Stranger in a strange land.

 Let’s get serious folks. (Dramatic pause) 

Adjusting to all this tomfoolery(!) I’ve got myself into hasn’t been easy. Just getting here was, shall we say, challenging..

Then living in someone else’s place with someone’s else’s stuff is just weird. Especially for a whole month. It’s not my place, not my stuff and that kind throws you off. It’s not like being in a hotel. 

So the refrigerator has stuff (food) in it. One of the cupboards has stuff in it. Are you supposed to use that? Who knows? I’m not using it because there’s nothing I want to use.  Plus it feels weird to use it. (Lots of weirdness going on on my part)

We are living in a five condo building. We hear and see the other peoples lives. There is a little baby in one unit we hear crying. There are kids in a couple places. They play outside.

We have turned our lives upside down in every way you can. Left our home. Left our stuff. Left our neighborhood and city(and country).  Left our family and friends. 

We fit what would be a years worth of our lives into a carryon suitcase and a backpack. What did I pack? Mostly clothes of course. Short sleeve shirts, long sleeve shirts, shorts, jeans, sweatpants, undies. It will be in the forties some places we go. I brought a Jean jacket. Figure I can layer. Three pairs of shoes. Meds, small amount of toiletries, tablet, phone, chargers. That’s about it.

Passports, vaccination cards, credit cards (2). In my research I found out that schwab checking/debit card (I’m sure there are others) is the best one for me. No foreign transaction fees of any kind.  

Bought international health care insurance. None of my Medicare/VA/supplement works here. I will have to refill meds here. Haven’t had to figure that out yet. I did bring letter from doctor. 

Getting back to the mental, emotional part. I thought this would be similar to U.S., English speaking, similar culture, etc. It’s not. People here are different. They are stoic, polite, neat, they don’t do much laughing and cavorting in public. Nobody is showy. People don’t wear bright colors. 

We have found if you say hello to a stranger walking down the street, they won’t say hello back. However, it is easy to strike up a conversation with people.

Perhaps it is my naive observation but people here don’t seem to fear each other like the U.S. They definitely have a problem with stabbings here. It pales in comparison to the U.S. violence, shootings. There is no mass violence. 

There are so many different cultures here. It feels like more people here speak another language than English. It’s weird to hear all these different languages. It’s fun though. 

We’ve had to figure out an elaborate public transport system with underground, overground, trains, buses. We bought a monthly card. Really expensive. We’ve managed it pretty well because it’s pretty easy to understand. 

Changing tube lines can be easy or elaborate. Sometimes the next tube you want is close. Sometimes in the bigger stations with more lines you are going up and down steep escalators, walking  up and down several flights of stairs. 

London is an enormous city with many neighborhoods. You couldn’t possibly visit them all. The biggest lesson so far is you really have to pace yourself. Sit down a lot, Take days off. Relax. 

To think it will be a new place, culture, people every month is kind of overwhelming but so exciting!

. 

We ain’t in Kansas anymore

 So it’s day 3 after we got here and even though we’re still exhausted, we can’t hold back any longer. We have to go into central London! 

We decide to get the”just kill me now” ridiculously expensive monthly travel card. That HURT but it makes travel easy. The line we live on goes across London and stops throughout central London. 

So we are official tube riders. Down the corridor, scan the card, upstairs to the platform and voila(!), we’re on the train..

Turns out this is one of the busiest lines so it’s often crowded. When the train door opens, there’s a scramble for empty seats. It’s a dog eat dog, snooze you lose, situation. 

On the train are ordinary people of all shapes and sizes dressed in their understated black, beige, brown English clothes. Little color. It’s in the upper 60’s but there are no shorts. Some people have on winter coats. OK…

Nobody is yelling. Nobody is talking to themselves. Nobody looks too threatening. Just minding their own business. This isn’t what I’m used to in Mpls. where if someone isn’t a complete wack job every time you get on, there is something wrong. 

So off we go to dazzling downtown. We come up from the oxford circus station and are blown away. Magnificent beautiful old buildings surround us. 

It immediately strikes me that we are in a city that is thousands of years old and it’s right in front of me. 

To quote a clique, we ain’t in Kansas anymore.

Almost homeless in London

 On the 3rd night things take a dramatic turn. 

I always ordered my groceries for delivery at home. So I thought I’d try it here. So I order it just like usual, pick a time slot for delivery. Everything’s cool.

Get a message saying they are behind. Okay, that’s alright. Time goes by.  I had ordered a evening delivery and it’s getting late. I had told them ring the buzzer and I’ll come down and get it. So I thought maybe they had just left it at the door. So we thought we’d go to check.

So we went out to the hall to go downstairs. The door shuts behind us. We go downstairs. It’s not there. Come upstairs and discover THE DOOR IS LOCKED! Do we have the key? Ah no…we were just going 50 feet down to the door. The lock is from the 1920s or something and automatically locks.

So we are staying in a five unit condo building. We are on the second floor. WHAT THE HELL ARE WE GOING TO DO NOW?! Remember I told you the owner is in France? Neither one of us had our phones with us to call anybody.

I am picturing us spending the night on the street, homeless in London. I’m picturing the police breaking down the door.

So we think- hey maybe there’s a sort of caretaker in the building who has e very one’s keys or something…So we knock next door. No answer. Okay go downstairs.

Door #2: Guy offered to help us force the door open. Ah no…Door #3 The guy knew the owner and had her number! He said he’d call her. I fell at his feet to worship him. Har.

So he calls and comes out to tell us her parents will be there ion 10 minutes to let us in. Hallejulah!

She comes. We apologize profusely. We go in. I superglue the key to my hand. (!) All is well. Another crisis averted

Fox in the henhouse, except there are no hens

So it’s our first night at the airbnb. I am in a blissful deep sleep when I am startled awake by some snarling sounds. There is some kind of wild animal outside! It goes on for about a minute. 

Naturally I yell to my son: What’s that?!! He thinks it’s some drunk guy outside! I tell him no human makes that that sound. It’s some kind of animal. So it stops and we are so tired we go back to sleep. We are so tired that as long as it went away, who cares? After all, it ain’t comin’ in here.

Earlier that evening we had had an interesting experience. There was a fox in the front yard. What???!!! A fox wandering around in a city neighborhood? 

Well it turns out London has a population of 10,000 foxes! So not an uncommon sight. We heard it a couple nights after that (though not sounding nearly as mad as first night- har), but haven’t heard it sense. I kind of miss it.