I felt very British yesterday...

After all, what's more British than tea and biscuits? ;)

I really like my dorm, and especially my floor (I don't know anyone on the second floor, it's like they don't exist). But my floor is great. Everyone's been really nice, and nearly everybody's friends with one another, so it's a good community. It reminds me a little of how Shippee was...though of course the Ship was in a league of its own.

The only downside is that it is a first years (freshman) dorm, with all the craziness and noise that comes with it. British accents are considerably less cool when they're keeping you up at 1 AM. The walls are so thin, and my room is across from the stairs, so it's pretty bad. I have newfound sympathy for anyone who lived in Northwest freshman year. It's even weirder because I'm used to South, which was dead quiet. I think I'm going to have to get ear plugs, and take late classes. I've been getting up early everyday since I've been here and having trouble sleeping, which has made me chronically sleep deprived. I'm hoping it'll get better once I get on a regular schedule. I'm definitely sleeping in tomorrow and napping later!

Besides that, though, it's been fun. I've done karaoke (Sing Star) and watched two British shows, EastEnders and Little Britain. They were...funny. The first unintentionally; it's a soap, so the dialogue was terrible (everyone was shouting "You're evil!" at each other, and every character was homicidal). The second show was full of strange British humo(u)r. ;)

I also had real Earl Grey tea and biscuits (cookies) with people in the kitchen, which has been the gathering place where I've talked to almost everyone on my floor. It's really neat, because they come from all over Britain (the north, south, London) and the world (Pakistan, Nigeria, China, and there's another American girl from the University of South Carolina). I also met some French and Italian students at the study abroad orientation.

And, finally...today I got to ride on top of a double decker bus!!! It was annoying, because the airport messed up my visa, so I had to take a trip back to sort it out. The only good part about it was that I met some people on the train who gave me lots of advice about places I should visit, and I got to see more of the countryside and city of Coventry. The first time I came into Cov, it was too dreary to see much, but today was sunny so I got good views of beautiful old houses and town squares.

Oh, and public transportation in Britain is not that great. Both buses I took were at least twenty minutes late, and one of the trains stalled on the track for a half an hour! It might be because it snowed, and since England gets snow so rarely they don't know what to do with it. It's hardly anything compared to Upstate NY (or even Connecticut)!

Random US-UK differences:

-They don't sell twist tags seperately, they're included in the freezer bags
-Freezer bags don't have ziplocks
-A bag of crisps (chips) is filled with several smaller bags
-Tea bags don't have strings on them--so annoying
-They don't have American cheese, ha ha