I bunked with someone and she made me breakfast. She also insisted I take a picture of breakfast.
Clotted cream! I had this with homemade scones and strawberry/banana preserve.
Clotted cream is really unique. AFAIK, you can't find it outside of England. I have a recipe to make it, but it's really troublesome. At someone puts it, it's the joy of eating someone that should be liquid but isn't. The closest thing I've ever tasted is whipped butter at the Ritz Carlton, but clotted cream is smooth and rich while still being light (a contradiction, I know, but that's the magic of the stuff) and not having the distinctive taste of butter.
someone then asked me to chop down a tree for her, her previous attempts to dissuade me from coming because "it's not worth it" notwithstanding. I knew that there was a catch somewhere. What I didn't know was just how big the catch was - I was expected to chop the trunk of a tree in half using no more than spades, shovels, rakes and a pair of pliers! I refused to even try - I didn't have a parang, let alone a chainsaw or even an axe.
After some assorted gardening, someone gave me a partial tour. In the States, many of the universities have Oxbridge envy and so their campuses look like cleaner, newer versions of Oxford and Cambridge. You can't beat the real thing, though!
Newnham college
People punting along the river at the back of King's College
Photography is banned in the King's College chapel but they sell postcards. Bah. I can't remember if they proffer the excuse about respecting the place of worship, which many such joints do, which would make them humbugs.
King's College
St Benet's Parish Church, the oldest structure in Cambridge (Saxon tower)
Malaysian Mannikins in Mark's and Spencer! I make an exception for this since it's football season. Akan Datang for the definitive answer to the Malaysian Mannikin question.
someone had to run off to do other things, so I was left sitting in front of St Mary's eating strawberries. someone had assured me that these were very good, but we have different standards of sweetness so even strawberries she raves about as being extremely sweet would likely only be alright to me. As you can tell, I'm not a strawberry person. I'm lucky I didn't pay a bomb for a box of Hollandse Aardbei.
While I was sitting in front of St Mary's, who should come along but Lisheng? We had lunch together (I was still full from breakfast so I just had a bowl of soup) and he continued my tour. Despite our intellectual and spiritual differences, contrary to what people might think we do not throw chairs at each other in real life, since we are both capable of vehement disagreement without disliking the other person personally, something most people are sadly incapable of. He tried to engage me on some issues but I refused: "I'm on holiday".
St John's
Bridge of Sighs
Lady Mary and St John of Revelations fame, St John's Chapel
St John's Chapel
Gate to Trinity
Clare College bridge with 14 stone balls
King's Bridge
Punting (this is me facing the opposite direction of the previous shot)
In the alley behind Barclay's bank, we saw a sign about the pipe (which ran under some windows) being coated with anti-climbing paint. Having itchy hands, I was curious how they would make the paint slippery, so I went to touch the pipe.
Bad move. It was coated with a black, slimy, disgusting substance which came off onto my hands. It bore an uncanny resemblance to automobile grease. It may not stop rats, but I assume it works on burglars.
Lisheng then had to run off, so I went to retrieve my backpack from someone's front door, since she wasn't at home. While walking there Xianjie, who was supposed to meet me a while later, saw me and ran after me. My bad luck then resumed, for I went to what I thought was the right house but neither it nor the next house had my backpack. I tried to call someone, but my credit had run out thanks to the previous day. Xianjie lent me his phone, but someone's phone was off.
Punt dock
I wanted to try my hand at punting, but with all the bad luck I'd been getting I was quite sure that I'd fall into the river, so my valiant punter had to go at it unassisted. As it is, we collided with another punt 3 times and had at least 1 near-collision.
Ivy-covered building, St John's College
It's quite surreal hearing a guy in a punt ask a girl sitting on a wall fronting the river: "Have you checked your Facebook today?"
A short while before I boarded the bus to return to London, someone finally SMSed back and I eventually found out that I went to the wrong house (at least it wasn't *after* the bus left or later). When I returned, I found that my backpack was indeed there and so I didn't have to write off the textbook and miscellany inside it. I should've checked all the houses at the start, but it was a combination of bad luck, disorientation and poor decisions made under pressure. Because of my detour, I missed the bus back to London and had to pay £10 for a new ticket.
I was waiting for my coach to depart, when out of a female toilet cubicle came first a dog with a collar but a broken leash, then a man and finally a woman. I have no idea how they fit inside the cubicle and what they were doing inside.
I saw a movie poster in London which read: "Muhammad - the Last Prophet". MUIS would no doubt condemn this, since it implies that all other prophets who came after him are false, and this denigrates other people's faiths.
British place names are a perfect example of the inconsistency of pronunciation in the English language.
There was a stupid PRC girl taking pictures of herself on the bus. It was damn stupid. And culture be damned, this gender defect seems universal.
My bus arrived in London 46 minutes late thanks to traffic. This is the mark of a proper bus company - they left on time and arrived late.
Victoria coach station has single sex toilets in one building. There's also a sign saying where single-sex toilets are. This despite the fact that all the business is done in cubicles and the wash basin area is visible to people from outside the toilet area, so there's next to no chance of any hankypanky going on. This didn't stop a group of tudung-ed girls looking at the unisex toilet for a while but then running off looking for a single-sex one, though. Really, single-sex toilets are so inefficient. They should just build unisex ones to save space. But then again I would end up having to queue for toilets too, so maybe not...
Left luggage at Victoria coach station had 2 rates - 1 for up to 2 hours and one for 2-24 hours. There were also 3 sizes of baggage (with differing prices) - small (<10kg), large (10-20kg) and extra large (>20kg). My small bag would've cost only £2,50 to leave there for 24 hours. Gah.
There's a Eurolines service from London to Poland. Whoever takes it must be mad - it takes 26-28 hours to get to Warsaw. Other glorious options: London-Casablanca (52-55 hours with 240-300 minute wait in Paris), London-Moscow (62-63 hours with 200-300 minute wait in Cologne). Good luck to them.
When I presented the printout of my reservation to the people at the Eurolines checkin counter, I was told that I needed to get a new ticket even though I'd already paid for one, since the reservation was not a ticket. When I went to the ticket counter to ask for my paid-for ticket to be printed out, I was told again that I had to buy a new ticket. If I'd known this earlier I'd have had half a mind to refuse and book a flight just to stop Eurolines from fleecing me even more. As it is, I grudgingly handed over £21 for the bus ticket back that I had already paid for.
After screwing me in every orifice, Eurolines had gouged out a new one and had pounded away while I was still reeling from the shock of it all.
The bus driver had a long list of announcements. Among them was that it was a new bus, so would we not eat spaghetti, tortellini, chicken wings with curry and other messy foods on it. The other was a request to switch off our mobile phones because they might interface with his onboard computer, and then he'd have to reset it because the brakes might not be working (wth - it's a lie even on airlines and he tried to pull the same trick on us?!) He screened Ocean's 12 on the trip, which was a pity since I'd already seen it before, but it was a good way to kill some time.
One of the good points of traveling by bus, besides having the experience of a 10 hour trip (but then not all new experiences are good) was that I got to travel through the Eurotunnel. Interestingly, the French border police were stationed on the English side, and I read that the same happens on the French side of the tunnel. The shopping centre at the Eurotunnel shop complex said that their prices were a match for those in the Calais hypermart. Hurr hurr. Amazingly, the vending machine had 500ml soft drink bottles for £1,10, so maybe the claim was true.
The man beside me on the bus was annoying. Not only did he fidget a lot, he got out at every rest stop. Even the one at about 3am somewhere in Belgium (the bus stopped an insane amount of times - one at about 11:30, once about 12:30 or 1 am somewhere in France and once in Belgium - I remember the first and last clearly, the second vaguely and there might've been one more). Perhaps he didn't need sleep, or couldn't sleep on a night bus.
On Friday I went to the Eurolines office to try to get my money back. The girl at the counter was pleasant and helpful, but this was probably because it wasn't her problem - she said that I had to contact the same people I paid, and since I paid online I had to contact Amsterdam. When I got back and called Amsterdam, they told me I couldn't get a refund for the bus leaving early but could write a complaint letter (bah). As for my having to buy a new ticket, the woman on the line confessed that this was odd and put me on hold for many minutes before someone else came and put down the phone. On calling back, I was told that (surprise, surprise) I had to write in for a refund. I said I wouldn't have a Dutch bank account by the time they resolved my problem, and the woman said she didn't know how they'd refund me.
When I called DBS to ask why my credit card had gotten rejected, I was told that there was no record of failed/rejected transactions, and that if my card had been rejected, it should show up in my database. So it seems Eurolines sucks so much that they warp the laws of reality, just like the cock.
I speculate that Eurolines's business model goes something like this:
- offer low prices to tempt people
- make buses leave early so people get stranded, you save on fuel (less weight) and people pay money to get the next bus
- have frequent rest points so people get stranded (you save on fuel and people have to pay a fee to reclaim baggage)
- if people don't have their tickets with them, refuse to print out the same ticket even though everything's in the system, and make them buy a new ticket
- (I infer,) for amendments and cancellations force people to go to the Eurolines branch where they made payment even though they likely have a unified database
- make people write in for refunds when you screw them, so most of them won't bother
The beauty of the Eurolines scam is that those who travel with them have no alternative. They are willing to put up with all of the troubles because they can't afford (or are too cheapskate) to fly. So even if Eurolines screws them there's nothing they can do. Hell, I think I may have come across the a sort of Giffen good in real life at last (for those who travel often, at least).
It is no coincidence that everyone I've talked to who has heard of Eurolines (at least 2 I can definitively identify) has said they suck:
- someone described her 12 hour journey within Germany in 1998 with the words "you will wish for death", though this had more to do with her sensitive physiology than the screwiness of the company; also, in typical fashion, she revealed that the company was Eurolines only AFTER they'd sodomised me (just like how she'd said Keukenhof was the only absolute must-see in the Netherlands AFTER I'd said I was going there and after I'd been in Utrecht for more than 3 months).
- Chara left a comment: "Yes Eurolines sucks. I can so totally understand your frustration... We had a bad, baddd experience in Budapest coz of Eurolines. Bad experience in Salzburg... again Eurolines. How can they expect you, a tourist, to collect your tickets during office hours, oh wait, their office closes on Sunday, and wait, it's right smack in the middle of some ulu street in Prague... oh wait, there's no alternative, you'll have to purchase a new ticket... tough luck... And hello, what help line... They don't speak English and/ or have utterly rude people answer the calls and/ or hang up and leave you stranded in the bus terminal. In the end, we had to fork out money to call their main office in Brussels or some other place to get the whole situation sorted... Oh and did I mention that a train ticket from Salzburg to Munich is a zillion times cheaper than the Eurolines fare, and so much more worth it, coz the ride's really much more scenic?? Just fyi... But yes, we should all boycott Eurolines, seriously."
Morals of the story:
1) Eurolines sucks
2) Read the fine print
3) Eurolines sucks
4) Always go earlier
5) Eurolines sucks
6) Don't mix up your reporting times
7) Eurolines sucks
8) If it's too good to be true (the price), it's probably a lemon
9) Eurolines sucks
10) If you can, fly
11) Eurolines sucks
12) Don't be penny wise and pound foolish
13) Eurolines sucks
14) There are some things not worth compromising on and some levels beneath which one should not sink (ie taking Eurolines)
15) Eurolines sucks
Money I lost because of Eurolines:
- €1,32 bus fare
- €4,30 train fare
- €127 plane ticket
- £15 Heathrow Express
- £21 bus ticket from London to Utrecht