It took me awhile to put this little article together. I chose not to leave out any significant parts because I must stop fearing judgement from others. This is a personal pitfall, so to read further, you must promise you will respect my so-called questionable actions.
I’m across the pond. Let me tell you about the trip. There are three parts:
- Why?
- The Journey
- Arrived
Why?
November, 2012 I faced my life with a very brutally honest thought. I’m not happy; I’m bored. I’m a very easygoing person and I only knew a few people in my immediate life that are the same way. A 45 minute drive to the north of Manitowoc is Green Bay where I made several friends about a year ago while attending the local state university. In the recent months I’ve visited them often and even considered living there. Quite a few people I know played devil’s advocate and convinced me I shouldn’t be so keen to settle down citing financial and even more ridiculously, living vicariously through me would never be the same. Given some thought I kind of understand. Kind of. Consequently I thought bigger.
I kept my mouth shut for perhaps a few weeks. I couldn’t stand any more unsolicited advice. Come mid-December one morning I decided I quit my job and move on. My idea was simple: move out and travel abroad — starting with Britain. I wrote a very formal letter giving my two weeks notice for the coffee shop I worked at. My boss was taken aback and through & through impressed with my leap of faith. I remember my father pointing out I was rash; I did not even book a ticket! I am rash and that is the beauty of how I do things. I began to throw away everything that was of little value to me. I reduced my possessions by almost half. I bought a MacBook Air because of its minimalistic design and ultra-portable nature. I started telling my friends and co-workers I was leaving.
On December 23rd, I booked my airline ticket for a Chicago (ORD) to London (LHR) flight on January 16th, 2013. The next day was my last day of work; later on I gathered with my family and my father’s extended family for a lovely Christmas Eve. I even saw my cousin who recently moved to Texas that evening! Christmas day I received my backpack for traveling, a few extremely useful books about traveling, and some useful utilitarian items. I spent the next few days playing Minecraft. I logged 25 hours playing my single-player world — escapism in the happening. For New Years I spent the time with my friends in Green Bay. The time there was crazy, ergo more enjoyable.
After New Years my 16 day countdown felt like it lasted for at least a month. Over the days I visited with much of my friends and family; regrettably missing quite a few — such is my life. I boxed up a good deal of my stuff. I donated or packed the rest. All my belongings fit in two 3×3×2 feet boxes, a large luggage case, and a huge backpack. It may sound like I don’t own many things, but even now—reflecting—I still feel I have too many items that aren’t necessary or practical. On the go-day I took a nap on my cot from 02:00 to 05:00. (I prefer a cot occasionally as it’s simpler and easier to manage, much to my family’s distaste). I finally finished the packing I started the last evening around 08:00. I had my last breakfast cooked by my mother and hugged my younger brother goodbye. I finally left after hugging my father goodbye around 09:00. My mother drove me to Milwaukee’s Intermodal Station where there is a bus that has daily service to Chicago. We arrived to the bus’s pickup point ten minutes early. Perfect! I hugged my mother goodbye and I boarded with my backpack and my luggage case in the cargo space.
The Journey
We had the good bus driver apparently. Some ladies who were taking the bus and in transit to arrive in Hawaii for vacationing; one of them explained to the driver and I how the other driver [sic] left five minutes early even when she was there waving her hand frantically. I listened to Aphex Twin and Yoshinori Sunahara the way down on an ancient iPod Touch 2G I recently purchased. We arrived at ORD Terminal 1 around five minutes early. I was confused as to where to check my bag. Whatever. I printed my first boarding pass at a self-service check-in machine for customers who do not have a bag to check in. Oops. It didn’t matter. My luggage case weighed in at 60 lb and I went back to a bench to take out a bag from my case to use as a second carry-on. It worked perfectly with my now weighing in at 49.5 lb — 0.5 lb short of the limit. I saved myself $200 USD. I now have my boarding pass.
I went through security is less than 30 minutes. I shifted my second carry-on between hands as it was pretty heavy. It was uneventful except for I forgot to take out my laptop and they spoke to the man next to me telling him to take his electronics and liquids out. I started to speak but stopped after I realized I was done. Ok, you scrubs, I’m gone. Glad that was over, being screened is always too tense for my taste. I walked through a tunnel underneath the tarmac to my gate. Then I sat down at the gate and rested for several moments. I checked for free WiFi, no dice. I then noticed free access internet terminals; the cache is you have to watch an ad for a few minutes before gaining access. I checked Hacker News and BBC News. According to the browser’s user agent it’s a Windows NT 6.1 machine. I then logged off and made my way across the hallway to a food court.
Not until I ordered a Double Cheeseburger and Fries did I realize what I was in for. The man before me ordered a Polish Sausage and it was split in down the middle and placed in a bun with the finishing touch of being served on a wax paper square. My burger and fries were treated with similar respect. Ah well. It was necessary food. I then sat at my gate for 2 hours and 30 minutes reading The Masters of Doom. I waited for most of my group to enter and I finally committed to standing. I didn’t want to stand in another line with all my gear. In the plane—a Boeing 767—I had issues getting to my seat as I didn’t notice where the row-numbers are and entertainingly my backpack was almost too wide to fit between the class-dividing-hallways which house restrooms, drinks, some foods, and other miscellaneous items.
My seat happened to be a few rows from the back. It was a window seat and I had most of the row to myself. In fact there were only ~50 passengers which is ~25% of the airplane’s capacity. We were in the air in no time. I fell asleep pretty quickly, comforted by the drone of the engines. I awoke to quite a bit of turbulence. I don’t recall a rougher time flying. I then spent most of my time alternating between sleeping or reading on my Kindle. After awhile dinner was served with mine being the first served as I had requested a vegetarian meal. It was a vegetarian curry with rice, salad, shortcakes, and some slices of little bread with a spread. I was impressed. For drinks throughout the 7 hour and 30 minute flight, I had sparkling water, regular water, and tea. (I brought my own green tea onboard.) At some point I did try to listen to some tunes with some success, but honestly it was just as relaxing to listen to the drone of the engines.
We were over London and I was very impressed with the almost uncanny appearance of the cityscape. Every time it gets me. It may as well be a very detailed model city. It was about 05:00 local time and there were many street lights illuminating the roads sparsely filled with matchbox-sized cars. We landed around 05:30 and it was quite a long walk to the customs. I made a mistake and tried to gain entry using my US passport. They did not like that as I did not even know the address of my grandmother’s home. I did not want to mention I am also a British citizen with a British passport because I thought they wouldn’t have the facilities to manage a person like me in their system. Alas they had me sit down and did some poking around. The customs officer finally asked the magical question, “Do you have a British passport?” and I was on my way. I was amazed how I was treated like a new man after that question.
I had a doppio espresso at the café in the lobby for departures. I then rid myself of my US dollars at the currency exchange desk. They wouldn’t exchange my US change, so I told them to put it in their donation bin. Useless metal that was. The time is about 06:10. I walked outside to the smoking area for a smoke and find a random person to chat to (it’s amazing who you’ll meet if you’re willing to speak). I chatted briefly with a Slovakian airport worker drinking espresso and smoking a hand-rolled filtered cigarette. I offered a trade and he just gave me one and it was impressive; I’d place it up there with Dunhills and Camel Non-filters.
My brief acquaintance left to start his shift and I entered the elevator to the central bus station. The stupid door kept on sliding close and opening as if it were a massive, squashed, accordion that plays the music of muted mechanical flute. Finally shut, I took an escalator or two to the station. There were at least a hundred people in this very large room and it only got busier as the morning progressed. I took a seat and corresponded with family using a free 15 minute session online (with my own computers of course — pro-tip, don’t trust public machines with login details). Being that the bus station has an inflatable roof that is most likely seasonal, it was down right frigid. Luckily I had a summer sleeping bag made from fleece and snuggled up in that for a while while reading on my Kindle some more. Around 08:30 I got up and used the restroom. The door was wide open and it was like -2°C. Chilly bottoms! I then popped in the café with all my gear. Another doppio espresso and a lovely mushroom, cheese, and bacon panini were consumed. I then sat about waiting out the remainder of my time mostly people watching, back at the benches.
Finally 10:35 rolled around and I got on my coach. I tuned in to some of The Grateful Dead and Johnny Cash. The lady sitting across from me was reading some documents typed in Hebrew. Fascinating! I noticed “WC” and “LPG” on the various road signs as we sped down the M4 towards Cirencester. Finally at my destination, not just my grandpa was there, but my grandma was there too! How exciting!
Arrived
My case fit in perfect into my grandfather’s tiny red Toyota and we were off to the Garden Center to eat and purchase some plants. My chili and rice hit the spot. I tried Suko Tea for the first time; it usually has a very unique and special flavoring like apple with mint. I seriously cannot recall exactly what we did after the, but obviously we went home. The house is as I remember; absolutely clean and spotless as per my grandma’s preference. I pretty much have the entire bottom floor to myself, not that I need it. I’ll take it though! I had a shower which was much-needed being that I hadn’t washed for at least two days. Soon after I fell asleep around 18:30 in my fleece sleeping bag even though I asked for dinner.
I awoke at 05:00. There were so many Facebook messages! OMG GUYS! Yeah. Well thanks though, it was a pretty nice way to socially reconnect. It was fun! 07:30 I had a lovely breakfast with grandmother. Vegemite (I had a jar in my luggage) on nicely buttered homemade toasted bread. Porridge with Agave. (No thank you mum!; we have honey now!) Some instant Coffee served black. Grandfather came by later, after I walked about in the snow. Indeed, it’d snow and this is pretty uncommon of in the UK. I saw all the shops, on my walk — including Tesco’s!
Anyways after that in no particular order I…
- purchased a Nokia 100 with an Orange pay-as-you-go SIM for £20.
- successfully withdrew cash from a cash machine using my Bluebird card. (The nice people at the Phones4U shop where I bought my mobile at couldn’t get it to work.)
- broke the Terms of Services to enjoy Pandora and Turntable.fm by using a SOCKS proxy tunneled through ssh (using ssh’s -D flag) — so what? I didn’t realize our fat cats in the music industry still don’t have their licensing policy rationalized.
- visited the local Apple authorized reseller (and seemingly the only computer-focused shop).
- discovered I broke my Kindle 1G; I suspect it happened while I was in the bus station and bumped my backpack too hard. I’ve actually broken the same model once before by stepping on it also while traveling. They’re just made to break, by design—that screen has virtually no impact protection when case-less and even the plastic housing doesn’t go a very good job of protecting the circuit board as it’s just two pieces of plastic held together by tabs.
- enjoyed a good wine here and there, legally & responsibly.
- even got my grandparents to try a Vodka-Redbull (Vodka Bomb) and they found it strange, but not bad!
That’s it for now. Leave a comment.