LLWorldTour

Habitual runners get off on the kick in of endorphins that give them that extra boost they need. I get the same jolt from an exciting day of travel or an unexpected side trip to a new and undiscovered land (for me…not for all mankind) that I hadn’t planned to visit. Traveling seems to give me a near constant roller coaster type of adrenaline rush. It’s a healthy drug, travel, but may cost a bit more than crack.

I was flying to New York City in five days. My trip was winding down. I was about to return to the United States after 15+ months traveling around the world and living out of the same bag (my faithful traveling companion…which I often refer to as my boyfriend—he’s sturdy and trusty, but can often be a pain in the ass and the wheels and metal zippers aren’t too cozy to cuddle with). My last few days in England I was not planning a whole lot, but then wham!

Another spontaneous trip miraculously presented itself on my very last weekend abroad. I was staying in the charming old Roman town of Bath, England (aptly named for the natural hot springs discovered there by the Romans about 2000 years ago) for a few days before I headed back towards London just to jump into Heathrow one of the world’s busiest airports and go through a possible strip search at the tight British airport security for the zillionth time and board the thirty-fourth flight of my world tour to rack up approximately 115 hours of flight time and 42, 220 miles (67, 946 kms) around the planet.

A British friend and fellow world traveler, Caroline, who I’d met during a ‘swim with the Dolphins’ experience in the chilly waters (freeze your ass off type of ‘chilly’) off of the North Island of New Zealand, lives near Bath and we planned to meet for lunch before I was to hop on a train and head back into London. I was planning to spend my last three nights in England actually outside of London in a small town near Windsor with another friend I’d made in Turkey who graciously offered up his flat to me and my boyfriend (Mr. Suit Case), but then he (Glen, not my bag) came down with the flu and feared his nasty germs were coating all the surfaces of his home. Caroline emailed me about how it was too bad I couldn’t join her and her girlfriends for the weekend in a resort town on the north coast of Wales. ‘But…wait…I can join you!’

And another great trip unfolded perfectly before me right when I needed it.

I joined four other single thirty-somethings for the weekend in Llandudno, Wales where we hiked and laughed over glasses of wine by the fire sharing tales of travel, men, and other girly things (so “Sex & the City”). We even got pulled over by some lovely Welsh policemen. Caroline had forgotten to put her lights on—good thing they didn’t notice us driving the wrong was down a one-way street about five minutes prior (and it was the Brit driving on the ‘right’ side of the street, not the American). The area was beautiful with rocky, green hills meeting the sea through the foggy mist. It was a perfect weekend and the perfect temporary ending to my travels.

Oh, how I will miss this rush of the unexpected trip that seems to come out of nowhere, but really comes from all the cool friends I’ve made around the world. If it weren’t for them I would never have seen the amazing terraced mountainsides of SaPa, Vietnam, the beautiful vineyard covered island of Bozcaada, Turkey, or the multi-personalitied charming yet industrial city of Gothenburg, Sweden. I guess it’s true what they say: When one door closes, another one opens.

Random London Musings:

One rave:

The city is full of amazing museums. I’m not a huge museum goer and still checked out the Tate Modern (housed inside an old power plant on the banks of the Thames), the Victoria & Albert, the Natural History Museum, the British Museum (which boasts the largest covered square in Europe), and the National Gallery. They are all great and the buildings themselves were oftentimes just as impressive as the contents inside. And the best part—they are free. You can just pop in for no more than an hour and not become overwhelmed because of their size because you know you can always go back whenever you want thanks to the no-admission fee.

And one rant:

What is up with the eat-in/take-away differing prices? I don’t find this very fair and frankly don’t understand why this concept is still around.

One Cheer:

All the pubs, bars, and restaurants have gone ’smoke-free.’ I have to say it is wonderful to hang out in pubs now where it just smells like someone’s living room (not even stale beer smell) and not a smoky den that would make my clothes stink and usually make me leave early due to the inability to no longer breathe.

One Jeer:

The London Underground does not run all night nor were there any train or bus services at all on Christmas Day. C’mon people, this is London not Albuquerque (sorry my friends in NM)! London is one of the biggest cities in the world with an incredibly diverse population who certainly don’t all celebrate Christmas and need to ‘move’ on the 25th of December. I mean even New York and Chicago have public transport still going on that day and have 24 hour trains the rest of the year.

I have traveled all over the world and had trouble reading the street names in some places in Germany or Turkey (Can you say: Mecidiyeköy? It’s pronounced Medj-i-dee-ye-kurr), but even though they are in English, some names in London are just as foreign to me. I couch surfed near “Tooting Bec” tube stop. I could have eaten at the very appetizing sounding restaurant chain, ‘Slug and Lettuce,’ but I didn’t. I passed pubs with names like ‘The Blue-Eyed Maid” and “the Rat and Parrot” and “the Hairy Armpit.” And I could have eaten ‘winkles and whelks’ (snails), but I didn’t.

One night I met Tony, Emma, Nick, and Sara at the Cow, a famous pub near Notting Hill. I don’t often go into bars alone as I usually feel more comfortable going solo at a café with a coffee and a book. But it was damn cold out and when I got there, the friendly, intimidating atmosphere beckoned me inside for a quick pint. This surprisingly turned into a few pints and dinner.

The Cow was a nice corner pub (not really sure if it is on a corner though), not too trendy and not too ‘over done’ fake British. I was at a small table just across from the bar partaking in a pint and reading my trusty guidebook (Lonely Planet) just minding my own business. That is, until I started eavesdropping on the conversation next to me between two guys (one of whom had an American accent) and two gals. Their conversation had turned to Americans and how easy it is for them to find ‘legal’ work in Britain. This sparked my interest and my nerve to jump into their chat. I was feeling a kinship with my fellow American and, as always, was curious to hear his story. I finally blurted out in my tell-tale American accent, “Please tell me where to find work because I’m an illegal American always looking.” They laughed, introduced themselves, and in literally seconds were inviting me to join them for dinner. Tony was a documentary filmmaker in New York, Emma was an Artist. Oh, and she used to be married to George C. Scott’s son. It turned out to be another fun night and quite typical of the solo traveler who may not be alone enough to even use the word ‘solo.’

I spent the rest of my rainy and damp days in London strolling around picturesque ‘hoods like Chelsea, Hampstead, and South Kensington catching up with friends I had met during my travels around the world: a late ‘English’ breakfast with the fun English School owner I’d become friends with in Istanbul, lunch with the sweet British law student I’d cruised down the Danube with in Budapest, dinner and drinks with the charming Airline CEO I’d met years back at the British Consulate’s house in Chicago, sleeping at the flat of a cool chick I’d met on a tour of Turkey, wine and feasting with an Australian Couch Surfing Host and her cool Tasmanian (and nicely devilish) friend, beers with a cute chap and fellow Crisis volunteer, dinner with a Sri Lankan/Australian I’d also met in Turkey who lives in London, and a partridge in a pear tree…

Perhaps for the very first time, this Christmas I finally discovered what it’s all about. They say that ‘giving’ is the best gift of all…and I’ve always enjoyed that, but this year was something truly special. Don’t start choking on my cheesy words yet, because I really mean it. I wanted to do something in London to get ‘in’ to the city more like I had in other places—I wanted to work somehow and meet the real people of the city. And I did just that–I met the city’s true residents—the homeless. During all of Christmas week I volunteered for something called Crisis Open Christmas. Crisis is a national charity that focuses on the ‘hidden’ homeless people who may be living in hostels, cheap hotels, or sleeping on friend’s and family’s floors. The Crisis vision is that all homeless people, or those in danger of becoming homeless, should be able to easily access individual help and support to help them to rebuild their lives and prevent them from remaining trapped in the cycle of homelessness.

Homelessness has changed over the last 35 years but it is far from being solved. Today, the majority have some form of accommodation, but still need companionship and warmth at Christmas. During the Crisis Open Christmas more than 1,500 ‘guests’ were welcomed at eight different centers spread around London in empty office buildings from the 23^rd to the 30^th of December 2007. The guests were not only provided with warmth, companionship, food and a safe place to sleep, but also amazing services such as checkups from on-site doctor and dentist, professional advice on housing, and other treats like an arts and crafts center, a computer lab, a movie area, karaoke, live musical entertainment, and even a mini beauty saloon for some pampering of massages and hair treatments. Of course there were also showers and plenty of cots to sleep on.

I was just one of 7,000 volunteers who gave up their time during the holidays and many of whom return again and again every year to ensure that homeless people are not left out in the cold and are given the chance to move up in their lives. Without any family here, for me it just felt like the right thing to do.

I worked the afternoon shift (3-11p) for five days. Every day we started with a volunteer meeting at which different jobs were divvied up. I was not only impressed with the whole operation, but with the efficient organization of so many volunteers. The volunteers in charge had been doing this for years and had perfected the way to run such a program. Every hour or so we were relieved and rotated into a new job so we were able to try many different things and meet as many different guests as possible. The bottom line to everything was interaction with the guests—something many of them unfortunately don’t get much of all year long. Smiles, conversations, laughter and constant warmth painted the overall scene everywhere you looked.

One of my favorite jobs was working at the ever-busy coffee and tea bar. It kept me busy making drinks and there was no better place to get to talk to guests and get to know them. In just a day or two I was calling people by name and of course, they knew me as the girl from Chicago with the funny American accent. Another great ‘post’ was at the front gate where guests entered and exited. Since we were an alcohol and drug-free center, guests did have to be patted down. This job was given only to women as we were seen as less threatening. Of course it was a nice and funny treat for the many male guests and they joked with us and seemed to be exiting and reentering more than frequently to just to get ‘felt up’ by a lovely lady.

Other ‘jobs’ I did: dinner service, food clean-up, ‘gap’ duty (basically making sure guests didn’t go where they weren’t supposed to), and overall mingling. Luckily I never got assigned to toilet duty, but I have to say every volunteer seemed happy to be there and it was an amazingly positive environment.

One of the preconceived notions I and others have…and the most common question I was asked: ‘weren’t they dirty and smelly?’ I think we are so used to seeing (or smelling) the inebriated bum on the corner that perhaps we assume that is what they are all like. But after one day there, I was honestly forgetting that these were ‘homeless’ and was even confusing some volunteers for guests. They were all different kinds and from all walks of life–artists, writers, philosophers, musicians, immigrants, mothers, husbands, sons, etc. Yes, there were some drunks, but the majority were rather friendly, intelligent, and openly thankful for Crisis.

I did had a few ‘experiences’ because of the fact that I am very friendly and smiley and sometimes this can be misconstrued as ‘more’ especially when you are dealing with folks that perhaps never get any attention at all. I not only had a few new ‘boyfriends’ trying to woo me, I got my first marriage proposal. Not exactly the way I’d imagined it, but still flattering. One guest, I’ll call him Michael, started to fancy me. He was also a bit of a hot head and involved in a few fights between a group of Poles and a group of Blacks. Knowing he was taking a liking to me, the head volunteers actually used me to calm him down. I would hang out and talk to him, go out and smoke with him (without actually smoking) and in a way it felt a bit manipulative as I thought they were using me to sort of play on his emotions a bit, but I guess if it prevented violence then I guess it was okay. Michael ended up giving me a hand written note on the last night thanking me for ‘looking out for’ him saying he really liked me and ‘thought we could be more than friends.’ It reminded me of notes I’d gotten in grade school. I let him down gently and he took it like a man. Another guy, I’ll call him Johnny, started out as a super sweet guy always coming to talk to me. But after five days, a declaration of love and a marriage proposal, he became a bit of a stalker who kept giving me his phone number and asking for my info. This was a big ‘no-no’ of course.

Sadly, though, it was kind of like a ‘bubble’ in our center, a kind of safe place where you could talk to strangers, and laugh with drug addicts and convicts and not even think twice about it. Even walking back to the tube after my shift I would see some new ‘friends’ and say ‘hello.’ This was very different from real life where we all too often divert our eyes from the sadness we pass on the sidewalks of our own cities. It has definitely made me change this thinking. But, nevertheless, it will always be the same on the outside where you don’t have the safety net of Crisis behind you and really just never know what might happen.

Just think about a life where perhaps you are almost always alone. And then here at Crisis you are surrounded by warm people who talk to you and smile with you all week. I can’t imagine what this must feel like, but many guests continuously thanked us all week for our time telling us how much it meant to them.

This was the best part for me…to just make someone feel good and not alone. The hardest part was on the 30^th the doors were closed…and the intensity of the week came to an abrupt end. What happens to these people now? Hopefully, with the help of Crisis, they will be on their way to a better life. But I do think the reality is, for better or worse, the majority will be back again next year. If this could only be the ‘true meaning’ of life all year round and not just at Christmas, we’d really be onto something.

There is an oft-used (read: over-used) saying coined in the 1800s: “when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life.” This was actually my first time hearing this turn of phrase, but just outside of the airport I was already ‘tired’ of it (it being the saying, not London), as it was printed in just about every guide, pamphlet, and article about London. Things in London are civil: you must buckle your seatbelt on the bus (the driver actually came down the aisle to make sure we were all tethered in), the immigrations officers were formal yet cheerful, everyone queues up (lines up) perfectly and even the ATM machine was nice to me. ‘He’ said: ‘thank you for getting cash out of this hole in the wall.’ And I’d only just left the airport.

During all my past travels, I’d only been to London once before nearly 12 years ago on my very first trip abroad. I was only here for three days and it was the end of a three week backpacking trip with my good friend from university, Katie. I have to admit—three days was not enough and I guess after being in Paris and Rome for the first time, London seemed a bit boring. But now I know I had barely scratched the surface.

This town is so much more than red double-decker buses, big black cabs (in which the drivers are rigorously trained and are supposed to know ever single street in the city), and the queen. London is a fitting end (did I just say ‘end?’ I’ll get to that later) to the European leg of my world tour. Probably alongside New York City, it is the most culturally diverse city in the world. As I walked down the streets and criss-crossed the city on the tube (with the help of my trusty Oyster Card), I was elated to hear bits and pieces of other languages I’d encountered all over the world—Polish, Turkish, Chinese, Romanian, Arabic, French, German, etc. In fact, here you can hear about 300 different languages being spoken all over the city from the underground to the pubs to the streets. More than a third of all London’s 7.3 million residents were born outside the country. London is everything to everyone: it’s manicured gardens and stately palaces are complimented with vibrant ethnic street markets and raucous pubs (where you can breathe deep—they are sans smoke nowadays).

I walked with Joanne (a friend of a friend of a friend…and probably a friend of Kevin Bacon) nearby and along the Thames and saw the big tourist attractions from the huge Norwegian Pine in Trafalgar Square to St. Paul’s massive cathedral to the wonderfully progressive Tate Modern Museum. I braved the Christmas crowds and gawked at the festively decorated shops along Oxford and Regency Streets. I wandered down posh Upper Street in Islington (home of former PM, Tony Blair) and Portobello Road in the uber-trendy Notting Hill (no sign of Hugh, though). I ‘rocked down to Electric Avenue’ in Brixton made famous ‘round the world by Eddy Grant back in the early ‘80s. The block was an amalgamation of sights and smells. Jamaican tunes blasted out of fish shops, halal butchers, and wig stores all side by side.

London was expectedly cold, gray, and wet, but in some ways that added to the Christmas feel (and added to the flu I’d caught in Sweden). There was no snow covering the cobblestone lanes or Victorian roofs though…and there was no sign of Ebenezer Scrooge (“I’m as merry as a school boy!”) or Tiny Tim (“God bless us all, every one”). It’s funny how I spent both my Christmases abroad in English speaking countries…one way down under in the southern hemisphere and the other up north near the home of 0 Longitude.

I have to say it was odd speaking English all the time again. I was more aware of this than any other time in my life. I would go into a store ask for something and they understood me straightaway. It was quite odd after all this time, to just open my mouth and simply use my native tongue. There was no odd mix of Spanglish or mangled Turkish. I did miss the challenge and felt like now my brain could officially turn to mush since I was using even less of it than before. Although here in England, I guess I still do sound ‘different’ and of course as soon as I speak they know exactly where I’m from.