Blogs from England, United Kingdom, Europe - page 1713

I have gotten up way too early today so that I could shower off last night’s fun. The club was awesome and it’s HUGE. There had to have been about 300-400 people there last night dancing the night away. They played really good music—a lot of mixes from the USA and some European stuff. In total I had a blast, apart from the inhalation of smoke from both cigarettes and machines. I had to have fun to partially lose my hearing because the music was so loud. (Kris you would have had a fabulous time and I doubt you would have lost your hearing.) It was well worth the 5 Quid (pounds) and they handed out cards to go back any Friday or Saturday night for FREE with 3 friends!! It truly is a different university ... read more

After 2 flights of boredom, we arrived at Heathrow Airport at 5.50am on Sept 21st. In Kuala Lumpur Amanda got searched whilst checking in for our flight to Heathrow, though obviously had nothing on her. Takeoff, landing and turbulence are fun, whilst cruising is quite boring. England is very different from Melbourne in some ways, though very similar in others. Major differences are the speed limits (much faster here), the width of the streets and the supermarkets (they sell everything!) We went for a walk down the street to the shopping area yesterday and found that despite popular opinion they do sell Milo, Cadbury, and Vegemite in the shops. On the way back we saw a car accident but luckily no one was hurt. We’ve met most of the family now (I think) and they are ... read more

I told Jim I'd set up this blog, and he looked at me like I was mental. Apparently spending ten minutes in an internet cafe every few days is a serious waste of time. This from the man who searches all the souvenir shops for 'the best' fridge magnet, everywhere he goes. We had a new flatmate move in last night. He's been to some of the places we'll be going to soon, so I intend to freak him out with a million questions before we leave. Meeting HG later to discuss our London Film Festival options. This is a serious business, and may require more than one gin & tonic. So far I haven't seen anything in the programme to rival Napoleon Dynamite, but you just never know. Out with Roke tomorrow night I think. ... read more

I feel like I'm just living in London now, but I guess I *am* still a visitor, so I should probably tell everyone at home what goes on here. I've just spent some days shepherding Ange around the city, and have decided I could never be a tour guide. Tourists ask too many bloody questions. I had my standard defence worked out pretty quickly though; every time she asked what some building was, and I didn't know, I just said they were offices. Her trust in me may now be less than absolute. We had a good time though, and I'm a bit envious of her seeing London for the first time. I remembeer what that was like, and it would be nice not to be jaded about it again. I do still love it though, ... read more

Today we got up again and were fed a pretty boring meal. It seems like breakfast is going to be horrible here, so it’s a good thing that I’m feeding myself. At least today we had some porridge or oatmeal which wasn’t too bad. However, if you are one of those people that don’t like breakfast, you’d probably do just fine in England because the fare is pretty bad. After breakfast I headed over to try and get on the internet. I got there a quarter till when it would open and waited in a huge queue until half past when it was to have been opened because nobody was there to give us the login codes. One guy hacked into it and checked his email then left. He refused to tell anyone around him how ... read more

Hi Folks, Having talked to Australian friends here in the U.K, apart from the obvious, Sunshine and great beaches!! & the kookaburra chorus in the morning, there are an amazing array of food stuff's that they really miss about home while here in the U.K, here are just some of them, the list is endless: Twisties (cheese only), Cheezels, Burger Rings, Cherry Ripe, Tim Tams, Nutri-Grain (crunchy cricket bats), Pavlova with passionfruit pulp, French onion dip (made the Aussie way), Aussie bacon, Large beef sausages (not the piddling sausages we have) and T bone steak on the barbie, Samboy chips, Aeroplane Jelly, SAO bicuits, Iced Vo-Vo's, mangoes (the Bowen variety) , watermelon, pineapples (apparently they have huge ones!!) whiting fillets in beer batter, etc! etc! I have been asked to try all of these things when ... read more

Today they fed us breakfast which wasn’t the greatest, especially since no fruit was available. We then did a whole lot. First we took a very incomplete and hard to understand/hear tour of Nottingham University Campus. It was somewhat informative if you were able to hear what the tour guides were saying. Then since we were on our own for lunch, a group of us (4 Americans, 2 Aussies, 1 Venezuelan and a Mexican) headed to the bus stop to catch a ride into the city centre. We then split up a bit and ate lunch, explored the city a bit, the shopping center called Broadmarsh, and checked out phones. I have to get a new phone it looks like because mine is not compatible with SIM cards. Then as we wandered back towards the bus ... read more

Well here I am less than 48 hours from departure and despite my best efforts to be ruthless and travel light (a new concept to me) I still can't fit everything in my bag. I'm sure this will come as no surprise to anyone that even vaguely knows me! The problem is, I need all this practical stuff like sleeping bag, water purification kit and sleep mat, so there is no room for my hair straighteners! Whose idea was it to go camping?! Well I'm feeling a bit nervous now and sad to be saying goodbye to my family who have been fantastic, putting me up (and putting up with me) since I came back from doing a ski season in France earlier this year. But, there's no going back now and I am excited about ... read more