British English vs. American English

After two years of dating Mark I thought I was pretty well prepared in translating British phrases, but alas the language barrier is greater than anticipated. In the following list, some of these I learned from Mark while others I have recently picked up...
What British People Say... otherwise known as English (A dictionary composed by yours truly)

Jumper: n. an article of clothing resembling a sweater (not to be confused with the American translation of a dress worn by a young girl)

Cheers: This word has so many different levels of meaning that I think I have only tapped into the surface of its usage. It can mean thank you, you're welcome, goodbye, have a nice night... I am almost afraid to use it both because of my lack of an authentic accent and because of its multitude of possible translations.

Bap (spelling to be verified...)- n. a roll/ hamburger bun

Tyres- alternative spelling for Tires... thought it was a joke at first, you know how some stores spell quick market as Kwick market or something to be clever- apparently it's legit

Trolley- n. Shopping cart

Pants vs. Trousers: Pants are underwear while trousers are what we would call pants

Also, it appears the words pound (as in money) and quid are interchangeable... will investigate further

There are many many more phrases to add to the list, but this will have to suffice for now. To be continued.

Definitely not in Kansas anymore...

 My room the outside of our dorm building- this part is where the computer lab room is

 The street my dorm is onsome neighboring houses

the walk towards Brockley

for the life of me, cannot get this picture to load vertically...

Wow, to sum up my first impressions of my new life in London is no easy task. I was overwhelmed upon arriving with the thought of all that I had to do, anticipation over my program, and being on my own after a summer at home followed by a few weeks vacationing in Northern Ireland and Scotland with Mark. The area around campus is a very diverse area (though in some places a bit sketchy as we've been informed by local police that gave safety talks). Any type of ethnic food imaginable is within walking distance.
Among the Chinese and Vietnamese restaurants, Carribean, fish and chips places, and the blaring signs for "southern fried chicken" I realized how different this would be from my study abroad experience in Cortona.  I thought being abroad before would have better prepared me for living in a new country, but I realize now that my experiences in Cortona are in no way comparable to my experiences here. I wandered through the most idyllic Tuscan village imaginable with not a care in the world and had amazing friends from home to share it with. Here I am required to fend for myself much more, the thought of which was at first overwhelming in a place that I knew nothing about. Also, the post graduate lifestyle seems as if it will be a lot more independent than our weekly Saturday trips to equally idyllic small Tuscan towns.

I did not expect to be overwhelmed when I first arrived, but I am so incredibly thankful that Mark was here to help me out so much. Whenever I was worried or overwhelmed he would take care of it for me and helped me find my way around and carried my luggage (both my actual luggage and all my emotional baggage of moving in to a whole new place). We found diferent routes in the beautiful neighborhood (see pics above- a lot nicer than immediately around campus) I am living in, bought supplies, discovered a great restaurant/coffee bar (The Orchard- already becoming one of our favorite date spots) right near my dorm, and even had time to take in some of the sights of London to take my mind off of all I have to do here. I was so sad to see him leave this morning, but so thankful for all of his help. He even paid an arm and a leg without me knowing it so that he could stay an extra day with me and make sure I was settled. After a sad goodbye, I am beginning to try to tackle the long list of meetings and things I need to do this week in order to get settled. So much information is thrown at international students, but I do feel fortunate in the fact that English is my first language (though Mark would dispute this statement saying that I do not speak proper English)

St. Andrews

After our time in Northern Ireland, we drove to Scotland (including my first ever massive ferry ride- it was crazy, all the cars just drive right on to the ferry!) and spent a week in St. Andrews getting Mark settled. He has a nice apartment that he is sharing with his friend Tom and we had a great time going around town and getting him all set up for the year. Apparently I am a force to be reckoned with against small appliances. I kicked Mark's five dollar speakers accidently and broke them, and then I plugged in a hairdryer and blew half of the sockets in the house... luckily both issues were easily fixed after getting a hard time about my destructive tendencies from Mark. Along the way I was introduced to a British store known as Argos. As a comedian over here put it: Argos is the store that said "let's reinvent how stores work and all other stores will follow" and every other store responded "haha,  no." Look it up. It's like Ikea but all out of the catalogue. While in town, we met up with many of Mark's friends and threw a Welcome Back dinner for Mark. Mark was a little concerned about how we would feed everyone for the party, but luckily that is one thing us Cubans know how to do: feed crowds. So, I summoned all of the years of watching mother Teresa cook and we were able to pull off just the right amount of fajitas and rice and apple crisp for dessert! After enjoying our time in Scotland and celebrating our 2 yr anniversary, Mark and I were off for our long train ride with beautiful scenery of the British coast on our way to London.

(these pictures are actually from my last trip to St. Andrews, but I just wanted to show how beautiful it is there)

The long journey across the pond

The past few weeks have gone by so quickly, far too quickly to have actively posted on this newly created blog (especially given my spotty access to internet throughout my initial travels). After the long flight, I arrived in Dublin, Ireland at around 5am. Mark and his dad met me in the airport for an early morning drive through the Irish countryside. As I drifted in and out of sleep, I was able to see a beautiful sunrise over the miles and miles of fields (definitely understand why it's called the Emerald Isle). Driving through Ireland reminded me of all of the romance novels my mum (this is my attempt at using British spelling now) reads.
We arrived at Mark's lovely (another word used as often as we may use y'all) home in Northern Ireland. After a brief nap, I was up and ready to begin visiting with Mark's family. We went over to meet Mark's grandparents, Morenanny and Papa, who live next door. Morenanny and Papa are so welcoming, just like the rest of Mark's family, and made me feel at home right away. I drank tea... and no, not southern iced sweet tea... and ate a few too many sandwiches thanks to an attempt to put some meat on my bones, a concept all too familiar in my family. Mark and I then went to his Aunt Janet's house for dinner and met his cousins John and Emma. After a wonderful dinner and some great family stories, I was soooo ready for bed. It's so nice to go from my own wonderful family to the home of another wonderful family; definitely makes the idea of living abroad so much easier knowing Mark's family will be close by.

September 15th- The next day Mark and I set off to explore Belfast. We met up with Mark's friends Richard and Graham from Methody (his high school). Richard gave us a great tour of Belfast, including seeing Methody and Queens in Belfast. There is one street we passed that looks as if it is the front of a row of houses but actually upon further inspection is a row of building facades. Way back in the day Queen (Victoria?) was going to be going down that road but one side of the street was the backs of houses where people had there rubbish and backyards. This was not considered appropriate for the Queen to see the backs of houses, so a facade of house fronts was created and still exists today! We had a wonderful day in Belfast and the next day we were off to Scotland.