Days go by slowly here. Of late, Vicky and I have taken to spending most of our day inside the Starbucks (free wi-fi and one bottomless cup of coffee), where I spend most of my time following friends on Facebook and looking up cultural literature on life in suburban England. Which means that if you are a friend of mine on Facebook, I've stalked you, and that when I'm not stalking you, I'm trying to acquaint myself with things that British citizens take for granted. These are things that I would take, and did take, for granted as a US citizen, like, how much does it cost to have a mobile phone? Which company has the best broadband and cable bundle? Is it possible to watch any American TV shows in the UK? (Though, watching Downton Abbey and Sherlock on the first night it airs on BBC One is awful nice.) Which store sells the cheapest groceries? Is there a restaurant in town that actually has healthy food, or is it all Fish & Chips - all the time? If I weight 90 kilos, is that good or bad? How tall am I in meters? Driving on the left side of the road, really?
I tell you that the language and dialect the British use takes some getting used to, though the more you hear it, the better you are at understanding it. The Scottish dialect, same thing. The deep Scottish dialect, you will never understand it... don't even try and hire a translator when walking the highlands.
When trying to find an apartment in the UK, bring the following to every meeting with your real estate agent/ residential letting agent: your US passport, copies of current bank statements, recommendations from past landlords, letters of employment (if you have a job in the US, you can do remotely and/or a job here in the UK, get your boss to do this for you!) and have access to cash, as waiting for your US checks to clear might remind you a little of the trials of Job (the guy from the bible.)
Did you know that the UK government actually has a department that holds on to your security deposit for the landlord? If the landlord has a dispute, they have to file a grievance with the government and only if they win the argument, using an impartial third party as a judge, they are allowed to use your security deposit to fix up the apartment.
Did you know that the UK letting agents only take a small stipend to put an application down on an apartment, and that is all they receive from you, and from then on the apartment cannot be shown to any other prospective tenants?
Did you know that the UK has "socialized" medicine?
Ever been inside a UK taxi? Now, compare that with the size of the average New York City taxicab.
These things that UK residents may take for granted, I do not. It may be one hell of an adjustment for a simple academic from New York City, but I'll tell you, in no uncertain terms, that the UK life has got some great perks... a mobile phone costs about $50US/ month with unlimited everything... I think I may be on cultural overload right now, but I think it best that I am thinking about all of this now instead of when I am dead-center of a PhD. program that promises to be intellectually harrowing and almost exclusively British in its origins, by which I mean that all the professors will have extreme British accents complete with British slang... Maybe I'm over thinking this.
Confusion now hath made me his masterpiece! -- Macbeth, Act II, Sc. III
Year One, Day -5 -- Words written: 0
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