Sliding inevitably into winter

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Hello everyone.

I've had a few recent reminders that my blogs have died off since I've moved to London. While London is still new & exciting for us & we are doing loads of touristy things, I must say that it's not as interesting writing about work than some remote village or getting nearly run over by 8 million motorbikes (Ho Chi Minh of course).

I really enjoy the 'slices' of life that a couple of friends have provided in emails and letters - as they remind me that everything is going along so nicely at home. So in return I'll endeavour to give you a wee insight as to what it's like over here.

The bad news here is that I think we have seen the end of our wonderful record breaking summer ;-(. It's getting darker earlier and earlier and this weekend I had to wear a light jumper over my t-shirt around the house. It seems as it's all downhill from here - long, dark nights, cold, gloomy days. Oh well I think we'll be attempting to slow down and have some relaxing evenings at home & the odd night out at a cosy pub or restaurant. Hmmm, sounds nice!

·t is a bit different being over here as we're trying to combine being a tourist with working. What that really means is the usual hard slog Monday to Friday (including about 5kms walking each day to & from the tube & work) followed by a weekend of exploring / driving / training around the countryside exploring new towns & tour sit spots. We normally return home exhausted on a Sunday night in time for another week's slog at work.

Two other differences that I've found are both related to the fact you're away from your family and many friends. This means that the friends you have and make over here are more like family - and you make a lot more effort to see people. That is lucky as without cars you rely on public transport - which means that friends who are not far as the crow flies are one and a half hours each way by train. Chris, my brother, is over two hours away by tube (and it's no better if you drive as the traffic makes it even longer!). Good thing we push ourselves harder than at home to catch up. Pity that public transport shuts down between 12 & half past and if you haven't sorted out a night bus you're facing a minimum £20 ride home.

The second difference is that as well as being a destination in itself London is the jumping off point to Europe and beyond. So somehow, at some point every person you've ever met in your life turns up and needs a bed for a night or 20. Actually it's really fun, until they overlap & you end up with people on the floor & come home from a hard days' work to cook & clean for an army. At least it feels like that sometimes.

All that touring, socialising and taxiing home starts to get expensive when the (unverified) kiwi rule of thumb is that you earn half here what you were earning back home - so $50,000 NZD equates to £25,000. And with rent and property prices being dollar for pound (although of course the accommodation here is way colder, smaller & with just about no outdoor living whatsoever) and London just being shown as the most expensive city to live in in the world we are not saving nearly as much as we had hoped. Oh well, we are growing enormously (no I don't mean literally here guys - don't get your hopes up about fat or babies just yet) in so many ways - and learning so much that it is time and money well spent.

All in all we've loved our first (nearly) six months in London, but have found we haven't stopped for a breather. So are looking forward to taking it a lot more easily over winter. A lot of people say that it's really hard to begin with, but as we were both lucky enough to have a lot of friends already over here, good jobs very quickly & a great place to live in (plus being able to shack up with Chris & Ali until we got ourselves sorted - thanks so much guys) we feel like we landed on our feet. I think having come through Asia for three months first meant landing in an English speaking country with a shared history felt a lot like coming home.

Brendon's parents & Nana - she's 78 and managed a few days in Vegas by herself on the way over here and a month touring England, Italy & France with her daughter & son-in-law incredibly well - flew out on Thursday. We had a neat time catching up with them between their sojourns & enjoyed visiting Portabello Rd markets, Stratford-Upon-Avon & Oxford with them. Even better, I took last Monday off work & spent it with them in the hire car (what a luxury - not having to carry groceries home 1.5 kms each shop!) at the first shopping centre I've been to over here! We are now proud owners of a TV (we didn't need it over summer as we were never home but it's just in time for cold winter nights & staying in), speakers for our computer (so we can play all our music at last!), a wok, stock pot, George Foreman Grill (woah ha!), lots of little basics we were missing plus a digital box that gives us access to 700 channels.

The Reid's first arrived at the beginning of September, popped off for a week around SW England, came back for one night, then went on a tour of Italy & a few days in Paris. They arrived back from Paris last Friday night & were pleasantly surprised to find one of their best friend's son, Bryn, and his lovely gf Jodie, staying with us. Bryn, born in England, went to school with and played rugby with Brendon from the age of 13 and left NZ for a stint in London short after he & Jodie attended our wedding. Unfortunately they just returned from their summer holiday (5 weeks around Italy, France, Croatia, Switzerland etc) to find that Jodie couldn't work here any longer & had to book a flight home. Well at least Melbourne, she couldn't face giving up on her dream & going to little 'ole NZ so easily. Bryn decided to try & stick it out here for another 6 months before going to join Jodie in Aus. He needed a smaller flat and ended up in a bind with nowhere to stay for a week between flats. So they came & stayed with us, which meant my Cousin Keith who was already staying with us prior to his starting a post grad degree at a Uni just out of London had to move into sofa bed n the lounge. When the Reid's came it was Brendon & mine & Bryn Jodie's time to move out into the lounge as although they insisted they could sleep in the lounge we didn't feel it was right & preferred to give up our beds. Hmm four people, one double sofa bed, 1 single airbed & some cushions on the floor led to a sleepless time for all.

As an aside I am still completely hung up on the fact that I've just realised Byrn & Brendon could be brothers. Not convinced? Check out Bryn & Jodies' site: http://pic1.piczo.com/brynienjods/?g=25400886&cr=1
Scroll half way down the page, ignore those fould pics of me & you'll see Brendon & Bryn posing the same way as each other in every shot. The one of Brynie shaving his hair looks so much like Brendon even Bryn's dad thought it was Brendon. No wonder we used to get tehm mixed up on the rugby field. The other people in these pics are Bryn & Jodie of course, Bryn's sister Kristy (who's just returned from working in orphnages in Namibia!) and her bf Dan.

IT is true about the English drinking more here. Any excuse and they're off! TO make matters worse, Brendon & I started a wine course on Tuesday nights. It is a lot of fun, but imagine my surprise when I found out we have to consume six different wines each night. And normally you do have a glass of each one, once you've compared it to the other wines & each food type you're given for the food matching. The 'teacher' doesn't bother handing out spittoons any more as he said no one ever uses them. Phoaw! Quite a weird feeling on a Tuesday night! Not as much fun on a Wednesday morning.

Unfortunately this wine course coincided with my school reunion. Yes, can you believe it that both Brendon & I have had school reunions over here? There really was no contest really. Wine was the winner on the day. A large part of me wanting to attend the reunion was to catch up to friends I had lost touch with over the years. And with bumping into Sarah Donald (friend from St Cuths) in the street the week before the reunion I got to catch up with probably the main person I wanted to see - and catch up on everyone else's news via Sarah. We've since caught up again & I've found out what she's been doing over the last five years (working incredibly hard) and that Bridget & Julian (do you remember them from uni? Bridget was with me at St Cuths right from form 1) have finally got engaged & are traveling the world before getting married & moving to Cayman Islands to work!

Speaking of bumping into, we went to an 'underground' party the weekend before last, where the theme was - you guessed it - dressing up as part of London's underground system. It was great fun & people were very creative - we had Bakers from Bakerloo, Angels from Angel Islington, some tennis types form Wimbledon, including a lot more obscure references and even a Shepherd with a hair patch 'down there' (Shepherd's bush) and a 'chalk farmer' from Chalk Farm. Not only did I run into another ex St Cuth's girl who was to be attending the reunion, my ex neighbour Jeremy bounced up the stairs at about midnight. Hmm, small world.

So this weekend we've tried to really take it easy. And apart from Jodie's farewell on Friday night ;-(, we've 'stopped in' as they say over here. Cleaned up the house, caught up on washing & filing, generally chilled out. I've just returned from my regular run to nearby Tooting Bec Common - a beautiful huge park that makes you feel like you're actually out of the city for a while.

Anyway, hope you liked that little pic & watch this space for further updates.

Love to all

XX Claire

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