Over the Pond

My flights over from the US were long. As I was sitting in the Salt Lake City airport I began having second thoughts about the whole thing; it finally set in that I was going to another country by myself for 6 months. After my first initial shock, excitement set in. I'll never get the chance to be living this way, so young, so naive, ever again. I have an extraordinary amount of room for growth. After a couple last phone calls, I got on the plane to Paris and away I went, not putting foot on US soil for another 6 months.

I tried to sleep on the plane, but to little avail. I would have had an open seat next to me, but a tall man probably in his 40s was seated in the middle of two old ladies, and he wanted an isle seat, so I thought I'd offer. We chatted a bit, and he was a strong catholic and took his fatherhood to his two little daughters very seriously. We talked a little about fly fishing and a father's love for a daughter; it made me miss mine already : ) Instead of sleeping, I mainly just read the Inheritance (last book in the Eragon series). If you don't know, the Eragon series is about dragons. As I tried to sleep I noticed the airplane was almost pulsating, almost breathing, as a dragon would.  I couldn't help but look out the window and imagine I was on Eragon, in search of the rock of Kuthian and the vault of souls. I managed to sleep for a little while once the sky got dark, and I woke to the most beautiful sunrise shining through my window. Waking up to the sunrise is one of my most favorite things, so this made me really happy. I looked at the television screen/map tracker and saw that we were over Dublin Ireland and instantly smiled. The sky was beautiful and everything was at peace.

As we flew downward to land, Paris looked very...orange. The land was really flat, with buildings everywhere, and the smog looked kind of burnt. I noticed that all of the houses were in the shape of squares in contrast to our houses in the US. I got off the plane and prepared for my 5 hours in the Paris airport. I found my port with ease and tried again to sleep, with a little success. I felt kind of weird sleeping in an European airport because I felt like everyone was really proper, then here I was sleeping on the side chair. The plane to Manchester was the kind where you had to walk out to it rather than walking through a port-a-hallway thing. I felt like I was famous or something. As soon as I got into the airplane, I smiled as sounds of British accents filled my ears. I was on my way. A nice man sat next to me, but he was on his computer the whole time and we didn't talk too much. I saw the Eiffel tower from the sky as we left.

As we were coming out of the clouds to Manchester, the scenery was dramatically different. Green. Everything was green and hilly. The houses were still square, but they were somewhat scarce and bunched up into little colonies attached by windy roads rather than everywhere the eye could see. Everything looked clean and old. I got off the plane and went through customs. I met three girls maria, mariara, and sophie from Chile, and we found out we were all headed to Lancaster University. Their English was pretty good and we decided to travel together on the train. As I was going to the train station with two luggage bags and a backpack I needed to go through a thin little door/hallway, so I decided to make two trips rather than make it awkward for myself. It turned out the doors only allow you to go through one way. I was stuck on one side and my bag was on the other, so I waved frantically as people would go through in hopes that someone would grab my bag. The first lady just shook her head at me and kept walking after giving me a glare, but after a while a british guy about my age brought it through for me. I met the girls at the train station and they said they found the right train to get on (which was more like a subway than amtrak), so we got on it. We stood the whole way because we had a lot of luggage and weren't exactly sure what cabin we were supposed to get onto. After talking to some people, we realized we were heading in the wrong direction.

By this time it was about 6pm, so it was rather dark. The girls from Chile asked me if it was safe to be traveling this late, because it's usually not in Chile. I didn't know what to tell them, but it's not like we could just stop. We got off the train at the next stop and managed to talk with a lad in the train station to find out where to go. The stations are made of old stone with moss growing everywhere and the buildings look sort of like the ones in glacier park. There were literally no maps or lists of what port went where. We made it back to the original train station, or one really close, and figured out where to go.

We arrived to Lancaster and managed to get a Taxi relatively fast and cheap. The girls have me talk to everyone because they don't consider their english very good, even though I think it's great. We drove through the town of Lancaster and it was purely beautiful: old stone buildings, cobblestone roads, and left side of the road driving (although it was dark so I couldn't see much). The girls got out at their college, and I continued on to mine because it was further away. I had a hard time finding my college receptionist, but after wandering in the dark I managed to find it. The security dude led me to my flat and room and showed me how to open the doors ( there is a special key thing and a lock thing for every door). I immediately went to sleep on my bed without covers or a pillow.

I woke up at 1 in the afternoon and realized I slept half the day away. I took a shower and decided to walk around for a little while. I found a trail really close to my college that looks like it leads to a creek in a gully, and there were lush green bushes and vines everywhere alone the stone fences. I checked into the receptionist area because I was told to the night before, and I got my bedding and found out where to get some grub.

I just got back from a dinner with the international students and met a couple other students from the midwest who are studying here along with an Australian. We hung out for a bit, and tomorrow will be doing workshop things all day long. My jet lag has been going strong and I'm not sure I'll be able to sleep during their time yet, but I guess I have to try. My sickness has been gone for the most part, this morning I felt really weak and light headed as I was unloading, but that may have been because I hadn't had anything to eat or drink. Yes mom, I've been taking my antibiotics.