Ever since we arrived in England, I have been super excited about going on a Host Visit! I finally got my assigned location a few weeks ago saying I was going to be with a family in Insch, Aberbdeen Scotland. It was a visit to see a woman and husband in their late 50’s for the weekend of November 21st. I started my long travel journey to Scotland at 7:20 Friday the 21st of November morning. I walked to the University of Birmingham’s train station to catch an 8:03 train to Edinburgh, Haymarket. Once there I found out that my train actually left from New Street Station! Ahh! Luckily there was a train leaving at 7:47 going through New Street Station that would get me there at 8:01. I jumped of the train and ran to my next train jumping on as the doors where closing….phew! Now I had 3 ½ hours till I’d arrive in Haymarket. I walked up and down the aisle to find that the only seat left was a seat with no window, facing the opposite direction we were heading….great! Now my motion sickness is going to kick in. Luckily to my advantage, no on sat by me giving me room to breathe and since it was so early I slept the ENTIRE time! Waking up to find that the next train stop was my stop…again…. PHEW! I glanced at my cell to see the time only to find that yet again I had less than three minutes to catch my next train to Aberdeenshire, although this time I was lucky because when I got off the train the platform I needed to be on was just across the way. PERFECT! After another 3 hour train ride I was in Aberdeenshire. This time I had 40 minutes to wait till my next train. The train to Insch was only 35 minutes and when we arrived to the station it was SNOWING! A LOT!
I was starting to get really excited by this point not only that I was finally done with trains for the day, but to meet the people I would be staying with! It was absolutely beautiful in Insch with the snow and hills everywhere. It looked like a cute little fairy tale snowy town! After about 5 minutes waiting in the snow, Bron showed up. Bron was the wife and her husband wasn’t there because he was working in South Africa, so it was just going to be and her. Which I didn’t think was a big deal. After stopping at the store to pick up a few groceries we headed off to her house in the country which was another 10 minutes out of town. It was snowing pretty heavily at this time and I was starting to get a bit nervous. Bron kept making short comments on ‘how unwise it was for me to come to Insch in November’ or ‘It’s a shame I’m here.’ Even before we arrived at her home I already felt unwelcome and not wanted. We got to her home and when we walked in her house a friend of hers was there fixing her internet connection so as I stood in the entry way with my things not knowing what to do, she continued to chit chat with her friend for a long while. Then she turned and was like “oops, I forgot. I’ll show you to your room.” Once in my little tiny room, I tried texting Ashley to not only inform her that I was here safe but also to tell her I wanted to LEAVE! But, I had zero reception. Great. I walked down stairs and sat at the kitchen table while she was on the phone and just watched to tube for a bit. She told me that there was internet if I needed it so I first emailed my director to inform him on my safe travels but also to let him know how I was feeling about being here. Once I was done online, Bron left. Um…okay? After about an hour the phone started ringing. I didn’t answer cause I don’t live here. It rang again. Again no answer. It rang again and this time Bron came in and said “it’s for you! You were supposed to answer it!” Well of course! What was I thinking? When you meet someone for the first time you always answer their home telephone. When I answered it was Katie seeing how I was and telling me that Greg, my program director, had contacted her. Once Bron returned from her studio where she was doing work, she made another phone call to a friend to talk about how mad she was that she had to cook and mess up her kitchen. Keep in mind I’m sitting at the kitchen table listening to everything that she is saying. I felt not only unwelcome even more at this point but I also felt that this woman who volunteered to have someone visit her home for a host visit was feeling obligated to cook for me…..um….Finally she got off the phone and started cooking. Dinner was probably the most delicious meal I’ve ever had! I yummy chicken stew, different cheeses on crackers, and a glass of really nice red Scottish wine. Dinner conversation was okay, but we mainly watched “X Factor “on the tube. After dinner we went into the living room to watch a film that I offered as an option to do and she couldn’t figure out how to use it.
After she grumbled about not getting the TV to work I just was just like “Don’t worry about it, I’m kind of tired so I’ll just go to bed. What time would you like me to be ready in the morning?” she responded “9. Then we can see if there is anything we can do.” Alrightythan. The next morning I was down in the kitchen a little after 9 to find a yummy full English breakfast almost ready! YAY! She looked at me and said “if you don’t leave today, you’ll get snowed in.” Oh um, okay that’s fine with me. She did make me a lunch to take with me on the train which was nice but then we took a few pictures around her house in about 3 minutes, jumped in the car and took off into town so I could catch a train to Aberdeenshire. The trains were going pretty well cause I’d have about 10 minutes between each train to get to my next one. But, knock on wood, with my luck something happened when we were pulling into the station at Oxenholm. A woman jumped in front of the train I was on as we were pulling into the station. We all had to stay in our seats for little less than an hour while the police were asking questions and the ambulance where doing their thing. This was not fun. Then they finally had everyone get off the train and move to another. By the time I got to Manchester I missed my train to Birmingham and had to wait an hour till another train would come by. Once I was in Birmingham, Katie met me at the Station and my British roommate Emily picked me up so I didn’t have to take a taxi or bus home. Phew, I’m home. That experience is over. Never again.
If you ever want to take a trip to Insch, Aberdeenshire. Don’t
Cheers!
Kirsten
Monday 24 November 2008
Sunday 16 November 2008
England vs. Australia
So I got a job working for a catering company in Birmingham called MJ Personnel. I got the job a month or so ago and I haven’t been called for a job yet till Wednesday afternoon. They called to see if I’ll be able to work on Saturday in London at the England vs. Australia Rugby Match and of course I said “YES!” They called the next day to see if I would be willing to work behind the bar, I said I’m a fast learner and that should be fine. So on Saturday morning I arrived at the office along with 7 other American’s who work for MJ at 6am. When I signed in, the lady behind the desk asked me again if I’m comfortable behind the bar and again I told her I don’t have much experience but could learn fast. She told me to wait a bit by the corner. A few minutes later a call came in and the other person in charge whispered to the lady behind the desk something along the line of ‘he isn’t coming’ and she quickly looked up and turned to me and said “Try on those black suit jackets over there.” I obediently did and was sent to get on the coach.
Once in London, the manager started called out names for the people who needed to get to their positions immediately, I was one of those people. I get off the bus and counted out only 5 of the 40 MJ people who came to London. I started getting a bit nervous. A lady met us as we got off the coach and started assigning locations. She pointed to me and said “Retail Bar” and I quickly responded “Um, yeah I’m American and I’m not so good with English currency yet?” She then switched me to box seats. Phew! Then a woman came up and grabbed my arm to lead me to where I needed to be. After a long walk to get to the new part of the stadium, we took an elevator up to the 4th floor. She led me into a very posh looking room and when I entered there were a lot of people standing around in black shirts, ties and the same apron. As I walked through the room past what I assumed where the servers, I noticed 4 people dressed in the same attire standing patiently behind the bar. I was then introduced to two women who were the managers of that particular room. As I approached they started talking about how happy they are to see me and how much success they have had with MJ Bar Supervisors…..yup I was going to be a Bar Supervisor.AHH!!! They kept telling me things such as the plan for the day, the drinks they wanted ready for when the guests arrived, blah blah blah I couldn’t really hear them because inside I was freaking out. After they were finished I told them in the most professional way I could about how I was more or less a ‘supervisor in training’ and that I’ve ‘never’ worked in a bar such as this, and how if they preferred I could ring up my manager to get someone else more experienced. The two women just stood there for a bit and then the main woman in charged looked at the other woman, then to me and said “You know what, you can’t learn anything till you try it. I trust you and I know from meeting you that you’ll do just fine.” That was it. I put on my big girl shoes and went to work. I was introduced to the 4 bar staff who reported directly to me and they were very nice. One is actually a study abroad student as well, he is from Georgia Tech. I’m a pretty fast learner and I’m a pretty good actress so I played it as if I knew exactly what I was doing.
First off, Sheena who was the main woman in charge wanted me to get 8 trays ready with orange juice, water, champagne and buck’s fizzes. I only knew what a buck’s fizz was because I remember one of my British roommates talking about them and I was like “What’s that” and they were like champagne and orange juice. In America, I believe we usually call them Mimosa’s. So right off the bat I was doing well. We were getting the noon drinks ready and everything was under control. Throughout the day the drink orders were pretty self explanatory. The main orders were beers which were easy enough, although there were a pretty big handful of others as well. When first person who ordered a gin n’ tonic, they asked for a larger, so I thought to myself it must be two shots if it’s a large and for some reason I said “Ice and a slice?” I think I heard that from a movie once and they were like “Please.” Okay, at this point I was like Wow, I’m doing pretty good for never ever doing this in my life. The other drinks ordered simple things like vodka cokes, brandy, wines, whiskeys, port, a few becks shanties and some Red Velvets. I only knew the last two cause I watched one of the people working behind the bar mix one for a guest prior to my order if it. Again, phew. After all the guests were finished and left to watch the game we cleaned up and sat down to eat ourselves. Although since it took so long to clean, I only had a few bites of my steak till I had to get up again for the half period drinks. After that I had to get the pre-order drink trays ready for after the game.
So throughout my ten hour shift I had a few bites of food, a sip of coffee and no bathroom breaks. When the game was over and everyone was enjoying their pre-ordered drinks, the host of the event, some big wig rugby player who I don’t know the name of started bringing up speakers. Three famous alum rugby players, again I don’t know the names and the two captions of the England Rugby team, England lost so the mood wasn’t that great. Just as the host was about to close the event, guess who walks in? Steve Williams, Beijing gold medalist in rowing and Victoria Pendleton gold medalist in Track Cycling! It was really cool! Steve Williams walks up to the bar and orders a coke. I handed him the coke, brushed is fingers and was two inches from a REAL OLYMPIC GOLD MEDAL! So yeah, after all 80 guests left Sheena handed me three sheets of inventory in which I needed to count every bottle, can, and all my supplies. I also had long list of chores like cleaning the bar and fridges before I could leave and let my bar staff leave. So after about an hour or so we were done. All the servers checked out with Sheena and I was the last to leave. She handed me my tips of the night, 20 pounds, which is really good because people don’t tip here and it wasn’t a cash bar. Then she shook my hand and told me what a wonderful job I did and how should couldn’t tell for a minute that I was ‘still in training.’ So I took that as though I did a pretty darn good job. As I walked back to the coach, a few people who I worked with caught up with me and asked a little about me, I found out that I was the youngest person in the room yet the third in command. Hehehe. I was 19 and I was working with mostly 22-26 year olds.
So in conclusion, I had a wonderful experience in London as a Bar Supervisor and I still can’t believe I pulled it off. It was a great learning experience and I’m happy I took the job. Oops, it’s 1 am!
Cheers
Kirsten
Once in London, the manager started called out names for the people who needed to get to their positions immediately, I was one of those people. I get off the bus and counted out only 5 of the 40 MJ people who came to London. I started getting a bit nervous. A lady met us as we got off the coach and started assigning locations. She pointed to me and said “Retail Bar” and I quickly responded “Um, yeah I’m American and I’m not so good with English currency yet?” She then switched me to box seats. Phew! Then a woman came up and grabbed my arm to lead me to where I needed to be. After a long walk to get to the new part of the stadium, we took an elevator up to the 4th floor. She led me into a very posh looking room and when I entered there were a lot of people standing around in black shirts, ties and the same apron. As I walked through the room past what I assumed where the servers, I noticed 4 people dressed in the same attire standing patiently behind the bar. I was then introduced to two women who were the managers of that particular room. As I approached they started talking about how happy they are to see me and how much success they have had with MJ Bar Supervisors…..yup I was going to be a Bar Supervisor.AHH!!! They kept telling me things such as the plan for the day, the drinks they wanted ready for when the guests arrived, blah blah blah I couldn’t really hear them because inside I was freaking out. After they were finished I told them in the most professional way I could about how I was more or less a ‘supervisor in training’ and that I’ve ‘never’ worked in a bar such as this, and how if they preferred I could ring up my manager to get someone else more experienced. The two women just stood there for a bit and then the main woman in charged looked at the other woman, then to me and said “You know what, you can’t learn anything till you try it. I trust you and I know from meeting you that you’ll do just fine.” That was it. I put on my big girl shoes and went to work. I was introduced to the 4 bar staff who reported directly to me and they were very nice. One is actually a study abroad student as well, he is from Georgia Tech. I’m a pretty fast learner and I’m a pretty good actress so I played it as if I knew exactly what I was doing.
First off, Sheena who was the main woman in charge wanted me to get 8 trays ready with orange juice, water, champagne and buck’s fizzes. I only knew what a buck’s fizz was because I remember one of my British roommates talking about them and I was like “What’s that” and they were like champagne and orange juice. In America, I believe we usually call them Mimosa’s. So right off the bat I was doing well. We were getting the noon drinks ready and everything was under control. Throughout the day the drink orders were pretty self explanatory. The main orders were beers which were easy enough, although there were a pretty big handful of others as well. When first person who ordered a gin n’ tonic, they asked for a larger, so I thought to myself it must be two shots if it’s a large and for some reason I said “Ice and a slice?” I think I heard that from a movie once and they were like “Please.” Okay, at this point I was like Wow, I’m doing pretty good for never ever doing this in my life. The other drinks ordered simple things like vodka cokes, brandy, wines, whiskeys, port, a few becks shanties and some Red Velvets. I only knew the last two cause I watched one of the people working behind the bar mix one for a guest prior to my order if it. Again, phew. After all the guests were finished and left to watch the game we cleaned up and sat down to eat ourselves. Although since it took so long to clean, I only had a few bites of my steak till I had to get up again for the half period drinks. After that I had to get the pre-order drink trays ready for after the game.
So throughout my ten hour shift I had a few bites of food, a sip of coffee and no bathroom breaks. When the game was over and everyone was enjoying their pre-ordered drinks, the host of the event, some big wig rugby player who I don’t know the name of started bringing up speakers. Three famous alum rugby players, again I don’t know the names and the two captions of the England Rugby team, England lost so the mood wasn’t that great. Just as the host was about to close the event, guess who walks in? Steve Williams, Beijing gold medalist in rowing and Victoria Pendleton gold medalist in Track Cycling! It was really cool! Steve Williams walks up to the bar and orders a coke. I handed him the coke, brushed is fingers and was two inches from a REAL OLYMPIC GOLD MEDAL! So yeah, after all 80 guests left Sheena handed me three sheets of inventory in which I needed to count every bottle, can, and all my supplies. I also had long list of chores like cleaning the bar and fridges before I could leave and let my bar staff leave. So after about an hour or so we were done. All the servers checked out with Sheena and I was the last to leave. She handed me my tips of the night, 20 pounds, which is really good because people don’t tip here and it wasn’t a cash bar. Then she shook my hand and told me what a wonderful job I did and how should couldn’t tell for a minute that I was ‘still in training.’ So I took that as though I did a pretty darn good job. As I walked back to the coach, a few people who I worked with caught up with me and asked a little about me, I found out that I was the youngest person in the room yet the third in command. Hehehe. I was 19 and I was working with mostly 22-26 year olds.
So in conclusion, I had a wonderful experience in London as a Bar Supervisor and I still can’t believe I pulled it off. It was a great learning experience and I’m happy I took the job. Oops, it’s 1 am!
Cheers
Kirsten
Edinburgh, Scotland
I had an amazing time in Edinburgh! I absolutely loved Scotland! It started at 7:45 am Friday morning. We had a 7 hour coach ride ahead of us and I wasn’t too happy….but, I took some motion sickness medicine and slept the majority of the time. We stopped three hours into our journey in a little town called Carslile. We had a little more than an hour so a group of us decided to eat lunch at this little Italian restaurant. Our food took forever and by the time we got it, we had ten minutes to eat it and still get back to the bus which was somewhat of a hike away. Of course, my food came last of all and it was boiling in the bowl when I got it…yay. I ate it as fast as I could and believe me; I have no taste buds left!
We still had another four hours till we got to Edinburgh, but since there was a lot of traffic when we entered the city, it took longer. Therefore, we had less time to get ready for a Posh Dinner at the Edinburgh University with UMD’s chancellor who made the journey over here to see how everything was going. The posh dinner was a lot of fun and in this really cool building that looked almost like a Castle on the outside.
The next day we toured the Scottish Parliament. It was a newly constructed building and it was beautiful. After the tour, a small group of us took a coach ride to visit Roslyn Chapel. Roslyn Chapel was absolutely phenomenal! After Roslyn Chapel we went back to our 5 star Youth Hostel. After a yummy dinner at a local Chinese restaurant, the majority of our group made our journey across part of Edinburgh for a ghost tour of ‘the most haunted’ place in Great Britain according to the BBC. It was a very freaky tour of the vaults and a cemetery. It wasn’t necessarily people jumping out to scare you but the history of the rooms that we were in was very unsettling. The next morning I woke up bright and early go to with a small group on a walking tour of Edinburgh with Amy, our assistant director of the program. The tour was pretty cool, we saw the National Gallery, some chapels, the castle, and oh yeah how can I forget, we got a cup of coffee at ‘the elephant house’ where J.K. Rowling wrote Harry Potter!!!
After the walking tour I went off on my own to do some shopping till the time came for me to meet up with Katie and Ashley. I wondered a bit from store to store just enjoying some me time in Scotland. During the walking tour I noticed a beautiful pink wool coat in a store window and as I was on my own, I came across it again. So since I had the time, I wandered in the store, tried it on….and bought it. Yup, I have a bright pink, knee length wool winter coat from Scotland.
The next morning we got up early to make our way back to Birmingham. Three hours into our trip we stopped in the small town of Lancaster. So we had a little more than an hour to eat, we decided we didn’t want to scarf down hot food like last time so we went to the nearest little café by the bus to get a quick bite. Well…there were four of us, three of us ordered cheese burgers n’ chips and one ordered fish n’chips. All of us ordered a glass of tap water. After the waiter took our order, he put his coat on and walked out the door. A few minutes later he came back with a pack of classes, removed the card board and filled them up with water and served it us. Then we saw the cook come out of the kitchen, leave, and run across the street to the grocery store. When she came back she had a box of frozen burgers and breaded fish. Mmm….that’s a bit odd… Then the waiter left again and came back with a back of hamburger buns. Our food came a few minutes later and was horrible. That was my experience in Lancaster and I don’t think I’ll ever go back. Yikes!
Cheers!
Kirsten
We still had another four hours till we got to Edinburgh, but since there was a lot of traffic when we entered the city, it took longer. Therefore, we had less time to get ready for a Posh Dinner at the Edinburgh University with UMD’s chancellor who made the journey over here to see how everything was going. The posh dinner was a lot of fun and in this really cool building that looked almost like a Castle on the outside.
The next day we toured the Scottish Parliament. It was a newly constructed building and it was beautiful. After the tour, a small group of us took a coach ride to visit Roslyn Chapel. Roslyn Chapel was absolutely phenomenal! After Roslyn Chapel we went back to our 5 star Youth Hostel. After a yummy dinner at a local Chinese restaurant, the majority of our group made our journey across part of Edinburgh for a ghost tour of ‘the most haunted’ place in Great Britain according to the BBC. It was a very freaky tour of the vaults and a cemetery. It wasn’t necessarily people jumping out to scare you but the history of the rooms that we were in was very unsettling. The next morning I woke up bright and early go to with a small group on a walking tour of Edinburgh with Amy, our assistant director of the program. The tour was pretty cool, we saw the National Gallery, some chapels, the castle, and oh yeah how can I forget, we got a cup of coffee at ‘the elephant house’ where J.K. Rowling wrote Harry Potter!!!
After the walking tour I went off on my own to do some shopping till the time came for me to meet up with Katie and Ashley. I wondered a bit from store to store just enjoying some me time in Scotland. During the walking tour I noticed a beautiful pink wool coat in a store window and as I was on my own, I came across it again. So since I had the time, I wandered in the store, tried it on….and bought it. Yup, I have a bright pink, knee length wool winter coat from Scotland.
The next morning we got up early to make our way back to Birmingham. Three hours into our trip we stopped in the small town of Lancaster. So we had a little more than an hour to eat, we decided we didn’t want to scarf down hot food like last time so we went to the nearest little café by the bus to get a quick bite. Well…there were four of us, three of us ordered cheese burgers n’ chips and one ordered fish n’chips. All of us ordered a glass of tap water. After the waiter took our order, he put his coat on and walked out the door. A few minutes later he came back with a pack of classes, removed the card board and filled them up with water and served it us. Then we saw the cook come out of the kitchen, leave, and run across the street to the grocery store. When she came back she had a box of frozen burgers and breaded fish. Mmm….that’s a bit odd… Then the waiter left again and came back with a back of hamburger buns. Our food came a few minutes later and was horrible. That was my experience in Lancaster and I don’t think I’ll ever go back. Yikes!
Cheers!
Kirsten
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