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I woke up at 06:30 after sleeping 12 hours. All day I watched Netflix and talked to family over Skype. In the mid-afternoon I finally got my phone all set up so that it would only cost me about 3 cents per minute to call home. If you want my number pm me on facebook. I stayed in my room almost all day not leaving until I was invited for cookies with my flatmates.

When I went downstairs for cookies, I met the rest of my flatmates. In total there is two girls from Canada, two guys from England, a girl from Lithuania, and lastly me the American. We sat around talking and, eating the amazing M&M cookies until around midnight when everyone decided it was getting late as we had to get up early for our first day of induction at the uni the next morning.

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After arriving at Clanny house, I waited in line to receive my key. After getting my key and other arrival goodies, I was led to my room. My room is what they consider to be a large room which is about a 15’x15′. In the room there is a bed, wardrobe, sink, desk and, a dresser. One thing to note about the UK faucets is that there are two separate spouts. One provides cold water while, the other provides hot. They are also on opposite sides of the sink so there is no way to mix the water. Next I made my bed, charged my phone for a short time then left to do some shopping as towels are not provided.

Navigating a new town is difficult. In Sunderland as students we receive free access to the 700 and the 701 bus routes. The maps that the uni and the bus company provide however do not include the actual names of the stops that the bus makes. After riding 45 minutes on the bus while trying to figure out where I was, I disembarked near the city centre. In the city centre, there is a large shopping center not unlike a mall called the Bridges. My first stop in the Bridges was at Carphone Warehouse for a prepaid SIM card. I had planned on getting the iD plan that they provide themselves however, they were out of stock of their own SIM cards. I decided not to get a SIM card immediately because, the other plans cost so much more. I left Carphone Warehouse in search of someplace that sold towels. After walking for a while, I found a department store called Primark. I went inside and bought the first towel I found which was navy blue and not badly priced. My next stop was the Post Office. I asked in Primark for the directions to the Post Office and, surprisingly nobody knew where it was located. I wandered around for a while after this trying to find the Post Office myself. I got terribly lost and it began to pour rain. I began to give up hope and walked back toward the bus station. Then I decided I did not want to give up. I walked past the bus stop and went into the Sunderland Winter gardens and asked the person at the front counter where the post office was. I think she must have thought that I was blind since it was straight across the street and down a block from the gardens. I went in, waited about 15 minutes then, left with my Biometric Residence Pass (BRP). I then went back to the bus station waited 15 minutes since I had just barely missed my bus and, went back to my flat (It was easy to get to on the return). I then planned on watching Netflix for a while before I went to bed.

Shortly after beginning to watch Netflix, I heard a knock at my door. It was my first flatmate that I met. She was from Canada and asked if I would like to go grocery shopping at the local Aldi (Pronounced Al-Dee not All-Dee by everyone else in the world). I said sure and made the walk to Aldi with her. At Aldi, I purchased almost everything  that I would need for making tortilla pizzas, spaghetti and, ham sandwiches. I had planned on making dinner after I returned to my flat however, all I did was put my food away. I then went up to my room, put my pajamas on and, went to bed. I fell asleep as soon as my head hit my pillow around 18:30 because, I had been up for over 30 hours straight at that point.

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We left Topeka around 08:00 on Friday morning for my departure flight to Dallas at 12:44. After we arrived we found out that my first flight would be delayed long enough that I could not possibly make my connection to London. This was easily remedied by a quick stop at the airline desk where they issued me two new tickets, the first to Chicago and then from Chicago to London. The second flight to London was still scheduled to arrive in time for me to make my connection to Newcastle.

Since my flight would now leave at 14:15 instead of 12:44, we went to McDonalds for my final meal in the United States. We returned to the airport around 13:30 and I said my goodbyes to my family before going through security.  Surprisingly this was really easy even with all of the electronics I brought with me onto the plane. About 30 minutes later I boarded the plane and found that I had a lot of leg room (my new ticket was issued for economy plus). We took of slightly early and were not in the air for very long at all.The flight was so short that literally as soon as the guy next to me pulled out his laptop he had to put it away.

When I departed the plane, I had no idea where I was at the airport and had to ask the counter what terminal I was in. I was glad to find out that the gate I arrived from were on the same hallway in the terminal although, the hall was probably half a mile long. When I arrived at the gate, I still had about an hour to spare. While waiting, I noticed a guy getting on the plane that had a parachute as carry on (I didn’t anyone would actually take a parachute on a plane).

I finally boarded and we took off a few minutes after we were scheduled to. Seated across the isle from me was someone with a dog that was really well behaved throughout the flight. About an hour and a half into the flight we were served dinner. The two choices for the main entree were chicken and rice or cheesy noodles. I went with the chicken and rice. Included with the meal was salad with a vinaigrette, a sealed roll, Swiss cheese and crackers and, a brownie that tasted like Play-Dough.  It was not good at all but, what could I expect considering it was airplane food (The salad was good though). The next four hours were awful. You would expect being a seven hour long international flight you would get more legroom than you would have on a short domestic flight; at least I did. In real life it seems that the airlines must play a game called “How Many People Can Fit in a Clown Plane”. This was by far the worst part of the journey to get here. I tried sleeping but, could not. I ended up watching Mad Max: Fury Road a few hours before we were scheduled to land. Around 05:00UTC or 23:00CST, we were served breakfast which, consisted of yogurt with granola and dried cranberries. About an hour and a half later we landed in London.

When I got off the plane in London, I had to take a bus to Terminal 5 from where I landed in Terminal 3. It was no joke over a mile of walking to get from the plane to the bus. When I arrived in terminal 5 I followed the signs to where connecting flights disembark from. After waiting 10 minutes in the line I was told that since it was my first time in the UK I would have to go through Customs. I walked back the other way toward the line that I was really happy that I did not have to go through (The immigration line for connecting flights was much shorter). When I got to this very very long line they opened a line dedicated just for first time students (There was a lot of us, 7 at least that were on my flight coming to the University of Sunderland). This line was short and after 15 minutes I had my passport stamped. Now is when it got fun. Because we had to go through customs, there was no way to go through the terminal to get onto my connection. To reach my connection, I had to walk clear to the airport exit, take a lift back up onto the departure level, go through security again then, finally walk to wherever my flight was departing from. I was worried about time as I completed these tasks as I only had an hour to get to my flight from customs. From gate to gate, the time taken was about 2 hours.

We began boarding about 15 minutes before our departure time and took of 30 minutes after our scheduled departure time. This was the quickest flight of all. About 15 minutes into the flight drinks were served. The drinks served were not what you get on an American flight though. On this flight the drinks were juice, water, Hot Tea, and Hot coffee. Instead of pretzels on this flight we were given bacon or ham sandwiches which was good since I had not eaten since breakfast on the first flight. Before departing this flight, I met a girl from Colorado who was also going to UoS. After landing I retrieved my bag from the baggage claim which was surprisingly there considering that I had changed my first two flights after checking my baggage. Just pass the exit doors from the claim area the uni was waiting for the students that were arriving.

The representatives from the school took us to where we waited for the rest of the international students to arrive. After dropping my stuff off, I wandered the airport looking for a cold bottle of water. This was easier said than done as the market type stores all had warm bottled water. Starbucks was there for me though with their overly priced (still cheaper than the other places) cold bottled water. This water cost me 2 whole pounds or $3.09 at the time. After getting my water we went to the bus which seemed like a charter bus. I almost forgot to mention it was raining in both London and Newcastle. The bus departed and, the entire trip I kept thinking we were on the wrong side of the road. 45 minutes later we arrived at Clanny House, my home for the next year.

 

Tips

  • If you can afford it fly business internationally. You get real blankets, better pillows, seats that lay flat and, Bose headphones for the in flight entertainment.
  • Make sure that you have a long enough lay over. 2 hours was plenty in London even though I was worried about time. If you’re connecting in Heathrow to another UK town, you have to have enough time to go through customs or immigration.
  • Pack at least 2 sets of clothes in your carry on just in case your checked baggage does not arrive on time.
  • Take some Benadryl or an alternative as it is really hard to sleep with all of the noise, light and, the small space on the long flights.
  • Bring a Towel if you’re studying here. They’re not provided.
  • Optional: Bring sheets and a pillow. The provided sheets are ok but, not the best. In my opinion the pillow is really soft so if you want more support bring your own. The provided sheets and pillow are decent enough though and, if you don’t have the space in your baggage allowance I wouldn’t worry about it.