London Days and Nights

Friday came around and finally it was time to get out and do a bit. Luckily Kate had organized a night out with Erin and a few of their friends. I met Kate at Bethnal Green and we then went out for lunch in Shoreditch at the Spittalfields market. We walked back to Bethnal Green vshe had via Brick lane and some other well known spots along the way. Before too long it was time to start drinking, so we started on the wines and talked as we waited for some of Kate’s friends to arrive.

Ilsa rocked up first, she’s a stunner from Latvia, but strangely speaks with what is nearly an Australian accent, due to the amount of time she spent with Aussies while learning English. She’s apparently always had a thing for Aussie guys, but has recently turned to the darkside, getting herself a Kiwi boyfriend. Ilsa had recently got a little bit sick and then found that chowing down on Aspirin made her feel better, unfortunately she had forgotten that she is allergic too Aspirin and had since got a very sore and swollen tongue which she needed to apply Bonjella too every few minutes. She was never originally planning on coming out with us, but being as she had already been drinking all day, it didn’t take many more to convince her to come out with us.

Shortly after that Erin, and then David rocked up and the evening got rolling. We had ourselves in stitches most of the evening due to the fact that Ilsa would say “this song changed my life” to nearly every song that came on the stereo. And we would all laugh hysterically until we cried, then Erin would have to go re-apply her eye makeup. Then she came to me ask what it looked like, and I replied, “It looks fantastic Erin, just don’t look in any mirrors tonight”.

We made our way out to ‘cargo’, which was a cool club that was playing shithouse music, so we made our way somewhere else. I have no idea what it was called, and the music wasn’t a whole lot better, but it was free entry and we had a good time until we all rolled out of there at about 2am. We then walked to brick lane for a Bagel, before jumping on the bus and heading home.

The next morning Kate, Erin and I walked to an amazing food market. It was one little street with heaps of stalls, most of which being food. I got a fantastic meat pie, a muffin and a slice of brownie. I could’ve got a lot more if I was taking it home, rather than eating it that day. We then all made our way back to Kate’s place and watched “Drag me to Hell” in honour of it being Halloween. After the movie I made my way back to Jax and Belle’s, and was greeted by all the people on their way out to Halloween parties. Hannibal, bloodied Nurses, Vampire rock stars and Cutesy little witches were all there to greet me as I boarded my train.

Sunday morning was an early start as Belle, Jax, Belle’s student, Andreas and myself all jumped in a hire car and drove out to Stonehenge. It was absolutely atrocious weather until Jax asked Belle to wish for good weather when we were about 30 minutes away from Stonehenge. To my surprise it had totally fined up by the time we got to the ancient monolithic structure, and it remained fine for the rest of the day.
After taking some hilarious jumping photos in front of Stonehenge, we made our way to Glastonbury for lunch. It’s a very cute little town, although the lunch was a little overpriced for the quality. It’s still a little weird to be eating a meal in a building that was built two hundred years before the Europeans settled Australia however.

We left Glastonbury and I decided to let Belle drive, being as she hadn’t driven in 18 months and she does break the stereotype of how an Asian female drives. She started fairly promptly with a stall, but got the hang of it again before too long, and just as the sun was going down we arrived in Bath. It is a beautiful little town, and I do wish we got there in the daylight and got a bit more time to look around.

The next day I made myself angry by going to the Tate Modern and looking at all the modern art. Some modern art is great, but unfortunately most of it just makes me furious that such an unartistic pile of shit is being hung in a gallery next to Andy Warhol and others who are actually artists. The final straw was when there was a mirror. Nothing special about it. Just a mirror. With a little white card next to it sprouting some wank about it turning the art around and making the viewer part of the art. No. I’m sorry. No matter what crap you put on the little card, you have hung a mirror in an art gallery. You, good sir, are a wanker. That is all.
Tuesday was a particularly cruisy day where I did very little, but did hear from Paula that she had been accepted for a property in Neukoln. This means I have a place to live in Berlin, and along with that I’ve been getting some interest from a few of the jobs I’d been applying for so I’m starting to feel much happier about the upcoming move, even though I still know that it’s crazy. Now, at least, I feel like it’s good crazy.