Well, folks, after several exhausting hours of flights, I finally made it to England, heading out the doors of Heathrow airport into the real world at about 10:15 p.m. local time. Caught a cab to Allison's from there, and for the first time I've ridden in one of those London taxis... ya know the ones... the classic black things with the cool insides... um... let's see if I can find a pic... Oh, the internet is great - absolutely riddled with pics of the bloody things! But, anyway, it being 10 p.m., it's dark out, of course, which means that I got to see the sights in London at night. It was gorgeous! I mean, I've done it before, in February, when I got to hang out with Allison, but for the first time it was just me in the back of the cab (which is huge, by the way - seats at least 4 people back there!), staring out the window as London passed by. To get to Allison's place it's about a 50 minute drive straight through London, and so I passed absolutely every single sight, each of which is floodlit at night, and it's absolutely freakin' gorgeous. Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, the Tower... lovely.

I didn't bother playing the tourist this time around, though. No open-topped double decker bus rides for me, I'm afraid. I I spent most of Tuesday cross-stitching in Allison's sitting room, watching British daytime TV... There's this program on BBC1 about the effects of alcohol in Britain, which is fairly interesting, and there's another one on BBC1 or BBC2... maybe 2... where the presenter has been showing off the links between classical music and modern pop and the weavings and interlinking facets of the two. On Tuesday it was about the Beatles, then yesterday it was about Cole Porter. It was pretty cool. Tuesday evening, Allison and I went out for dinner at a curry place near her work, then wandered back to her place to watch Bridget Jones' Diary, which I still hadn't seen. I laughed. A lot. It reminds me that there's still hope for my romantic life yet, even if Bridget is a completely fictional character. It was nice to see Allison again, and she might even be on the same flight as me back to Edmonton for Christmas, interestingly enough.

Yesterday was spent packing up again (not that I'd unpacked much at Allison's anyway), catching a cab (not the cool London sort, unfortunately - those are stupidly expensive) to King's Cross Station (where I neglected to find out if there was a Platform 9 & 3/4 sign up yet again!), and then hopping on a train up to York. Hopping. Hm. Not hopping so much as struggling with all my luggage. I was dreading having to deal with the stuff at the other end since the York railway station, unlike King's Cross, has several staircases that you might have to take in order to reach the exit. Thankfully, just as the train was slowing down to pull into York, another guy on the train saw me hauling all my luggage down and offered to help with a suitcase or two since he just had a small bag. He helped me to the taxi rank with my stuff, and I shoved it into a taxi, then it was off to the University, which is just outside a little village called Heslington... although it's difficult to tell where York ends, the University begins, and then where the University Ends and Heslington begins.

Heslington really is a tiny village. A couple of banks, a post office, a couple of pubs... that's about it. Quaint and cute, but not that much there. I wandered down there to open a bank account today, only to be told by the bank in question that I had to make the initial application online, wait for them to mail shite out to me, then head into the main branch of the bank in York city centre to actually activate the account. *sigh* Thank god for the Visa card. I may actually need it.

Having arrived at the University, I checked in with the porter, got my keys, and hauled my luggage to my room, which looks like this:

It's pretty tiny, and the duvet cover is nothing to speak of, but hey, it's mine... and best of all, it has its own bathroom. A tiny, minimal, claustrophobic's-worst-nightmare bathroom, but a bathroom nonetheless. The residence is really modern - it was only used for the first time in the 2002-3 school year, so nothing is old, it's all still fresh and bright... It has a bit of sterility to it, but hopefully I'll accumulate stuff soon enough and have it decorated a little. I don't know if York has an equivalent to the Imaginus sale... and I just noticed that the date on those photos is totally wrong. Oops. I'll have to fix the camera (mom gave me her digital camera! Yay! There will probably be lots of photos on the blog now, assuming I can remember to take the camera places. The best bit of the whole thing, though is probably the view. Check this out:

Now that, my friends, is a view. The whole campus is centred on a man-made lake, which has hundreds of birds living on/around it - ducks, geese, etc. Those little black splotches in the photo are ducks. And there are these black birds with white splotches on their heads that I have yet to identify that are all over the place. And pigeons and such, of course. In fact, I can hear them outside my window right now. That might get annoying, but hey, I sleep through anything.

My 'flatmates', if you can call this a flat, seem fairly nice. Unlike the university rooms where I've been before, there's no real common lounge-y area with a TV and sofas and that sort of thing. Or if there is, I haven't seen it. I share a kitchen with 5 other girls, 2 of whom seem to be Chinese (I know one is... haven't actually said more than two words to the other one yet), one from Uganda, one from England, and then one who hasn't moved in yet, I don't think. If she has, I haven't seen her, and there are still all sorts of papers and things outside her room.

I'm going to have to get over my fear of bridges pretty quickly, though. If you want to get anywhere on campus without it taking an inordinate amount of time, you have to use those footbridges like the one in the pic. It's not too bad being on them, but it's definitely uncomfortable for me, since I hate the damn things so much.

I spent the morning this morning wandering into Heslington, discovering that you have to apply for the bank account online, then wandering around campus doing paperwork and the like. I have set up my email account with the university (yay!), which is nice, since I JUST received the email from the U of A saying they're going to cancel my account. Buggers. So if anyone wants to get ahold of me, send me an email quickly, and I'll let you know my new address. I also hit a stationery store quickly for pushpins and the like for the memo boards in my room. I'm seriously considering buying a printer as well, as they're only about 49 pounds... which reminds me that I really need to figure out how to type the pound symbol... I'm probably going to need to do that fairly often.

But to finish, I bring you all a list of the major differences I've noticed so far:

• Traffic (obvious, I know, but it's just reflex for most of us to look left, then right as we cross the street. Now I have to retrain myself to look right, then left.)
• Light switches. For some reason in this country, you flick the switch DOWN to turn everything on. So confusing.
• Electrical outlets. Different shape, different voltage. Luckily I bought adapters for my two plug-requiring electronic appliances before I left.
• Telephone cords. Different shape plugs into the wall socket. I attempted to use mine to access the phone line for dial-up internet before I got my network services set up, and failed miserably.
• The hot and cold water faucets are NEVER combined into one stream of water.
• The healthcare system is two-tiered. EVERYONE gets the basic stuff, which is decent in and of itself, but, hey, if you can pay for more, go for it! And they really don't have a problem with it over here. Honestly, I think it could be a model for Alberta and Canada - everyone DOES get service, and those with the ability to do so could put themselves on the upper tier, removing themselves from the queue for the lower tier, and hopefully alleviating some of the backlog. But, then, I've never discussed the healthcare system with a Brit, so who knows?
• Pillows have no loft whatsoever. None. It's like there's no pillow there at all. I'm seriously going to have to try and find someplace with real pillows.
• No one seems too keen on bedsheets. You have one sheet to cover the mattress, then to cover yourself up, you get a duvet. That's it. Forgive me, but I like my layers. I need to find an Ikea or something like it around here.

Now, fortunately, there are some things that are similar to home. While out shopping, I found Terry's Chocolate Oranges. Yay! I mean, I think they're a British invention to begin with... and here the slogan is "tap and unrap", rather than "whack and unrap", but it's still pretty much the same thing. And I found Special K Red Berries! Yay! And Fusion pens!