Everything You've Ever Wanted to Know About England...

Not really. Okay, so it's taken me a while to work up the energy to write about my trip to England but I'm gonna do it! It was a pretty interesting trip, mostly for the strange situations that we got into. We left at like 7 a.m. on Tuesday for the airport...wait, that's not strange OR interesting. Umm I went with a friend named Jan (for you Americans, that's like Yahn, it's a dude, not Jan like the Brady Bunch)..

Right-o, so we were about to go through security and Jan asked if I had the bag for his pasta. I thought it was really strange that he asked me to bring a ziploc for pasta the night before, but I did anyway. Later did I realize that pasta was actually paste, which is actually tooth paste. Aha! So I took it out, gave it to him, and he asked if I had a bag for MY pasta and toothbrush. I said no I didn't need one. He said I had to have one- it's a requirement- especially for all of my liquids... a rule I thought was a bit silly. We got through security with no problem after that, except as I was getting my junk out of the x-ray box, I quickly realized there was a picture of a realistic giant tarantula on the bottom. This made me die a little inside.

We boarded the plane and almost immediately heard the terrifying screams of a young girl, maybe 5, a few rows behind us. During our 2 hour flight, this little demon screamed like a banshee and kicked the back of the seat for like 45 minutes, like someone was torturing her! It was really disturbing. I lost my patience about 3 minute after her screams started, and had a really hard time not reaching back there and smacking the crap out of her. I considered giving her my iPod to watch Ice Age 2 but Jan told me not to.

We had to go through my favorite part of the airport, customs! I was excited to talk to officials who actually spoke English. Jan went through the EU citizens long huge line with the screaming kid while I went to the express "other" line. She asked me for my passport, so far so good. Then she gave me the 3rd degree about why I was in England and why I was living in Slovakia. She concluded it was silly for me to "give up graphic design to teach English". She obviously missed a part of that story. She asked me for my return ticket--which I didn't have-- then she asked for an address of where I'll be staying--also didn't have. She made me sit down and not say anything and I couldn't use my phone to get that info. Ok really long story really short, (cause this blog entry is becoming super long) she was SO MEAN to us and it took so long to get through customs cause she thought we were traveling backpacking terrorists. Ugh, stupid lady.


As we were rushing out of the airport to get the bus outside the terminal, I noticed a Starbucks (which has become a true sight for sore eyes for me). With my eyes on the beautiful green logo my body continued to keep running out the door. We got to the bus stop and realized our bus wasn't there yet. So with wide eyes and a giant smile I ran back in the airport to get my quad espresso over extra ice with a splenda (except they didn't have splenda which made the drink nasty) and a sweet mug I've been wanting for a while.

We boarded the bus, found our seats and were excited to see the English countryside. Very quickly I noticed that the bus driver was actually a retired race car driver and drove our gigantic tour bus like he did in the good ol' days on the racetrack. This, of course, triggered a relapse in carsickness. What makes the roads we traveled different from normal roads and intersections in the States is that instead of traffic lights, you usually have round-a-bouts. These are fun in a small car going slow, but not so much fun when you're sitting in the back of a bus going way too fast around about 89 of these in a row.


We got dropped off in Cambridge by the bus, except we totally forgot to a) print out a map of Cambridge, b) get Anya's address c) get numbers for a taxi and d) highlight the route from the bus stop to her house. Long story short, we ended up just getting a cab to our hostel. The cab driver informed us we were probably getting ripped off because they didn't serve breakfast. This definitely calmed my nerves. Anya came over and we walked to an Indian restaurant like 100 ft. from the hostel and then went to get a drink next door. As we were playing pool in a room in the back, these two teenage girls came in, sat down, and played pop music on the speakerphone of their cell. They sang along to them too, which was a lot of fun to listen to, especially after paying for the jukebox to play some of my own songs. Later they came up to us and were like, "Hey you guys are cool, can we have a picture with you?" Anya and I both wanted to say, "Look, if you want a picture with Jan we can just move out of the way."

For the next few days we spent a lot of time touring the beautiful sites of Cambridge. We saw some super old buildings, schools, statues, museums and shops. It was really nice! We also found this Cafe Nerro which was an English coffee shop chain of some sort- my mint mocha was fabulous. We also ventured the long walk to Anya's sister's house where she's living temporarily. We had a few lovely dinners there and enjoyed their super cute apartment. For New Years we went to their house. There wasn't a TV and I couldn't find a live London countdown, so I found a clock online and we had our own countdown. :)

Something I really really enjoyed about Cambridge was how much English was everywhere! How refreshing that was for me to just be able to ask people questions, get directions, and KNOW exactly what I'm buying at the grocery store. That was so nice for me! Except I kept saying "Dakujem" (Thank you) after buying something at the store, which I'm sure made the clerks a bit confused.


It was time for us to go so we made our way to the bus stop... except, what appeared to be a huge bus on the map, was actually NOT the bus stop as I had anticipated. We had just walked like 30 something minutes to get there. After asking a few people where the main bus hub was, we realized we were on the wrong side of town! Fortunately we had plenty of time to spare. As we walked to the real bus station I was kicking myself in the pants for directing us in the wrong direction--I hate that! While beating myself up, my camera strap unclipped and my camera crashed onto the pavement with a loud, CLASH. As time stood still watching the camera plummet to it's doom, I heard it squeal," ....nooo you dropped me you fool!" This made me feel even BETTER about myself!

We waited at the real bus stop for a while until it was time for Anya to go. Our bus was to leave at 6:40 pm. Well, it was 6:38 and no bus (usually they come a few minutes early). We asked a bus driver if he heard of any delays. She looked at our ticket and said, "You're at the wrong bus stop guys." Our jaws dropped. "You're supposed to be at **such and such** bus stop. That's like a mile or so down that way." Jan said, "BUT WE ONLY HAVE 2 MINUTES!" After an uncaring look from the driver, we took off running down the road in the direction she pointed with all of our luggage. We eventually arrived at another bus hub and we frantically started asking everyone which bus they were waiting for and if ours had arrived yet. No one knew anything and we were freaking out! Eventually we found out from someone that the driver was late and we were okay. We both just about collapsed with joy.


The drive back to the airport was even worse than the first one. Apparently there are more than one retired indy car racers in the English bus system. I wanted to throw up so many times, it was ridiculous. At one point I went to the bus bathroom (which is about 2 ft. x 2 ft. in diameter). I was thrown against the walls and window, making a huge racket as my head met the plastic walls--except the engine was so loud that Jan didn't hear it. So when I walked out, laughing, he didn't know why. As I went to sit down, the bus driver thought it would be funny (HA....HA) to sharply and quickly turn the wheel, throwing me against the window near my seat. GOOD TIMES!...not.


We had one transfer for our bus ride in the middle of nowhere. This was fabulous, especially since it was probably 20 degrees out or less, and we had to sit outside on a bench for an hour and a half. It's been a while since I've been that cold. Eventually the stupid bus came again and took us back to Birmingham. (This ride was better, as I sat in the front seat and watched Grey's Anatomy and cried a little when the doctor almost died...I digress...). We arrived at about 11 p.m., but our flight wasn't until 6 a.m. the next morning. The airport WAS FREEZING I tell you, unbelievably cold. We found a big half circle restaurant bench and tried to catch some sleep before the flight. At about 4 we got up and got our tickets. Our flight back was miserable. This stupid little kid wouldn't not crying (DEJA VU RIGHT!?!?), I was ridiculously tired, I needed a shower, the nosepiece on my glasses had broken so my glasses were digging into my nose, I was cramped in the seat, and Ryan Air thought that among all of this, I would want to actually hear their radio-style advertising about how great their airline is being blasted from the loud speakers into my ear. I almost lost it. Seriously.

Anyhoo we got home and I fell asleep at noon till that evening. I didn't mean for this story to be so dang long, but oh well. So you must be wondering, will I ever visit England again? Well, maybe. Here's my official opinion as of this morning on this day: I could live in England easily (except the whole driving on the wrong side of the road thing- sucky!), but honestly I don't know if I'll travel there JUST to travel, like, from the States. The reason is, when I think of traveling I want to see places that are really different from what I'm used to. That's what makes traveling so flippin' interesting! Living there would be a piece of cake, but traveling, maybe not. For the record, I'm really really glad I went! It was great to see Anya and spend time there, it was great to see so much English, and it was great to have a little adventure.