A Few Notes on Being Home

People keep asking me what it is like to be home. They ask me this everytime I come home. And the answer changes each time. Of course, it is an emotional time. There have been a lot of changes this year.

England also changes and confuses me. Last time I was home, just before this last trip, I discovered this new chip and pin thing- you know it as EFTPOS in Australia. So you hand over your card and type in your PIN, or you put your card in the machine and type your PIN or you hand over your card and are given a receipt to sign.

Now you see the confusion. So many ways to do the same thing and I never know which one I am meant to do. Then my sister tells me that I can no longer buy a ticket on a bus in Central London as I get on the bus, I have to purchase one before. The old open backed Routemaster buses have been decommissioned and put back into service while I have been away. The Guardian newspaper has changed size and shape.

Also, while I am 'at home' in England, I don't actually have a home here anymore. I am staying with my very generous, long suffering sister, on an airbed in the living room. That is hardly the same as being back in your own bed and actually able to unpack your bag once and for all. And I don't feel like I have just the one home anymore- I get homesick for Australia, Ireland, Korea and England at various times. Even though I am back in the UK I sometimes get homesick for the England that I used to live in seven years ago before I started this transient life.

I left England on 18th November 1998 and last night I met up with the people that I left with back then, Amanda and Des. While it feels that my friends have got on with life (got married, bought houses, had kids, got a career etc) my life feels a bit like it hasn't changed that much. While they now talk of trips to Ikea, I am still talking about drinking and clubbing. It can make me feel like I have failed to grow up.

But in a good way! I love my life, as I am fond of telling people. I have very proud of what I have achieved over the last seven years- all the places I have been to, the people that I have met and the ways in which I have changed. I have to admit though that arriving back in England has made me miss Korea even more- rather, the people in it. Even if I met up with all of my mates here in London every week, I won't have a social life as healthy (or unhealthy) as I had in Korea.

I have spent the last couple of days wandering round London, between job interviews, and of course taking photos. I love being a tourist in London- all those famous places that I used to take a bit for granted when I lived here and things which didn't exist back then, like the London Eye.

This is the skyline, looking back the City of London from the Golden Jubilee pedestrian bridge that runs along the side of Hungerford Bridge out of Charing Cross. There was a gorgeous sunset that night

This is the Golden Jubilee Bridge itself- this is also a newcomer since I left London

The National Gallery lives alongside Trafalgar Square, it used to be across the road but the road has been rebuilt into a pedestrian area which has opened up the Square in a fantastic way

The really quite famous Big Ben and Houses of Parliament

And the London Eye, now one of the biggest attractions in the city.

Right, I am just waffling on now for lack of anything really interesting to write. So I will go and fill in an application form or two.