Impressions and Observations

The following is an incomplete list of my first impressions of the English and other random travel sightings.

1. Americans hold their passports in their hands as they walk through the airport. Everybody else keeps it in the jacket or pocket and only breaks it out when necessary. Americans clutch that important document like an evangelist clutching the pocket-Bible. Maybe we wish to convey a sense of entitlement and a perceived necessity of recognition.

2. I feel like I am in a Guy Ritchie movie.

3. Everything, down to the BBQ sauce on the table of the cafe, is "By Appointment to Her Majesty the Queen." That's silly.

4. My first meal was two runny eggs, a long sausage, two flat and floppy slices of ham, buttered bread, and a half pound of baked beans. I wasn't expecting baked beans for breakfast, but I kind of liked it.

5. My tea came with milk already in it. I forgot where I was.

6. I think the waitress creamed when she saw the tip I left her. I forgot where I was.

7. English girls (and this is only my first impression) don't take care of their hair the way American girls do. It's just sort of there. I like nice hair.

8. The English seem spiteful in a number of interesting ways: driving on the left hand side (honestly, give it up), having the steering wheel on the right side, not using the euro, and having their own plugs which are different from the mainland.

To be continued.