I made it!

Well, I made it. I’m here and all in one piece.

There was a bit of a fiasco with my flight from Amsterdam to Manchester yesterday after I wrote the last blog. I did find my gate ok but was then informed that the flight had been cancelled! Everyone was booked on to the next flight which was due to leave an hour later. But when I got to the new gate I looked out the window to see construction work going outside and it didn’t look like there was any way a plane could get up to the gate.

Turns out there was no way a plane could get to that gate, and we had to get on buses to go out to the plane out in the airfield somewhere. More waiting and confusion, and finally, half an hour after scheduled departure time, everyone was on the flight and we took off. So I was 1 and a half hours late.

Fortunately Amsterdam to Manchester only takes an hour, because I was thoroughly sick of airports and airplanes by this stage and I think I would have gone crazy if I had to sit on another plane any longer than that.

I was sure I would never make it to my bus on time, but when I booked the ticket I left a couple of hours leeway because I had no idea how long immigration and customs might take. But immigration and customs took about 10 minutes and I ended up making it to the bus with 20 minutes to spare! Thank you God!

He’s really been looking after me ever since I got here.

When I got to the uni I was given my temporary accommodation – Room 703 in the Chalres Morris building (which is actually three buildings and it took me getting lost in the wrong building to find this out.) When I finally did fid level 7 in the right building I went looking for room 703. I walked along the corridor, 701, 702, through another door, 704...hang on what happened to 703? I searched for a while and checked every room on the floor but there was no 703 to be found. Once I’d convinced myself that it really wasn’t there and I wasn’t just jetlagged and hallucinating, I went back to change rooms and now have 605 (which fortunately exists). It’s got a great view over Leeds from the window, but I’m glad I’m not staying here permanently. There is a common room at the end of the hallway which is the most filthy, disgusting thing I’ve ever seen. The cushions on the chairs are all stained, one is missing, there is an iron burn on the carpet..... Also, you share a bathroom between two rooms – but it really couldn’t be classified as a bathroom. It’s like the ones you get in caravans with the shower over the toilet and it opens on to two rooms, so if you didn’t realise the person in the room next to you was in there you could just open the door and get a surprise. There is no way to shut the other person’s door from the inside so potentially the only thing between you and embarrassment is a sliding frosted glass screen.

Apart from that, its been ok. I met some girls and a guy from France not long after I got here (by accident because they knocked on my door looking for a friends room). So we went down and had tea together. Again, thankyou God – just as I was thinking about whether I could face going down to tea alone to face hundreds of people I didn’t know, the girls knocked on my door. So far I’ve met 4 French people, 2 Finnish people and an American girl. Strangely enough I’ve come to England and haven’t really met on English person yet!

Well it’s about 7am while I’m writing this. I’ve been up since 4am. I watched the sun rise, though you can’t see it through the clouds – or perhaps its just smog, hard to tell!! That’s something I’ve noticed – on the horizon is a permanent haziness. Right now I’m looking out my window and anything further than 10km away is barely visible!! And I don’t know if its because of that, or something else, but the sky here isn’t as blue as at home. It’s a lot paler. But the weather has been good. It was actually hot yesterday. (And I only brought two t-shirts – the rest of my stuff is for cold weather!)

I’m quite tried right now and wish I could go back to bed, but even if I could sleep (which I don’t seem to be able to do hence waking at 4am) , I’m trying to ignore it and stick to the time zone. Going to have breakfast with my new French friends soon