A Hundred Years Ago

Or maybe just over a year but it seems longer, I was sitting at my computer in Korea when I received a phonecall that started the longest day of my life. My friend, Rory, was coming over for lunch but didn't realise that he would spend most of his time sitting on the floor, unable to find the words to say to me. Later that day, more people came over and helped me to clear my flat into boxes, backpacks, suitcases, rubbish bags and various homes around the city, all the time trying to offer comfort in a comfortless suitation.

The second phonecall arrived that evening as I stood in my half empty flat with Patrick and Heimi. My flight would be too late. The moment had passed and all I could do was go home and try to deal with the aftermath. The words of comfort stopped as there was nothing that could be said to make things better. No words would replace the feelings of loss.

As friends finished work they came to my house one by one for my unplanned last night in Korea. They looked to me to know what to do and strove to find a way to break the monotony of the tears.

Pub, I said, I want to go to the place I think of as my second home. The place I return to after a weekend out of Gangneung to feel like I have really made it back. I want to say goodbye to my friends and my memories, dammit.

So we went and sat in seats that we had never occupied before, the conversation swinging from normality to the end of the world and back.

A few tequilas and beers later, a guitar appeared in Rory's hand. I was going to play at your goodbye party so I am going to play for you now, he said and he played over my tears.

Two months later as I was preparing to go on my round the world trip I loaded some songs onto my MP3 player. Unfamiliar with the technology it took me a while. Did it work, my sister asked as I put the headphone into my ears. As the guitar started tears escaped once more, I guess so, I replied.

At first it was hard to hear the song and not be reminded of the loss. I would skip it or listen and revel in my pain, the hurt proving that at least I could feel. But I still listened, in the mountains of Vietnam, in the outback of Western Australia, on the beach in Fiji, on the metro deep beneath the streets of New York and my pain evolved.

Now I am back in London and listen to the song often. It is always the same song, written about a girl that I have never met by a boy that played for me the night that he didn't know what to say. When the song begins, I smile and hug my feelings close. As Rory starts to sing I remember the love in the room that night, the love that I felt for someone I had lost and the love I had for and received from my friends sitting next to me and sent across the world in emails and phonecalls.

I have loved, I do love and I am very much loved.

As I listen to Rory sing, I feel close to everyone in my life. A song about Rory's pain makes me appreciate my own.

I may not be with you guys every day, every year or even see you from one year to the next but I think of my friends often, those I still have and those that I have lost along the way, no less important though the link has been broken.

Who knew that you could get all that from a song? Certainly, as Rory sat down to write a song about the girl that broke his heart he wouldn't have known that it would be listened to by a girl in London with a heart spread across the world.

No Jacket Required

I love waking up in a new city. The day stretches out before me with little idea as it how it will unfold and what I will see in this unexplored place.

I arrived into Barcelona 'El Prat' airport- love a city that calls its airport 'The idiot' though I am willing to concede that perhaps it has a different meaning in Catalan- at around 10pm on Friday and caught the bus into the city. The trouble with travelling in Europe is that no one speaks English- I know that sounds daft but compare it to travelling in SE Asia where folk have to speak English to get some much needed cash off the gullible tourists. I was dropped off at Placa Catalunya- which meant nothing to me but turned out to be a hop, skip and a jump from the hostel.



As I was checking in, I got invited out for tapas by the receptionist and a group of American lads. When I thought about refusing I was told, 'you don't have any friends here'. Harsh but fair so off I went.

This was my first time in a tapas place so food was recommended for me. Which is why I ended up with duck foi gras and small bits of bread. I have to say that it was fantastic! And all that sharing bits of food off each other's plates really appeals to the Korean in me. A few mouthfuls of bread and meat, two beers and a walk later and I was at home. In the hostel that is. But I had made myself a nice little den by stringing up my sarong from the bunk above me. I crawled in and slept.

Saturday morning came ripe with possibilities. So I had a bit of a lie-in then headed to the hostel living room to seek out guide books and maps. The Lonely Planet cites Gaudi's La Sagrada Familia Cathedral as one of those places that you must see before you die. Good enough for me and off I went.

Building work started in 1882 and there is no finish date yet. It is a glorious confusion of towering spires- eight of a proposed twelve have been completed so far-and each end of the temple is decorated one with cubist figures from the Easter story and the other with nature inspired facades from the nativity story.



The queue to get in was pretty long but, given the structure in front of us, this was for the best really as it allowed more opportunity to admire.

I walked around and more photos than is healthy, sat outside and drank a coke while looking at it all.

But I only had two days in Barcelona so had to make the most of it.

I decided to do this by taking an open op tour bus- I know, spoon feed me the culture, but it seemed the best way to get around and see most of the city and perhaps learn something on the way. What I hadn't reckoned on was that this form of transport was even more popular than the sights it was taking us to. The queue was enormous and when I did make it onto a bus I only managed to get a seat downstairs. Ah well, the next stop wasn't far.



I alighted at Parc Guell- the park that houses Gaudi's home from 1926 until his death. Though he didn't design the house itself, he did a lot of work on the park. And it is wonderful, mosaic benches line a long viewing terrace which showcases two mad gingerbread style houses framing a view of the city. It is hard to tell from above that the city is laid out in a strict grid formation.



So far so good. But the queue to get back on the bus was even longer and four came and went before I got even close to the front of the crowd. When some guy tried to queue jump it was more than most tempers could cope with and he was manhandled back into the baying mob- where, I assume that he was torn into pieces as small as everyone's fraying nerves. I didn't see as I had managed to scamper up the stairs and was now the proud occupant of a seat.

And buggered if I was going to go through that again! I stayed put on the bus, admiring the view but refusing to get off until we reached Placa Catalunya again.

I got off there for a walk down La Rambla- the most beautiful street in the world according to James Joyc, according to our guide. And where else can you buy albino hedgehogs as pets? the trade in pet tortoises was outlawed about twenty years ago in the UK but apparantely was still alive and well in Barcelona. The sound of the cockerels crowing was so wonderful that I even wanted to take one home with me to wake up to every day.



After a ramble up La Rambla I got on a different tour bus to see the south of the city. Again I stayed on for the whole trip until we got to the Colombus monument- a structure which puts Nelson's column to shame for sheer pomp and glory. No mere four lions for this man- he has a whole pride and in different positions too.



And Colombus stands at the top pointing out to sea, his head covered in the obiligatory bird poo.

I had myself some dinner on La Rambla- one of the advantages of travelling alone is that you can eat what you want, when you want and where you want- perfect! One lovely pizza later and back to Placa Catalunya.

I crawled into bed later than night with images of fantastical buildings filling my oh-so-seldom used brain.

I woke up even later on Sunday- oh glorious day! Despite the weather reports on Yahoo forecasting 18 degrees for the whole weekend, the thermometers on the streets were showing 24... no more reason to head to the beach needed.



And off I went. Having spent some time in London trying to decide which jacket to take with me, it was a surprise to get to the beach and find it covered in bikinied bodies- some of which were bold enough to take their tops off- and on Easter Sunday too!



I had spotted the cable car the day before that linked the beach to Miramir on the hill above and thought that it looked like a good place to take photos. I wasn't wrong. However, I didn't manage to get up there straightaway. Oh no, first I had to sit on the beach and admire the weather and water. There was just one thing missing- a quick trip the local Spar later and I was back on the beach only this time with an ice cold beer in hand. Perfect!

I found the tower to the cable car only to discover that the lift was out of order so I had to go to the next terminal- back where I had started my walk.



Huff. And there was a queue, of course, which I joined for over an hour before I managed to get into the lift- pushing past all the couples shouting 'Una, UNA!' buggered if I was going to get left behind again.

The views from the top of the tower were worth the wait alone- the cable car ride was very short but long enough to get some good photos. I had lunch at Miramir overlooking the city before walking back down and doing some more shopping on La Rambla- you might have guessed that I quite like it there.

Then it was time to take my poor sunburnt face back to the hostel to pick up my stuff then off to the airport.

The plane was only slightly delayed by someone attempting to get on with an expired passport- a Canadian person, we were told- while I looked around to see if anyone else had forgotten to pack the suntan lotion, they were English people after all. But it appeared to be just me. Ah well.

We arrived back at Stansted just after 11pm and my lovely sister was waiting for me at the gate. Fantastic!

I had a wonderful weekend- just what the doctor ordered. Now I am just busy writing this between bouts of Easter egg eating and rushing to the mirror to see if my sunburn has calmed down to an acceptable level yet.

Happy Easter, All!

My Name is Helen Eames and..

... I am a holiday addict. It has been three weeks since my last weekend jaunt and it has been tough. Sometimes I wake up to find that I have been browsing the travel pages on Ceefax in my sleep. I once woke up half though booking a flight to Prague on the internet.

I have fought this terrible affliction with your help but it has been too hard. So, bog it, I am off to Barcelona in a couple of hours.

On my own, before you ask.

Just for two nights.

Back to work on Tuesday.

Adios!

Talking about the weather

I read a book recently ('Watching the English' by Kate Fox) that said English people talk about the weather in three particular ways. The first is as a test to see if further contact would be desirable:

person A 'nice day today'
person B 'yes it is'

And the ice has been broken and they will go on to have many happy children. Another time we employ the use of weather talk (as Ms Fox calls it) is as conversation opener- the equivalent of 'How are you?'.

The last main time we talk about the weather is everytime there is a lull in conversation. So that pretty much covers a lot of my time in the classroom.

Kate Fox does also point out that the weather in England is so variable that it is not by accident that we use this topic. And, crikey, it was spring one minute and then we have been plunged back in winter the last few days.

Unfortunately it was a spring day when I decided to take my students out for a two hour walk around Central London and a winter day when we actually went out of the classroom. Bless 'em, some of them even managed to smile for the camera

This term I have been cursed with a classroom with windows. Some people might prefer the natural light but I find the window too much of a distraction. No wonder really when you consider that this is the view from my room in the afternoon

It is all go! But noisy so I prefer to use the AC than have the window open. But this room, bless its little cotton ones, has the AC unit but no sign of the controls anywhere- and high staff turnover coupled with teachers moving between the three schools means that I have been unable to find anyone who worked in the room last year who can tell me how it is supposed to work.

As usual, it has been a busy week for me- too much time in the pub coupled with going over to Patrick and Heimi's for the weekend have left me little in the way of Helen-time. But I didn't work today- some of you will be vaguely aware that I left Korea a year ago tomorrow (12th April). I spend the morning getting back from my student's house where I appear to have retired after over indulging on the weekly one pint Monday event at the Walkabout on Charing Cross Road and the afternoon catching up on some much missed daytime telly.

Back to school tomorrow though only for a couple of days before the start of the long weekend. Which I am celebrating by bogging off to Barcelona on Friday night- something I planned way before I broke my glasses yesterday morning and shelled out £255 for replacements- and yes, that was the cheapest I could get them and I still have to wait more than two weeks for delivery. So no reading in bed for me for a while.

And if it feels like I am not updating often enough then consider that you would be equally disappointed by an endless list of pubs visited and pints drunk.