Bognor Regis (Finally) Actually

The entire time since I was given my placement, until I got here last weekend, I believed that I would in fact be living in a town called Bognor Regis. I shortly learned that my host family and the school I work at technically reside in a village named Felpham (pronounced Fel-fam by the locals). It takes about 45 minutes to walk from my house into the town center of Bognor Regis, so I made the trek this past Sunday. It was a lovely day for a walk, sunny with a very light snowfall. On the way to the town center, I made sure to take some photos of the more interesting local buildings. It is easiest to walk along the "pram" or promenade along the beach, and more scenic.

Kitschy lamps posts and pastel beach bungalows

Just a block or two in from the promenade is a thatched-roof cottage which the famous English poet William Blake once resided in! I'm still not sure yet what is on the inside or if you can even go in, but it's fun to see from the outside too. I just love that there are legit thatched roof houses here. So quaint!

William Blake's cottage

Good Ol' Billy Blake

  Apparently, Blake moved here in 1800 to work on illustrations for a book by a different poet. I had forgotten he was also a painter, but I can't say I'm a huge fan of his mostly Romantic period artworks. They're worth a Google, though. And just look at that face. What a babe, right? Ha..ha... There is a pub called "The Fox" across the street where he was also once arrested. Woo!! I will definitely have to give that place a visit. The next interesting building I came across was the very, very old church in town. Not as impressive as the Chichester Cathedral, but it definitely gives the village more old-timey charm. Once the weather is better, I will be going back to all these places to take better pictures with my good camera and to try and explore more.

Norman Church in Felpham: St. Mary's

And FINALLY, we get to actual Bognor Regis. There is a very large resort called Butlin's that is right at the beginning of the town limits. This picture is taken facing towards the sea. I'm not really quite sure what is under those funky white tens, but I'm determined to find out some day. They also make navigating my way to town a little bit easier :)

Butlin's Resort, Bognor Regis, UK

 After that, I finally made it into town to get my cell phone figured out and do a bit of shopping, although I failed to realized everything here closes at FOUR on Sundays and therefore couldn't get too much taken care of. Must plan ahead better, next time. I was very impresed by the amount and variety of stores, even on the one street I got to. I went back today because my new favorite clothing retailer was having a 20% off for students night. Definitely cannot escape consumerism here. This weekend I am off to have a few adventures in London! It's supposed to be 40-ish degrees and sunny, so I'm quite looking forward to it.

Shopping and Castles

Today marked my first full week of being in England. It snowed quite a bit for the UK (3-5 inches) yesterday and has been bitterly cold ever since, thanks to the wind. My host parents wanted to take me over to Portsmouth, which almost every person here so far has told me I need to visit, but we were very unsure of how the roads would be. They ended up being in good condition, but we opted for going to two smaller towns nearby instead.

We first stopped by one of the local supermarkets and I was pleasantly surprised to find that they have more vegetarian cuisine hear than I can find back at home. Brilliant! I'm also developing a slight addiction to Kinder chocolate, and am determined to try as many different types of cider as possible while in England.

After leaving the supermarket, we drove for about five minutes before turning a bit to the left and coming upon a small town called Arundel, complete with it's very own castle! Aptly named, Arundel Castle. We drove up to the portcullis to get a bit of a closer look, and then through the town which lies mainly on a hill, with many steeply sloping roads lined with little shops and cafes. Sue promised we would come back and walk through town on a nicer day.

A blurry view of Arundel Castle from the car

We proceeded to Chichester, which was another five or ten minutes away. We stopped in quite a few clothing stores, and I was very proud of myself for not buying anything :) I did find a lovely new water bottle (forgot to bring one with me) and a funny card that I had to get. There was this "market cross" at the top of one of the main streets, with four streets jutting out from it in every direction, which I was instructed all pointed either due north, south, east or west. They were so many different shops I couldn't believe it! Some I have heard of, like Crabtree&Evelyn, but many others that were very new and exciting. We had afternoon tea (and cake!) at a really nice "brasserie" that is owned by one of Britain's favorite chefs, Raymond Blanc. It was lovely. I will definitely be returning to both of these places before I leave! I still have to explore the interior of the lovely Chichester Cathedral.

Chichester Market Cross

Chichester Cathedral

Tom-ay-to, To-mah-to*

I have just finished up my fourth day of student teaching at Downview Primary School. British kids are so freakin' adorable. Especially the really little ones. They also have the best manners. Well, especially compared to American kids, as a whole. Of course, many of them still act out and misbehave from time to time, but they listen quite a bit better. Or so it would seem. Perhaps it is just their endearing British accents. All I know is, today a five year old made his introduction with me and I just melted. I am currently, and possibly most of the time, going to be working with one of the "Year 4" classes (the U.S. equivalent of third grade). The kids in my class are great, and I am so proud of myself because I have almost learned all of their names already! I haven't really done much teaching per se, but yesterday I did get to help out with Year 3 art. They were making aboriginal dot paintings and I was very impressed by how excellent some of them turned out. The sad part of my day was before we started painting, I got to tell the students a little about America and Wisconsin, and then they were allowed to ask me questions. Well that wasn't the sad part, that was kind of fun. Some of them wanted to know what kind of animals there are in WI, and I realized it's quite similar to the wildlife here but with different species. That's also not the sad part. One little boy raised his hand and asked me, "Why are there so many gun noises in America?" I think I panicked because I can't really remember what I responded with, other than mumbling something about the popularity of deer-hunting in Wisconsin. And then I realized that these kids were more or less the exact same age as the 26 killed in Newtown, CT. I heard they are naming a new school after Victoria Soto and it makes me very happy to know that she will be honored. I do hope those gun laws get passed.

On a lighter note, maybe, another student later asked me, "Why do Americans know everything?" From the previous storyline, it's quite obvious that we don't.

*The title of this blog post is brought to you by the very sassy 8-year old who has all week relentlessly made fun of how I pronounce tomato.

Planes, Trains, and Freakin' Automobiles!

I have arrived! After many long hours of travel, my host parents picked me up from the train station, and after a short drive, we pulled up to a lovely brownstone house that is about 300 yards from the oceanfront! My place of living for the next 10 weeks. The neighbors have palm trees in their front yard, how bizarre and lovely. But more about that later. After a slight "miscommunication" at the Manchester airport, my large suitcase has gone m.i.a. Well, the airline has it, in fact, but it is currently coming to the house via some delivery service. Thank goodness it will be here soon!

The Manchester airport was nice, but a bit confusing. I didn't know the gate of my flight until ten minutes before we were supposed to leave, but it in fact ended up being not ten feet out of the "lounge" area and all the shops/restaurants. There was a large area with duty-free merchandise that more or less sold liquor and perfume. I wonder what that says about tourists... Any who, the flight was relatively non-eventful. The plane was just as big as the plane I came on from Chicago, except it was probably only about one-fourth of the way full!! I thought that was quite interesting, as I've never seen such an empty flight in the US. I was very happy to have a window seat, but then rather disappointed because we were above clouds the whole way which blocked my view from all of the scenery. Oh well. The bit I could see, I noticed, had a much more varying and odd-shaped patchwork of fields compared the the rectangular farm fields in Wisconsin and Illinois.

Aerial view of just outside Manchester

I got the bad news about my luggage not long after my arrival at Gatwick, but trekked onward to locate the train station. I must say, I love trains. I can't believe we don't have more passenger trains in the US. I suppose we are trying, but certain politicians have other agendas. I missed my first train because I thought it was a different train but in fact it was just my trian being early! So I caught the next one that was about half an hour later and met a nice local from Dorking who tried to help me work my cell phone. That is still a work in progress. The train ride itself was about half an hour, and I saw some nice fields full of sheep and small towns on the way in. It was also pretty affordable, my one-way ticket was about $20, but of course if you buy a return as well there is a discount. I will be looking into the train more as I hope to take it into London at least a few times on the weekends. The Bognor Regis station is only about a 10-minute walk away, which is excellent.

Time to research the train and whatnot. Cheers to public transportation!

Airports

Currently stuck in Manchester for a layover. The stupid wi-fi cost money but it's definitely worth it since I'm here for 5 hours! The flight from Chicago to here wasn't too terrible, but it was indeed not comfortable enough to get a good "night's" sleep, even with those sleeping pills!! It was mostly the chairs and the fact the people were constantly walking up and down the aisle, and much too forcefully in my opinion. The in-flight movie was some weird story about Joseph Gordon-Levitt as seemingly cracked-out bicyclist in New York that delivers packages. Oh boy. I was very disappointed because apparently their domestic flights get to watch Pitch Perfect!! (Sadie). I will see it eventually! The other disappointment was that they didn't even offer me wine as a beverage because I apparently look like I'm fifteen years old or something. Therefore I just assumed they didn't have any, and of course every single person after me go wine. So I had the joy of sitting and watching all of the adult-looking adults around me enjoying their wine :( Next time I shall be more demanding!

The Manchester airport seems ok. I ended up going through stupid security again when I didn't even have to, but their exits and entrances are extremely confusing. I exchanged my dollars for pounds at an ATM type thing, and found that the exchange rate is in fact EVEN LOWER than I thought originally. So my chai latte was only 2.95 pounds which seems quite decent but is in fact just under five bucks. Well, still not terrible, and it definitely reminds me of home (Starbucks, cough cough). Now I am off to explore my UK Netflix options.

Cheers to the dollar sucking it.

ERMAHGERD, FERSCERL CLERF!

Andiamo!

My visa arrived yesterday morning, HALLELUJAH! I have more or less finished my packing, hooray for not procrastinating until the very very last minute! I'm still debating whether or not a backpack can pass for my "purse" in addition to a carry on. We shall see.

Elizabeth is currently in the middle of purchasing her ticket to come meet up with me in London after I am done student teaching. I am very much looking forward to our possible travels!! We are looking into different cities to visit in Germany, France, and Spain. It is so excellent to have friends in different parts of Europe to possibly meet up with. Especially if they speak the local language :) My French is extremely rusty, but decent enough to survive. I was slightly scarred by the disdain we faced in Montreal when people realized they had to speak English to us. Rude.What the hell else is being bilingual good for if not communicating properly??  However, it will be a good challenge to be faced with non-bilingual French speakers. Hopefully my high school French teachers will be proud...

Cheers to new adventures! 

Panic Mode: Activate

I can literally feel my body being flooded with stress hormones. I am supposed to leave for England in approximately 4 days, and there is no sign of my visa being A) approved or B) mailed to me. AWESOME (please read this exclamation with only the most contemptuous sarcasm). I took the desperate measure this morning of paying a prioritizing fee, of which I did not pay sooner because of ill-fated advice a third party gave me. But now I have decided to overthrow their terrible judgement and fend for myself. The worst part about it is that I had to pay those stupid people. Have no fear, I will be inquiring into reimbursement. Good customer service is one thing when it involves a fast-food order, but when it comes to something like this, good god people, get your crap together! Only grumpy cat can express my feelings now:

Here's to hoping my visa shows up! Cheers.