I arrived in december and London was cold,

I stayed in the bars along Charing Cross Rd. Well, Borough High Street actually. But I am getting ahead of myself. My leaving party did not really go off so Steve, Richie and myself got a hotel room in New Plymouth and dealt to a good amount of beer. We got some strange looks bringing a chilly bin into the flash hotel we were at. Had a great night which was a good send off from NZ.

My journey to London began with a day spent in Auckland, a day in Sydney catching up with Bob and seeing the sights, a night in Bangkok worrying about the shuttle, then a two hour transfer in Bahrain. Of the airlines I flew with, British airways came out on top. When I asked what they had to drink the response was -Everything-. Before we left Bahrain Gulf air had two air hostesses walk through the plane with fumigators. Always a good start. I arrived in London half an hour early so had extra time to get through customs. I arrived at the hostel at 2300 New Years eve and was at the bar by 2330. Double shots and red bull helped me get into the spirit of the season. I ended up watching the London Eye fireworks on the tv in the bar, much better then standing in the cold by the river. Had a great night, even though I do not remember much, ended up lost in London and did not get back to the hostel until noon.

New Years day I woke up to darkness. This put me in a spin until I realised it was only 4 in the afternoon and it gets dark early here. I met some Finns and ended up going to Ministry of Sound with them to see David Guetta. Cost 30 pounds to get in but the music was great and the girls pretty. I ended up taking the train to St Albans on the sunday and stayed in a hotel near the school I now work at.

I woke up on the monday to a frigid day with snow on the ground. Snow! I arrived at school early and waited around until someone figured out what to do with me. Turned out the heating in the science labs had been turned off so the whole department was frozen. Verulam school is much different to Waitara. I not only have twelve classes that are made up of 300 odd students, they behave worse than the kids at Waitara. But, I have survived a week and the longer I am there the easier it should get, in theory anyway.

Differences I have noticed so far between NZ and Britain? The cold to start with. Better music, Larger loaves on bread, the chocolate milk tastes weird, burgers seem to be bigger, servos do not have pis or pie warmers, they still have 1, 2 and 5 cent coins, paper money and no option for pin on credit card. Broadband runs at 50mb, and supermarkets have huge selections of ready to go food. All in all it is similar to home but with enough differences to make it interesting. Now I am going to go and enjoy my weekend before I have to go back to work.