I seriously need to update my blog.

Istanbul, Part III - Vignettes

Here is a list of all the things I loved about visiting Istanbul:

• The weather - warm and sunny


• The Bosphorus - blue, gorgeous, could stare at it for hours


• Raki - though two shots of that and I lost my damn mind


• Cuisine - had some amazing kebabs and hummus plates


• Affordability - at 3 Turkish Lira to 1 GBP, things were surprisingly cheap. We had an amazing sushi dinner one evening overlooking the sea, with appetisers and a bottle of very nice wine, and I think it cost us each the equivalent of £25-30. Unheard of in England, and hard to do in parts of America, too.


• The mix of old world and new world visible everywhere, and the way you can see the layered levels of the city’s history (Byzantium - Constantinople - Istanbul)

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Guest Relation

We stayed in a hotel called The Surmeli, which was shaped sort of like a big cylinder and looked nothing like the photos on the website. In fact, when I think about it now, what I remember most is “brown”. And not a good, modern chocolatey brown, but rather a tired, Brady Bunch wood paneling 70’s courdoroy brown. To the immediate left upon entering the lobby was a small desk with a sign that read, “Guest Relation”.

And as we found out, not only was there an “s” missing, but also missing was any real comprehension of the English language. Allow me to demonstrate…

After the first taxi ride of death across town, during which we seriously feared for our lives, we arrived back to the hotel with the wide-eyed stares frequently found on victims of natural disasters. Our knees were wobbly, we were shaking from the adrenaline rush of the past 30 minutes and we were in desperate need of… alcohol. As we in no way wanted to risk a taxi ride of any real duration again that day, J and I decided to visit Guest Relation for some advice. E made the wise decision to head up to the room.

J: “Oh, hello. Do you think you can recommend somewhere close to the hotel where we could have a nice drink? We’ve already eaten, and we just want somewhere to relax.”

Guest Relation (GR): “Oh, yes, you can go for wonderful food in Bebek!”

J: “Is Bebek near? We were thinking to find something in Taksim, which is very close.”

GR: (pulling out map and pointing to a location that was at least six inches away from our hotel on that map) “Try here, is a great Italian place. You can have good food in Bebek.”

J: “We have already eaten. We are just looking for somewhere close to have a drink. Maybe in Taksim?”

GR: (now pointing to the other side of the map) “Right here, near the bridge, is great restaurant. Very good food.”

It is worth noting that we were staying on the other side of the water from the main tourist attractions like Hagia Sophia, Grand Bazaar, etc. The bridge she was referencing was at least 20 minutes away by taxi and had featured a starring role in our afternoon ride of glory

J turns to me, with a look on her face that clearly shows her lack of amusement with this process. So I step in.

Me: “I’m sure that’s a lovely place. But we don’t want to go there (pointing to place on map). We had a crazy taxi ride today.  We want to stay near the hotel. We want to go around this area. (Drawing circle with my finger around where our hotel is on the map) We just want to get a few drinks.”

GR: “You want taxi? Then I say Bebek. Definitely best food in Bebek. You go Bebek.” And she sat back with a satisfied smile on her face.

Me: “We really do not want to EAT. We just want DRINKS. NEAR THE HOTEL. CLOSE BY.”

GR: “You want I call Bebek then for you? I call restaurant for you now?”*

*We did eventually make it to Bebek for sushi. It was lovely, but the best part was that our Lonely Planet guide listed the main attraction in Bebek as… the local Starbucks. So we are still unclear as to why Guest Relation was so sold on Bebek.

That was the end of that conversation because we could take no more. We said no, thanks, we’d give Bebek a pass and that we would sort out the situation on our own. To be honest, I’m not sure where we ended up going that night - it is highly possible that was when we decided to buy a litre of vodka at the corner shop and hit the Popeye’s.

It is also worth noting, while we’re on the subject of “Guest Relation” that this woman also tried to send us to a public pool that sounded suspiciously like a tourist trap style of Lido Deck (This is the website - http://suadaclub.com.tr/ - which looks cool at first until you see how closely all the deck chairs are arranged. Imagine all those chock full of annoying tourists - and us being TRAPPED on there for the day). We kept trying to get more information about this SuadaClub - was it adults-only? Was it touristy? Was it nice? We were willing to pay for the best we could find, as we wanted one day of high luxury.

Our original plan was to go here - http://www.caudalie.com/uk/turkish-spa.html - but they were unfortunately closed for the weekend. Guest Relation responded to all our questions by saying, louder and louder “Suada great place! I go there myself all days I can!”. That was enough to ensure we did not, in any circumstances, want to visit this Club Suada.

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The Taxi Ride

It is worth trying to describe the infamous taxi ride. We picked up this taxi after a long day of shopping at the Grand Bazaar. We couldn’t find a taxi outside the Bazaar and so we spent some time wandering rather suspicious looking back-streets until I went into a hotel and got directions to the nearest taxi stand. J has some sort of internal GPS because she had been pointing down this scary street all along with the certainty that taxis were to be found at its end. That street was exactly the one that hotel directed me to.

It should probably have served as a harbinger of things to come that we had to walk down the scary street to get to this taxi. We passed men who, of course, gave us the evil eye and hollered and yelled. We tried to walk on sidewalks which ranged from non-existent to where they would suddenly turn into big holes or steps going down. If you weren’t paying extremely close attention, you could easily break your neck, and I’m not exaggerating.

At the end of the scary street, we found ourselves staring at a sign for Taxis - when suddenly, a taxi flew down the street and came to an abrupt halt. Silly girls that we are, we took this to be a good omen and congratulated ourselves on our luck.

We got into the taxi, gave the address of our hotel, and settled back for what we thought would be a relatively uneventful ride. (We were already accustomed to the somewhat aggressive driving style - after all, our taxi driver that morning had gotten into an argument with another taxi driver over who should be in what lane - and they continued this argument while driving down the street, hanging out their respective windows to scream at one another. I really wish I spoke Turkish because I’m pretty sure there were some legendary insults traded that would have been worth remembering.)

That taxi took off like a bat out of hell, and didn’t stop. The driver seemed to know only two styles of driving - gunning the engine and going fast as he could, or slamming on the brakes with a massive fury. No obstacle was too great to slow us down. I am honestly surprised we did not end up driving on the sidewalk. We wove in and out of traffic with near pathological precision. There was one instance where I would have bet my last bit of monies that we were going to be hit by a bus, and yet we avoided that collision by less than an inch. That taxi sped through the streets like we were running from the po-lice. We took corners on two wheels, sped through traffic lights, narrowly avoided hitting people, other cars, buildings. At one point we were on these really steeply downgraded back streets to avoid a traffic jam and there was a woman in front of us who dared to drive normally. Between her and the speed bumps in the road we managed to only exceed the speed limit by 20MPH. I thank Baby Jesus for that car being in front of us as I am truly frightened to imagine what our driver would have done with those speed bumps. All I can imagine is that scene from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off when the two garage attendants take the convertible out on a joyride and you see the car going airborne -

I’m pretty sure it would have been something like that, only way, way worse. I remember remarking to E that I felt like we were inside The Bourne Identity, only without Matt Damon or any conceivable reason for people to be chasing us.

Needless to say, we did not tip that taxi driver. I think E even gave him exact change, which is kind of hard to do in Turkish lira. I don’t know if the driver thought he’d get a prize for beating the sound barrier and getting us back to our hotel whilst being mostly airborne, or if he just wanted us out of the car so he could pick up and terrorise another fare. I do know we were so glad to see the back of him!

(Although, when stuck in traffic a few days later, we did find ourselves missing Mr. Crazy a little bit, and remarking that he would have gotten us through that traffic jam in no time)

Aside from the crazy driver, we had:

• Driver who stopped on the side of the road to talk to a man with a suitcase, and apparently negotiate that he would pick him up once he dropped us off - and then he drove like a demon to our hotel and all but threw us out of the cab


• Driver who drove in circles a few times running up our fare before J’s internal GPS caught on


• Driver who offered me the opportunity to marry him and make some babies since we were both single


• Two drivers fight over us when we came upon a cluster of taxis and weren’t sure which one to pick. One driver even warned us about the other one saying it would be so expensive


• Varying degrees of cost for the exact same trip - sometimes it cost 20 lira, sometimes 40, sometimes 13. It was bizarre


• We never took the same route twice. Every taxi driver had a different way to get us to the Grand Bazaar, or back to our hotel.


• One taxi driver who said he knew exactly where our hotel was and then proceeded to take the most roundabout way possible. It was so bad that we abandoned the taxi and ended walking the rest of the way back

At the end of it all, I really missed London’s black cabs. I even missed the crazy minicabs with their hilarious foreign drivers and questionable odours.

The best part of all this is that about four days into the trip, we were reading what J’s Lonely Planet guide had to say about the taxis and we found this:

Istanbul is full of taxis. Some drivers are lunatics; others are con artists – most are neither. If you’re caught with the first category and you’re about to go into meltdown, say ‘yavaş!’ (careful/slow down!). Drivers in the second of these categories – the con artists – are unfortunately reasonably common. All taxis have digital meters and must run them, but some of these drivers ask for a flat fare, or pretend the meter doesn’t work so they can gouge you at the end of the run. The best way to counter this is to tell them no meter, no ride.

There was also a sentence (which I can’t find now) referring to the apalling road safety record of the city, which was by no means a surprising fact.

I consider myself lucky to have escaped unscathed and now have a much greater appreciation for the orderly nature of English traffic (something I thought I would never say).

And for the record, ‘yavaş!’ is pronounced “Yah-vash” ;)

27b/6 - One of the best websites around

Looking to laugh so hard you start to cry, like for real cry? Check out this website - 27b/6 run by an Australian man called David Thorne. I think if he weren’t already married, I would get on a plane, hunt him down and make him marry me. He speaks my brand of crazy, for sure.

My YouTube Channel

For your auditory amusement…

http://www.youtube.com/user/aliaenor76

Istanbul, Part II

I’ve been meaning to write about the rest of my trip, but unfortunately along with some amazing scarves and gifts, I also brought back some sort of Turkish plague - and so have been feeling miserable for the past week or so.

I am sufficiently cracked out on Benalyn and Ibuprofen/Codeine tablets to no longer feel the burning in my throat or sandpaper swipe of every cough and so blog I shall :)

Istanbul - Part I

24th August 2011
Istanbul, Turkey

Having a hilarious time so far in Istanbul. The tone of the journey to come was set by the taxi ride to the airport Tuesday morning. Our flight was at 06:30 out of London City and so E. told me that the cab would arrive at 3am to pick me up before going to her house. We would then meet J at the airport. The taxi arrived right on time, complete with crazy, smelly, oily-haired driver who thought it fitting to clean out the trash in his vehicle by taking it out and throwing it on the sidewalk in front of my flat. He also seemed to think that playing crazy Indian music (India Indian, not Native American Indian) at full volume was appropriate. He then proceeded to audition for Formula 1 on the way to E’s house.

We arrived at the airport around 04:00 after a level of crazy driving that left us both white-knuckled and deep in prayer. We walked in the sliding doors at London City only to be called over immediately by the woman at the information desk who told us that sorry, the airport was closed until 05:15 am, but we were welcome to wait on the benches with rest of the wayward travelers. Seeing as how I had a grand total of 3 hours sleep, and E had just arrived from a long trip to the U.S. at midnight, and hadn’t slept at all yet, we were both horribly disappointed. Nothing was open - so no coffee, no tea, and certainly no sausage roll for E. :(

J. arrived shortly thereafter, at which point we all found it hysterical that we got to hang out in London City airport for a good hour or so before check in. We did manage eventually to get some tea and coffee and sustenance before making our way to the gate. We wandered through Duty Free, sampled free Pimms (at 6 in the morning) and then made our way to the gate. Only to find the door to our gate closed. And the sign - when we bothered to look at it - said “Wait in Lounge”. We were off to a brilliant start.

The flight to Zurich was relatively uneventful - horrible muffins, free chocolate, bouncy whirry little plane and we managed to connect just in time. The flight to Istanbul offered a dubious lunch and a screaming little Turkish boy who managed to hit upper registers of sound only seen by world class sopranos.

Upon arrival, we went to get our visas, where I impressed the non-English speaking border agent with my three words of Turkish: Hello, Thank You, and I Love You. The hotel had offered us a taxi for 65 Euro, but we found a shuttle service for 24 Euro and decided to take that. Big mistake. Huge. It took us three hours to get from the airport to our hotel - three hours for what should have been at most a 40 minute journey. Granted, we hit horrendous traffic and stopped at three other hotels along the way, but we’re also pretty sure the driver was lost. About two hours in, E. wondered aloud if we were even still in Turkey or not.

We finally arrived at the hotel, which ended up being really nice… save for the pond-size pool outside. We decided to drop our things and then go out for a nice dinner. We all wanted to walk after hours on planes and in the bus from hell… which turned into a game of human frogger. Traffic in Istanbul is horrendous - basically gridlock and no respect for lights, lanes or pedestrians. We had to cross about six lanes of traffic and regardless of the lights, cars just came anyway. By the time we made it to the restaurant, we were all a bit traumatised. We ate at a nice brasserie in the Astoria building and our waiter was really funny and nice. We asked him for suggestions on where to go out, and when we left, he handed me a note that said:

“semi professional guide. Ozhan.” and his phone number.

We could not stop laughing, and J and E keep calling him my semi-permanent guide. We walked back to the hotel and prepared for an early night in as we were all exhausted. J and E brought ear plugs and so they missed both the strange drumming sounds and the 1am porn movie that was being filmed apparently in the room next store. (I didn’t think they would believe me… until it started up again at 9am this morning)

The best part of the evening was that we kept trying to find our hotel on the map in the Lonely Planet guide - we asked like three people - with no luck. J. spent a good half hour before throwing the book aside and declaring that our hotel must apparently not exist.

__

Breakfast this morning was… interesting. There were scrambled eggs (runny), hard boiled eggs, soft boiled eggs, chicken sausage, veal sausage, lots of crazy cheeses, real honey on a honeycomb, amazing bread, yoghurt, figs, apricots, Nutella… Most of the food was really good but the combination was so strange. I ended up having two hard boiled eggs, some dried apricots, a slice of cheese, fruit salad and bread with Nutella. We played a game at breakfast by trying to figure out which couple it was that was making the crazy donkey noises the night before. Based on the choices available, we really hoped that whoever it was was still sleeping.

We took a taxi to the Grand Bazaar for a bit of shopping. On the way, our driver gets into a road rage argument with another taxi driver. The two taxis were riding alongside each other and the men were screaming at each other in Turkish - while weaving around traffic.

Today was absolutely hilarious. I could write for hours - and probably will - but E’s netbook battery is low, so I’ll try to summarise:

• The minute we got out of the taxi, we were greeted by two Turkish store owners who wanted us to look at carpets. I asked them if they were magic, and he told me he had some of those at his other store. They were very nice though, and took us to a good money changing place


• We got to see an old Turkish man standing on a milk crate yelling and screaming (in Turkish). Turns out that he hates the government… a lot


• The vendors in the bazaar are hilarious and very aggressive. They were enthralled with us - but seemed to think E and J were Australian, Italian or if they were from Barnsley or Manchester. No one guessed London. They were excited I was from America, but no one knew where Ohio was (typical)


• One man followed E and said, “Where did you learn such good English?” to which she answered, “Because I’m from England!”


• One of the vendors insisted on getting a picture with me, taken with his cell phone camera. He also sold E a purse for £7, which was awesome


• We were offered tea, coffee, and from one particulary strange vendor, whiskey. We didn’t partake of any, but we did buy scarves from Mr. Whiskey.


• The joke of the day was the vendor who got mad at me for implying that his wall of celebrity photos was photoshopped and so he then asked me, “Are you pregnant?” and when I stared at him in shock, he made a big belly symbol and yelled, “Baby?” I had no words - just stormed out of the shop. J turned to him and said, “You’re lucky you’re still alive”


• The baby thing became a running joke throughout the day, but I’m still not too happy about it. I wanted to lift up my dress and yell “Does this look like pregnant to you, playa?” - but considering we were getting all kinds of depraved offers already, I wasn’t encouraging the situation.


• J got propositioned to go to a Ramadan celebration by some kid’s granddad while the kid stood behind her and made thrusting noises


• In one store, an old guy grabbed J and kissed her on the cheek and then started grabbing and touching. For no reason at all.


• The bargaining was the best part. “How much?” “300 lira”. So E says “I’ll give you 1 lira”. When challenged she tells us “Well, everyone says you start low!”


• “Goolay goolay” means bye-bye in Turkish … or, as I found out because E and J wouldn’t stop laughing, “testicle testicle” in British English.


• I’m pretty sure that one man had me say something like “I’m a dirty heathen” when I asked him how to say “I’ll be back”. Only because the word Allah was in there three times.


• They loved my Turkish until I learned how to say “How much is that”. Also funny was that I would ask “How much is that, please?” in Turkish and then they would answer me in full Turkish… fully knowing I didn’t understand a word

After all day at the bizarre bazaar aka where E wants to spend the trip, sweaty smelly men notwithstanding, we wanted to take a taxi to a waterfront hotel. We finally tracked down a taxi rank and settled on the W because we thought W’s are always safe. And so began the taxi ride of death.

This driver was on crack. First we had to sit in horrible traffic in which there were vendors selling bottled water and flowers. Then, as soon as there was a break in the gridlock, our driver took off like a rocket. He wasn’t just driving fast - he was aggressive to the point of us having at least ten near-death experiences. I’m not exaggerating. I probably didn’t help the situation by screaming “Oh, help us Baby Jesus!” a bunch of times. He drove towards oncoming traffic, tried on purpose to clip a car to clip a car because they were driving too slow for him, weaved in and out of parked cars, seemed to try to hit pedestrians on purpose and was constantly accelerating and slamming on brakes. At one point I almost lost control of my bladder. By the time we reached the W, I had developed an amazing level of religion. At one point, E was like “Should we throw up our hands?” (like on a roller coaster)

We paid him exactly the amount on the meter. I don’t think he was too happy but there was no way we were going to tip for that experience.

The fun continued at the craziest W I’ve ever been to. No one really spoke English. I ordered a glass of champagne - pointing to the name of the champagne on the menu - and got a glass of rose for my trouble. I then got the one English - speaking person there to understnad what I meant and finally got my bubbly. J. went to the bathroom and got stuck in the stall because the door didn’t work correctly. I then went and got stuck in a different stall. We ordered “risotto balls” which ended up being fried ricotta cheese balls…and horribly inedible. We were all shocked that somewhere liked the W could have such crazy inconsistent service.

We braved a taxi ride back to our hotel - which was fine, save for the fact that the taxi was almost out of petrol and a police motorcycle followed us for about a mile with its flashing lights on… for no reason. We got out of the taxi… and ran straight to the Popeye’s across the street.

Yes, there is a Popeye’s in Istanbul. Brilliant. After much sign language, laughter and a mistake involving something called a Pop-Roll, I got my chicken nuggets to take away. I also got a picture with the staff of Popeye’s, which seemed to be the highlight event of their year.

And now, it is off to sleep, perchance to dream, perchance to be woken again by freaky noises. This time, though, we’ve promised to make the noises back.

Don’t mess with England and America when we get together ;)

Матрёшка

Stardate: 21 August, 2011
Listening to: “I’m Not Your Toy” by La Roux

“Although I know it’s unfair I reveal myself one mask at a time.”
Stephen Dunn

When I was younger, I used to want to be an actress. I will never forget my mother telling me to stay away from that career choice. She was adamant about not letting me even try out for school plays. Not because she thought I wouldn’t be good at it - but because she thought I would be too good at it… that I would lose myself in whatever role I was playing and not necessarily be able to find my way back.

I never really understood what she meant, and chose instead to see it as yet another way my parents were ruining-my-life and if I could just find my real family, then I could live a beautiful, cotton-candy life as the princess I knew I really was.

But I understand it now. 

I am a dangerously emotive person. Even when I’m happy, I’m like the colour yellow with just a shade of black underneath. I’m always a half-step away from falling desperately in love and I’ve been known to disappear into bathrooms to have a cathartic crying session - well, just because.

I think I let things affect me far more deeply than they reasonably should. I am completely wrapped up in a movie of my own making and going full-out for that Oscar performance.

My brother and I have talked about this - he has shared that he struggles with a similar manifestation of this trait (finding himself sometimes getting almost irrationally angry at the most inconsequential things). It’s like we take the “go big or go home” thing to a new level, emotionally. We’ve agreed that it is probably a direct result of our childhood - and how nothing was ever moderated. Things were either really, really good and happy or they were manic, tragic, awful.

I can’t help but seeing the world around me as written words on a page, and that page as part of a script for a movie of which I am the star performer. During my morning commute, I’ll imagine that I’m on my way to deal with something deliciously tragic and beautiful and I’ll have worked up several acts by the time my train reaches my destination. And then when I step off the train, I’ll start up with a completely different interpretation of the world around me - slipping in and out of emotions like I flip through dresses getting ready on a Saturday night. 

Which begs the question - can I discern the real from the imagined? I am fairly sure I can, though it takes quite a lot to get through the haze. Whenever someone is able to do that - even just a little bit - I find myself romanticising them to a somewhat unhealthy degree.

And so I find myself in relationships that make no sense and yet instead of backing away, I slip into a different persona and try to convince myself that no, everything is fine, this is really who I am meant to be only I just didn’t know it before. This farce continues often for as long as the other person will let it - or until I exhaust myself trying to keep all the versions of myself straight, and I slip up, and everything goes to hell.

At which point, I react emotionally… and yes, well, you see where this is going. Self-fulfilling prophecy, anyone? Since moving to England, I’ve been through at least deliciously melodramatic romantic experiences.

All of this came to mind today when I realised that about this time last year I was in the early stages of putting someone on a pedestal. Someone who really, really was not right for me. That entire experience ripped a piece out of me - not because I fell desperately in love (though true to form, there were little hiccups of moments where I thought maybe-possibly-perhaps), and not because the ending was horrific or anything.

I find myself a bit damaged because I spent that entire experience being someone other than myself. I was so terribly lonely at the beginning and doing what I always do - cycling through various personae to see which one clicked - and it just so happened that he responded to the one that was least like who I really am in so many ways. She was still razor sharp smart and funny - but she was muted. It was me, but me rinsed and filtered and wrung dry of most of my essential traits.

Oh, and I knew it was no good. I felt it deep inside, and I ignored it - all because I desperately wanted companionship and because this person happened to slip through my haze just a little bit.

I would like to say I’ll never do that again. I’m certainly going to try very hard.

I’m spending my time these days focusing on setting aside all my various masks, digging out that girl deep inside the nesting dolls. I want to take her out, dust her off, and hold her gently - reintroduce her to the world. She is a bit crazy, a bit dangerous, and a bit of a hot mess - but definitely worth knowing.

—

Observations

Last night at a friend’s leaving-do (aka going away party), I came to two rather sobering relevations:

1. If I want to spot the single (and or gay) men in a crowd at a “hip” party in London, just look for T-shirts. My (married/attached) friends and I quickly realised that all the men who were attired in button-down shirts were taken (aka “domesticated”).

2. As I approach my 35th birthday, I realise my days of passing off being single as a “desire for freedom” or “a choice as I focus on my career” are numbered. Very shortly, my singlehood will quickly become one more of the universe’s little jokes.

All that being said, I’m still not willing to settle for what passes for eligble men in London today. I’ve met some amazing people through my dating forays, but I’ve also met some complete freaking weiiiiirrrrrdos who make me seriously question the integrity of the global gene pool. And so I’d rather be rolling solo at home, watching Nikita while painting my toenails than out on a date with someone with whom I could never imaging having an 8th grade make-out session. For example.

Action plan? Find a fun-loving sultan and/or son-of-sultan whilst in Turkey next week.

Perfectly reasonable approach. :P

Federman out.

Obama’s Folly: Why Taxing the Rich Is No Solution

Link: Obama’s Folly: Why Taxing the Rich Is No Solution

“Is the president willing to risk one of the last sectors in which the United States enjoys a comparative advantage, betting that less burdensome taxes have nothing to do with this competitive edge?”

P.S. - Since when does earning $250,000/year make you “rich”? Comfortable, yes. Rich? No.

I think this society suffers so much from too much freedom, too many rights that allow people to be irresponsible.

Boyd Rice

Sorry, I'm not trained for that...

Just had a hilarious conversation at lunch during which myself, and two colleagues (one Algerian, one Polish) had a good rag on all things English.

My favourite is the story told by A., which involved buying cheese at a local Sainsbury’s.

“So my boyfriend and I bought a slice off a wheel of cheese, because we wanted to take it with us to the park and make sandwiches. We realised that we didn’t have a sharp knife, so we took the slab of cheese back to the deli and kindly asked if it could be sliced… only to be greeted by a look of dumb panic from the Sainsbury’s deli employee.

"Um, I dunno”, he mumbled. “You see, I haven’t been trained on this.”

P. then told a story about trying to get an extra link added to his watch. After waiting weeks for the part to arrive, he went to the shop as requested and was told to wait 15 minutes. Thirty minutes, then forty-five minutes and then an hour passed. When P. inquiried about his watch, he was told, quite rudely, that it wasn’t ready yet, and that he should probably do some more shopping and then come back. When P. that he didn’t have time to wait any longer, he was told that there was only one person who was specially trained to add links to watches and he was unavailable… and she was unable to provide a time as to when he might be able to make himself available. P. promptly lost his temper, demanded his money back and sought custom elsewhere.

My contribution to this party was sharing the ridiculousness I encountered at my last job. The employees had been requesting a microwave in the new building for months, and HR kept demurring. After a particularly vocal employee feedback session, the reason emerged that HR was very concerned about the health and safety implications of having a microwave in the kitchen, and about the accidents which could potentially occur without proper training.

Seriously.

In the end we got the microwave… but posted to the top and side of it, and also on the counter door above, were explicit instructions on how to handle it safely. Nevermind the fact that they bought what had to be the cheapest option out there and so it took finding an engineer to figure out how simply reheat last night’s dinner.

Ahhh, England.

Thanks to my friend Megan S. for pointing this out - Look in the top right corner.
Click on the photo to read the article, “Riots in Britain: Anarchy in the UK”

Moving, Moving, Moving! (To Tumblr)

Don't get too excited everyone... I'm still staying in the UK.
But I'm moving my blog. I'm now over on Tumblr, so be sure to visit and bookmark. I don't think I can automatically email updates any more so you're going to have to put some work in and actually "Follow" me! :)

http://anarcheintheuk.tumblr.com/

[youtube=]

joshua radin - star mile (by casafashion)
Not the actual video, but one of my favourite songs

I want to live here. Nice, France

The English response to the Riots

We are so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others that in the end we become disguised to ourselves.

~François Duc de La Rochefoucauld

Wonder Woman?

I don’t know if this is an actual quote or if I’m misremembering, but I think I once heard someone say that the things we hate the most in others are but a reflection of our own worst qualities. Even if this isn’t an accurate quote, I still think it is somewhat true. I have long said that I hate weakness in others – especially in the opposite sex. I have been known to dismiss people and feel unrelenting contempt towards them solely on this trait alone. Well… just recently something happened that made me realise that perhaps the reason I am so demanding and unyielding in this aspect is because deep down, I can be pretty weak myself.

Witch Lady

Disclaimer: my nephew is perfect and exempt from this post. :D

My brother and sister will immediately know what I mean by the title of this post. I am referring to the scary woman who used to live at the bottom of our cul-de-sac and who would come outside and scream at any child who got within 5 feet of her driveway or yard. She even used to try to argue that she “owned” the part of the cul-de-sac that was in front of her house.

Wonder Woman?

I don’t know if this is an actual quote or if I’m misremembering, but I think I once heard someone say that the things we hate the most in others are but a reflection of our own worst qualities. Even if this isn’t an accurate quote, I still think it is somewhat true. I have long said that I hate weakness in others – especially in the opposite sex. I have been known to dismiss people and feel unrelenting contempt towards them solely on this trait alone. Well… just recently something happened that made me realise that perhaps the reason I am so demanding and unyielding in this aspect is because deep down, I can be pretty weak myself.


I never thought of myself as inherently weak – I mean I’ve been through some crazy shit in my life and come out the other side, often times better off. I’ve stayed strong in situations that would have put other people under. But like anything else, I reckon that weakness isn’t binary. There are varying shades, varying degrees, and varying kinds of weakness.  And this is going to sound ridiculous, but the closest analogy to my own weakness that I can think of is Superman. He was so strong, could move the world fast enough to go back in time, bend steel, stop bullets – but put him around a piece of kryptonite and a 3 year old could take him down.

I certainly won’t be stopping any bullets or holding up speeding trains any time soon, but I consider myself to be a pretty fierce, capable woman. So what’s my kryptonite? Given what it is, I’m not sure putting it out there on the interwebs for all to see is such a good idea. Let’s just say that one of the very things that makes me who I am is also what leaves me vulnerable to some serious emotional hurt. I’ve also realised that, in a typically unfortunate twist of fate, the personality type to which I am most attracted is also the one most well-equipped to  cause me serious emotional havoc.

So where does this blistering insight leave me?

Slightly confused and majorly frustrated – because like anything else, just because I now sort of understand it doesn’t mean I have any clue as to how to go about repairing this hole in my defence system. (This whole situation is like Canada - I mean we know it’s there, but what on earth to do with/about it?) I suppose that the upside is that now that I know I have a propensity for possibly being more sensitive than is good for me, I can at least try to put things into perspective moving forward.

I’m thinking maybe adopting a shield would be a good move too. I haven’t quite worked out the psychic-shield option, so I’m thinking something more like this -

Regardless of its efficacy, it certainly would be a conversation piece.

On the train: “Excuse me, sir, you’re getting fingerprints and Englishness all over my magic shield.”
At work: “I’ll be right in for that meeting, just need to polish up my shield. Has anyone seen my sword?”
In da club: “Girl, I know you did not just spill your glass of Hypnotiq all over my shield. Don’t make me put on my magic arm cuffs and take you outside to my invisible jet!”

Or I could just stick to my tried-and-true most favourite shield of all, and that is my ineffable sense of humour. ;)

Federman out.

The London Riots

It’s been a while since I’ve updated my blog. I haven’t traveled anywhere super exciting (unless you count an unexpected foray into the underbelly of Wimbledon last weekend) and to be honest, the entire blog thing has slipped my mind. But the shameful acts of last week during what will probably be forever known as the “London Riots of 2011” have got me thinking.

Berlin

Mood: Exasperated, yet still happy
Theme Song: "It Can't Rain All The Time" - Jane Siebel

It's been a while since I've written, and for that I must apologise. I've gotten busy, and distracted, and it seems the older I get the shorter my attention span becomes, making it a real challenge to sit down and actually write a coherent sentence that is non work-related.

I think the one truth I'm discovering is that no matter where I go in my varied travels, my expectation of what the place will be like and the reality are two very different things. I'm not always disappointed (i.e. Nice, which was FABULOUS), but sometimes it all feels a bit anticlimactic. Berlin falls a bit into the latter category.

Curiouser and Curiouser

I am still holding to my resolution not to poke fun at London or complain just for the sake of complaining. However, I do have some unanswered questions that I must pose both to England and to Europe in general.


Read more »

Helsinki

Finland… what do I think about Finland? I think it was COLD. And that frightened me because it was March. And all the Finns I met kept talking about how lovely the weather was. Those of you who know me well understand that I do not do well with cold – especially with windy cold. As I stood outside in the morning, awaiting a taxi, all I could think of was how horrible it must be in December when it is really wintertime.

After I got past the bone-chilling freeze and warmed up, I found myself surprised by Helsinki. It is much more industrial-looking and city-like than I had expected. I suppose that this is largely due to the fact that my main points of reference are all European countries with long histories of being governed my monarchies and so I expected to see soaring palaces and opera houses and government buildings. Instead, I saw this -

 

View from the Hotel Torni where we had cocktails, a building famous for having been used by the Allied (Soviet) Control Commission in Helsinki after World War II. Torni is one of the tallest buildings in the Helsinki cityscape.

To be fair the Helsinki Cathedral, and the buildings near it are quite grand – but not in the typical European fashion. I learned that this is largely due to the history of the city (something about which I am horribly ignorant) -  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helsinki. . I learned that Finland was owned for quite some time by Sweden (who didn’t do much for the country to be fair) and then in the early 19th century, was taken over by Russia. I think Finland gained independence in the early 20th century but then spent much of the following decades being ravaged by the two world wars. Thus the architecture is not overly surprising. That being said, I have to confess I found the city rather bleak. For some reason, I kept thinking “Eastern European” (probably from films and such) – which must be due to the Russian influence, because Finland is pretty far north and is considered part of Scandinavia.

The Finnish language is craaaazy. As I’m fascinated by linguistics, I did some googling and was a bit pleased to discover that the reason why Finnish didn’t remind me of any other language is because it is in a language family with such super-popular languages like Hungarian, Khanty, Mansi, Permic, Mari, Mordvinic, Sami, Estonian, Karelian, Veps and Votic. I am usually really good at picking apart a new language and finding ways to understand how it works. While in Vienna, I even came close to understanding the structure and phrasing of German. But Finnish threw me for a loop. “Hello, how are you?” becomes “Hei. Miten menee?”. “Thank you. It was a pleasure to meet you” becomes “Kiitos. Oli ilo tavata.” Now YOU tell me if that makes any damn sense at all! Even Japanese made more sense to me, and that is a language that doesn’t even use letters! Needless to say, the language made for great fun when reading signs. There were many double vowels (lots of “aa” and “ii”) and words that are three or four letters in English ended up being 12 or 15 letters long in Finnish.

But don’t just take my word for it… this picture (left) says “Academic bookstore” (or so I was told). Even if it says more, check out how crazy it all looks together!
 

And the food… oh, dear the food. I only had two experiences with “real” Finnish cuisine, and both scared me. One was at a rest stop – basically a Finnish truck stop where we stopped for coffee. There was a buffet and it was filled with… what I can only describe as trays of different coloured mush. Oh, and there were sandwiches which looked to be filled with mystery meat. But, as everything was in Finnish, I couldn’t even figure out what was on offer. The other occasion was when we ate lunch in the hospital cafeteria in Turku. Lunch consisted of an iceberg lettuce salad plus some bizarre interpretation of an enchilada (everything was day-glo orange… and I could just barely identify peas and chicken). Yuck, yuck, yuck. The hotel food we had, on the other hand, was perfectly acceptable and very Scandinavian. Lots of fish, vegetables and cheese. And the dinner at the Salutgorat restaurant (photo, right) was amazing. Of course, this restaurant was in the poshest area of Helsinki…

 

The second day of my trip was spent in Turku, which I learned used to be the capital when Sweden owned the country. We drove from Helsinki and encountered the craziest weather. It went from being sunny (but cold) to a sudden blizzard to rain to sun again – all in the span of about 90 minutes. This is what the view between Helsinki and Turku looked like -

 

Pretty exciting, huh?

The other thing I found interesting was the amazing cultural differences. Most people in Finland are either Swedish or Finnish and I don’t think I saw very many people of colour at all. I was shocked to overhear that a co-worker had been horrified to learn that her former boss was from Africa, as she “didn’t know if she could work for a black” (I’m not sure if that was because of a dislike of black people, or just not understanding the culture) – but she was pleased to find out he was actually from South Africa, and thus was white. The other comment that caught me off guard was when the chief of surgery at one of the hospitals was talking about her newborn baby, and how everyone had bought her pink gifts. She said, “I am sure happy I ended up with a girl, because if I had a boy I didn’t want him to be a homo!” This was said in casual conversation and elicited much giggling and laughter. I personally just sat there, along with my boss, our mouths agape. I still can’t work out if maybe it was just a translation issue (her English was very stilted) – but, still. Someone should remind her that English speakers don’t run around saying “homo”. Not what I had expected from Finland, that’s for sure!

However, I have to say that despite the cold, the unintelligible language, and the mystery meat, I did enjoy Finland. I get to return end of June, and I hear that this is the best time because it is actually warm and sunny. I am looking forward to walking the Esplanade and visiting the market by the sea. Perhaps I will even begin to understand a few words beyond “Eh” (no) and “Yo” (yes)!!

Kunnes seuraavan kerran ...

Vienna

"Slow down, you crazy child
you're so ambitious for a juvenile
But then if you're so smart, tell me
Why are you still so afraid?

Where's the fire, what's the hurry about?
You'd better cool it off before you burn it out
You've got so much to do and
Only so many hours in a day

But you know that when the truth is told
That you can get what you want or you get old
You're gonna kick off before you even
Get halfway through
When will you realize, Vienna waits for you?"  - excerpt from "Vienna", by Billy Joel

I arrived in Vienna late Tuesday evening after an all day meeting at a hotel at Heathrow Airport. For those not in the know, I have been in Vienna for my product's European launch meeting, where we officially launch celebrate the launch with our internal European colleagues. Total headcount was about 70 people and the meeting lasted from Weds evening - Friday afternoon. The fun part was that I had about 4 1/2 weeks to plan and execute everything, and for 2 of those weeks I was travelling in America.

I spent several hours working with our event team and agency teams setting things up and then collapsed into bed around 1am. I was up at 6:30am on Wednesday and after a quick breakfast, proceeded to run non-stop for the rest of the day, working to get everything set up for the big kick-off that evening. For anyone who has not planned a meeting, there is SO MUCH work to be done that people just don't see. Setting up all the signage, ensuring the breakout rooms are configured and arranged, getting the A/V and lighting just right, checking and rechecking all the orders with the hotel so that nothing goes amiss - it's an immense amount of actions to check off on a to-do list. I ran around all day Wednesday until we officially kicked off the meeting at 19h with a knowledge fair + dinner buffet. The highlight was when I asked for my hamburger at lunchtime to be cooked medium rare and I was told quite vehemently (like when I was in Germany) that "NO! That is ILLEGAL". I wanted to counter that was should be illegal is overcooking meat, but I was too tired to be my usual pain in the ass self.

When the meeting kicked off, I was eyes and ears the entire time, making sure everything was going well, organised properly, and that all my VIPs were happy. Once the meeting ended at 20:30, there were another few hours of set-up to do. I think I got to bed that evening about midnight.

I was up at 5am on Thursday, as this was the big kick-off day. All of my VIPs (including our Regional President for Europe) were giving presentations and the day was chock full of workshops, three of which I was running as well. The meeting ran from 8am - 5:30pm, and then we met again at 7pm to go to the big dinner gala. The gala lasted until 1am, and I made it to bed (after some urgent, last-minute emails) about 2am.  I was up at 5am on Friday to deal with a logistical emergency. The meeting ran until 3:30pm, and then there was a good hour and a half of final details, packing things up, etc. By 5pm, I was ready to absolutely collapse. However, I rallied to meet the global team who had flown over from the U.S. for dinner, as I wanted to see Vienna on a Friday night. I got to bed last night at midnight, and then had the luxury of sleeping this morning until 9am. I worked until check-out at noon, and then spent the afternoon exploring a bit of the city, using up the very last of my precious energy reserves.

I'm proud to report that the meeting was an unqualified success. I had so many people complimenting the agenda, or the venue, and telling me that it was one of the best meetings they had ever attended. The gala dinner on Thursday night was at Palais Daun Kinsky, and people could not stop raving about it. Everything seemed to come together seamlessly and there were no snafus (that were visible to anyone besides myself and the event team). My boss, her boss and his boss were all extremely happy and I think I made a very good impression. I am more tired than I have been in years and I ache all over, but I'm happy. I wish I could disappear for a week to recharge, but that is most definitely not going to happen!

So, my thoughts on Vienna.

I really, really like this city. The people I have met have been amazingly helpful and friendly. I have very limited German, but I have found that they accept my attempts graciously and don't comment when I make grievous errors. I think it's just like in Paris - they like you more for making the effort. I did have a guy offer to "buy me" on the Karlsplatz... he said that in German and I thought I misunderstood, but when I asked him to clarify, he said in very loud, animated English "I.... BUY.... you!!!". I chose to ignore his obvious meaning and said winningly, "you buy me...frankfurter?" with a big smile. So I got a free lunch and managed to escape handily into a woman's shoe store thereafter. As expected, he did not give chase.

I have fallen in love with the architecture. I don't know why people don't build like that anymore, as it truly is stunning. I think what impresses me the most is the level of detail involved. Modern buildings, intricate though they may be, seem so boring and cheap compared to the grand designs of Europe. I just think that in 500 years, these buildings will still be standing. I doubt, however, that future alien races will marvel at our glass and steel monstrosities. (I will find out first-hand, of course, since I'll be having a robot body and will still be around, just like that little robot kid from AI)

Friday night at dinner we went to this charming little Austrian restaurant where the menu was all in German and the food choices consisted of boiled meat + potato, fried meat + potato or sausage + potato. I opted for the boiled version – called Tafelspitz – and it was surprisingly good. I loved the potatoes and carrots that came with it even more. I guess it feels familiar since that is pretty much standard Cincinnati fare – meat and potatoes.

I want to finish this blog entry before my next birthday, and so in the interest of time, I’m just going to bulletpoint the rest of my thoughts (apologies to those of you expecting more lush narrative…)

• Smoking is still allowed in Vienna. You can have a smoking or non-smoking room. The restaurant we ate in was about as big as my flat and half of it was a “smoking section”. (Which was filled with an old man and a couple who were apparently trying to have sex with one another through their clothes during dinner… strange thing was no one seemed to mind this at all…)
• German is easier to figure out than I originally thought. After so many days of hearing it and staring at it, it started to make a bizarre sort of sense to me – thus reinforcing my long standing belief that I have missed my calling as an uber-linguist and/or ninja spy.  I am actually only sort of kidding in that respect, since I really am good with languages. I picked up the accent in Austria well enough to fool people into responding to me in full-blown sentences. I’d ask for water, or buy a ticket or ask for directions and then have to haltingly say, “Entschuldigen Sie… Ich spreche kein Deutsch. Sprechen Sie Englisch?”, using up all the German I have at my disposal.
• The city was very clean – surprisingly clean given the number of tourists wandering to and fro
• I now have Ameri-dar (kind of like gaydar, but for Americans). I can spot them miles away. In one case it was an obvious case of wearing a visor + Rockports, but in another it was all about the posture and the way they walked. I don’t know how to describe it but I can see someone across a crowded space and just know. Is it the look of overfed entitlement? Is the map-holding and stupid commentary? Is it the fact that they seem to congregate in fast-food restaurants with their loud, ill-behaved children? Or is it something more primal… a secret ancient sensing of one’s own “tribe”? These are the thoughts which keep me awake sometimes… LOL
• I wonder if I’m that obviously American? I am thinking not, since I had so many people just walk up to me and start conversations in German. Not trying to sell you stuff German, just the “hi, how are you” kind of things. Must be because my family history is… well, German.
• Many of the men do sound pretty much like Arnold – yes, the Governator. But there is a distinctive Viennese accent and they are quick to point out that they speak Austrian German, not regular German. Which is true… as their version is much more lyrical than say, Munich German.
• I am an idiot. I didn’t need to go to Vienna to suss this out, but the trip reinforced it. I’d like to blame it on severe exhaustion and stress, but it’s pretty much down to me being a ‘tard. You see, I was reading all these magazines in my room and they kept mentioning “Wien” and going to “Wien” and so on and so forth. And so I was really puzzling out where this “Wien” place (I was pronouncing it “ween” in my head)… until at the end of my second day it just suddenly hit me that “Wien” = Vienna, just like “Munchen” = Munich. To quote my friend Charlie Sheen, “Duh”.
• They seem to eat a surprising amount of fish in Vienna – this may not surprise others, but it did me.
• The art history in Vienna is just as fascinating as the musical history. I am a HUGE Klimt fan, and it was fantastic to go see an exhibit at the Leopold Museum featuring him and Egon Schiele (another favourite). I’m thinking I need to do an Art History tour of Europe…

And with these scattered thoughts, I shall end this missive. I enjoyed my brief trip and I would love to go back – not only to Vienna (and explore the famous nightlife that I didn’t get to see, but some of my co-workers did until six in the morning ¬¬) but also to the rest of Austria. Which is funny because Austria was never on my list of places to see.

But I’m proud of myself because I pushed through the fatigue and spent a good 12 hours exploring the city, fulfilling my resolution to see as much of Europe this year as possible… and of course, not to deprive Europe of seeing as much of me as possible, either. ;)

Next stop? Helsinki… stay tuned!

Federman out.

The Airport

I have a love/hate relationship with the airport. I love that being
here means I am off on a new adventure. I hate the hassle, though.

Take today. I had a meeting at a hotel near Heathrow Terminal 5. I had
to walk to the Terminal, take the elevator down a level, then go down
two more levels and wait 15min for a train. The train then took me one
stop to this weird junction where I had to follow this weird maze, go
on another elevator ride, more walking, two escalators... All before I
ended up outside of Terminal 3.
I checked into my flight with little drama - hallelujah for my BA
silver card which let's me hop to the first class line. Then I had to
go through security. I always pick the wrong line...this time I ended
up smack dab behind Ali Baba and what looked like three of his forty
thieves. These people were rocking turbans of some sort, massive
amounts of facial hair and were wearing what looked like old
bedsheets. They were setting off all kinds of alarms. They had to be
wanded, patted down, basically strip searched. And guess who was stuck
behind this little circus?

So I finally clear security and have to go through passport control.
Where the same thing happens EVERY time. "How long were you in the UK
for?" they ask. "I live here." I answer. Then there is much flipping
of passport pages and grumbling until they find my UK visa sticker.
*sigh*

I managed to avoid the sinful temptation that is the duty free
extravaganza (sooo hard. I don't wear a lot of makeup but I loves me
the packaging. So shiny, so pretty!) and ended up being pleasantly
surprised by my YO! Sushi salmon/tuna box. (Let's see if I still feel
that way in a few hours...)

I am now on the plane - after the mile long trek to the gate, the use
of some extremely dubious toilet facilities, and a jam-packed
weaving-all-over bus ride to the plane. I love how, even with assigned
seats, all these people were fighting to get on the plane. Where they
will sit for two and a half hours. Idiots.

But I am happy to be travelling and I can't wait to explore Vienna.

In other news, I have to get more pages added to my passport (tricky
feat as I have to be in town long enough to allow for the 10-14 day
processing time). When I got my passport in 2003, I never could have
imagined that I would have travelled - and would be travelling - so
much.

And despite my grumblings, I love it. Frankly, I start to feel
uncomfortable if I'm in town for too long. I'm not quite that guy from
Up In The Air, but I understand the bizarre comfort of the anonymity
of frequent travel. Especially these days when most hotel rooms tend
to be bigger than my current flat.

And now I am off... Shutting down before the flight attendant giving
me the evil eye makes it to my row.

Federman out.

E-Fed vs. Virgin Media

I had no idea my little war with Virgin Media would prove so popular! As requested, the text of the infamous email is below. However I do believe I should provide some context to the situation first. I have Virgin Media for television, broadband and home telephone. I never use the home telephone (except for when I answer telemarketing calls for “Curtis”, something that is happening with increasing frequency).  The broadband tends to work okay, except for when it doesn’t. And when that happens I just chalk it up to “England”, and wait 20-30 minutes. Voila, it comes back good as new. Up until recently, I’ve had no issues with my cable television (other than the fact I had to install it myself rather than wait the standard Slovakian 3 months that it normally takes in these here parts).

So I was out of town for the past two weeks, during which time I guess my love for cheesy television shows caused my Virgin Media V+ box to just go psycho. I returned to discover that none of my shows were recorded (no Vampire Diaries, no Nikita, no Mentalist, no Criminal Minds) and that, even better, my TV was stuck on FIVEUSA. My remote control would not change the channel, no matter how many times I replaced the batteries or unplugged and rebooted the V+ box. Knowing the pain that is Virgin Customer Care, I tried nearly every option – before I accepted the inevitable and picked up my home phone last night and dialed 150. The secret code for Virgin phone customers that gives you a direct line to customer service. Or so I thought.

What happened was a bit like that scene in Back to the Future where Marty and the Doc are high fiving each other because the dog came back from a minute into the future… and then the Libyans show up all fired up over some plutonium. Ok, bad example, but it still felt like an ambush.

I dialed 150, navigated through the labyrinthine automated menu, only to be greeted by a male human voice speaking a language I have never heard in my life. “Excuse me, sir?” I asked. “Did I call Virgin Media?” I did not understand the response, and indicated as such. And so, in the tradition of morons everyone, he began jabbering LOUDER at me, as if that would help. I pointed out – again – that I could not understand him. This went on and on, with me requesting to speak to someone who spoke English and him yelling at me. Finally, he just hung up on me.

I was irritated, but willing to give Virgin a pass. Everyone has bad days, and working in a call center has to suck. So I called back – picked up my home phone and hit those three magic numbers once again. This time I got a woman… who was no more understandable than the man. What I did discern was that she had major attitude problem. I’m talking Jackee in 227 attitude problem. I’m talking Lil’ Kim after jail attitude problem. She didn’t even really give me a chance, just began screaming at me and then hung up.

Now I was getting pissed off. I called again, punching those numbers in the automated system with controlled fury. I got a guy this time – who still was not intelligible. I tried to discern what he was saying, or where I was calling, but it literally sounded like he was speaking a language that has yet to have been discovered. I kept saying, “Sir, I have no idea what you’re saying to me. If you can understand me, can you please direct me to someone who speaks English?”. This went on for 14 minutes (I counted) before he simply screamed “AAAAAAARGGGHuuuuuiuhhyYOOOOOU” in the phone and hung up.

Ok, now I was really pissed, approaching DEFCON 2 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEFCON). I called back again. Lesser men may have given up, but not me. I was on a mission and I was about to make someone feel the pain. This time I got a guy, who kept trying to tell me his name was “Rupert”. Um, not in this lifetime buddy, unless Rupert is a name commonly used by people in a country where they speak a language that sounds somewhere between the guy in the Simpsons who works at the Qwickie Mart + Klingon + drunken Polish. I had had enough at this point. I explained to him that I could not understand him, that I’m sure he was trying hard, but that I desperately needed to speak to someone who spoke English so I could get my damn TV fixed. I explained that I lived in the UK, and as such, expected to speak to people who spoke English. (At this point, I would have even settled for Geordie) I did not sign up for Virgin Whateverthehellcountryyou’rein, I signed up for Virgin Media UK. I have no idea what “Rupert” thought of this since I could not understand a damn word he said. After repeating myself six times (I counted, making tick marks on the back of a minicab flyer, each tick getting increasingly darker and more ragged), he finally put me on hold. I sat mute, hoping beyond hope I would get a nice supervisor who spoke English. I could be accented English – I didn’t care. I just wanted to hear something I recognised.

Alas, ‘twas not to be. I received a woman who identified herself as the “zoopwerwyyyysuher” and proceeded to yell and jabber at me for a good minute or so. I could only make out a few words, from which I used my context clues (learned in 4th grade… thanks Mrs. Bolin!) to piece together that she thought I was an asshole who hated people with accents (not kidding). I tried to explain that I had mass love for everyone, but that I wanted to find someone who spoke English. My argument was that if I habla’ed Espanol, I’d get someone who could habla away with me. Therefore I wanted someone who could speak English – plain and simple. “But klajfileuaflkdjaklfjdlkajflkdjalkakljdlaj!!!” she screamed at me. When I explained I couldn’t understand her, she said, in a painstainkingly slow pronunciation “youuuuuuueh lllliiiieeeeeeeee”.

Well, ladies and gents, that just set me off. I had been calm until then, but my blood was boiling. However, age and wisdom prevailed (and more honestly, fatigue, as I had been at this now for 45 minutes) and so I tried to remain calm. I tried to work with old girl, even telling her that since she couldn’t speak English, if she could spell the letters, we could try to communicate that way. So thus went the next 20 minutes of my life.

Her: “alkdjlkajflkdjlkfjadlkjflakjfkdlajfkldajflkdjalkfjad”

Me: “I’m sorry, ma’am. I have no idea what you just said. Could you spell it please?”

Her: “Wuuuh-ahahaich-ahhh-tuh zeee-ehhh-ehhh-muuuuu-zeeee tooooo buh zuh kaljdlkajfkldjalkfjdakljfldakjlakj”

Me: “I’m sorry, ma’am. I’m moving a bit slow. If my Hooked on Phonics serves me well, are you trying to ask me What seems to be …something or other?”

And so, and so forth. Until I had explained my issue and she had spelled out some sort of half-ass resolution. Which still made no sense. At this point, I had been dealing with this mess for 1h 14m, and was near an Incredible Hulk level of rage. I chose to just smile, nod and hang up rather than fight the good fight.

But I couldn’t resist. I tried one more time… and this time on the magic 150 line, I got someone in the UK. Or at least with a UK-style accent. And I let loose, boy did I let loose. If you think the above was harsh, you should have heard me – pacing my living room in my boxer shorts and T-shirt, cup of green tea in hand, hair all wild and filled with the fiery fury of a thousand dying suns. Hence, the £50 credit.

Most people would have been happy to stop there.

I am not. most. people.

I decided to send one of my famous email missives, reproduced for your viewing pleasure below. The result of said email was a phone call today from Virgin Customer Care (in the UK, natch) and an additional £45 credit being added to my account. There was also quite a bit of apologising. I pointed out that while I appreciated the credit and the apologies, what I would appreciate more is a call centre where people speak English. Well, apparently their computer systems allow them to track the people who answered my call (who naturally didn’t record any notes in my file, of course)… this is because I called from the Virgin batphone (my home phone). So I know a few crazy ass foreigners who are not having a good day right now… *evil grin

I didn’t consider the following email to be my finest piece of work – it was written in anger – and even now in copying it, I have to resist the urge to edit, to finesse, to improve. But here it is… over-the-top, furious and quite entertaining with a bit of distance. I hope you enjoy. I know I’ll sure enjoy my two months of free service!

The Email

“Dear Virgin Customer Care:

I am writing this letter to complain about the horrendous service I received while dialling Customer Care (150 from my home phone) on Sunday, 6th March. My account number is ******** and I have been a Virgin Media Customer since October 2011.

I attempted to contact your Customer Care department, as directed by your website, to report a fault with my Virgin Media V+ Box. I ended up spending 1h 15m on the phone, during which I spoke with five of your “representatives” – three of which yelled at me, insulted me and hung up on me.

The larger issue is not the unconscionable abuse I received from your employees, but rather the fact that not one of the five representatives with whom I spoke had a proper command of the English language. To be clear, I’m not referring to bad grammar, or a heavy accent, or even a speech impediment. I am referring to the fact that each of them sounded like an emissary from a foreign country populated by rude, incompetent and mentally unbalanced radicals. I realise that sounds extreme, but I encourage you to search your records for your calls. I made my first call at 21:08 GMT from my landline, ***********. Subsequent calls followed thereafter as I was continuously screamed at and hung upon.

As an American living in the United Kingdom, I have come to terms with the poor levels of customer service offered by companies. I have realised that what I would consider to be absolutely intolerable and unacceptable is simply the norm. I have spent hours arguing with customer care representatives from all sorts of industry – utilities, department stores, estate agencies – just to be granted what I consider to be the basic minimum of acceptable customer support. However, at no time have I ever been so offended, insulted and abused as when I called your Customer Care office for assistance.

For a company that likes to maintain that you are committed to customer care, the actions of your employees speak otherwise. I strongly doubt your company mission or vision involves hiring unintelligible associates who make a practice of abusing and insulting your customers. I switched from Sky because of their horrible customer service. It was extremely depressing to realise that I preferred dealing with them, because a) at least I could understand them when they refused to support my needs and b) they never insulted, screamed at or hung up on me.

I realise that I am just one customer of many and that if I leave your service, you will not suffer greatly. However, what I can promise you is that I will trumpet my cause far and wide. One of me may not cause a problem. A hundred may raise eyebrows. If I can communicate to a thousand – or more – of your customers, then you are facing real issues. Because everyone knows that the power of one dissatisfied customer outweighs even the best marketing or retention campaign (I should know, I’m in that industry). I can assure you that if my issues are not resolved to my satisfaction, that I will leverage the power of my extensive social networks to share my horrible experience with your company.

In today’s political environment, I doubt the hard working taxpayers of the UK would be pleased to know that jobs are being shipped offshore and taken from their reach – only to have those self-same UK taxpayers be insulted and abused by people who don’t even have a 10 year old’s command of the English language.

I expect a representative of your company to contact me immediately to resolve this issue. I look forward to learning how you will be addressing the grievous errors perpetrated by your “representatives” as well as to how you plan on retaining my business.

Regards… “

Adventures in America, part 1

Outward Journey
I am too much of a damn princess these days, and not necessarily in a good Avril Lavigne rock star way. I had to fly American Airlines (instead of British Airways) because it was much less expensive and would you believe I actually threw a fit (in my head) because AA doesn't have fully lie-flat seats in Business Class? The last time I flew to California it was in Premium Economy and I felt like I had been beaten with a stick the whole way. I quickly realised I needed to slow my roll, big time. I was very VERY lucky that my company adopts a humane approach to transatlantic travel regardless of the airline. And the seats went 98% flat, and we had really fancy nice food.

The flight over to LA was pretty uneventful, except for the fact that I went through a box and a half of tissues. I woke up the Sunday before I left feeling like I had been run over by a freight train and it was no better that Monday when I flew out. I felt so bad for the guy sitting next to me because every five minutes I was blowing my nose. By the time I got to San Diego, I was exhausted and ready to collapse. I checked myself into the hotel (a very nice Hyatt in Mission Bay) and went immediately to bed, do not pass go. No, wait, I cannot tell a lie. I ordered a room service hamburger that I didn't really eat. But it sure smelled good. It smelled like America, land of real beef that they will cook any way you like.

San Diego is absolutely as beautiful as I remember it. It's a gorgeous city, and a really nice mix of old and new, modern and manageable. The water is gorgeous and so relaxing and I loved waking up everyday and opening my patio door in the hotel room to stare across the bay. There were birds and boats and palm trees and it was just... serenity.

The next few days were spent working out in the field with a sales rep and then at the annual AAOS Congress. The highlight was on Thursday when one of our agency representatives took me to a business lunch. We needed to discuss some things about upcoming events and so we decided to leave the confines of the convention hall and seek sustenance out in the real world. The convention center in San Diego is right by the Gaslamp District and so there were many restaurants to choose from. We settled on Nobu because we both love sushi, and Nobu is known for having awesome sushi. By sheer dumb luck, we ended up with two seats at the sushi bar and so we proceeded to murder the menu. And then it happened. We decided to have just one more spicy tuna roll. Right after we ordered, we heard loud yelling and commotion.

There was a man standing in the middle of the restaurant, very disheveled looking, and he was yelling at the top of his voice. I couldn't understand what he was saying at first, but I noticed the entire restaurant had gone deathly silent. A line of people who were waiting for a table suddenly moved quickly back out the door. And then the man yelled, "I've got 75 grams of Lithium!!!" along with some other nonsense. I don't know if I've just seen too many episodes of CSI and Criminal Minds and Law and Order, but my brain translated "lithium" as something like "plutonium" at first, and I swear my heart stopped beating. For about a good 30 seconds, I really thought the man was holding some kind of radioactive material and was threatening to nuke the place. So many thoughts went through my head - "Can I make it to the door?", "What the hell?" and "Holy shit, is this how it's going to go down for me? I'm going to die because I just had to have one more damn spicy tuna roll??!!"

The man kept yelling and then it seemed like everyone was able to breathe again and the noise level in the restaurant returned to normal. Some men from the kitchen came out and I think they escorted the guy out back onto the street. It turns out he was a recently released mental patient. Because, of course, the first thing you want to do as a recently released mental patient is run smack dab into the middle of the city's most prestigious sushi restaurant and start yelling.

I am thrilled that he was just a normal crazy and not a blow-the-place-up crazy. But I have to tell you, it really put things in perspective. I realised, sitting on my stool, surrounded by delicious food and congress attendees in their suits and ties, that nowhere is really safe. And that Americans really do live inside a perfect little bubble of safety. Even after the tragedies of 9/11 and Oklahoma City, we still tend to go about our business as if nothing bad could ever happen to us. The idea of a sidewalk bombing or a suicide bomber rushing into a crowded restaurant is unthinkable. And yet, in all honesty, there is nothing to stop anything of that happening. Sobering thoughts.

Seattle
I flew to Seattle at the end of the congress to spend the weekend with friends. I got lucky enough to sit next to a mother and son on the flight who talked nonstop. The child was 2, and he was adorable... for about 20 minutes. And then he was basically a walking advertisement for birth control. He wasn't a devil child, he was just a two year old on a several hour flight. Which, let me tell you, is no fun to sit next to. He was up, he was down, he was crawling around, he was yelling, he was poking, he was crying when he had to sit in his seat, he was spilling cranberry juice on me. He did get entertaining as we were about to land because he kept yelling, "Seattle! Seattle!" and his voice was LOUD. The entire plane was cracking up laughing because the kid was SO excited to be going to Seattle, even though I'm pretty sure he didn't know who or what a Seattle was.

I spent a wonderful few days catching up with friends, during which I actually sang karaoke at a place called the Tiki Bar. And, like Forrest Gump, that's all I have to say about that.

I miss Seattle. I love how green everything is, and how spacious the city is. Driving around, I kept marvelling at how wide the roads were, and how much room there was for everything. After England, Seattle seems like a playground of space. I was also struck by how many stores there were. On every corner. It's not like that as much in England. If you want to buy something, you have to really want it because it's a production. There are no Wal-Marts or Targets where everything is at your disposal. There are no Rite-Aids which have everything from gardening tools to makeup to groceries to small electronics. I started to feel the old pressure..."Buy, buy, buy". I don't feel that in England. I still want stuff, but because I know that it's at least a train ride + a few tube stops to get anywhere decent, I carefully consider my purchases. Well, that and also the fact that everything is ridiculously expensive.

I did have a facial and that was pure heaven. America knows facials. The ones I've had in Europe have been embarrassingly bad. No glycolic peel. No steam clean. No vitamin treatment. No extractions. Just a bunch of washing the face and slopping gloop on it, which doesn't help anyone involved. So it was glorious to spend an hour being pampered and having my skin really looked after.

I have severe housing envy now, too. My friend's place where I stayed is absolutely gorgeous - it's a two bedroom, two and a half bath condo - and we worked out that once you convert my rent from pounds to dollars, we are essentially paying the same amount a month. Which is mega depressing. She has cathedral ceilings, a huge kitchen, a patio, a two car garage, wall to wall carpet, two floors, a massive walk in closet, a huge master bedroom and master bath... the list goes on and on. I have a fourth-floor walk up with periodically functioning appliances, sporadic heating, rugs that I am scared to black light for fear of what I might see and gravitationally challenged furniture which I assembled myself. I won't lie, I miss the American standard of living. If anything were to bring me back to the US, besides missing friends and family, it would be the fact that I could live a much better life for my money.

Cleveland
I flew out this morning from Seattle to Cleveland. I got upgraded because I flew Delta and I still hold status with them, and my cabin was filled with the elderly and the obese. That is something I've definitely noticed on this trip - how much bigger Americans are. While the English aren't the most svelte people in general, they have yet to achieve the rotund physique of many Americans. I've noticed that seeing someone really huge is a rarity overseas. It seemed that 8 out 10 people I've seen so far over here are overweight in some fashion. Now, I know that I am not going to be on the cover of Maxim or Fitness magazine anytime soon, so I'm not judging.

I just find it somewhat depressing. America is so wealthy compared to other countries, and there are so many places and ways to exercise, and yet as a nation, we choose to stuff ourselves and live unhealthy lives. Where I live in England, there aren't many gyms or workout places, so I tend to work out in my apartment or go for runs around my neighborhood. But over here, it's so easy! There's a gym every couple blocks it seems.

Of course, what also struck me were how many restaurants there were, and fast food. We don't have that in England. There are pubs and there are restaurants, but not huge chain places and not so easily accessible. I also noticed all the food commercials on TV - that's a big difference too. It seems America is a culture that worships the super thin and yet everything about our marketing and media and commerce is centered around more is better and eating, eating, eating. I'm staying in a Marriott and around me there are SIX different restaurants within walking distance... and that's not counting the four across the street, or the ones down the block, or the ones further down from that, and so on and so on. Just makes me wonder - who needs that much food all the time? And the restaurants are not healthy options either - Mexican (well Americanised Mexican), The Olive Garden, Red Robin, etc. I think it would be more palatable if the food weren't overprocessed and served in ridiculously large portions. I mean Red Robin has bottomless baskets of fries. Sure sounds like a great idea, but healthy it is not. (I do have to admit that I have, on occasion, been known to put the hurt on some Red Robin, though.)

I went over to some friends of mine while in Seattle who happen to be from France. They made lunch, and here is what they made - pate with french bread (delicious), a roasted salmon, roasted zucchini and rice. Dessert was fresh fruit. We had a glass of white wine with lunch and then coffee afterwards. This is apparently normal for them - the way they eat and the way they cook. The food was delicious, filling and healthy.

I've noticed this in the UK - that the Europeans on my team tend to insist on actually taking a lunch, and going down to the cafeteria to sit and eat for 20-30 minutes. They get really grumpy if I suggest grabbing a sandwich and taking it back to our desks. My American friends reading this will understand that eating a sandwich is normal for lunch, or grabbing a burger or a frozen meal or something like that. One thing I have learned living abroad is to really take my time with my meals and appreciate the food. I do miss the convenience factor of frozen meals, but I do enjoy sitting down to a real meal more. It helps that the frozen meals in England are absolutely disgusting (at least to me). Maybe if more Americans took time preparing their food and then sitting down to eat it, we would be healthier?

I'm off to test some of my theories by having dinner here in the hotel. I know I'll be shocked by portion size and yet simultaneously thrilled by the low, low price for all that food. What can I say - it's the American in me. I love a good value. ;)

More to come as the adventures continue, and as the DayQuil continues to work its magic and my mind clears... (I love American OTC drugs!!)

Federman out.

Homeward Bound

I know I have been horribly remiss at keeping this blog up to date, and that is something I will strive to change in the future. I always have these great ideas on the train, or in the shower, and I mean to put them in my blog - and, in typical absent minded professor fashion, I forget.

This morning I had a bit of a tussle with my driver. My team administrator was nice enough to order a car service for me, so imagine my surprise when I walked outside to find a vehicle the size and shape of a panel van waiting for me. I reminded the driver that I was only one person and he said that he just takes the vehicle he is assigned to. As I am such jolly good fun in the morning, I felt compelled to point out that we had ordered car service, not van service. He didn't like that so much. I swear he drove over every speed bump he could find on purpose just to make my life miserable. I swear I think a rickshaw would have had better suspension and given a smoother ride. So I got to make the 1 1/2 journey to the airport in the back of a serial killer van being driven by a pissed off fat dude with a bad attitude and an even worse Cockney accent.

I am sitting in the Admirals Lounge at Heathrow awaiting my flight to California. I'm off on a bit of a work/fun jaunt to the U.S. - my own four-city tour of awesomeness. San Diego, Seattle, Cleveland and Cincinnati. The Admirals Lounge is not nearly as nice as the BA Galleries Lounge. The bacon rolls are on the wrong sort of bread, although they do have tomato on them here. But I think that's less of a "let's be healthy" feature and more of a "if we load this up with cheap tomato, maybe they won't notice that there's not that much bacon" approach. The bacon rolls that BA offers are like 1/4 pig they are so thick. Now that's how I like my bacon rolls to roll ;)

I am fighting the beginnings of a cold - my throat is scratchy, I'm all stuffed up and I'm coughing up a lung. I'm currently all hopped up on Beechams Ultra (kind of like DayQuil without the "I'm on crack" feeling) and Vick's VapoRub. I am hoping to get some sleep on the plane because I really did not sleep at all last night. I went to bed at about 12:30 am after chatting with my brother and I kept waking up every hour or so. I'm not sure why, but I find this always happens the night before an early flight. It's like I'm afraid I won't wake up on time or something. Considering that only happened to me ONCE, and it was in Evansville, Indiana after a night of way too many shots and jokes about Sir Beef, I'm not sure why I'm so paranoid. (Incidentally, the Evansville story is hilarious. I made it on to that plane with literally seconds to spare. I don't know how I did it but I managed to shower, check out of the hotel, return the rental car and get to the plane in like 40 minutes.)

I'm really looking forward to going back across the pond.  I plan to eat salads... real salads, and lots and lots of them. If there is one thing that England cannot do well, it's make a decent salad. (I won't even touch how furious it makes me that they insist on referring to the lettuce + tomato + onion that goes onto a sandwich as "salad").

On a side note, there are some funky looking people in this lounge. It's a good thing you don't have to be attractive to get in here, or the place would be empty except for me and the woman sitting next to me who looks like a Ralph Lauren model. Oh and that cute guy over by the bacon rolls. But I've just seen him eat four bacon rolls, two yogurts, three danishes and six croissants so I'm getting a bit concerned. I'm also a little worried about the old guy sitting in front of me with SIX duty free bags which are all chock full of alcohol. He looks confused enough as it is without adding booze to the party... And well looky there, bacon roll guy just got himself a glass of red wine. At 09:42 in the damn morning. I sure hope I'm not sitting next to him, as I worry about the after effects of these choices.

And on that note, I'm going to go apply a second coat of Vicks VapoRub (thus assuring that any man who displays interest in me must REALLY be interested) and stuff my pockets with packets of green tea for the long 11 hour flight ahead.

I love travel. ;)

Dancing - America v. England

Mood: Happy
Theme Song: "Flipside" - Moloko

I'm watching the latest season of "Got To Dance" - basically the UK equivalent of So You Think You Can Dance - and I can't help but be amazed by the vast difference between what is considered "good" dancing in the UK, and what we think is good back in America. I find it to be pretty consistent when dealing with established forms of dance - salsa, lyrical, ballet, ballroom. It's when people come out and try to "street dance" or freestyle that my eyes start burning.

I'm honestly not trying to poke fun here - I really don't understand how certain things are considered "good dancing" or "rhythmic". I know that England is an island, but they get MTV and they are highly influenced by American culture. What they appear to not be influenced by is the ability to stay on beat or "feel" the music. I've just watched a series of dancers come on the stage, jerk around like they have epilepsy but because they "pop" some part of their body or wear a hoody and jeans, they are lauded as being "real" and "street".

I am not exaggerating when I say that I've given better performances drunk in the middle of the street. The whole thing leaves me rather frustrated, and frankly, speechless. I'm really hoping that some of my English friends will read this and try to explain. Because I don't get it. A beat is a beat. You're either on it, or off it. Mimicking a video and throwing up a lot of rapper hand gestures does not make you a dancer. Hell, I do that five days out of seven for no reason when I'm waiting for my train. You don't see me trying to win money on a TV show.

American friends, do me a favor. Check out this dance troupe - and give me your honest opinion. Am I being too harsh? Have I just been away from home too long? They won the title in 2009 and are universally lauded as being real "hip-hop" dancers. To me, they look like mediocre extras from a late 80s Janet Jackson video. The little kid is cute, but I bet there are any number of 4-6 year olds in any neighborhood in America who would clean his clock without thinking twice.

I made a resolution last year to stop making fun of England, and I think it's a good one. Rather than make fun, I am really trying to understand the culture. It's just hard when I encounter things like this - where there is such a HUGE gap between what I see as reality and what the Brits accept. Although, in thinking about it, what most Americans think about England is really, really incorrect so maybe it's just fair play.

I welcome your thoughts.
Now, seeing as how anyone and their grandma can get on this TV show, I'm off to practice my moves so I'm ready for the next round of auditions...  =)

One Year Anniversary

Mood: Contemplative
Theme Song: "Theme Song to Laverne and Shirley"

Happy One Year in England to me!

As of yesterday, I have been living in England for exactly one year. And while I'd like to say "Oh my god, it went by so fast!", the truth is that I felt every single minute and every single day. I think it's fair to say that 2010 was by far the most challenging, frustrating, and yet amazing year of my life. And while there were days when I didn't want to leave my bed, let alone my apartment, I wouldn't trade the past 365 days for anything in the world.

Moving to England has been by far the best thing I have ever done for myself - better even than that time I allowed myself to eat $100 worth of sushi. This experience has pushed me far past all of my comfort zone and way beyond my normal boundaries. And all I can say, even as I'm still nursing some bumps and bruises, is how grateful I am for having this opportunity.

I began this blog as a way of chronicling my adventures overseas, but I had no idea what a wonderful time capsule it would be, and what a great mirror into myself. A year into this, I am confident I could now live anywhere in the world, English-speaking or not. (In fact, I wager that it would be somewhat easier to live in Japan or Russia or Kabul because I would immediately expect things to be different. In England it's hard because the language is the same and so many other things are the same and so the differences really, really stick out and surprise.) The idea of starting over again doesn't scare me or worry me - in fact, it thrills me a bit if I'm honest. I've learned, truly, that life is what you make it. I can make friends anywhere and I can live my best life anywhere on this planet (or beyond). It's all down to me.

I could spend ages writing about all the things I've learned this year - tangible things (like how to navigate the English system or things I learned about Asia) - and I'm eventually will. But what is on my mind right now are the intangible things I've learned.

If an unhappiness follows you from one country to another, then you can't blame it on anything outside yourself. I learned that I was carrying a tremendous amount of baggage that was weighing me down, emotionally, mentally, and even physically (sad people don't get out much and so they're not in the best health).

Being isolated from your friends and family forces you to deal with certain things all on your own, and to abandon what would normally be cause for a full-on pity party. I think the best example of this was this past Christmas. I went into a full-on emotional tailspin because I was away from home, away from my friends. I literally spent four hours one night just curled up in a ball and crying. I say that not to elicit sympathy but to point out the ridiculousness of my behavior. I think had I been back home or more comfortable in my surroundings, I never would have snapped out of that funk. As it was, I had no choice but to face myself in the mirror and lay down the law. While it's okay to be sad every now and then, feeling sorry for myself gets me nowhere. It's a vicious cycle with no positive end.

Being in a new place where you need to make new friends forces you to really see yourself and really think about the kind of people you want in your life. I spent the first part of the year trying to be friends with anyone I could, and accepting dates haphazardly because I was - quite frankly - lonely. As I settled down, and began to know myself more, I realised that there are no hard and fast rules about these things. I needed to trust my gut - and realise some hard truths about myself. I'm picky, I'm demanding, I'm not going to be friends with everyone. I will always have many, many acquaintances - because I'm that crazy social extrovert who is doing the Centipede at group gatherings for no reason - but those who will be my friends, and those who could be something more - will always be few.

Being in a different time zone than most of your friends and family also forces you to have more detailed conversations with yourself - and to actually listen to what that voice inside your head is saying. And sometimes it doesn't make very much sense at all. In fact, sometimes that voice inside your head is speaking an entirely different language. This past year has allowed me to become fluent in my own language, and more importantly, to know when I'm feeding myself a line of bull. ;) Having that filter has also helped me to clearly define what I do and don't want from myself and what I deserve from friendships, career, relationships. The more I course-correct and add a "don't do that!" to my list, the more I learn and grow.

I think the biggest lesson I've learned between pre-England me and me now is confidence. I've always felt strongly about my abilities, but it has taken the daily battering of navigating a new country and culture to force me to have a better understanding of myself. It's a bit frightening, but I really feel as if this past year was when I finally... FINALLY... became an adult.  A really fun, crazy, and completely impractical adult - but a grown-up nevertheless.

I realised the other day that I have finally stopped comparing everything to America, and that I don't immediately convert £ into $ in my head anymore. I have finally come to terms that England is not America and never will be, and if I can just get over that fact, I can begin to appreciate all of the wonderful things this country has to offer. I had cocktails in the May Fair bar in Westminster the other day, and it was fabulous to sit on a plush sofa drinking an overpriced vanilla martini and listen to the hilarious conversations of the nouveau-riche. London had better brace itself, because I'm all in for 2011.

I am so looking forward to the next 12 months. Life is truly what we make of it, and I intend to make this year absolutely stellar. When I write about my second anniversary in England, I hope that it is with happiness and joy and a huge smile, as I'm looking back at amazing adventures with amazing people. I also hope that I will finally have mastered the Soulja Boy dance, but I probably shouldn't get ahead of myself just yet... ;)

Federman out.