Jane Eyre.  Because Jane Eyre is amazing, and Michael Fassbender (Sp?) is beautiful and amazing.

T-79 Days; Seriously impatient now

I can't believe I wrote that it would be seventy nine days.  We are now in the seventies.  That is dangerously close to being the sixties, which is officially two months... I'm really not sure how that math adds up... though I realize that in my last post I thought it was three months until London, when in reality, it was three months until Swansea, and I was wrong about the hours.  But oh well, it was still an exciting day.

The countdown itself is until the day I leave for New York, so it's another few days until London and a week until Swansea.  So it's really more like T-79, 84, 87.

I've been having a lot of fun the last few days planning my trip to London.  I guess its one trip I had been planning on spending a lot of money on.  Maybe that's obvious, since I've already spent $230 on the hotel.  I know it would be cheaper to stay in a hostel, but I'm worried about being reachable in case my luggage is lost at the airport, and the risk of my luggage being stolen is exponentially higher at a hostel.  Because what I'll have with me on that trip is literally everything I'll have to my name, I thought it would be better to stay in a hotel on my first trip.  It's also because its a new city, new country, new continent.  I have never been out of the US before, save for a brief trip to Victoria in Canada once, and let's face it, that doesn't really count.  Since I don't know really what I'm doing, I think a hotel is definitely a better idea than a hostel.  Once I've gotten into the swing of things, I'll hostel until the cows come home, but until then, I'm living in luxury.

Aside from the hotel, I've been looking at attractions.  I had considered getting a London City Pass, or whatever its called.  Its basically a discount card that you can purchase for about £60 for one day.  The pass gets you access to the faster lines, and £90 worth of attractions, so if I was going to be going hog wild, it might actually save me money.  But I'm not really going to have time to get to £60 worth of stuff, let alone £90 in a single day.  So I scrapped that idea and have decided on one paid attraction for each of the three days I'll be in London.  In all, that brings my total to about £30 for attractions for the trip with about the same for food.

As far as where I'd like to go, I've almost definitely settled on Kensington, Natural History Museum, and the Globe theatre.  Natural History Museum is free, so I'm set there, Kensington is about £11 for students, and the Globe is £11 for the tour and £7 for standing room at a show.  I'll probably mostly just wander around near westminster and view it from afar, maybe stop by trafalgar square.  I had hoped to go to Camden Market, but it's just too out of the way for this trip, so I'll have to save it.  Of course, there are a million other things I'd LOVE to do but can't afford like St. Pauls Cathedral, The Tower of London, Buckingham Palace, Westminster, and the London Dungeons, but I figure I shouldn't burn a hole in my pocket too quickly.

Welp, that's about all I've got to share today.  I should probably proof read this, but I just can't bring myself to.  Is anyone even reading this?

T-88 Days, On Being Impatient

I have to very seriously ask myself what it says about me that the most exciting things to happen to me recently are these: 1) I now know that my tier-4 sponsor school is in fact Swansea and NOT Chico, and 2)I am now in possession of a money belt.

Of course, neither of these things mean ANYTHING to me for another month at the earliest.  I can't apply for my Visa until I have my CAS (conformation of acceptance to study), which supposedly won't be until July, and I'm banking on mid to late July.  My money belt doesn't really mean anything until I am hosteling it, since I don't even really expect I'll use it while I'm in London.  Maybe I'll use it just to prove that I need it.

I recently also acquired a copy of the Rough Guide to Wales, a jewelry roll, a foldable travel day pack, Rick Steve's Europe Through the Back Door, and a Streetwise London tube map which is about a third of the size I expected it to be.  In all, I'm doing pretty well for the things I need to buy, though I am beginning to think maybe I should have bought a rain shell instead of a jewelry roll and tube map, but in the end I'll need them all, the only difference any of it makes is when it arrives.

Mostly, I'm just sitting on my hands wishing I could be doing more to prepare.  I can't set up housing or apply for a visa or do any packing.  I'm horrifically impatient, but forced to wait.  It's unbearably frustrating.

In the meantime, I am making lists up the wahoo and making phone calls about selling my starbucks stock for a few extra dollars to last me until I get my finaid, or maybe for a bit of extra spending money in London (okay, let's face it, its almost certainly to keep me going until finaid gets here, but hey, a girl can dream, right?).  I'm also dealing with some, shall we say, less than brilliant people with the office, who has continually sent me angry emails claiming I have failed to submit a form that was most definitely submitted, forcing me to send several duplicates of the form until at last they sent me an email explaining that it was missing a certain signature stamp, which apparently they couldn't tell me the FIRST time it was submitted incomplete.

So I guess what I'll really do for the next month is troll an Amazon and keep a running track of all the things I can't afford.

T-107 Days; Money Matters

I’m a little concerned about some of the people I saw at the orientation as representing our country while they are abroad.  I realize that the US doesn’t have the greatest reputation in certain places, yet these people were showing up unprepared after a night of hard partying, talking about how they were dehydrated.  It seemed almost as if they were just sort of there on a whim, as if one morning they woke up and thought, “I wonder how they party in Marseille,” and they signed up to go.

My study abroad peer advisor is a bit like one of those.  Not NEARLY as bad, obviously, but a little.  A few weeks ago I got an email from the Visa Agency requesting that I make sure I have the adequate funds in my bank account for at least one month before applying.  Basically, when applying for a Tier-4 visa in the UK, you need to have enough money to pay your fees, which, with exchange, is about $7000.  I don’t have that much money, I have never had that much money, and, as I’m hoping to be a writer, I will probably never have that much money.  Hell, I don’t even know what that much money feels like, I’ve never even seen that much money.  And I doubt that any other student has, so I can’t possibly be the only student traveling overseas for year who doesn’t happen to have that much money just hanging out in their bank account.

So a week or so ago, I wrote an email to my peer advisor saying essentially that.  I figured there was some form I’d need to sign, or to bring in an official financial aid award, or some other little formality like that.  The poor girl, apparently she did have that much in her account, or more likely her parents did, and she had no idea what to do.  But rather than saying what I would have in that situation, “I’m sure there’s something, I don’t know what, but I can find out,” she said, “I have no idea what you should do about that… I’m going to have to ask Jenn and Steve (the people essentially in charge), they might be able to help with the specifics of your case.” My case… as if I was something special, something hitherto unknown.  And thus the panicking began.

How am I supposed to prove I have this much money? I don’t have this much money.  Best case scenario, I’ll have to lie.

And then BOOM my head exploded and I was sure I was going to be massively in debt and I have no way to pay for any of this and I’m in so much trouble how am I going to pay for anything and I just bought a backpack and I don’t have tennis shoes, but I need to buy a pair because mine are dying, but I can’t afford them.

And then I got an email from Steve saying that all I need is an official printout of my financial aid award and I’m fine.  Of course.  As expected.  I’m still going to be massively in debt, but at least I can pay for school next year.  Now I just have to figure out how to pay for the visa…