Days back in the UK

As you have known, I was out of my accommodation in Liverpool on the fifth of September and went on a short trip around Europe.

When I was in London for a few days before I left UK to Italy, I had doubts where I would live after the whole 16 days’ trip in Europe.

I was worried because I would have about a month time before I go back to Malaysia because I was unable to move my flight dates forward.

I was naive. I thought I could make it in the UK after my studies. Thus, I had decided to return at mid November. After being here for a few months, things just aren’t looking very bright, and I miss home a lot.

After some discussion with my parents, I contacted the travel agent to move forward my dates, they was unable to help me because the seats are all booked up at economy class, and since I purchased the return ticket with student price, I was unable to change the class of the ticket. The best date of return is 30th Oct, with 18 hours of wait in HKIA for transit back to KLIA.

Oh well, another month in UK, without much help I could rely much on besides money, I could survive I guess. If I were to stay in hostels, it would easily cost me £15 per night, and with at least £5 of food, I would need at least £20 a day, and £140 a week, and £560 a month, to survive in the UK.

Thanks to a friend I know who is living in London; his uncle offered me a place to stay at Tadworth, Surrey - a small town in a county south of London, which has train services running into London every half hour. (Insert map with driving direction from London to Tadworth)

It was an Oriental restaurant known as Royal Phoenix, but it has been left alone, or to be exact, abandoned for a few months after being notified that it would be purchased for redevelopment.

I visited the place before I leave London, it was not very dirty, but it was dusty, and things were out of place. After having looked at the rooms, I told myself I will go through this, because this is been offered to me to stay for free.

After getting this accommodation, I felt much safer when I leave London on 9th September to continue the journey with my friends.

When I got back into London from the trip on 25th September, I was feeling very happy because I am seeing English words again! Italian, French and German were what I see all the time during the trip, with little English word. I could even speak and understand some basic Italian and French (Just a little).

I went back to Liverpool to get my luggage and see autumn in Liverpool. It was gorgeous.

After grabbing my 30kg luggage, my friends and I got to Manchester to spend the last two days together in the UK this time. They flew back to Malaysia on 28th September from Manchester Airport.

We went on a little tour in Manchester as well, to Manchester’s China Town and the famous Old Trafford, Football ground of Manchester United.

As you know, I spent my birthday and Mid-autumn festival in Italy, so I didn’t really get a chance to eat mooncake. I ate a red bean paste mooncake in Manchester’s China Town!

While we were away for our so-called European trip, there were some changes to the local transport fares.

Daysaver bus pass in Liverpool was £3, now £3.20.
One way train ticket from Liverpool to Manchester was £8.80, now £9.10.
Daysaver bus pass in Manchester was £3.30, now a f***ing £4.

Things are getting more expensive in the UK. It is so hard to live in the UK now. I have to find ways to save.

Too bad we did not take a group photo before I bid goodbye to Chalis, Kien Fu and Kelvin. Or else they could be featured here too! Lolz!

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I took a 5 hour bus from Manchester to London with my 30kg luggage, 7kg backpack and 5kg plastic bag containing miscellaneous items. I hand-carried them from the London Victoria coach station to Victoria underground station (10 minutes walk without luggage), where no lifts or accessibility access is available (this means I carried all of them by stairs), and all the way from East Putney underground station to my friend’s house which is about 10 minutes walk without luggage.

It was tough work. I was sweating even with the cold weather.

Finally, after some hours, I got to Royal Phoenix.

Things weren’t right when I reached there. 1. It was very dusty.
2. It has the abandoned-for-some-time smell.
3. No hot water – no shower
4. No heating – cold nights
5. No workable kitchen – no hot food and hot drinking water
6. No Internet access (of course, I am in an abandoned old restaurant).
7. My laptop spoilt. This is because:
a. My laptop doesn’t have enough space to store all the pictures taken during the trip. So:
b. I had to remove my Ubuntu to store those pictures. But:
c. My laptop requires Ubuntu’s boot files, removing it makes my computer unbootable. To solve this:
d. I had to boot with a Windows XP CD to fix the Master Boot Record of my laptop’s hard disk, which governs what should the laptop does when it is booted. But:
e. My laptop’s CD drive is spoilt. To fix this:
f. I need to plug in an external CD drive to boot my computer with it. Luckily: g. There was an old computer in Royal Phoenix which has a CD drive in it. But:
h. I don’t have a screwdriver to unscrew the computer to get the CD drive.
i. In conclusion, I need a screwdriver to get all this fixed.

Well, definitely I didn’t really want to stay there, but I have no choice because I have limited budget to survive for a month, my budget has to include the journey I am heading to, which is Prague in Czech Republic and the Netherlands, which is about 10 days, 3 days in Prague and a week in the Netherlands. My budget is about 50 Euros a day, which means about 500 Euros for the trip and that makes about £420 has to be allocated for the trip.

I only have £10 budget to spend for a day, anything more than that means I will have to ask my parents to transfer money to me again. This is something I do not want to do. I understand that with the credit crunch going on in the States and the UK, they need the money to survive. I sure hope things are not as badly affected in Malaysia.

Well, seriously, things have not been looking very bright. I had to go to my friend’s place to eat hot food, shower and get online, which is something not very good to do, since I am not paying anything and I don’t feel very much welcomed. In Chinese, I feel very bad to 寄人篱下.

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As far as I want to tell what happened when I was in Royal Phoenix, I don’t really want to mention it because it was unbearable.

On the first day, I wasn’t really allowed to leave the place because I didn’t have the key to it. But due to some discussion with one of the family members of my friend, I got to the house and showered, ate, and relaxed. I got some groceries too. And I got the key in the end.

On the second day, I didn’t go anywhere. I wanted to go out badly to get breathing mask for cleaning purposes. Mind you I have a very sensitive nose towards dust. I was basically sneezing around almost all the time. I wanted to get a screwdriver to fix my laptop as well.

When I got ready to go out, it was raining. Just to avoid being wet and sick, I stayed at home, and searched the whole restaurant for a screwdriver. I could find none, but some wine opener with a small knife attached to it. With all my might, I tried and tried to unscrew the computer with it, and finally, after few hours of attempt, I got my laptop fixed, and everything seemed less unbearable.

I was in Starbucks and I just love the Jazzy music they played, which calmed me so much and gives me the mood to write so much. I had spent a few days writing this already. Too bad there is no free WiFi connection here, and they are closing at 7pm. Lolz! I am heading to McDonalds to post this online, and to get my dinner before heading back to the old Royal Phoenix. And McDonalds here don't have power points for laptops. Sorry my battery can't last this long for more. So, I will post again soon. Seeya!