BLOG: Bobcat Abroad
For better or for worse
By Heather Irish, Staff Writer
January 30, 2007 | 12:47 a.m.
But seriously, I have already survived the little things, as all college students are familiar with, when moving to a new place.
I've managed to finally find my way around this city. My walk to work every day is equivalent to a walk from Old South to College Green. When I get to work I have my group of friends here from OU, but I also have my coworkers to talk to. It helps that most are in their twenties and we go out for drinks afterwards. I don't even notice their accents anymore. I've totally adjusted to my new life of going to work, albeit sadly without a paycheck. Only the tiniest of things tend to remind me of where I am.
I live in this nice flat (apartment) in Cardiff Bay that is decorated with bright colors reminiscent of the south of France. It's a very Euro-styled flat. It's all very relaxing, except for a couple of appliance issues.
The all-in-one washer and dryer is in the kitchen nestled with the cupboards. It's a lot smaller than what we're used to in the States. There are three knobs that you have to deal with. One tells the degree of heat for the dryer (reminder, it's in Celsius. A little tip from CNN -- double the Celsius temperature then add 30 to get the degree in Fahrenheit), one tells for how long you want your clothes dried and the other tells what setting you want the washer on. Once you accomplish that you put a little square laundry detergent in and close the door. But beware, the door won't let you open it until it's done drying, and if you put too many detergent blocks in the washer you will have clothes that are stiff as a board. The drying is interesting, too. The British dryers extract the moisture from your clothes instead of blowing hot air on the clothes like it's done in the States. When you take your clothes out of the dryer they feel slightly damp, but the moisture will evaporate after a couple minutes.
The Europeans are much more eco-friendly than us. In every room, the kitchen especially, they have switches by all the outlets. For instance, you might have the microwave plugged in to the outlet, but you have to flick on the switch before the microwave will cook anything. There are also switches for the oven and stove.
Hot water is slightly different, too. The hot water is on a timer, so when you want to take a shower and don't want to have to worry about the hot water fading in and out, you flick a switch. Hot and cold water come from separate pipes, and in most bathrooms, there are separate faucets for hot and cold. But because they're from separate pipes, each faucet ejects either extremely cold or extremely hot water. You can always tell who the Americans are in the place I intern, the Welsh Assembly Government. We'll be the ones rushing our hands back and forth, frantically trying to get a nice medium temperature. The Brits always look at us slightly perplexed as we do this, and I know we're a topic of the next conversation when they return to their office.
One of the more important differences occurs whenever I leave my flat. When I walk to the city shopping centre that's about 15 minutes walk from my flat, I am subtly reminded that I am in Europe. After being told by my parents all my life to look left-right-left when crossing the street, I can't help to want to do it here. However, the whole driving on the wrong side of the road kind of puts a damper on my mindset. So whenever I get to a cross walk I go into a slight panic mode when I have to reverse my mom's advice. It's now right-left-right. I don't want to recreate the scene out of “Closer” when Natalie Portman is hit by Jude Law when she fails to look the right way. Although the thought of meeting a cute guy may be worth a couple of bumps and bruises...
But these mishaps and random oddities, while aggravating at the time, make me smile and think of how lucky I am. I'm in a place thousands of miles away from the States, and in less than a month the UK has become my home. The little cultural differences make Cardiff more magical. It will be hard to return home. Perhaps I won't come back. I've fallen in love, for better or worse, with the UK.