Sandy's diary in Manchester (Dec, 2000)

Just click on any of the following underlined dates and you can get to know what's happening to me that day.

11th Dec, 00 (Mon)

Test!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have you guys noticed that there is a difference between the English alphabet and the symbols used to represent the pronunciation, which you can find in the dictionary? Do you know that symbols like a, e, i, aI and eI are different from those letters used in our daily life, what they mean and how they are pronounced? We as linguistics students have to know all these things and a test was held today to check our knowledge.

It's not a usual test, which only requires you to memorize all the theories. We had to make use of our ears, eyes (maybe) and be attentive because what we were asked to do was we transcribed every single word or utterance that the lecturer had just made, using the IPA symbols. It sounds interesting but it was not an easy task...

13th Dec, 00 (Wed)

The first dinner at the China Town

This was the first time that I had a dinner in the China Town, as a celebration of the end of the first semester and the coming of Christmas. I enjoyed it very much and perhaps more, especially when I hadn't eaten such delicious Chinese dishes for three months.

The weather: the first day was the most chilly but sunniest

The happiest thing: got out of my city and saw something different in London

The unhappiest thing: my organiser and calculator being stolen

The luckiest things:

1) got rail tickets at a surprisingly low price one month prior to our trip.

2) saw the parade at Buckingham Palace by chance

The unluckiest and most expected thing: my organiser and calculator being stolen - might be stolen by someone while I was walking on the busy street with my friends.

OVERALL IMPRESSION:

It's weird not to travel London when you're in the UK. It's the most crowded and prosperous city here. Most of the international companies and shops of famous brands station can be found and most of the people enjoy living here because of its liveliness and people. It can be comparable with those big cities like New York and Tokyo.

However, I'm not sure if my loss has adversely affected my impression of London. Anyway, it's really a good place for shopping and working with lots of good job opportunities.

Food: Not too expensive if you know where to go for. we had a dinner in the China Town and it's delicious but not expensive. (There's really a lot of restaurants in London's China Town and it's very crowded everywhere, compared with Manchester's but I don't think there's anything special besides this). And we found a restaurant which provided a buffet dinner at a low price.

Tourist Spots:

Our schedule was full on the first two days as we were trying to rush to as many places as we could. We went to the Westminster and Buckingham Palace soon after getting off the train. It was extremely cold that day and I shivered on our way to the Buckingham Palace along the road of St. James Park. We also visited the British Museum. There's really a big exhibition room for Chinese antique. Lots of visitors as well.

How could one miss the chance of shopping in London? We strolled around long busy shopping streets one after another in the evenings but we didn't buy anything as those clothes were still expensive.

The next day was also exhausting. We went to St. Paul's Cathedral and Tower Bridge (it's very beautiful) and in the afternoon to Madame Tussaud's (In fact I did go to Madame Tussaud's in Sydney and took a lot of photos then. This time just wanna see if the one at London was different). At least one film was used just for taking photos there. Not sure if it's because of our tiredness or the fact that there's nothing special about London, we didn't visit many places on the third and fourth day. We took photos outside the Millennium Dome (but not go in) and Greenwich Royal Observatory. We did visit Harrods but stayed there for only a few minutes.

20th Dec, 00 (Wed)

My hair-cut

It had been said that it was much more expensive to have a hair cut and I was a living proof. For a new start or image or whatever, we went to a local hairdressing shop which is considered of high class. And sometimes it's not just about money. It may be difficult to get the same hair cut in another country as you do with your individual hairdresser.

I felt a bit uncomfortable with my new hair cut and missed my old hair style which I had had for several years. When you don't like your new hair cut, you don't think it's worth whatever amount it costs you. And now I even paid 3 times more than i did in Hong Kong!

Oh, goodbye to my old hair-style and my money...

24th Dec, 00 (Sun)

My first Christmas Eve in the UK

Many friends of mine thought I would have a special Christmas abroad and yeah, it was supposed to be special in a country where Christmas is the most important day in a year, just like the Chinese New Year in the Chinese society.

I had been thinking about how to spend my Christmas Eve. I stayed at Manchester (usually students from Asia stayed here for Christmas) since I came back from London while many students, esp. those from Europe, had flew back to their home countries during this festive season and long holiday. It had become very quiet on the campus and in the university residence.

A friend of mine and I had been thinking about holding a party with some other flatmates but we ended up partying with each other in her flat, eating pizzas and minced pies while watching those seemingly boring TV series. We expected to see "Titanic" again on TV but it was shown on Christmas evening.

So, what could we do? Well, we turned to watch VCDs on the computer and surfed the net instead. And that's what my first Christmas Eve was like...

27th Dec, 00 (Wed)

the so-called Christmas sale

Christmas sale was something that I had been looking forward to. Whenever I wanted to buy a clothing item but I couldn't afford to, I'd tell myself to wait until after Christmas when those clothes were expected to be on a big sale. And it came finally...

Perhaps shopping was the most common activity here after Christmas. There were many people in every shop and the clothes were in a mess. The price tags of "£5", "£10", "£15" could be seen everywhere and it's not easy to find a person without any shopping bags. After searching for a long time, I bought a knitwear and a new organiser only.

It was extremely chilly and freezing today, which was in fact a sign of what was going to happen the next day. (see below)

28th Dec, 00 (Wed)

Woh....Snow at Manchester!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The first thing I had to do when I woke up in the early morning was wipe my eyes as I couldn't believe what I saw. It snowed!!! I was so excited and surprised. This was the first time I saw snow in the flesh. Outside was a white picture of scenery and a thick layer of snow had been accumulated. I thought of going out to feel the snow but finally I stayed at home all day long, reading materials for my essay.

It's pity that I didn't take any photo with the snow because there's no-one except me in our flat at that time.

<= It's me: "Oh, it's beautiful..."

(By the way, thanks to Karen, who sent me the above cute pic!)

31st Dec, 00 (Sun)

New Year's Eve (Happy New Year!)

Last year there was a big celebration of the coming of the new millennium everywhere in the world (some people argue that 2001 rather than 2000 is the start of the new millennium). What about this year? Just like on Christmas Eve, shops were closed earlier. A countdown activity was held at the city centre. But instead of going out, I did the countdown on my own in my room.

The snow was melting down.

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