Friends! in Manchester and Wales

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I’d been promising to visit my Manchester friends the entire time I was in Spain, and I finally made it! It’s an unpopular opinion among Americans, but I didn’t really care about visiting Britain. The trip, though, did serve the dual purpose of seeing friends and leaving my heavier bag there to pick up on my way home 5 weeks later.



How did my friends inaugurate me to England? We went for a “typical” English dinner of Indian food, of course! It was excellent! Then we went to a pub for drinks to continue our catch-up.




I was only in-nation from Friday evening through Monday afternoon, but the guys were working Monday, so I really just had the weekend with them, and I only had Friday night and Monday in Manchester, because we were headed to Wales Saturday and Sunday!



I didn’t see a lot of Manchester on Friday night, but what I saw was shockingly similar to places in the northeast US. I know we’ve shared a lot over the years, but I didn’t anticipate the similarity in architecture. There were lots of buildings where I thought, “That would fit right into Pittsburgh.” The difference is that in that area of Manchester the building styles repeated with little variety for blocks and blocks. In the US, there tends to be more variety in housing styles. Of course, there were also some of the more traditional stereotypical English stone buildings, but not too many.



Their driving on the left side of the road was also pretty unsettling. As a passenger in the front seat it’s jarring to not have control of the vehicle, and I often had anxiety about being on the wrong side of the road (which is the right—read: correct—side there). It’s also risky to be a pedestrian. Even though I tried to be focused, sometimes out of years of habit I’d look the wrong way before crossing the street. They also have their walk lights angled towards cars and not people, so it was a little hard to tell when I could cross.



On Saturday morning we walked the dog around Platt Fields Park, then we started our drive to Wales, which is only a couple of hours from Manchester. The further we went into Wales, the hillier and greener it got. It wasn’t really forested, but covered in grass, mossy rocks, and some low brush. It’s true—there were a lot of sheep too!



We stopped in a town called Conwy on the way. It’s a cute little touristy harbor town full of stone buildings surrounded by a medieval wall. We had a nice time walking around and went up on the wall a little. We didn’t tour the castle, which was more money than we were willing to pay, but we did get fish and chips for lunch. It was good, basically exactly what you’d expect, just . . . lacking in vegetables or colors other than tan. My friend ordered a side of mushy peas, which I guess would have helped?



After that stop, we headed to our accommodation, a little outside the village of Dolgellau. We dropped off our bags and headed to town. I convinced them to walk because it wasn’t that far, plus then we wouldn’t have to worry about DDing. It wasn’t a terrible idea, but the road was narrow and curved, so we could’ve been in the path of vehicles if they’d come along.



The town, although also very cute, didn’t have a ton going on. It did have 4-5 bars, all of which we visited on our afternoon bar crawl. It was another beautiful day, and we made the most of it enjoying drinks in the sunshine. It had been a culture shock hearing lots of English everywhere, almost too much interference after rarely hearing native English speakers for the last two years, but this changed in Wales.



Although I’d heard Welsh wasn’t that common, most of the town of Dolgellau seemed to speak it. And sometimes it took a few seconds to realize they were actually speaking English because the accent wasn’t familiar. They must get some tourists there, but the vast majority of customers seemed to be locals hanging out on a Saturday afternoon. It at times felt a bit uncomfortable as outsiders.



We eventually decided to pick up some food from the grocery store for dinner since the restaurant options were almost completely reserved (it surprised us too!). The guys vetoed my vote to walk back, and we instead found out that there was one taxi that ran in the town. After he understood where we were (we still don’t know how to pronounce that town name), he agreed to take us the mile up the road. Well he didn’t turn the meter on, and I guess we didn’t think to ask him how much it would be. I don’t remember the amount, but it was safe to say we felt thoroughly scammed. I get that he probably doesn’t get that much business, but really! The three of us actually had a negative taxi experience in Korea before too!



The next day we wanted to do a nature adventure nearby. We finally decided on the Precipice Walk. Unfortunately the clouds were ominous. I, unlike my companions, was prepared with a rain jacket, scarf, and water bottle. We had maybe walked 15 minutes when it started to drizzle. We kept going but I gave up my scarf to one of them. We went a bit more before the real downpour started. Luckily, we found some trees to take cover under for the worst of it. It was a beautiful walk, but I wish we’d had better luck with the weather.



We headed back to Manchester, a bit sleepily because of the cloudy day. On the way, we discussed what to make for dinner. Yes to Korean food! But it wasn’t just some Korean food. We went overboard! We probably spent two hours cooking, and it was wonderful. We still had some sunshine left after dinner, so one friend and I went on a walk to get ice cream.



When we got back, the other friend was watching the Manchester benefit concert. This was a little over a week after the Manchester attack outside the Ariana Grande concert. Although the city had sprung back quickly, it was easy to get teary-eyed thinking about the victims and their loved ones. To recover, we drank wine, ate ice cream, and put on some Korean face masks. It helped.



Monday morning, I hugged the guys goodbye before they went to work. Then I relaxed a bit and planned what I wanted to see in Manchester. It was a pretty ugly day, so I wasn’t incredibly inspired to go out exploring. Finally I got my act together and decided to go to the Whitworth Art Gallery. But once I got there I gained motivation to go downtown. I climbed up to the second floor of a double-decker bus (bought a 4ish pound ‘day-rider’ pass) and headed towards the center.



Downtown, I wandered around a bit, again surprised by the resemblance to Pittsburgh (but without skyscrapers). The buildings there tended to feel grander than Pittsburgh, more historical. It rained rained rained all day. I went in the ground floor of the town hall, which is pretty, then I headed over to the John Ryland Library. It was free and interesting. I also walked through St. Ann’s Square, where they’d placed memorials to the victims of the attack. After that bit of tourism, I had to go back to my friends’ house to pick up my bag. I was headed to Croatia!



Some culture differences from my few days in England/Wales. First, as I mentioned before, I wasn’t used to being surrounded by so much English. I still had some ingrained Spanish language habits. For example, I accidentally said “Perdón” instead of “Excuse me” when I almost bumped into someone. I also had problems in English. I felt stranger speaking English with an American accent in England than I felt speaking Spanish with an American accent in Spain. I even started to inject more English intonation into my accent without meaning to.



The Mancunians I met really seemed to be a friendly group. They seemed to be very polite in how they phrased things, and they also seemed to just chitchat with strangers, if the bus is any indication. I think Manchester is one of the most diverse places I’ve ever been. I knew ahead of time that they have the Curry Mile, a long stretch of road with Middle East businesses, but the city itself really seemed to have lots of people from around the world. It probably makes me seem pretty “small-town”, but I don’t know if I’d seen women with hijabs working before. For Manchester not being a huge city, it’s really got a lot of different cultures. I can see why my friends have decided to settle there. I’d go back eventually to spend more time in the city, and I’d like to do more outdoor stuff in Wales. Next time!

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Comments

[Home and Away]

Thanks for posting...
and I love Croatia so can't wait for those blogs!