I have now been out of the states for a week and I am getting settled into the Welsh lifestyle. I will start from the beginning....
The flight was great, and I slept 6 of the 8 hours, so that was nice. Once arriving in London, it took me about 3 hours to make it to my hostel by subway (which was definately not 3 hours away from the airport). Stupid, stupid luggage. The subway system is really nice and easy in London, but not when you have a huge backpack, along with 2 huge suitcases, because you have to get DOWN and the back UP from the subway. So I would leave one suitcases at the bottom and carry the other up, then go get the other suitcase and carry it up the steps. It was a lengthy, frustrating process. Everyone was extremely nice and patient with me though. There were even 3 different people that offered to carry one of my suitcases up the steps, so that was really helpful! London is a busy, fast pace city, but the people there still have the generosity of southerners back home. It is awesome! So I made it to my hostel which was nice and located next to a beautiful park right in central London. I got to see the Picadilly Circus area, which is like a mini Times Square. It was awesome! But also very busy.
The next day I woke up, and needless to say, I took a taxi to the train station. I was not brave enough to do the subway again with all my luggage, and the extra few pounds it cost was totally worth it to me. The 3 hour train ride was great and flew by because I slept about half of the way. I did get to see the countryside while I was awake and it was covered in snow and beautiful! Once I got here I took a taxi again to the Student Village, where I will be living for the next 5 months. I came into my house, and everything was dark and there were a lot of doors, which I had no idea where they led to obviously. So I walked up the steps until someone heard me and then I met a few of my house mates. I met about 4 guys, which were all really nice but I couldn't remember their names or where they were from or anything, I just knew that they all had really cool accents.
Over the next couple days I met the rest of my house mates, and as far as I know there are 5 of us girls and 4 guys, with a grand total of 9 house mates! We all share one kitchen and there are 2 bathrooms. Honestly, I think for that many people this place is fairly clean (way cleaner than when I lived with that many people at the river). I have hung out with my house mates a few nights and normally we are all in the kitchen eating dinner together. They are all really nice and helpful if I ever have any questions. I have met so many other people too, just through where I live and at school. I have even met a few people from UT who I didn't know back in Tennessee.
I finally started school yesterday and that was great! I am taking two class, but it adds up to be 12 hours of classes back home, so that is pretty cool!! I am signed up for 3 classes right now, and this week I am going to all of them and decide which one I want to drop. I am going to be taking one English and one Geography class. The class I went to yesterday was a 2 hour class studying Welsh writers throughout it's history, it was a great first day. My teacher is bilingual in English and Welsh however, so he is extremely hard to understand at this point for me. The Welsh have a much stronger accent than the English, it is wild how much harder it is to understand them. I think it will get easier with time, but yesterday in class I took notes and listened, but I probably only truly understood half of the lecture. The teacher was very nice though. And something really cool, he gave us our book. He asked for 1 pound in return. They must save so much money on books compared to UT students!
Oh yeah, before school started on Monday, me and 2 other Americans went to check out the Gower Peninsula, which I think is in the list of top 10 things that must be seen in Britain. It was Sunday, so the bus is not as frequent, and we are all still learning the public transit system around here, so we just decided we should start walking. We ended up walking to the lighthouse in a town called Mumbles, which is around 6 miles or so away we were guessing. We made it there and then we found all the hiking in Gower and it was sooooo beautiful! We saw the three cliffs area I believe, we weren't really sure where we were or how far we had gone, but we knew it was gorgeous! The beach is right across from the school and is so nice as well, and there is much more hiking to do in the area we made it to, but we wanted to get headed back before dark, so we had to say goodbye to the nice hiking trails over looking awesome cliffs on the beautiful beach. We saw a rainbow on our way out, and we could see both ends and it was really bright! It was so awesome! That is an area that I think I will be spending a lot of time hiking around at (but next time I think I will catch the bus there haha). We got a bus back to campus after returning to the town of Mumbles, and then walked back to the Village, which is about 3 miles from campus. We all decided we had walked well over ten miles that day, but it was totally worth it!
Everything here is beautiful, and the people are extremely nice! I am excited about everything to come in the next 5 months!
The flight was great, and I slept 6 of the 8 hours, so that was nice. Once arriving in London, it took me about 3 hours to make it to my hostel by subway (which was definately not 3 hours away from the airport). Stupid, stupid luggage. The subway system is really nice and easy in London, but not when you have a huge backpack, along with 2 huge suitcases, because you have to get DOWN and the back UP from the subway. So I would leave one suitcases at the bottom and carry the other up, then go get the other suitcase and carry it up the steps. It was a lengthy, frustrating process. Everyone was extremely nice and patient with me though. There were even 3 different people that offered to carry one of my suitcases up the steps, so that was really helpful! London is a busy, fast pace city, but the people there still have the generosity of southerners back home. It is awesome! So I made it to my hostel which was nice and located next to a beautiful park right in central London. I got to see the Picadilly Circus area, which is like a mini Times Square. It was awesome! But also very busy.
The next day I woke up, and needless to say, I took a taxi to the train station. I was not brave enough to do the subway again with all my luggage, and the extra few pounds it cost was totally worth it to me. The 3 hour train ride was great and flew by because I slept about half of the way. I did get to see the countryside while I was awake and it was covered in snow and beautiful! Once I got here I took a taxi again to the Student Village, where I will be living for the next 5 months. I came into my house, and everything was dark and there were a lot of doors, which I had no idea where they led to obviously. So I walked up the steps until someone heard me and then I met a few of my house mates. I met about 4 guys, which were all really nice but I couldn't remember their names or where they were from or anything, I just knew that they all had really cool accents.
Over the next couple days I met the rest of my house mates, and as far as I know there are 5 of us girls and 4 guys, with a grand total of 9 house mates! We all share one kitchen and there are 2 bathrooms. Honestly, I think for that many people this place is fairly clean (way cleaner than when I lived with that many people at the river). I have hung out with my house mates a few nights and normally we are all in the kitchen eating dinner together. They are all really nice and helpful if I ever have any questions. I have met so many other people too, just through where I live and at school. I have even met a few people from UT who I didn't know back in Tennessee.
I finally started school yesterday and that was great! I am taking two class, but it adds up to be 12 hours of classes back home, so that is pretty cool!! I am signed up for 3 classes right now, and this week I am going to all of them and decide which one I want to drop. I am going to be taking one English and one Geography class. The class I went to yesterday was a 2 hour class studying Welsh writers throughout it's history, it was a great first day. My teacher is bilingual in English and Welsh however, so he is extremely hard to understand at this point for me. The Welsh have a much stronger accent than the English, it is wild how much harder it is to understand them. I think it will get easier with time, but yesterday in class I took notes and listened, but I probably only truly understood half of the lecture. The teacher was very nice though. And something really cool, he gave us our book. He asked for 1 pound in return. They must save so much money on books compared to UT students!
Oh yeah, before school started on Monday, me and 2 other Americans went to check out the Gower Peninsula, which I think is in the list of top 10 things that must be seen in Britain. It was Sunday, so the bus is not as frequent, and we are all still learning the public transit system around here, so we just decided we should start walking. We ended up walking to the lighthouse in a town called Mumbles, which is around 6 miles or so away we were guessing. We made it there and then we found all the hiking in Gower and it was sooooo beautiful! We saw the three cliffs area I believe, we weren't really sure where we were or how far we had gone, but we knew it was gorgeous! The beach is right across from the school and is so nice as well, and there is much more hiking to do in the area we made it to, but we wanted to get headed back before dark, so we had to say goodbye to the nice hiking trails over looking awesome cliffs on the beautiful beach. We saw a rainbow on our way out, and we could see both ends and it was really bright! It was so awesome! That is an area that I think I will be spending a lot of time hiking around at (but next time I think I will catch the bus there haha). We got a bus back to campus after returning to the town of Mumbles, and then walked back to the Village, which is about 3 miles from campus. We all decided we had walked well over ten miles that day, but it was totally worth it!
Everything here is beautiful, and the people are extremely nice! I am excited about everything to come in the next 5 months!
