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.