The Scarlet To-Do List

My, oh, my! So many things to do. It’s only May, but England is on the mind.

I’m a to-do list kind of gal. I don’t know if that’s a good thing. And it’s probably what feeds into my journal fetish (I have 14 blank journals that I’ve collected simply because I thought “these would be pretty to write lists in”). It’s a great wonder I remember to shower and use the loo (or toi-re as the Japanese call it) every day. It’s not on the list.

Well, my current to do list is really, really long. Here’s a little teaser:

-Sell my car (that I bought only 6 months ago)
-Find an apartment (which is really difficult when the estate agents refuse to email you back)
-Wait for BSU to send me approval for applying for a Visa application
-Buy plane ticket and book hotel
-Pack significantly less for England than I did for Japan
-Figure out my classes
-Pay off my tuition (so I can get a measly 575 GBP off the total)
-Get my entire life’s saving transferred over to GBP (which is going to be like kicking me in my metaphorical balls. Exchange 1,000 bucks to Yen, you get 100,000 yen. Exchange 1,000 bucks to GBP and you get 642 GBP >:(  #$*(&%#!!)

-Soak up enough sun to last me a year in cloudy England.
-Worry, worry, then worry some more.

I’m at the point where it’s too early to be doing any of these things (besides worry and tan), but getting close enough where I have to have it all lined up and ready to be checked off the list.

But, holy bangers and mash, Batman! I’m getting excited! Is it weird that I’m more nervous about moving to England than I was Japan? I don’t plan on working during my year at school and maybe that’s part of the reason. I do feel sufficiently prepared to live abroad again, though! I’d say Japan was the perfect preface to it. If I could survive in a country where I didn’t speak the language, couldn’t read for squat, and stuck out like a turd in the pool, surely England will be easy as pie? -cake? -crumpets? Right…?

If nothing else, the thought of British accents, rugby bodies, and fish n’ chips keeps me rarin’ to go! And the fact that I’ll get to spend an entire year devoted solely to writing and enjoying life. It’s a dream come true.

Here’s some of what I’ll miss about Florida (note, none of these pictures have been edited, just Florida beaches in all their glory):

A Yankee by any other name would still smell as... American?

As any American knows, Yankee is, typically, a term used to describe someone from New England. Apparently, in actual, old England, the term Yankee is used to describe anyone from the US. Imagine my confusion when I, as a barely Southern girl from Florida, found out I might be addressed as such! Blasphemy!
How ever will I rectify my self-identity?

Pish posh. I may not be from New England and the rebel flag toting Southerners might spit on my flip-flops if I introduced myself as such (Any Red Sox fans might do the same), but maybe across the pond I’ll be able to come to terms with the nickname.

Maybe it’s much more likely that I’ll be called “poppet” (dear gods of pet names, I hope so) or “love” when I move to Wiltshire County. Or maybe the moment my feet touch UK soil, someone will point and shout from across the airport “Hey, Yankee! Take your torch and stick it up your jacksy and take your load of old codswallop elsewhere, on yer bike now, ta ra!” I’ll admit that I just googled “sentences in British slang” and that came up. I am aware that the chances of encountering the aforementioned airport yeller are slim… Bummer…

Anyway, I’ll be making my transition to Yankee in September, when I move to England to attend Bath Spa University in Bath, England. And being the silly, endearingly-oblivious Americans that we are, whenever I try to explain this to someone I am met with a response something along the lines of “are you going to school for spa therapy?” or “are you going to build baths and/or spas?” To which, after the 10th time, I come back with, “For the love of-NO… No, I’m not, but that was a very educated guess.”

I go on to clarify, explaining that the university is named after the town which was named after the famous Roman baths that made it a famous spa town way back in the Georgian era. I wikipedia’ed it. The best weapon to arm yourself with is, of course, legitimate information procured from a website that isn’t supported by institutes of higher education.

Then I go on to say that I’m getting my master’s degree in Creative Writing. Oh man, if I could get a picture of the looks I get in response to that.Stick that in my scrapbook and suck it.

Anyway, back to being a yankee. Last October I returned from beautiful Japan, where I'd been living since 2011. There, I was known as a “gaijin” (foreigner) and had no hopes of fitting in even if I committed myself to living there for the rest of my life (and married a Japanese man and had the inevitably gorgeous children that come from any mix with the Japanese). Maybe in England it’ll be different. At least I can pass for a Brit (as long as I keep my mouth shut), whereas in Japan my looks… stood out. Like a donkey amongst a herd of full-bred Arabian horses.
So I have great expectations for the adventure that I’ll be embarking on come September. To a place where they speak some semblance of my language (unless I travel up to Scotland apparently) and have waist sizes other than 00, 0, or 1. And where I hopefully won’t turn down a guy because I thought he was 12 when he was actually 32… Darn those glorious Asian genes…