Day 6/5

Welcome to Day 6, England / Day 5, Bristol. Dad and I arrived last Saturday morning and spent our first hours in the UK renting a car and driving to Bury St. Edmunds (northeast of London) to spend two nights with my aunt and uncle. We managed to haul one of my 49.5lb suitcases (there were three) up to Aunty Rachel's third floor guest room, and then took a much-needed nap before meeting my grannie and godmother for dinner. Much fun of the reserved British type ensued until the second bottle of wine, and then much more fun began.

Sunday afternoon, after more heroic wrong-side-of-the-road, ah! a roundabout! driving by Dad, we arrived in Bristol (southwest England - I'm posting a map for the directionally-challenged). Since then, we've done lots of shopping (including an expedition to IKEA), moved me into my dorm-flat, got lost as little as possible, and sampled lots of Bristolian beer. I've met three of my four flatmates: Caryn from South Africa, Abby from China, and Mathew from India. All of us are curious about our fifth living companion; hopefully it's someone who knows how to pick the lock on the door in our flat that says "Roof Access." Honestly, that's just asking for trouble.

Tomorrow is international orientation day, Saturday is a trip to Cardiff (the capital of Wales) with Dad, Sunday is for laundry, Monday is course registration, and Tuesday is a field trip to Exmoor (southwest of Bristol, a big, windy, wet, moor with that is archaeologically important and has at least one pub). I'm looking forward to it all, of course, and to a visit from Molly next weekend. Fingers crossed I'll find a good nightclub by then. :)

UPDATE:
Have met final flatmate: Harris from Cyprus.
Our little family in flat 29 is now complete.