Six Months In A Leaky Boat

I've just managed to survive six months in the UK since I arrived here in mid-November. It hasn't all been plain sailing (hence the subject of the entry), but it has been a valuable learning experience. Time seems to have passed very quickly in those six months, so I would like to take stock and reflect on my six months in a leaky boat.

I suppose I've been fortunate already having a job lined up before coming over here to the UK. In addition, my company agreed to help me with accommodation for up to one month. All I needed to do was to find a nice place to live and weather the storm of settling in to a new country. A lot of other people have come here with hopes and dreams of having a good experience in the UK, but they don't have a job. Not finding a job as soon as you would like is a very stressful time for everyone, and unless you have a job your experience in the UK hasn't really started. So I'm glad that I don't have to sail in the same boat as those other people, and I know of a few people who have struggled to get jobs in the UK and have had to set a course for New Zealand.

Before I arrived in the UK, I had hopes on living in the big city that is London. It's the centre of activity, and I figured I wouldn't have any problems finding a place which suits my interests. When I arrived, I figured that a probationary period in Reading would be a good idea just to get my feet on the ground. I even told Tina that I would only intend on staying in Reading for 2-3 months. So why am I still in Reading much longer than originally planned?

Well the reasons were simple. The house I live in is comfortable and spacious, and I only share with one other person. I've found a fantastic housemate and I wouldn't want to live with anyone else any time soon. My house is also close to work, and the rent is relatively cheap by Reading standards. The area that I live in reminds me of a typical quiet suburb in Auckland. Contrast this to the sprawling big city that is London, where I could live with up to 3-4 other people and pay a hell of a lot more in rent.

Like London, Reading is close to major London airports, so overseas travelling is not a problem. However if you drive, and especially during the holiday periods, it's easier to get to other parts of the UK if you travel from Reading because of its central location. If I lived in London, it's far more difficult to travel anywhere by car.

Reading is not the most exciting town, but it has all that I need at present. It's close to London, but I am finding that I don't need to travel to London all that often. It took me a while to realise this fact. Given the location of my house in Reading, and Reading's location in the UK, it all came down to location, location, location. For me, location is very important. It doesn't mean that I will stay in Reading forever. I still would like to experience living in London, or I may live in an entirely different town altogether, e.g. Amsterdam! Time will tell.

Adjusting to life in the UK was a challenge in itself. Setting up bank accounts, and a national insurance number was quite a mission. I took these all for granted in New Zealand because these were set up for me by my parents. Dealing with HSBC UK was a very frustrating experience and the customer service was awful. When my bank card didn't arrive on time, and my cash ran out, I was forced to withdraw another large sum of money directly from the bank.

Then there was the credit card. HSBC UK declined my application on the spot as I had no credit history in the UK. I was flabbergasted. I had a huge credit limit in New Zealand, so why couldn't they check that? So I had to start over again. I applied for a credit card with another company who offered much smaller credit limits. After using this card for around a month and a half, I applied again to HSBC UK. This time, and completely by surprise, HSBC UK gave me a "real" credit card, with a very nice credit limit too. I suppose it's their way of saying sorry after screwing me over in the first place!

As soon as I arrived, I got straight into running, with the Reading Half Marathon as the goal. I didn't bring any running shoes with me, so I had to buy a new pair from a specialist running shop, and ask my folks in New Zealand to send up my main pair. I have to thank my boss for spurring me into registering for the Reading Half Marathon, as without my gear or a goal to work towards I would have no motivation to run in the UK. But I had a goal, I have my shoes and I devoted quite a lot of time training for the event. In the end, I surpassed my own expectations, smashing my previous personal best with a time of 1:36:40. I'm certainly getting faster and stronger with my running, and hopefully while I'm here I can keep up the hard work and get even faster. Currently I'm training for the Berlin Marathon, and I've already set a lofty goal in the hopes of setting another big personal best.

I had high hopes on taking up other interests here in the UK, but with running as my main priority it's not easy to get into them. At the start of the year I joined a chess club, hoping to get back into the game seriously. However I only went to a handful of club nights. The vast majority of members were retired old men or middle-aged men, which wasn't my idea of meeting new people in my age range. After missing a few club nights due to running training, and having lost too many games, I slowly lost interest in playing at the club, and pretty soon I stopped going to club nights. That was £45 down the toilet. Perhaps Chess isn't something I should be pursuing seriously. A couple of my friends have so many interests, and they seem to find the time to fit them in. I really need to know how they actually do it.

One of the things I realised before I moved over was the need to know the language of the country you are travelling to. When I was in France, people always spoke French to me, and I couldn't rely on them understanding broken English. So on reflection I decided to learn some French and German on my own through daily podcasts. I went to France again and managed to make some French conversation whilst over there. Learning German was partly for my upcoming Berlin Marathon, and partly because of my housemate. As with learning all languages, both languages are challenging, but satisfying to use once you have them under your lips.

Life in the UK is not wholly different to life in New Zealand, but there were a few things I had to get used to. For example, the British are very particular when it comes to queueing. Even if there isn't a solid queue forming, they still obey the first-in first-served rule, whereas that is not necessarily the case in New Zealand. And I keep saying chips when I mean to say crisps. Potato chips have a very different name here, and by saying chips the British think I am referring to the stuff served at McDonalds and KFC. I guess that's why they love serving gravy with their chips.

And then, there is my Kiwi accent. Sometimes I have to repeat myself, say things a little slower, or revert to the Queen's English when speaking to the locals. But at least Hayley Westenra knew I was a Kiwi and understood exactly what I was saying. So while I'm here, I'll be flaunting that accent to every Brit that I talk to, even if they keep asking me what a Beef Wullington is.

During my time here, I've sort of become more patriotic, for want of a better word. I'm proud of saying I am from New Zealand. I don't bother to change the way I speak, even if I become the subject of some ridicule. I still keep my eyes and ears on developments happening in New Zealand. And I'm listening to a lot of New Zealand music lately, and in my opinion there is a lot of good music from New Zealand. For Tina's birthday present, I made her a CD of New Zealand music songs, and named the CD after our street address, to add some sentiment to the gift. The CD included songs from different genres, songs from legendary artists, songs from upcoming artists, my personal favourite songs, and songs rated by New Zealanders as the best songs of all time. In the end, I think I came up with a good mix of songs, and I think she liked it.

To close, one of the songs I included on the CD was Six Months in a Leaky Boat (wow the same name as this entry), which has many references to New Zealand. Everytime I listen to that song, in a land far away from home, I can't help feeling more patriotic.

Aotearoa, rugged individual
Glisten like a pearl at the bottom of the world
The tyrany of distance didn't stop the cavalier
So why should it stop me? I'll conquer and stay free
Ah come on all you lads, let's forget and forgive
There's a world to explore, tales to tell back on shore
I just spent six months in a leaky boat
Lucky just to keep afloat

I may be living in the UK for six months, but I'm still a Kiwi at heart.

Walks Along The Seine, Laughing In The Rain, Our Last Summer, Memories That Remain

The title of this entry was inspired in part by the ABBA song, Our Last Summer, which ties in to my recent trip to Paris. But unlike the song, for me, my trip to Paris was not for romantic reasons. However, I definitely felt the romance while I was there, and Paris has it in spades.

A mate from Boston and myself decided to go to Paris while he was here. I organised the Eurostar tickets and the accommodation, and we both contributed ideas and researched the places we wanted to check out. In the end, we managed to cover quite a lot of area and attractions during our 3 days there. Paris is a very big city and 3 days wasn't enough to see everything. But we managed to see a lot of things, albeit at a rushed pace.

We saw the Arc de Triomphe, climbed the Eiffel Tower, went inside Notre Dame, Sacre Coeur, Les Invalides, Roland Garros and the Louvre, cruised down the Seine on a boat, checked out Moulin Rouge and walked down the Champs-Élysées.

Before I went to Paris, I tried to learn some French to speak to the locals. I covered greetings, etiquette, introducing yourself, where I come from and where I lived. It went rather well, as the locals seemed to want to know where I come from, so I just dished out the rehearsed line "Je viens de Nouvelle-Zélande, mais maintenant j'habite à Reading", which means "I come from New Zealand but now I live in Reading". I think I must have said that three times during my time there, and the locals seemed to be impressed (either with my French or my Kiwi heritage), with replies such as très bien and bon voyage! However the locals I spoke to also had good command of English, possibly because Paris is very cosmopolitan, so when they spoke English to me, I replied to them in beginners level French.

I can't really think of a single attraction that did it for me. The entire city of Paris captivated me, with its friendly people, tree lined streets, historic buildings, food (pain au chocolat, or chocolate croissants, are to die for), and, of course, the beautiful French ladies which I couldn't help look at! Paris is a lot like London in a way. Both are big cities, have similar public transport systems, and has a river that basically divides the city. However Paris has a certain romanticism to it, which London doesn't seem to have. Hence I found Paris to be really endearing, in particular the tree lined streets, and the French style outdoor cafes.

I wouldn't hesitate visiting her again, and when I do, I hope to arm myself with more French to really get along with the locals.

Paris restaurants
Our last summer
Morning croissants
Living for the day, worries far away
Our last summer
We could laugh and play.

The Good Samaritan Was Just Not Good Enough

I was unfortunate enough to witness a deeply disturbing incident on Thursday 30th April. Here's how it unfolded.

As I walked home from the gym, listening to music in my own little world, I noticed someone at my local bus stop trying to grab my attention. The lady was a mess. She was incoherent and she smelled of booze. I tried to ignore her, but then I noticed blood, and as I realised the severity of the situation I stopped and tried to listen to her.

From what I made out, she was assaulted by her partner. She sustained a broken nose, which troubled her breathing. Blood was on her face and her hands, and the clump of blood-soaked tissues in her hand did little to stem the bleeding. In the other hand was a large can of beer.

Distressed, she said that she needed to get to her mother's place. I initially thought that her mother's place was far away, as I thought she was catching a bus. But when I tried to reason with her I learned that her mother's place was not far from where I lived. Apparently she took the bus to her mother's place, but as she took a different numbered bus (bus number 111 instead of bus number 6), she got dropped off at a bus stop that was not the closest stop to her mother's place. Hence her current position and her current predicament.

She had a suitcase, and a carry bag. The suitcase wheels were unstable and stiff making it impossible for her in her state to drag it along. Plus it was heavy, and she kept telling me that she was going to collapse and die. I volunteered to carry the suitcase to her mother's place, knowing that when she got there she would be taken care of. An ambulance would be contacted to treat her injuries, and the police can be notified about the assault.

It only gets worse.

The suitcase was very hard to drag on the wheels, and the handle was about to break. So I carried it under my arm from the bus stop, past my house and into the little street where her mother lived. The suitcase contained pretty much all her possessions - clothes and a DVD player. As we walked, there were a few people that looked at her, but no one was interested, or showed any concern. It was as if she was the village idiot, always getting into trouble, and that no one wanted any involvement with her. Gently I suggested that she stop drinking the beer, but she replied that it helps kill the pain.

Finally we reached her mother's place. And even though I was only 100 metres away from my house, the street that we were on felt like another part of town. It was seedy and run down. I knocked on the door. There was a sound of a dog barking, but no one seemed to be at home. I knocked again, and the dog kept barking but still no one opened the door. I knocked a third time. The dog kept barking, and still no one opened the door. The dog kept barking, and the wait felt like ages. Finally a window opened from above, and a lady stuck her head out.

"What's that noise?", she sounded rather irritated. I didn't know who that lady was, and I presumed it wasn't the mother. When she looked at the lady I was helping, she got really angry and said "I don't want you in here!" It was the mother, and my heart sank when I realised that this was a case of a very dysfunctional family.

I tried to step in, and reasoned with her mother. "Please, she needs help". The mother immediately snapped back at me. "Don't tell me what to do, you don't even know half the story!" I was immediately taken aback, and pretty soon it was mother hurling insults and expletives, and daughter pleading to be let in. The argument soon got heard by the neighbours. A black woman stuck her head out from her front door of the adjoining house, wondering what the fuss was about. Pretty soon, she jumped in telling them to be quiet. The mother was a complete battle-axe, telling her to shut up. I just stood there shocked at the situation.

The mother demanded that the daughter cannot stay at her house, telling her that she has had enough of her. "I've got my own life to live! I don't want you ruining it for me! You drink too much and your friends are into drugs! I've had enough! You're 29 for god sake, Alison!" Alison pleaded that she won't stay, she just needs to come in and get cleaned up. She said that she had found a place to live, but the tenancy agreement did not start in another 2 weeks. The mother was still unsympathetic. I feared that she might just close the window and leave us out in the cold.

She did exactly just that.

But after a couple of minutes of standing outside, she opened the front door and started laying down more demands. She gestured at the beer that Alison was carrying and said, "You can't bring that in here. I don't drink! And I don't want you staying here, you leave by the end of today!"

I helped Alison bring the heavy suitcase inside her mother's house. The inside was a big mess. Inside the house, the mother told Alison to "take her shit of the table", probably demanding that her bag be dumped on the floor. This was a very bad relationship between mother and daughter. I've never seen anything like it before. It was as if I was in a bad episode of Coronation Street. They say that you shouldn't believe everything you see on TV, but when they portray an example of dysfunctional families and domestic violence, take note! It is very real and it exists in our society!

I waited outside, itching to get home, when Alison came outside to say thank you for helping. She asked me for money. I only had a 20 pound note on me, and I just couldn't give that to her. She might use it to buy booze, drugs, or some other illicit materials. She asked for my name, which I gave her, but in her unfit state she mistook it as Gary. I didn't correct her. I believe she asked me for my contact number, and I could've given her my business card, but I basically left her and rushed home as soon as I could.

As soon as I got home, I immediately took a shower. My body was in a sweat, both from the gym and from that experience, and my hands smelt of her blood. It was very unnerving and scary, not just for Alison who will probably sleep on the streets, but for me too. As I washed myself, I immediately thought of the parable of the Good Samaritan from the Bible.

A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead with no clothes..... But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and looked after him. The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper. 'Look after him,' he said, 'and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.'

From this story, I was the part of the Good Samaritan, and Alison was the unfortunate victim. But regrettably, I fell far short of being a Good Samaritan. I couldn't take her to my house. I wasn't able to take her to the nearest A&E, or the nearest women's shelter. I didn't really say much to quell the hostile situation between Alison and her mother. In fact I was pretty useless. I thought that if I was in New Zealand, I could have done more to help her, just because I had a car, and a knowledge of the local facilities. But here in the UK, I have nothing, except the bare essentials.

The realisation, combined with the situation I experienced, distressed me greatly that evening. After a hard workout at the gym, I was looking forward to a big meal, but I had lost my appetite completely. Luckily I had a housemate to talk to about this.

That night, I lay on the couch in the lounge. And like a patient visiting a psychiatrist, I retold the story to Tina. We traded stories, exchanged experiences, and even shared a few laughs. It didn't make the situation right, but at least by talking about it I felt better afterwards, knowing that I did all I could to help Alison. Even now, as I draw on that particular disturbing experience to write this entry, I still can't help wondering what if.

I don't know what happened to Alison that night, and what has become of her now. The only thing I can do is to pray that she has the courage and strength to turn her life around, and that mother and daughter can reconcile on better terms.

For the full parable of the Good Samaritan, please read Luke Chapter 10 verses 25-37.

Nah I Dun Hev A Kiwi Ex-Int

Accents. I just love a good accent, just like how I love a good curry or a good red wine. Certain accents are pretty sexy, some of them sound just so damn hot! I'm living in Europe, now and I'm fortunate that there is an abundance of these sexy accents right at my doorstep. But then again, some other accents can sound like fingernails on a blackboard. I won't name them in case I might offend my parents, hahaha! Oh well, you probably guessed which one I'm referring to.

It just so happened that when I was growing up in New Zealand I thought the Kiwi accent didn't exist at all. Out of all the English speaking countries in the world, the Kiwi accent just sounded ordinary, for want of a better word. It was as if you couldn't distinguish it from other English speaking countries, like you had to use a process of elimination to narrow it down. So I can just imagine someone from a non-English speaking nation using this particular line of reasoning:

okay so it can't be the Aussie accent because the "e" sound doesn't sound so strong, and it can't be the Yankee accent because it doesn't sound annoying at all, and it can't be the Pommy accent because it doesn't sound pompous and camp. Yep, it's gotta be a New Zealand accent.

(Again I'm doing a piss take, so please put your sarcasm filters on and take my comments with the required grain of salt.)

The reason why I love accents is because they are great for distinguishing different groups of people. They're great for stereotyping, making jokes, and generally taking the piss out on different races. That's the reason why I enjoy listening to them and trying to imitate them. Years ago, I was intrigued by the South African accent, courtesy of Lethal Weapon 2. Pretty soon I was trying to talk like a South African, which led me to impersonate a manager who was a South African. I called up one of the workers, pretended to be him and told him he got laid off. A very stupid thing to do, yes I regret it very much, but luckily it did not go out of control. However he totally fell for it. I didn't sound like my manager at all, but I employed a very convincing South African accent, and to the untrained listener it just sounds the same irrespective of who is speaking.

But I couldn't put my finger on the New Zealand accent. I always thought it was a neutral sounding accent. It wasn't strong like the Australian accent, and it didn't have a distinguishing characteristic that sets it apart from other native English-speaking countries.

Boy, was I wrong!

When I started living in England, I couldn't help notice that I sounded so much different to the locals. Of course it's obvious. Sometimes I got a few quizzical looks when I have a conversation with other people, wondering what I was saying. For example, my office manager confused my sentence "I'm getting a watch today", with "I'm getting a wash today".

But it wasn't just the sound. It was also the style of speaking as well. Kiwis tend to employ certain Kiwi mannerisms in their conversations, unique to other English-speaking groups. In particular, using the word "eh" after every sentence. It seems that this is a Kiwi habit to end a sentence with a question word, such as "eh", designed to give the other person a chance to speak. And it seems that I'm also in that category, and have been for a long time, way before I learned about this unique mannerism. Imagine this simple conversation I had with a pommie lady in the kitchen last week. Firstly, the non-Kiwi version.

A: So what did you do in the weekend?
B: Oh, I went to Paris.
A: Really? What was the weather like?
B: It was very good. Lots of sun.

Now imagine that person B is me.

A: So what did you do in the weekend?
B: Oh, I went to Paris, eh.
A: Really? What was the weather like?
B: It was awesome, eh. Lots of sun.

And it was through living here in a foreign country that I finally got an understanding of the Kiwi accent. Of course I also googled the Kiwi accent, and watched a few NZ videos on YouTube, just to hear what it sounds like, and quietly laughed when I heard something being said Kiwi style, thinking "yep that's how we speak in Aotearoa!" Even New Zealanders in the office reckon that I have a Kiwi accent, in fact a riul thuck one.

So, will I conform to the masses and try to speak differently? Adopt the Queen's English? No way! Learning about the Kiwi accent, and the way that we speak, has only made me more prouder to be a Kiwi. So while I'm here, I'll be spilling out my words and flaunting my strong Kiwi accent, much to the annoyance of others around me!

Fush 'n Chups, ini wun? Sweet as, bro!