9:00pm Saturday the 26th of June 2004.
I just woke up. Seriously, I was so tired I fell asleep on the bed instead of reading one of the (many) books we’ve bought on this trip.
Today I was going to meet Shaniqu/Ben, and I did! It was great! I really loved it.
After a bit of delay (his bus being too late), I was at the railroad station at 10:31am, nervous as hell, as I’d only seen one photo of him before, he could be anyone. I got a text message saying what platform he had arrived at, and of course me being very unfamiliar with the railroad station, had a hard time actually finding the right one.
I first saw him as I walked down some stairs, and as he looked about the right age and a bit like in his photo, I knew it was him, even though I didn’t want to be too certain and begin greeting a stranger (I’ve known Shaniqu for over two years and married him once while divorcing him twice, he’s not really a stranger). Slowly we walked towards each other before he asked if I was Mette, or something like that.
As we walked to the other side of the river Ouse, where the main centre of the city is, which was quite a bit, we talked about random stuff, while having some awkward silent pauses, which we had both known would come, really.
We decided to visit the Jorvik Viking centre, as neither of us had been there before. I thought he’d been there, but I was mistaken. They took £7 for it, which I think is expensive (no, I can’t be bothered to check the actual sum it is in kr, it’s probably not too bad), but in a way it was worth having visited, and it was interesting. They even had a skeleton named Bob, who had suffered a very painful death from the looks of it! There were plenty of things to do, but mostly it was to look at things from the Viking age they had dug up in the area. A whole lot!
After we were done at the Jorvik centre, it had begin to rain outdoors, me with my FCUK rain umbrella, and he with one that hated the aspect of both opening up and going together again. ?
We walked around town a lot. Instead of going to the cathedral, we visited a church close by that had free entrance. Guy Fawkes had been baptized there apparently. And they were playing “Våren” (Spring) by Edvard Grieg!!
(To the left a map, they handed out to everyone of the church we visited.)
We had lunch at a small, nice looking café close to the cathedral. My chicken baguette was lovely even if I’m certain that it was turkey not chicken. I had some problems with finishing the meal, as it wasn’t too long ago since the breakfast with Anne in the hostel/hotel.
After the meal we walked around some more, ending up at a small art gallery, actually. It was raining outside, and it was nice inside, even if I wouldn’t have bought much of the art in there, if I had the choice.
We finally found a place to enter the city walls, even had a peak at a Richard III museum in one of the gates. Heh, I do think it was George W. Bush who’d killed the two princes in the tower.
As a difference from when I was at the city walls with Anne, it was pouring down today. It was nice though, as with there being far less people around, both of us talked more (if you consider Psh and Tsk talking, we talked much more) and the awkward silences disappeared completely.
(On the city walls of York: Shaniqu/Ben!)
(Me and Shaniqu in York!)
Afterwards we had a walk around at the York University. It was open to the public and we’re both the public =P
When we tried to have a look indoors, and had made it to the second floor, where everything was closed, a man who worked there came and got shocked to find people there as he’d just locked the door we’d come in through.
We made it out again alive, not to worry! Even had some singin’ in the rain before we left campus and the strange animal they seemed to enjoy having for no reason in one of the yards.
(Another photo of Shaniqu, notice how there's actually no rain then, aren't you all amazed?)
Walked around in the centre of York city for a very long time, talking, joking a whole lot (I can’t remember the last time I laughed that much), wondering where exactly we were and what to do next. Okay, so perhaps I was the only one wondering where we were, but then I saw the dear (wink wink, Anne) construction thingy (crane?) that’s at the construction site outside our room, and I figured which way that lead back to the hostel (after having walked in a circle a few times).
At the hostel/hotel (not sure anymore dammit) we got in trouble with the staff for filling water onto a bottle. Weird people. I saw Anne through our window and called her down, she and Shaniqu had already met earlier this day in the middle of town as a coincidence, but yeah they met again, Anne left after we agreed to play pool, though.
Me, never having played pool before was
very lousy, Shaniqu, who has played it for 8 years, was brilliant at it. He won the first game, where I myself couldn’t manage to get a single ball into the holes. I had a deck of cards in my purse so we played that for a while, then we had another game of pool where I won! Well um mainly because he managed to get the black 8 ball into a hole. I think I’m going to try and shoot/play pool again. It was fun, even if I completely sucked at it.
Having half an hour left or so, he continued his crossword, while I scribbled on the rest of the newspaper. I’ve never been any good at crosswords, neither English nor Norwegian ones.
We walked back to the station, to find out that there still was some time before his train went. So we continued with the game of “Who can get the other person pushed onto the railroad tracks first,” nice hmm? None of us managed it though, even how much we tried.
His train did come after a while, and he left York. Pretty sad to see the train leave, as I at least, had had a great day with him, hopefully we’ll see each other again later this summer.
(One of the city gates, they all looked somewhat like this one.)
(Micklegate, I think the street is named, it was a long street in any case, which had earlier been named Myklagada, according to Anne's memory of what the signs said.)
I walked around a bit on my own before I returned to the hotel/hostel where Anne was, and I had a bagel for dinner.
(To the right: me and Anne playing around with the camera.)
After that I haven’t done much. Reading, sleeping, sitting in the hall watching the mobile phone getting reloaded and of course; writing this!
The band we shared the same hall with has left, we think a new one is placed somewhere in the building, but right now there’s loud British accents outside in the hall.
I have seen at least 5 school bands from Norway in York by now, plus I’ve heard a lot of other Norwegian voices. They really are everywhere!
Mette.
Next Day.
Main Page.
The Day Before.