On Being Alive

I don't have anything to report, not really, so if you're looking at this and expecting a long in depth description of the nothings that I did while I wandered around in Cardiff on Wednesday, you can stop reading.  The problem is, I have again found the problem of having little to say about the trips I make.

Okay, so Cardiff wasn't meant to be a big excursion.  I didn't leave the St. David's shopping area except to go to the national museum.  And while that was interesting, there's not much to say.  It was a museum.  Better than I'd expected, not as good as the Natural History Museum.

I suppose the only thing to say about Cardiff really was that I thought it would be a good idea to wear Converse sneakers.  I figured it wouldn't matter, since I was only shopping, and I wanted to look a bit more fashionable.  Much as I love my sketchers, they're not exactly what one might call "fashionable."  So now I'm sitting in my living room, feet elevated, arches wrapped, wondering if tomorrow I'll be able to walk to the store and buy taco shells for cinco de mayo.  Such is life.

But I feel like writing a blog, feel like sharing with you the interesting thing that has been happening in my brain lately.

Earlier in the year I was staring some serious financial difficulties in the face.  Now, I am happy to report that I have saved enough to make, not only a trip to Germany to visit Lea, but also to stop in London and Paris along the way.  The tickets are booked, the hostel search has begun, and in less than a month I will be Europe bound.  It's more exciting than I can possibly put into words.  But it has also led to some interesting contemplation on my part.

For years I was sort of wandering through the education system, listening to teachers who liked to tell me that I wouldn't get anywhere, and maybe with the attitude I had, they were right.  But I wouldn't have had that attitude if I had more confidence, and constantly hearing about my continual failure wasn't exactly bolstering my confidence very much.  I was a dreamer, and dreamers have trouble paying attention to things they are told they have to pay attention to.  Sure, every so often we were given interesting books to read, poems to write, drawings to make.  I didn't hate all of school, but when a math problem was put in front of us and everyone else was determinedly scribbling away on their papers while I sat there completely baffled, I wasn't exactly a fan.  When the questions were about how George has ten apples and Miranda has eight pears and Bernie has six lemons, so how many sandwiches can their mother make?  And the answer is sixteen.  Just sixteen.  How the hell did they get that answer?  You can imagine why I struggled.

I went through school believing that, if I was lucky, I might snag a job.  If I was lucky, maybe I might marry rich.  Because if left to my own devices, I would be living with my parents until I died.

I finally dragged myself into an amount of self confidence at continuation school, where the teachers never once said I was a failure, even though I was literally there because I was a failure.  No, those teachers were the ones who smiled when I got confused and asked me to explain the problem as I understood it, and then help me to understand it properly.  These were the teachers who gave me credit for the work I wanted to do, the work I was good at, but still pushed me to do more, to do better, to do everything and anything, and who encouraged me to reach for something better than a job I could get, or marrying rich.  According to them, I should get a job not only that I could get, but that I wanted to get.  And marrying rich?  Really?  Don't be so prosaic.

Because of them, and because of the confidence they helped me find, I'm sitting in the living room of my apartment in Swansea, Wales.  I have a trip to Europe in less than a month, I have a manuscript finished, another started, and six more in my brain just waiting to get out.  I'm wearing a dressing gown I bought at Primark, and I say things like "naught" in everyday conversation.  I had a breakfast of a scone with clotted cream and strawberry jam (probably why I needed to go to cardiff in search of a new jacket, since my old, light weight jacket no longer fits.  Again, such is life).

Whenever I say that I owe this to my old teachers, people say I should give myself more credit.  And I do, I am not in any way saying that I'm not here because of me.  I am here because I have worked hard every day for the last eight or so years.  I am here because I put my nose to the grindstone, and though I've spent some time deciding what I want to do, I am here because I pulled my grades up and dedicated my mind to study and work.  I'm here because I believe in myself, and I would never have believed in myself if someone else hadn't believed in me first.  So do I believe that my 12th grade teachers deserve a bit of credit?  Definitely.

The thing is, now I'm sitting here and thinking about this trip I've planned.  I am going backpacking in Europe.  Not an extensive trip, but a trip nonetheless.  I'm in hostels for six days and on planes, trains, and automobiles (read: busses) for 36 hours in total.  I am twenty five years old, studying abroad, attending a real, big kid college, with international friends, running for president of an English Honours Society, have written a novel, going to write more, and going to be published (come hell or high water).  After a quarter of a century of being alive, I finally know where I am, and where I'm going, and that it's where I want to be and with the people I want to be with.  I have one best friend whom I love more than life, with whom distance will never matter, another best friend whom I love more than life, and with whom time will never matter.  I have a family that supports me, faith that strengthens me, a mind that will never fail me, and a hope that sustains me.

And now there's this little girl who pops her head up every so often and looks at this life.  There's the sixth grade me who didn't think she was worth it, who sincerely believed everything that witch of a teacher told her, and she sees these things that I'm doing, and she weeps.  Someone please go back in time and tell her how her life will turn out.

I am going to Europe.  I am going and I'm not looking back, not considering the money that I'm spending, the debt I'm potentially accruing because I know that it's worth it.  I'll return to my school and write my book and finish my degree and go to grad school and get a phd and become a professor and I am never, ever, ever looking back at those teachers and those jerks who used to say that I was nothing.  I wonder if they feel big, if they feel stronger for their criticism, if making themselves feel better and stronger than a small, lost little girl, has given them strength, and if by reclaiming my birthright, I am also reclaiming that strength.  I wonder if they'll see this blog and think that they've done right by me, convince themselves that all I needed was reverse psychology and that a drive to prove them wrong was what gave me strength to begin with, and in that way, they'll convince themselves that they had a hand in this strength that I've found.  On the off chance that they do read this, I want them to know that they're wrong.  That if it were up to them, I would be working at Noah's bagels in my home town, asking if they want lox on their bagel, or just a hefty serving of misanthropy on the side.

But I'm not.  I'm a student at a university in Wales.  I am a student at a university in California.  I am a student studying English, chewing Chaucer for breakfast and Chinua Achebe for lunch.  I write blogs and novels and poems and I speak with the strength I have found in myself and read in Maya Angelou, Sandra Cisneros, and Toni Morrison.  I am a person who is capable of standing up for what she believes in, then buying a ticket to Paris.  I'm a person who isn't afraid of failing anymore, you can't scare me with your threats, because failure is just a lesson and a lesson is just a day in this life.  Life is risks, and risks fail, and without those failures we never learn.  So let me fail, let me learn, and in learning, let me live.  I'm tired of just being alive.  I want to live.

I'm going to London.  And then Paris.  And then Berlin.  And from there?  Who knows.  But for now I'll look forward to that trip and imagine the days after it, when I will look back, smile, and remember that life is made up of moments and moments have to be lived.  So if you don't see me, look to the horizon.  I'll be there.  Don't worry, I'll write.

A London Advanture

People talk about falling in love all the time.  They talk about the way your heart leaps, the way that it flutters in your chest and the gut wrenching leap of excitement when you are given a surprise, albeit wonderful, moment of unexpected joy.  They talk about smiling all the time, the feeling of supreme contentment that fills you to the top until all you want is to sit and watch the world go by.

Twice in my life before now I have felt that rush, that thrill, of love.  The first time was with a boy a long time ago.  The second time was with San Francisco.  And now, now it is London.

Okay, so I literally just wrote a love letter about London.  That's weird.  Well, that's me.

In all seriousness, though.  I fell in love with San Francisco a long time ago.  I just enjoyed it, walking around, being surrounded by the most fascinating people from all over the world.  If for one moment I believed that I could make a life for myself in San Francisco, I would be back there in a heartbeat, searching for a house in the Nopa area, going for runs in Golden Gate Park, skipping rocks on Baker Beach.  But San Francisco and I were never meant to be.  And weirdly, it wasn't even about the money.  Sure, it was expensive, but I worked hard enough and I was focused and careful enough, so I was fine.  For one moment in my life, I wasn't concerned about money.  But for the love of all that is holy, I hated the people.  Not the everyday people walking past me, I loved them, irrationally.  I loved their stupid hair and their ridiculous clothing and their weird accents and bad smells because it meant that I was in San Francisco.  I loved them in the way that you love an ugly dog who bites when it's scared but cuddles you the rest of the time.  You love it because, on some level, deep down, it loves you too.

Well, I didn't expect to fall in love with London.  Not really.  I liked it well enough on my first trip, when I went to Kensington Palace and snapped photos of it from the open top of a tour bus.  But really, that was a view from the outside looking in.  It was like looking at a painting and admiring the landscape.  How lovely, you think, as you pause to gaze at it and acknowledge the work that went into it, and then you move on to the next painting in the exhibit, and you don't think much about each painting, you just let the overall effect of the thing rush over you.  Well, that was my first trip.

But then I went back.  This time I went with a friend, and this time I didn't take a bus tour, or wind up sick as a dog on my third day.  I also stayed in a much nicer hotel.  Don't get me wrong, the first hotel was nice enough, but for what I paid? Maybe not as nice as it could have been.

We stayed in Earl's Court, very near to the tube station.  It took a moment of remembering San Francisco and New York to get a hang of the underground, but once I'd figured it out it was cake.  The first day we arrived we settled into the hotel and set up our happy little Christmas tree.  Then we hit the shops.  Of course: London? That means shopping, right?  Well, it was raining and we weren't familiar with the area so there was a lot of wandering and admiring of the Christmas decorations and not a whole lot of actual shopping.  We did get to see Hamley's and Selfridges, even if we didn't really buy anything.

Then unfortunately when we started the second day we were both pretty exhausted, so it was a fairly lazy day.  None of the museums we were hoping to see were open and the Botanical Gardens were booked until kingdom come, so it was just off to Buckingham Palace where we got to see the tail end of the changing of the guards.  We were going to walk to Kensington from there (where did I get the idea that THAT was feasible??) but then this sort of downpour happened.  I don't think my friend appreciated it as much as I did.  To him it was just rain, whatever, get out of it for the worst of it, then move on.

But I was fascinated.  We were walking through Green Park when it started drizzling, and by the time we's reached Hyde Park Corner it was pouring.  I mean, it was a proper downpour.  Only, this was in London, so it was sideways.  My rain coat is only a short length, so I wanted to get out of it.  We made for a War Memorial, heads ducked against the onslaught, so I didn't immediately see what was inside.

For one thing, there was a war memorial inside, truly amazing with beautiful sculptures of soldiers standing on a plinth beneath an open sky.  Okay, there's one problem about what was inside, it turned out not to be fully covered.  There were pillars and a bit of a roof, but it was open in the middle, so not much against sideways rain, but it was good enough for a moment.  It was also freezing inside.  Unfortunately, it wasn't just the rain that was against us, but the air itself was frigid.

But there were also people inside.  The whole place was packed with other people sheltering from the storm, and in that weird way that we sometimes find ourselves connected to total strangers, here was this group of people from all over the world all sheltering together in a war memorial of all things.  And everyone was looking around, in awe of this mighty weather, of the extreme power of torrential rain, not only to soak you to the bone in icy water, but also to bring people together.

Of course, it was also a problem, because there wasn't much space for us to stand and anyway, it seemed silly to expect it to stop when the rain was predicted for the whole week.  So we waited out the worst of it and then soldiered out into the downpour again.  It took about two minutes more of walking to have me soaked to the skin from the waist down, and about a minute after that before the rain completely stopped.  Of course.

The next few days were still good fun.  We briefly saw a christmas market, shopped on Oxford Street some more, rode the tubes, ate at a pub.  Twice.

Christmas was good fun.  Once we got past the fact that everything was shut and nearly all the tours were booked for the day, we started making plans.  Even the tubes were closed!  We had to call for a car, which cost £25 one way.  Still, we went on a walking tour that went to several of Charles Dickens' most popular locations all while learning about his life and writing.  It was interesting, if freezing cold and a bit dull.  Then we went back to the hotel and had christmas tea at our hotel restaurant, which was surprisingly good, although the poor woman working didn't know what a yorkshire pudding was and referred to it as "a little pie," which was a bit misleading.

On boxing day we were misinformed that the Natural History Museum would be opened, so we decided to go there.  I was crushed when it was closed, but we decided to go to Sherlock Holmes instead.  Then on the way there we decided to swing by Kings Cross and see Platform 9 3/4.  So long story short on that front, London basically closes from Christmas Eve until the day after Boxing Day, because even the train station was closed.  Sherlock Holmes wasn't, though, so we went in that direction only to find a line as long as the street which wasn't moving.  Instead we went and spent tons of money on silly souvenirs and wandered down to Westminster where I bought a gargoyle and named him Watson.  He's on my bedside table looking so adorable I can hardly handle it.

After that we went on a Jack the Ripper walking tour which was sufficiently creepy, and much less cold than Charles Dickens, since I came prepared in layered stockings, four jumpers under my coat, earmuffs, a hat, and a tightly tied scarf.

That was basically the end of the London Adventure, to be honest.  My friend left for the airport around six-thirty in the morning and I went back to bed until ten.  Then I packed my bags and checked out with my eyes set on Natural History Museum and the Victoria and Albert.  I waited in line for NHM for about half an hour, but it was worth it in the end, although I missed the dinosaurs because the room was so claustrophobic and the line ridiculously long.  I knew if I waited I wouldn't get to see any of V&A, so I skipped it.

V&A was lovely, though I was so tired at that point that I was getting confused about what was where.  After about thirty minutes of aimlessly wandering I realized I hadn't eaten anything other than a handful of christmas candy, so I headed for the dining room and decided to have tea.  TEA.  In the V&A.  Earl Grey tea and a raisin scone with cream and strawberry jam.  It was delicious in the way that I could actually feel my coronaries constricting.  I felt so proper, sitting at my table reading my pamphlet and having my tea.  While I was walking it to the table after ordering, a woman pulled her daughter out of my way and said, "look out for the nice lady with her tea" and I just couldn't help but smile at the idea of having tea at the V&A.

Once I'd had something to eat, it was a bit easier to figure out how to maneuver the rooms and exhibits.  I can't decide if the Ironworks, the stained glass, the pond, or the ancient history room was my favorite.  I think probably the pond, which I cannot explain, but I'll post my flicker account once I've uploaded photos so you can see it.


The weird thing is, after all this, I hadn't actually done all that much in London.  Still, as I climbed onto the bus I knew that sudden and gut wrenching feeling, like I was being taken away from a lover.  There's no real way to describe it other than to say that somehow, somewhere in the day to day goings-on of my vacation, I fell in love with London.  I could see myself in a few years sitting at a Costa and writing or standing on a tube, fighting my way through the doors to the exit with the quiet background chime warning me to "mind the gap."  Of course, I won't, because in the same way that I know San Francisco and I aren't meant to be, I know that London and I aren't meant to be either.  This year is wonderful and I wouldn't change a thing. If I had the option to relive this last year, I wouldn't do anything different.  But I can't stand being so far from my friends and family, from California and San Francisco and redwood trees.  So as much as I love London, it is more of a winter fling than a deep abiding love.  I'll always remember my times in London with fondness, of the Globe Theatre and Oxford Street and walking tours.  I'll look back in fondness, but I will never regret leaving it either.

Anyway, I think that is about all there is to say on the subject of London.  I have several other blogs queued, so keep checking back.  I'll post when my flicker account is up and running with a link, so you can see all my lovely travel photos so far (spoiler: there aren't that many, since google+ apparently decided that it wouldn't actually upload any of them despite autobackup, and my phone crashed, so half my photos are just gone).

Until next time, my fearless followers!

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!