D'yer no wad I meen

Originally written 7 June 2005

Well this is the second exciting installment in the series of my new exciting adventures on the other side of the world, and I have already made some improvements, this being the new, improved, non-jet lagged version. Well since I last chatted I've been around a bit more of London and hopefully I'll be able to send some photos once I find an Internet cafe that actually has the facility to put a CD into PC but here's what I've been up to in the mean time. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention last time that the pub that I had the drinks at on Friday (the Slug and Lettuce) is right in the Jack the Ripper area of London, so that was pretty cool to know.

I stayed in a backpackers in Earls Court on Saturday night and have been staying at one out at Stamford Bridge (two stops further out from Hammersmith if that means anything to anyone) ever since, and will be there until I depart on my Contiki tour to Scandinavia on the 14th. It's £15 per night but I'm trying to get out of the habit of converting everything back to $NZD otherwise I would probably be staying on a park bench somewhere. I'm quite enjoying it there, of course it's got absolutely nothing to do with the fact that I'm the only guy in a room full of girls - an Aussie, South African, Spaniard and German. It's a hard life sometimes but I suppose someone has to do it.

I've already settled into the ways of the backpacker and am making the most of the "free" breakfast, which for me was 6 pieces of toast and a bowl of cornflakes yesterday. McDonald's and Subway have been the other main food sources recently (someone please let me know if I'm starting to "supersize". Does this McDonald's make my ass look fat???).

Went to the Camden markets on Sunday, which was really good. Heaps of ethnic stuff - food, clothing, etc and other stuff like Cd's, DVDs, tee shirts in fact almost everything. Some other interesting items as well, yes you could even buy magic mushrooms legally, and no I didn't buy any, but I will send the photo when I'm able.

Met up with one of my Kiwi friends, Trish, who has just got over here as well and we saw some of the touristy things yesterday - the London Eye, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, the Houses of Parliament (complete withmachine gun wielding policemen), Leicester Square etc etc etc. It's actually just like playing original version Monopoly for me at the moment, except that I haven't bought any property, gone to jail, or won second prize in a beauty competition, but there's plenty of time yet.

Trish kindly invited back me for dinner where she is staying in Whitechapel so I had my first UK supermarket experience at Sainsburys, which consisted of a roast leg of NZ lamb (how patriotic is that), vegetables (although she wouldn't buy the NZ Kumara, but who am I to complain) and Jaffa cakes. I provided the beer (Becks of course) but they don't seem to have Tui over here for some reason. Saw a bit of the East End on my way back to the train station aboard a doubledecker London bus, and went home very contented.

One thing about staying at hostels is that you never really get a full nights sleep. Got woken about 2am this morning by a bunch of (presumably drunk) people leaving the hostel then again about 5.50am by the Aussie girl going to work, but it's all part of the experience and so far I'm loving every second of it.

Had lunch in town with my mate Craig today (yes it was McDonalds again), and almost got run over by both a London bus and a London taxi in two seperate incidents. Have spent most of the afternoon (and now evening, gee where has the day gone?) in a couple of Internet cafes. Firstly, trying to book a cheap flight over to Copenhagen in Denmark for the start of my Contikt, secondly, converting my CV into UK format which was a lot more time consuming than I thought it would be, and thirdly writing this novel - is anyone still actually reading this? Cause if you're not then let me know and I'll stop giving myself RSI.

With regards to the Contiki, it looks like the cheapest option for me is to fly into Malmo in Sweden and get a bus to Copenhagen (only about30 minutes by all accounts) which is where it starts on Tuesday next week. I'm really looking forward to it.

Anyway, I've been staring at a screen for way too long (I almost feel like I'm back at work) so I'm going home. Take care all, see you again, same Bat Time, same Bat Channel.