They say bad things come in threes. And I've had such a bad run of it over the last week I'm hoping this is my bad-luck quota for the year well and truly filled.
Two Mondays ago I lost my job. It was hardly something to be upset about - I was working as a door-to-door findraiser and while my colleagues were great, wandering the far-flung streets of suburban London in the cold and the dark only to have doors slammed repeatedly in my face was hardly a joy. Besides, the company was new and shakey, so when they folded it nobody was suprised. A job is a job though, and between rent and food and my travel fund I was beginning to think I'd be stretched a little thin. Luckily I'd got that original job through a recruitment agency, and they set me up right away with some new work. Unfortunately the London job market isn't exactly booming, so the only work available is the jobs no-one else wants. Like, for example, street fundraising. You know; those painfully happy people you see in the city and who, no matter how hard you try to look inconspicuous, latch onto you and guilt you into paying out for a charity you'd never even thought about until about 30 seconds ago. Yep. That's me.
Believe me, I understand how annoying street fundraisers are. I can't say no to save my life, so I am the perfect target. But no matter how many times I'm asked, no matter how little money I have, no matter how guilty I end up feeling, I am always polite. It's just a job, after all. Apparently, though, not everyone is quite so considerate. I felt like crying for two days straight after I started. Being sworn at, yelled at, ignored or shoved aside for eight hours a day is hard work. I started on Tuesday, and by the afternoon it was all I could do not to slink off down a side street and weep for self-pity. My teamleader came up to me around five and all he could say was "Shannon, why do you look SO sad?" Well no, that's not entirely true. He also told me that people are mostly all cunts. And while I don't actually believe that, it's becoming a lot harder to refute.
By Friday I have to admit I was honestly enjoying myself. The sun was out, I was getting better numbers, rude remarks had quickly become like water off a duck's back. The people I was working with were fun and great company. I was in a good mood. Exhausted, but happy.
And then I went out and got hit in the face. Again.
Never in my life did I think I would have to say that even once, let alone two weeks in a row. I left the club because I was tired, had drunk enough and needed to get some sleep before work in the morning. There is a 24 hour bus to my house from the station nearest the club, so I went there. But it wasn't coming for ages, so I figured a taxi would just make my night that much easier, and would only cost me about a tenner. That was a mistake.
I hailed a black cab and asked the driver what it would cost to get me home. He told me £15. Admittedly a bit pricey, but at 2:30 on a Saturday morning it still seemed reasonable. But when we got to my road he tried to charge me £10 extra, and when I got out of the cab having only given him the original amount he followed me, threatened me, and then hit me. Unlike last time I was alone. So I ran. I literally turned around and legged it. Not exactly a hero, me.
Anyway, I woke up the next morning with a bruised nose, and fat lip, and the strangest feeling. Even though I was hurt worse this time around, I didn't feel as scared as the first time. My friends railed, and I rallied. I just didn't think about it. I thought about my friend Laura, when she had a fat lip. I thought about how, despite my landlady's assurances that London is a mean place, this could have happened anywhere. About how I still love London. About how this bad thing had happened, but I didn't have to let it have far-reaching consequences.
Really it's just a run of bad luck. But sometimes bad things are just the forerunners of better things. I lost my job, but got a better one. I got hit in the face, but I'll be stronger for it. On Tuesday evening, right at the end of the day, my teamleader came up to me again, to tell me that he didn't really think people were mostly cunts. Maybe he just didn't want to be the one to ruin my bright and shiney outlook on life, but it's true. Sometimes people are rubbish. But in the end, people are mostly good. Or at least I will continue to resolutely believe so.
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Saturday, February 18, 2012
The slap
A couple of days ago a guy I went to school with posted this charming article on his facebook wall, offering it up as a how-to guide for all us poor unmarried lonely hearts. A kind of odious self-improvement manual, heavily laden with barely concealed scorn and judgement for anyone who might be so ill-informed as to think that marriage is not the single most important life goal possible for a woman. Just to be clear - I am not friends with this person, online or otherwise, but such was the outrage caused by his post in my school friends (of both sexes) that it showed up on my timeline purely on the strength of everyone else's comments. Naturally I read it. And after I stopped feeling the need to punch someones face and/or dry-retch into the nearest bucket, my first thought was this:
Oh for fucks sake.
To think there are women sitting at their computers all across the globe, sipping gingerly at their hot water and lemon and nodding sagely as they think "gosh, you know what? She's right. I am an angry, self-serving whore. I need to change drastically in order to please someone I've never met, despite the fact this article assures me marriage is mostly a lot of hard work for very little gain" just sets my mind reeling. Not because I hate marriage or because I feel articles like this are betraying the mysterious sisterhood or whatever. It's because the whole premise of this article is patently ridiculous. Oh shit, not married by 36? Well, that's it then. All those things you achieved? That job you love? Those relationships you cultivated? Your house, your savings account, your flings and holidays and life experiences? Worthless. You've got no husband and, let's be honest shall we? You're not getting any younger.
The article begins with what I can only assume is meant to be a 'knowing' comment about feminism, or the apparent lack of that wanting to be married purportedly implies. But that is NOT WHAT FEMINISM IS ABOUT. Feminism is about equality. So I can get married straight out of school and be a stay-at-home mother, or I can never get married and have a high powered job, or do anything in between and still be a feminist because it was my choice. Personally I'm not sure if I will ever get married - it's to early to tell as far as I'm concerned. But I am sure that I want to make my way across the globe with an overused Barclay card and an oversized back pack. I'm also sure that while I'm on my way I'll want to kiss strangers whose names I don't know, and have flings with people who speak another language, and wake up with hangovers and manic memories and brilliant stories to tell when I finally wash up, broke and hazy, back on Australian shores. And when I do get back to Oz I'm sure that I will want to use my brutal ambition to carve out a career for myself that I can describe as exciting and exhausting and successful. I might not have a husband, but I intend on having a hell of a time.
So I was feeling pretty smug, what with my misogynist-hating friends and confident outlook when, in an astounding feat of cosmic timing, I went out on Friday night and got hit in the face.
All the men I know have been told, fiercely and repeatedly, that you do not hit women. So, understandably, it took me completely off guard. I just had no way of dealing with it. I ended up drunk and shocked and sobbing in the middle of Soho, completely unable to deal with the simple fact that I'd been hit. It wasn't even that painful. I woke up with a slight bruise on the side of my face, but given I bruise like a peach this is hardly a reliable indication of harm done. I've experienced much worse pain. And it wasn't even that big of a deal. I've known women in my time who have been beaten, raped, repeatedly abused. Comparatively this was a walk in the park. But it floored me nevertheless, primarily because I did nothing.
I went home, and I cried, and I got up this morning and went to work and life just went on. Of course. It was a blip, an irregularity on the face of my otherwise very happy, very lucky life. If the world stopped for every minor act of violence we'd be at a perpetual standstill. I felt shaken, but in the harsh light of day I also felt foolish, and ashamed. I had done nothing to defend myself. My friend's boyfriend hit him back; I didn't. It was a tiny event that made me feel weak, and worthless, and very, very small. But the worst thing was, when I was walking home and on a very expensive phone call to Australia, I realised that what I wanted most was not my mum, or my friends, but a man. I wanted someone to stand up for me, protect me. Isn't that awful? Isn't that the most hateful thing I could possibly have thought? Just two days before I had scoffed at that dreadful 'Why You're Not Married' article, and yet there I was, falling back on those same ideals because I got a scare.
Thankfully, thankfully it didn't last, and tonight I was able to make jokes about having joined a fight club to liven up my evenings with my old host-parents pre-babysit. And I play-fought with my old kids, safe in the knowledge that Ben will never ever hit a woman. It'll be an anecdote - that time I got hit in the face in Soho. It will sit in amongst the memories of other poor life choices and awkward situations, and pretty soon I'll find it mostly funny. And if anyone ever tries to hit me again, or tells me I deserved it, at least now I'll be better prepared. Because if there's ever a next time, it sure as hell wont be me that ends up crying. Or - if what I've read is true - finding my future husband.
Oh for fucks sake.
To think there are women sitting at their computers all across the globe, sipping gingerly at their hot water and lemon and nodding sagely as they think "gosh, you know what? She's right. I am an angry, self-serving whore. I need to change drastically in order to please someone I've never met, despite the fact this article assures me marriage is mostly a lot of hard work for very little gain" just sets my mind reeling. Not because I hate marriage or because I feel articles like this are betraying the mysterious sisterhood or whatever. It's because the whole premise of this article is patently ridiculous. Oh shit, not married by 36? Well, that's it then. All those things you achieved? That job you love? Those relationships you cultivated? Your house, your savings account, your flings and holidays and life experiences? Worthless. You've got no husband and, let's be honest shall we? You're not getting any younger.
The article begins with what I can only assume is meant to be a 'knowing' comment about feminism, or the apparent lack of that wanting to be married purportedly implies. But that is NOT WHAT FEMINISM IS ABOUT. Feminism is about equality. So I can get married straight out of school and be a stay-at-home mother, or I can never get married and have a high powered job, or do anything in between and still be a feminist because it was my choice. Personally I'm not sure if I will ever get married - it's to early to tell as far as I'm concerned. But I am sure that I want to make my way across the globe with an overused Barclay card and an oversized back pack. I'm also sure that while I'm on my way I'll want to kiss strangers whose names I don't know, and have flings with people who speak another language, and wake up with hangovers and manic memories and brilliant stories to tell when I finally wash up, broke and hazy, back on Australian shores. And when I do get back to Oz I'm sure that I will want to use my brutal ambition to carve out a career for myself that I can describe as exciting and exhausting and successful. I might not have a husband, but I intend on having a hell of a time.
So I was feeling pretty smug, what with my misogynist-hating friends and confident outlook when, in an astounding feat of cosmic timing, I went out on Friday night and got hit in the face.
All the men I know have been told, fiercely and repeatedly, that you do not hit women. So, understandably, it took me completely off guard. I just had no way of dealing with it. I ended up drunk and shocked and sobbing in the middle of Soho, completely unable to deal with the simple fact that I'd been hit. It wasn't even that painful. I woke up with a slight bruise on the side of my face, but given I bruise like a peach this is hardly a reliable indication of harm done. I've experienced much worse pain. And it wasn't even that big of a deal. I've known women in my time who have been beaten, raped, repeatedly abused. Comparatively this was a walk in the park. But it floored me nevertheless, primarily because I did nothing.
I went home, and I cried, and I got up this morning and went to work and life just went on. Of course. It was a blip, an irregularity on the face of my otherwise very happy, very lucky life. If the world stopped for every minor act of violence we'd be at a perpetual standstill. I felt shaken, but in the harsh light of day I also felt foolish, and ashamed. I had done nothing to defend myself. My friend's boyfriend hit him back; I didn't. It was a tiny event that made me feel weak, and worthless, and very, very small. But the worst thing was, when I was walking home and on a very expensive phone call to Australia, I realised that what I wanted most was not my mum, or my friends, but a man. I wanted someone to stand up for me, protect me. Isn't that awful? Isn't that the most hateful thing I could possibly have thought? Just two days before I had scoffed at that dreadful 'Why You're Not Married' article, and yet there I was, falling back on those same ideals because I got a scare.
Thankfully, thankfully it didn't last, and tonight I was able to make jokes about having joined a fight club to liven up my evenings with my old host-parents pre-babysit. And I play-fought with my old kids, safe in the knowledge that Ben will never ever hit a woman. It'll be an anecdote - that time I got hit in the face in Soho. It will sit in amongst the memories of other poor life choices and awkward situations, and pretty soon I'll find it mostly funny. And if anyone ever tries to hit me again, or tells me I deserved it, at least now I'll be better prepared. Because if there's ever a next time, it sure as hell wont be me that ends up crying. Or - if what I've read is true - finding my future husband.
Thursday, January 12, 2012
This Year
Here's a fun fact: I've now lived and worked in London for over a year. And to be honest I'm not sure if it feels like forever, or no time at all.
I spent Christmas in North Wales with my parents and my brother, and forfeited my youthful right to a New Years blowout to spend the last night of the year standing in the cold and rain on the Thames with my family for 8 hours - an ordeal made considerably less harrowing by a 6 hour game of What Would You Rather (a bionic arm, or a bionic leg?), and the presence of a hilarious Indian-English family who not only offered me free accommodation in the Midlands, but who also had a constant supply of wine and liquor they were more than happy to share.
Naturally spending some quality time with my family for the first time all year was incredible, the only real downfall being their inevitable departure. Because of how long it had been since I'd seen anyone from Australia (since Laura's mid-year visit, for those of you playing at home) I'd pretty much adopted an "out of sight, out of mind" approach to my life back home. Of course I miss my friends and family, but not with the kind of visceral sadness that pervaded my first month or two. But after six weeks of being able to call my mum to ask her stupid questions and getting Gary's equally stupid replies, and three weeks of forcing Luke to sleep on the floor, not having them around suddenly felt considerably harder than it had at the end of November. Not to mention the day after my folks flew out I met up with Lisa, a friend of mine from high school. All of which was great at the time, but really brought home once again the less glamorous realities of living half a world away from the majority of the people I know.
But! On the other hand, I didn't spend the first week of this year crying and feeling sorry for myself, primarily because last year turned out to be even more than I wanted it to be. I've missed plenty back home: my cousin's wedding, my friend's wedding, births and deaths and countless birthdays and parties and dramas. But I've also found new friends, and gone to new places, and seen and done things that hitherto had been entirely impossible.
Seeing Lisa also made me realise I really don't want to go home (and I mean that in the best possible way). I had been wondering if I was going to be away too long; if when I got back my life trajectory would be too out of sync with my friends for me to fit in anymore. Up until now my friends and I had, mostly by necessity, been on basically the same life path: school, then uni, then job. So even though I didn't live in the same place as my school friends, and hadn't come from the same place as my uni friends, we were, essentially, all in the same place life-wise. But when I opted out of the "real job" option it threw my timeline out. Happily, seeing Lisa made me realise that in two years my friends will still be pretty much the same people as they were when I left, and that if some of those friendships don't continue it wont be because of a few extra months' absence here or there.
Besides which, in the same way marking the change of year on an arbitrary calendar date has no real significance beyond what you choose to give it, a generally accepted "life plan" is only as acceptable as you want it to be. And while I know that eventually I will want to start my career, and possibly at some point in the distant future marry and/or have children, right now what I want is mostly just more. More adventure, more excitement, more new things. And I am exceedingly happy in the knowledge that at any moment I can decide I've had enough of London, or my job(s), or my flat and just up sticks, without having to consider the repercussions my decision might have for anyone else. Which is not to say the relationships I've built here - with my friends or host family or employers - are meaningless or essentially transient. It's just that they were built in the knowledge that they would have to be flexible. So while for now I'm quite happy with my new flat and new job and not-so-new city, I'm also impatient for the year to really begin. No matter what you think of fireworks and resolutions, there's no denying the promise that comes with a new year. And I have big plans for this one.
I spent Christmas in North Wales with my parents and my brother, and forfeited my youthful right to a New Years blowout to spend the last night of the year standing in the cold and rain on the Thames with my family for 8 hours - an ordeal made considerably less harrowing by a 6 hour game of What Would You Rather (a bionic arm, or a bionic leg?), and the presence of a hilarious Indian-English family who not only offered me free accommodation in the Midlands, but who also had a constant supply of wine and liquor they were more than happy to share.
Naturally spending some quality time with my family for the first time all year was incredible, the only real downfall being their inevitable departure. Because of how long it had been since I'd seen anyone from Australia (since Laura's mid-year visit, for those of you playing at home) I'd pretty much adopted an "out of sight, out of mind" approach to my life back home. Of course I miss my friends and family, but not with the kind of visceral sadness that pervaded my first month or two. But after six weeks of being able to call my mum to ask her stupid questions and getting Gary's equally stupid replies, and three weeks of forcing Luke to sleep on the floor, not having them around suddenly felt considerably harder than it had at the end of November. Not to mention the day after my folks flew out I met up with Lisa, a friend of mine from high school. All of which was great at the time, but really brought home once again the less glamorous realities of living half a world away from the majority of the people I know.
But! On the other hand, I didn't spend the first week of this year crying and feeling sorry for myself, primarily because last year turned out to be even more than I wanted it to be. I've missed plenty back home: my cousin's wedding, my friend's wedding, births and deaths and countless birthdays and parties and dramas. But I've also found new friends, and gone to new places, and seen and done things that hitherto had been entirely impossible.
Seeing Lisa also made me realise I really don't want to go home (and I mean that in the best possible way). I had been wondering if I was going to be away too long; if when I got back my life trajectory would be too out of sync with my friends for me to fit in anymore. Up until now my friends and I had, mostly by necessity, been on basically the same life path: school, then uni, then job. So even though I didn't live in the same place as my school friends, and hadn't come from the same place as my uni friends, we were, essentially, all in the same place life-wise. But when I opted out of the "real job" option it threw my timeline out. Happily, seeing Lisa made me realise that in two years my friends will still be pretty much the same people as they were when I left, and that if some of those friendships don't continue it wont be because of a few extra months' absence here or there.
Besides which, in the same way marking the change of year on an arbitrary calendar date has no real significance beyond what you choose to give it, a generally accepted "life plan" is only as acceptable as you want it to be. And while I know that eventually I will want to start my career, and possibly at some point in the distant future marry and/or have children, right now what I want is mostly just more. More adventure, more excitement, more new things. And I am exceedingly happy in the knowledge that at any moment I can decide I've had enough of London, or my job(s), or my flat and just up sticks, without having to consider the repercussions my decision might have for anyone else. Which is not to say the relationships I've built here - with my friends or host family or employers - are meaningless or essentially transient. It's just that they were built in the knowledge that they would have to be flexible. So while for now I'm quite happy with my new flat and new job and not-so-new city, I'm also impatient for the year to really begin. No matter what you think of fireworks and resolutions, there's no denying the promise that comes with a new year. And I have big plans for this one.
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Scoundrels
One of my favourite things about living in London is the live music scene. There are bands and musicians playing every week, from the totally unknown to the internationally renowned. Being a huge music fan I've taken advantage of this as much as possible (though not as many times as I would like - an issue I intend on rectifying fully over the coming months, especially now that I live so close to one of London's most preeminent musical suburbs), but I've not really talked about it here because I figured hearing me gush about how great any gig was would be considerably less exciting than actually being there.
That said, I also love it when people put me onto amazing new music. So, in the name of musical education, I wanted to tell you about the brilliant band I saw on Saturday night.
I have to admit, my track record for getting places on time has been shocking this year. I tend to think London is much smaller than it actually is (Australian spacial arrogance), and so allow myself rather less time than I really need. But I went to see the Kooks with a friend of mine who is incredibly punctual, so I made it to the venue in time to see not one but both of the supporting acts. Which, in hindsight, was a very happy coincidence because the first support act was Scoundrels, a four piece indie/blues outfit who turned out to play the best live show I've seen all year.
We were so impressed by their performance at the Kooks that my friend and I went home and immediately bought tickets to their next London show. But come Saturday I was beginning to regret the decision. Having worked seven days a week for the past fortnight I got to the club wrecked, starving, and starting to worry the band weren't going to be as good as I seemed to remember. I could not have been more wrong; they were so much better than I'd thought. They play this fun, exciting blend of Brit-pop and southern zydeco that in words sounds ridiculous but in reality sounds phenomenal. Hearing a bunch of English boys playing the kind of deep south blues usually associated with older black men with harmonicas is something of an unexpected surprise, but by no means an unwelcome one.
Admittedly I was brought up on a steady diet of zydeco care of my mother (who once even took me to a blues fest to see her favourite zydeco band. I was the 12-year-old who danced like a crazy person in front of the stage and got to chat with the lead singer. I'm beginning to think my mum brought me up to be either really cool or a groupie), so I'm possibly predisposed to love this kind of music. After all it does remind me of my heady glory days, before I became an awkward teenager who bopped carefully at the back in a way painstakingly calculated to keep me out of the spotlight.
But putting to one side for a moment my own weakness for the siren call of the blues, this band are still mind blowing. They play with enjoyment and talent that conjured images of jamming for hours in garages soundproofed with egg cartons on lazy, rainy English afternoons. And they were charismatic. I swear, show me some guy with a guitar and I'll show you my "whatever, my brother's in a band" face; show me some guy with a guitar and charisma and I'm done for. The music is energetic and cheeky, the lyrics occasionally wistful but mostly tongue-in-cheek. There are honestly no words to describe how much I enjoyed this band. Which is why I usually don't try. I just end up sounding like an over-excited fangirl. Or my 12-year-old self.
That said, I also love it when people put me onto amazing new music. So, in the name of musical education, I wanted to tell you about the brilliant band I saw on Saturday night.
I have to admit, my track record for getting places on time has been shocking this year. I tend to think London is much smaller than it actually is (Australian spacial arrogance), and so allow myself rather less time than I really need. But I went to see the Kooks with a friend of mine who is incredibly punctual, so I made it to the venue in time to see not one but both of the supporting acts. Which, in hindsight, was a very happy coincidence because the first support act was Scoundrels, a four piece indie/blues outfit who turned out to play the best live show I've seen all year.
We were so impressed by their performance at the Kooks that my friend and I went home and immediately bought tickets to their next London show. But come Saturday I was beginning to regret the decision. Having worked seven days a week for the past fortnight I got to the club wrecked, starving, and starting to worry the band weren't going to be as good as I seemed to remember. I could not have been more wrong; they were so much better than I'd thought. They play this fun, exciting blend of Brit-pop and southern zydeco that in words sounds ridiculous but in reality sounds phenomenal. Hearing a bunch of English boys playing the kind of deep south blues usually associated with older black men with harmonicas is something of an unexpected surprise, but by no means an unwelcome one.
Admittedly I was brought up on a steady diet of zydeco care of my mother (who once even took me to a blues fest to see her favourite zydeco band. I was the 12-year-old who danced like a crazy person in front of the stage and got to chat with the lead singer. I'm beginning to think my mum brought me up to be either really cool or a groupie), so I'm possibly predisposed to love this kind of music. After all it does remind me of my heady glory days, before I became an awkward teenager who bopped carefully at the back in a way painstakingly calculated to keep me out of the spotlight.
But putting to one side for a moment my own weakness for the siren call of the blues, this band are still mind blowing. They play with enjoyment and talent that conjured images of jamming for hours in garages soundproofed with egg cartons on lazy, rainy English afternoons. And they were charismatic. I swear, show me some guy with a guitar and I'll show you my "whatever, my brother's in a band" face; show me some guy with a guitar and charisma and I'm done for. The music is energetic and cheeky, the lyrics occasionally wistful but mostly tongue-in-cheek. There are honestly no words to describe how much I enjoyed this band. Which is why I usually don't try. I just end up sounding like an over-excited fangirl. Or my 12-year-old self.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Moving out
The past few weeks I've been in such a state. I finish my Au Pair job on the 17th of December, and with it goes not only my primary source of income, but also my home. And with the local and global economy rushing headlong into chaos, the job market isn't exactly thriving. So up until a few days ago my prospects were looking fairly dire.
Naturally I managed to get a job without too much hassle (it was always going to be one or the other). The company that hired me provides staffing for high profile, high end events. It's not exactly guaranteed full-time work - in fact they're advising already that January is a lean month - but it's a job nonetheless.
But if the job market is tough then the housing market is out and out war.
I must have looked at a dozen houses in the last fortnight. Of those, two were nice, and the rest had me genuinely worried that I might be sold into the white slave trade. I had always thought that shows like East Enders and The Bill portrayed only the scummiest aspects of London life. As it turns out, it doesn't matter how nice the surrounding areas are; if you live on an estate in London, the chances of you getting stabbed over £20 rise exponentially. I saw flats with no living area; a room with three doors and a curtain; and in the worst case was offered a place in a one bedroom flat sharing with an overweight middle aged man with a ponytail. I don't mean to be judgemental, but there are some things you should be obliged to mention on a room advertisement. And the going rate for a room is £150 a week.
I was beginning to think my top two options were death by exposure or being shanked on an under lit stairwell when I went to look at a room in Highgate, and found myself in flat search utopia. The woman I spoke to (also named Shannon) lives there with her adult daughter and one other lodger, a Spanish girl who's moving back home after Christmas. I was determined not to lodge with a family, but she made it clear I would be treated as a flatmate. Honestly though, even if she hadn't I probably would have offered her my firstborn for the lease. The flat is beautiful. It's in North London, flanked on two sides by Camden and Hampstead Heath (famously the home of Helena Bonham-Carter and Tim Burton amongst others). It has high ceilings and a private garden, and night buses to every corner of town. The next door neighbours are rich young bankers (single, too, according to my new landlord), and the area is practically overrun by people in the arts and media industries.
Afterwards I went home and decided that if I didn't get the lease on that flat I would give up and become a drifter, hitchhiking my way to the Med so I could sleep on the streets in relative winter warmth.
I picked up my set of keys today.
But wait, there's more. As if I needed any further incentive, I also found out the mother and daughter who own the flat are, from February next year, going to be spending much of there time in America. For weeks and months at a time they'll be gone, leaving me all on my own. Which means, to all intents and purposes, that for £400 a month (all inclusive) I just rented myself an entire house.
Naturally I managed to get a job without too much hassle (it was always going to be one or the other). The company that hired me provides staffing for high profile, high end events. It's not exactly guaranteed full-time work - in fact they're advising already that January is a lean month - but it's a job nonetheless.
But if the job market is tough then the housing market is out and out war.
I must have looked at a dozen houses in the last fortnight. Of those, two were nice, and the rest had me genuinely worried that I might be sold into the white slave trade. I had always thought that shows like East Enders and The Bill portrayed only the scummiest aspects of London life. As it turns out, it doesn't matter how nice the surrounding areas are; if you live on an estate in London, the chances of you getting stabbed over £20 rise exponentially. I saw flats with no living area; a room with three doors and a curtain; and in the worst case was offered a place in a one bedroom flat sharing with an overweight middle aged man with a ponytail. I don't mean to be judgemental, but there are some things you should be obliged to mention on a room advertisement. And the going rate for a room is £150 a week.
I was beginning to think my top two options were death by exposure or being shanked on an under lit stairwell when I went to look at a room in Highgate, and found myself in flat search utopia. The woman I spoke to (also named Shannon) lives there with her adult daughter and one other lodger, a Spanish girl who's moving back home after Christmas. I was determined not to lodge with a family, but she made it clear I would be treated as a flatmate. Honestly though, even if she hadn't I probably would have offered her my firstborn for the lease. The flat is beautiful. It's in North London, flanked on two sides by Camden and Hampstead Heath (famously the home of Helena Bonham-Carter and Tim Burton amongst others). It has high ceilings and a private garden, and night buses to every corner of town. The next door neighbours are rich young bankers (single, too, according to my new landlord), and the area is practically overrun by people in the arts and media industries.
Afterwards I went home and decided that if I didn't get the lease on that flat I would give up and become a drifter, hitchhiking my way to the Med so I could sleep on the streets in relative winter warmth.
I picked up my set of keys today.
But wait, there's more. As if I needed any further incentive, I also found out the mother and daughter who own the flat are, from February next year, going to be spending much of there time in America. For weeks and months at a time they'll be gone, leaving me all on my own. Which means, to all intents and purposes, that for £400 a month (all inclusive) I just rented myself an entire house.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Endings
Autumn is a wonderful time to be melancholy. Not truly sad, per se. More...wistful. A languid, enjoyable heartache. The falling leaves; the crisp, grey skies; the definite chill that permeates the air - these things are all geared towards thoughts of endings. Autumn is the final, beautiful hurrah before the deadpan black-and-white colour palette of winter. So it seems only fitting that this should be the time of year when my own safe little London life should begin to fall apart too.
I have known from the moment I took this job that it would end mid-December. But in January, December was a year away. And in June, December was half a year away. And even in October it seemed like an age before things like Christmas and snow and unemployment would come about. And now I suddenly have one month - 30 days and counting - before I have no job and no home. Oh. And a brother flying in for 2 weeks expecting at the very least a floor space to sleep on.
I've been fairly blase about my encroaching destitution. But my blithe "I'm not worried. Things always work out well for me" is beginning to sound mildly insincere, even to my own ears (and before you start thinking how irresponsible it is to just sit back and hope for the best, let me remind you - it HAS all worked out thus far, and with painfully little effort on my part. So my assurance up to this point hasn't been cavalier. It's been honest).
I went for my first room inspection tonight. I inspected the house, the housemates inspected me. It was, in a word, unnerving. The house was populated by antipodes, which I'm not sure about (why come to England to live with Aussies, after all). But mostly I was shocked out of my comfort zone by the fact that I'm quite likely to actually be offered a room reasonably soon. Which means several things - not least of which being that I really, really need a new job - including my leaving my host family. Leaving my kids. And they're not making it any easier.
I have been considering moving out of the West, and heading North or East, for a change of scene. But when I told my kids that I was going to look at a house in the next suburb over, they immediately celebrated how close I would still be. And when I came home after my interview my host dad asked me "When are you moving out?"
and when I answered "Well I suppose it depends when I get offered somewhere to live", he replied
"But...what about us?"
No, please. Break my heart a little more why don't you.
Still, it does feel good to know they still want me around after having me invade their home for a full year.
On the other hand, I love winter. Plus spring is always there, lurking just beyond the horizon. And it's time for a change. It has been wonderful, really and truly wonderful, spending a year here with my kids and their parents. But I'm ready for something new. A challenge, and adventure, anything. I'll still see them, if they need a babysitter or I need a sneaky feed because I spent all my money on things other than food. I'll have less room, I suppose. But I'll have more freedom.
I have known from the moment I took this job that it would end mid-December. But in January, December was a year away. And in June, December was half a year away. And even in October it seemed like an age before things like Christmas and snow and unemployment would come about. And now I suddenly have one month - 30 days and counting - before I have no job and no home. Oh. And a brother flying in for 2 weeks expecting at the very least a floor space to sleep on.
I've been fairly blase about my encroaching destitution. But my blithe "I'm not worried. Things always work out well for me" is beginning to sound mildly insincere, even to my own ears (and before you start thinking how irresponsible it is to just sit back and hope for the best, let me remind you - it HAS all worked out thus far, and with painfully little effort on my part. So my assurance up to this point hasn't been cavalier. It's been honest).
I went for my first room inspection tonight. I inspected the house, the housemates inspected me. It was, in a word, unnerving. The house was populated by antipodes, which I'm not sure about (why come to England to live with Aussies, after all). But mostly I was shocked out of my comfort zone by the fact that I'm quite likely to actually be offered a room reasonably soon. Which means several things - not least of which being that I really, really need a new job - including my leaving my host family. Leaving my kids. And they're not making it any easier.
I have been considering moving out of the West, and heading North or East, for a change of scene. But when I told my kids that I was going to look at a house in the next suburb over, they immediately celebrated how close I would still be. And when I came home after my interview my host dad asked me "When are you moving out?"
and when I answered "Well I suppose it depends when I get offered somewhere to live", he replied
"But...what about us?"
No, please. Break my heart a little more why don't you.
Still, it does feel good to know they still want me around after having me invade their home for a full year.
On the other hand, I love winter. Plus spring is always there, lurking just beyond the horizon. And it's time for a change. It has been wonderful, really and truly wonderful, spending a year here with my kids and their parents. But I'm ready for something new. A challenge, and adventure, anything. I'll still see them, if they need a babysitter or I need a sneaky feed because I spent all my money on things other than food. I'll have less room, I suppose. But I'll have more freedom.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
What is past is prologue
I doubt anyone would argue the fact that Germany is a fascinating place. The backdrop for the most heinous crimes of the 20th century, Germany bears more guilt than any other Western country. And yet it is amongst the most powerful nations in Europe, and one of the most important financial players on the world stage. It is basically holding the EU together by sheer force of will, despite having a deeply divided history. So to say I was excited to get over there is at best a mild understatement.
A friend of mine from Australia, Joshua Harris (whom I fortuitously ran into in Dublin), is studying in a small town in mid-Germany for the year and generously offered me the use of his couch. So, unlike many tourists, my trip didn't start in any of the usual places. After a slightly disastrous journey over the channel (missing my connecting flight in Frankfurt = bad. Having my flights realigned by the most courteous and helpful airline ever = good. If you get the chance to fly with a German airline, take it. They were amazing. And they gave me free chocolate) I arrived not in a major port of call, but in a tiny university town called Göttingen. This worked to my advantage in several ways. For one thing it meant I was greeted in Germany with the sentence "so, are you ready for some schnitzel?", which was almost enough to make my whole trip all by itself. For another it meant I was able to revive my own uni experiences. I'm pretty sure I spent at least 2/3rds of my time there in a state of happy inebriation. But most of all it gave me the chance to see some of Germany that had literally never been touched by the war. Thanks to a slightly bizarre agreement the Brits made sure their bombs didn't fall on Göttingen, and in return the big two in England were similarly unmolested. So Göttingen is this stunning half-timbered fairytale town that encapsulates all that is great about German history. Which is important. Given that most people visit Germany to see places like Berlin, Dresden, and Munich it is easy to forget there is so much more to the country than the past 80 odd years.
One of my favourite things about Göttingen was the story behind this statue. The Gänseliesel (Goose Girl) stands in the old town square, and is possibly the most-kissed little girl in the whole of Germany. Whenever a university student is presented with their doctorate, it is traditional for them to present Gänseliesel with a bouquet of flowers and give her a kiss. I found that story unaccountably sweet. For me it kind of summed up the kind of place Göttingen is.
After three nights with Josh I gathered up my bag and my hangover and made my way to Berlin. A word on foreign languages: no matter what you think you know, you really don't. I went to Germany confident that I couldn't speak the language (knowing that Auf Wiedersehen means the same as so long, farewell and goodbye is about as complex as my German gets) but even if I'd come fully equipped with a litany of helpful phrases I still would have been utterly perplexed. So fast! So accented! Happily everyone seemed to speak English, and all the Germans I came into contact with were super helpful.
By the time I arrived in Berlin I was starving and exhausted, so imagine my dismay when my hostel told me they'd overbooked my room. Things turned around pretty quicksmart though. They upgraded me to a private room (with en suit! luxury!) for free, and I found a lovely little Italian restaurant just around the corner. It was run by actual Italians (I know because they spoke more Italian than German) who were so pleased by my joy at discovering they did take away orders that they sat me down and fed me bread until my pasta was done. And while usually being alone in a hostel room would strike me as counter-productive, having the shower and light switch all to myself came pretty close to paradise at the time.
Berlin proved just as brilliant as I'd come to hope. Parts of it, admittedly, are blighted by the Nazi history. The courtyard where they burnt the books, for example, is surrounded by beautiful buildings that stand as testament to the city's previously liberal history - a church (designed by Frederick the great), a library, a university. The Brandenburg Gate is inextricably linked now with the image of Hitler walking into the city as the new Chancellor. And the Holocaust memorial is just beyond sad.
But Berlin is also really impressive. The Brandenburg isn't lessened as a piece of architecture because of one event. The museums are brilliant (I saw part of the wall of Babylon, for crying out loud). And it's also quite beautiful.
This building is a stunning church that looks about 500 years old. Actually it was only built about 160 years ago, when the then-king decided he needed older looking buildings to make the city more impressive. It's times like these I remember why I think the fall of the monarchy was probably for the best.
When I was in high school I took modern history. History was - is - one of my absolute favourite subjects. If you sat me down and offered me the choice between seven days in the tropics or seven days with an in-depth analysis of the past 300-odd years I'd take the plane ticket for the sole purpose of using it as a bookmark. If you make even a passing comment on the politics of the cold war in casual conversation you can wave goodbye to any chance you had of getting a word in edgewise for at least the next hour. In short, I'm a little bit of a history nerd. So when I was asked by a couple of my academic kindred spirits' one lesson what moment in history I would attend if given the chance it might have seemed like an impossible choice. It wasn't. If I could have been at any moment in history, I would have been at the fall of the Berlin Wall.
To say the Berlin Wall captivates me doesn't even come close to explaining how I feel. I had expected the wall to be more...well, frightening really. It was the cause of so much suffering. But in the end it was just a wall, which is why it fell. On the 9th of November 1989 a bumbling press secretary precipitated the greatest event in decades by uttering words to the effect of "I believe...immediately" on live international television and radio. Hundreds of East Berliners, people who had been taken without warning from normality and thrown into a state of constant terror, who hadn't seen friends and loved ones for almost 30 years swarmed out of their houses and peacefully ensured the destruction of one of the most oppressive regimes of the century. And when they made it over to the other side they were greeted by West Berliners handing out beer.
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