My first day was so odd. I kept thinking, ok, I’ll just go home now, then I’d remember I’ll never be going back to my flat with my friends, then panic, then depression.  I’d forget where I was when I woke up in the mornings.  I would take the dog for a walk and wonder where all the people were.  The 2 or 3 people that might have been on the street at the same time seemed to be walking in slow motion.  The biggest thing that I’m still struggling with is I think everyone here has the same face.  Seriously.  I was walking through town with my family, gawking at passing Wellingtonions and thinking oh my god, they all look exactly the same.  Dad reminded me that this wasn’t multicultural London where it is actually hard to find people who are born and bred English.

I can hear our accents.  I burst out laughing and mocked a friend of mine for saying “liptup” instead of “laptop”.  Then I realised that’s how I sound.  I can hear my own accent.  It’s really strange.

I’ve been to a few cafes and resturants and realised I’d completely forgotten the correct paying etiquette.  You don’t ask for the bill.  You don’t sit around for hours after dinner and chat.  You don’t tip.  You get up and pay at the cash register on the way out.  I struggled to stop saying “pounds” and “quid” when talking about prices.

It’s like learning a culture all over again.  I remember what I’m supposed to do but I feel odd doing it.

Unfortunately Wellington doesn’t seem to have any good pole dance schools that A) Fucking Email Me Back B) Don’t cost a fortune C) Seem like they don’t suck but Mum is keen to get a pole in the house so might just get on the DVDs.  I also bought a hula hoop and instructional DVD after being totally inspired by a friend and have been looking at piano lesson because why not.  I want to play piano.  So I’m going to do it.

I can’t say I’m totally happy.  I can’t say I’ve totally settled.  But it’s getting better.

I am waiting, as I have been for a few years now, for my Xbox to red ring.  I know it’s going to happen soon.  I bought that thing the day it came out, I KNOW it’s going to break soon.  I gave it a bit of a clean the other day thinking I will sell it on Trademe and replace it with the new shiny black ones that have wifi.  Then Dad was all, “But you know it’s going to break!  What if you sell it to some poor kid who has saved all his money to buy it?” and guilt, ARGH, I really want a new black one :(

I save things as .txt files in Notepad like little stickies on my laptop.  All of a sudden Notepad files decide they cannot open on their own anymore, I must open Notepad FIRST then open the files.  WHY?  WHY DOES THIS HAPPEN.  Why do I have to spend so long FIXING SHIT.

My precious first love, the PC I built for my 21st birthday and I, were reunited today.  Just like last time I came home, it’s decided to be a whiny bitch just to sulk at me, I swear.  First it decided to slap on a login password that I know for a FACT didn’t exist when I left, then in an attempt to thwart my “safe mode” login, it threw registry errors, then in an attempt to thwart my fixing of said registry errors its now flatly refusing to acknowledge that my hard drives exist.  I’ve had to throw this one in the category of Fuck This, Too Hard, accepting defeat and am taking it into my dads work to get it fixed.

My curtain has also come off the rail.  I AM COMING OFF THE RAILS.  MLIA.

***

It’s the hardest thing in the world – starting life again.  I suppose that is a dramatic way to describe it but that is what it truly feels like.  The hardest part right now is the nights.  Every night I lie awake terrified of my impending parting and the morning I’ll wake up alone on the other side of the world with London already becoming a fading memory.  I wonder if this was this hard for the other thousands of NZers who have done this before me.  My old Kiwi flatmate was ready to go home.  She woke up one morning, booked a flight home and as far as I can tell, has never looked back.  I wish I was ready.

It was easier the first time.  I was ready to leave NZ, no doubt in my mind.  When my friend told me she was planning to go to England for a bit, would I like to come along? I said yes without even really thinking about it.  We left 4 months after that conversation.  The hardest part was simply just learning how to live again.  Learning to carry cash because London doesn’t do freaking anything electronically like we do.  Trying to make sense of prices, what supermarkets were called, finding new friends, a flat, a job.  It didn’t take long for everything to click into place.  Initially, I missed a lot of things.  I missed mostly the food in NZ.  I missed my family (sort of).  I missed my best friend and my dog.  I got frustrated at not being able to drink the tap water without getting sick.  I thought it tasted like dishwashing liquid and it certainly felt thicker.  I can’t taste that anymore.

I wonder now what I’ll miss the most from London.  My friends, of course, I’m not looking forward to watching life continue on without me via Facebook.  I’m going to miss Pole Dancing.  I’m going to miss Amazon, the indignity of actually having to leave the house to buy comics depresses me.  I’m going to miss the tube and London’s minimal effort public transport.  I’m going to miss the travelling.  That having something to work for.

In a few weeks I will be starting life again for the second time.  Except this time, I’m not sure that I know exactly how to do it.

Things are tough right now.

Wondering if they’d let me have a go on what has to be the smallest digger I’ve ever seen in my life.  Knowing they’ll say no.

Burning my toes in the shower while I wait for the cold water tap to do its damn job.

Spending money when I know I can’t afford it.  This one holds hands with my Amazon obsession.

Trying to wipe away the smeared grey makeup from under my eyes then realising it’s not makeup, I just look like shit.

My haircut.

The fact that it’s currently impossible to dress according to weather, due to London loving to switch between YAY SUMMER and JUST KIDDING, WINTER AGAIN, LOL within the day.

Surprise anxiety which is caused by nothing.  Does not let up for at least 6 hours.

Finishing a book in two days when it was meant to last me the week.

Trying not to over text my friends about going out.  The waiting game.  TEXT ME.  ARGH, THE GAME IS TOO HARD, I JUST WANT TO BE DRUNK, OK?

That is all.

This post is going to be a disaster. I am sorry, English Language.

Last night we went out clubbing in central London and I attempted, midway, to do my sneaky run off and go home without anyone trying to stop me routine.  I didn’t get very far when I realised my wallet was missing out of my bag.  With all my cards, ID, Boots reward card and £70 of wages in there.   Spurred on by alcohol, I cried and cried and cried as my friends bravely put the call out to my NZ bank for me to cancel my credit card and then to HSBC to cancel my London card.  The wallet itself was a Nightmare Before Christmas collectable, given to me by my parents.

I was so miserable about this this morning, not to mentioned embarrassed by the crying like a 3 year old drama, hey – it’s been a tough week ok? that I didn’t actually turn my computer on till about 4pm.  Sitting in my Facebook inbox was a message that would have actually got me out of bed happy had I read it earlier.

“So yea i found what seems to be your Purse last night. it still has all the cash in it and cards, I work in soho if you would like to meet up and collect it just send me an email.”

Hurray for Londoners who are awesome.

Balls that I’d already cancelled my cards.

In other news…

I watched the Nintendo press conference at E3 yesterday.  I have to say, their games ranged from Sort of Average to AWESOME and back again.  Very, very excited about the Donkey Kong remake and the new Epic Mickey which looks really odd but fun.  I had planned to get an iphone once I head back to NZ but priorities have changed now.  The Nintendo 3DS is my new reason to live.  SO EXCITED, must have one, must have one NOW.

Oh my god there’s going to be one in purple.

My life is not complete until I have one.

Xbox kinect looks stupid.  Just saying.

I wasn’t so great at Art either, for that matter.  We were all give a copy of a simple colouring picture, a man gathering hay, I think.  It might have been something Biblical.  Desperate to avoid the embarrassment of another ugly and Over The Lines piece of work that I’d be forced to write my name on, I carefully selected my crayons in the exact same palette as another girl, who always coloured in the best.  I copied her drawing exactly.  The result was a horribly poor imitation, so much so that no one even realised what I’d done.

Perhaps after lunch we would have Silent Reading and then we would write stories.  This was the part of the day where my childish pride would suddenly take a lift.  I was in the most advanced group for reading and was given special Big Kid Books that were too hard for the other kids to read.  I was smug about this.  Then, the creative writing, which I loved so much.  I would write about fairies and talking animals.  I would write about fantastical worlds that I could see so clearly in my head.  I would force my mother to read them once I’d got home.

Years later, in high school, English was still my best and most loved subject.  After that… I guess it all just dried up.  I kept diaries and mostly spent and free time writing dedicated to life writing.  I still have snippets of conversations between characters in my head, although, I’m never quite certain who these characters are.  I construct situations and small beginnings of story lines and convince myself that they are really rather good and I should probably get back into creative writing at some point.  As soon as my hand touches a keyboard or pen, however, my brain freezes.  I’ve forgotten all those well described scenarios and what comes out is an embarrassing sentence or two, that I agonise over, then delete and forget about.

I’ve decided to start again.  I’m reading up a storm and, shamefully, bought The Artists’ Way as recommended by quite a few friends now.  Who knows, perhaps one day I might actually finish something.

We arrived in Barcelona at around 10pm, just enough time to get on the train towards the centre of town.  After 3 stops, we saw a station that vaguely sounded like the one we were meant to be at.  We got off the train, looked around and decided hells, we’d only been travelling for 15minutes and this can’t be the right stop, so we jumped back on again.  Almost an hour later I’d finally convinced Marcelo to stop being a damn man about things and ask someone where our stop is.  A quick conversation in Spanish occurred and Marcelo comes back to our seat, looking sheepish.
“I have bad news” he tells me.
“We were meant to get off at that stop and hour ago, weren’t we” I replied.
“Well yes, there was that.  We’re also not even in Barcelona anymore.  And this was the last train”.

After a lot of arm flailing and swearing, we briefly considered a taxi then decided against it, opting for the cheaper bus alternative.  Then the bus didn’t show up for 45minutes and another kind person told us that the buses had been cancelled and there wasn’t another one for an hour or so.  Taxi and £25 each later, we finally arrived at the freaking hostel.

Our first day was beautiful.  Sunny and warm, time to whip out the short shorts.  We wandered down to La Sagrada Familia, Gaudi’s greatest work.  It is an incredible building.  It’s also one of the weirdest things I’ve ever seen.  It’s still in construction, the inside of it hasn’t really been done at all, which we paid £10 to find out.  Barcelona reminded me a lot of Wellington.  The little boutique shops, every one of them burning incense, the goths, the emos and the hippies all chilling.  Everyone has a piercing or a tattoo.  You don’t really get that as much in London.  We returned home to the hostel late with Marcelo sulking as the rest of the hostel had gone out to watch the bull fight, something I flatly refuse to support.  In the distance, thunder boomed.  I thought that was odd as, like, it doesn’t rain in Barcelona, right? I mean, I only packed summer clothes.

It HOSED down for 2 days straight.  Not be put off, we still attempted to go sight see.

It was a bit of a failure.  We ended up in a mall and then randomly at an aquarium which was pretty awesome.

The sun finally made another half hearted appearance and we joined up a free walking tour of the city which was fantastic.  I think the free walking tours are the best ones, obviously because they’re free, but also the guides work for tips which means they just put a whole lot more love in there.

Our trip to the airport was once again, harrowing.  Despite leaving on time and assuming we were going to be early, Barcelona’s one train to the airport came almost an hour later than we thought it would.  Another mad dash to the gate, which left me mentally making a note to do a bit more time on the treadmill and we got there just in time for everyone to start boarding.

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