03/10/10 – Stranger in a Strange Land

Hello again!
Yes, well this weekend, I have travelled further, geographically, socially and mentally than I have ever before. On a weekend.
Two days ago, Friday to be exact, I had the day off school which allowed for travel to Cosham, England, for a now-distant friend’s 18th birthday party. I was incredibly excited to see her, as I hadn’t for a long while. 
 After 3 hours on a train followed by a rushed exit from it, I found myself in what was Cosham. Unfortunately, my first impression was of a small village being hammered with rain, a lot like the French village in Saving Private Ryan. You know, the one where Vin Diesel dies.
 Anyway, we were picked up by the friend’s dad from a McDonald’s, which I later found out had employed someone who had masurbated ‘into’ a Big Mac, discovered after the customer complained about it “tasting funny” (to others’ disgust, but my amusement). We were taken to the girl’s house…which was MASSIVE. The living room made other living rooms look dead. That’s how big it was.
 Later that evening, the guests arrived. The local ones. It was with this that I was struggled with the abundance of a posh accent. I had never seen so many people be so articulate all at once. They were normal teenagers, yet didn’t sound like they were going to stab me. Given my Newport upbringing, this was odd.
 I was also struck by the awkwardness between we Welshies and the locals. Was it purely because we didn’t know them and hadn’t been introduced, or was it something more? Was it because we were welsh? Poorer? It remained ambiguous. 
 As it turned out, one of my fellow ‘Welshmen’ was born only down the road.
 This was it. I had to break the ice.
 I moved from the left couch, to sit in the space between the left couch and the right couch.
 It was a bold move.
 Thankfully, though, it paid off, and conversations started up. The people were as charming and delightful as they seemed.
 Well, most of them. One bloke my friend and I were trying to converse with was a right prick. We asked him the usual “What A-levels are you doing?” question. He replied “I’m in college, actually?”
 ”Oh…what course are you doing?”
 ”I.B.”
 We didn’t have a fucking clue what that was.
 ”What’s that?” we asked, given our knowledge.
 And he replied, in the most snarly, patronising manner “You don’t know what it is? ARE YOU SERIOUS?”
  It suddenly came to me. It stood for “Irritating Bellend”.

The following morning I woke up in a sleeping bag, on an airbed, next to an Englishman on a separate airbed, in a room where something started printing. It’s definitely time to leave when you fuck up the host family’s computer document plans.
 Arriving in Newport at 3 o clock on the saturday meant I was only hours away from the next birthday celebration. This time, the plan was not a house party, but rather an expedition into the heart of the molten lava pit that is Newport town centre. For dancing, alcohol, girls, and other things I’m not very good at.
 I arrived at the house at about 8 o clock; the idea was to arrive at the house for a sort of alcoholic briefing, before moving out. 
 This stage was delightful; I had made a real effort to look my best, and people were sober enough for their compliments to sound sincere. £45 on a blazer well spent.
 Especially well-spent, in fact, as I needed to look older; my mission was to pass myself off as my older brother. This sounds simple, as we have similar genetics. Unfortunately, my eyebrows are invisible whilst his could cover a savannah. These were two massive hinderences to my plan. Maybe I couldn’t spend the night spending my (welsh) friend’s birthday. Maybe I’d have to be turned away at the door like a twat.

Nope.
I GOT IN! I couldn’t believe it. It took every ounce of me to resist shouting “I’M NOT EVEN 18! WOOHOO!!!”, which surely would have given the game away.
 It was as I made my way through the crowd of barely-covered girls, and sex-predatory boys that I realised….this did indeed involve dancing. to music I hate. With people that largely I don’t know well enough to dance with or talk about music I don’t know with.
 Fuck.
 After trying to blend in, but only ending up looking like a waiter trying not to drop an invisible tray above his head (that’ll be the “put your hands in the air”), I ajourned to the tables, with no one for local company but a couple eating each other’s faces, in a style that I’m sure draws from Dawn of the dead.
 but then a friend came over and we chatted. This was nice.
 Eventually, the opportunity and time arrived for me to throw in the towel, and my Dad came to pick me up while the others moved on to another place named after the bloke who owns it.
 Don’t get me wrong, I had an absolute blast. It was just awkward. Like the contrast to putting Samuel L Jackson in Games Workshop.
 You never know though, maybe I’ll evolve and adapt. In 3 months, I may have flair, charm, and dancing ability.
…and some thicker eyebrows.

S.