Wednesday was a challenge. My day began with some last minute packing early in the morning, then a 6 hour drive to LAX (I was far too broke to fly out of Phoenix). Luckily, we had some time to kill in LA before I had to be at the airport, so my brother and I cruised around LA awing the trees and the beach.
After a quick lunch, we headed to the airport, where I had to deal with a ridiculous amount of fees for my check on bags. Seriously, it should not cost $200 to check in luggage! I then had to say goodbye to my brother and escape from his prying (Sorry if you're reading this, and stop crying!) I had to go on to the security checkpoint all by my lonesome self and wait for my plane to leave. I was extremely lucky to have such a great plane ride. It was my first time flying on Virgin Atlantic, and I was very impressed. The plane was huge and had a sit down bar at the front, and beds to sleep in upper class!? Luckily, I had 4 seats to myself and was able to lay down. And not to mention, they had awesome movies on board, so of course instead of sleeping, I entertained myself the entire 10 hours of flight.
The whole experience didn't hit me until I arrived at Heathrow and went up to customs and had to fight my way into the UK. The Border Agency agent was hesitant to give me a visa since I don't have a set return date. I had to promise over and over that I would leave within the time allowance that my visa permits. Luckily, I was pretty good at convincing her, and I was finally given that wonderful little stamp in my passport, followed by a last minute evil glare from the agent.
Getting my luggage was a nightmare, but fortunately people took pity on me while I was trying to haul around three 50 pound bags and helped me out. And thanks to my awesome landlord, she had a nice taxi man with a huge sign with my name on it, waiting to take me home. My roommates were very welcoming and helped me settle into my new ikea filled bedroom. Seriously, every single piece of furniture in here is from ikea. Long live the Swedish. I began unpacking, but my lack of sleep overtook me and I fell asleep on my bed, without a blanket because of course, I forgot to bring bedding. Awesome right? My roommates had some friends over and I was introduced to everyone. Then we all ordered take-away, no, not take-out, it's called take-away here. Get on with it people. We had some delicious Indian food and hung out for the rest of the night.
I went to sleep fairly late, which was a big mistake, because I had to get up nice and early for orientation today. I got myself all bundled up and what I thought was prepared, however, half way on my walk to campus, it decided to start raining. It started with a drizzle, so I figured I could handle it. So I kept on walking slowly oooing and aaaing all the cute houses in my neighborhood. But sure enough, it kept raining harder and harder, until I was booking it to get to campus. It was a fun-filled, extremely informative and overwhelming kind of day. We had several presentations to attend to get us oriented around campus and to wipe off that lost puppy look on our faces we all had. Hopefully it worked, I might still have the look for another couple of days. I met my advisors and got my class "timetable" aka my schedule. (I've learned quite a bit of English lingo today)
My new friends and I walked to to Egham center in the afternoon (well it felt more like 10 PM since the sun had been down for hours already, I blame you AZ and your abundance of sunshine!) We had our first British pub experience. I must say it was quite awkward. I don't know if I have American written all over my face, or if I just looked completely lost, but everyone's eyes seemed to migrate towards us as we walked in. The staring continued, and it probably didn't help when we had to ask how to order food and what a "jacket" was (baked potato). After dinner we headed to the famous Tesco here in Egham. I had a long shopping list, with a duvet as my #1 thing to buy! After an hour of wandering around, I got some groceries and headed back home.
Seeing as I have to be up in 8 hours, it's time for me to hit the sack (that's super American, I need to learn the British way of saying that).
Greetings from Englefield Green!
Maggie
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