You Brought A Guidebook To A Party?

This weekend I went to Swansea, Wales to visit my friend Carly from my hometown who is studying there through a program sponsored by the University of Iowa. She is studying at Swansea University, and lives in the university’s student village in Swansea. It takes about 2.5 hours to travel to Swansea from London via a First Great Western Train. Swansea is on the southern coast of Wales adjacent to Swansea Bay. It is the second largest city in Wales after Cardiff.

I left London at 8:25am on Friday morning, and arrived in Swansea around 11:30. Carly picked me up at the train station, and we walked about 15 minutes from the train to City Center. There, we walked through a mall that had some good shopping and went to Tesco to pick up some food (The Tesco was enormous compared to London’s grocery stores – potentially even bigger than Jewel or Kroger would be! I informed Carly about how lucky she is to have so many food options.). Then, we caught the bus to the student village, which we picked up right by Tesco. It was nice because the bus stopped directly outside of Carly’s dorm.

Once we arrived at Carly’s dorm, we decided to take a walk around her neighborhood and explore. We were told that if you walked up the hill you could see Swansea Bay. So the two of us meandered up some windy roads, making sure that we were always walking up hill. Needless to say, by the time we got back to Carly’s dorm, I was exhausted, so I took a three hour nap. When I woke up, Carly had fixed me fish and chips for dinner! She is such an awesome friend.

We both ate dinner and then began to get ready to go out. Our plan was to invite some of Carly’s American friends over and then go to the club in the basement of Swansea University’s student union. So we get dressed for the night and head out. However, we ended up getting to the club around 11:30, and the line was RIDICULOUSLY long. They were saying that the club was at capacity, and they were using a one-in-one-out policy. We knew we would never be able to get in, so we decided to leave. Then, the bus that was supposed to come to pick us up and take us to the bar district did not come. So, we ended up just going home and hanging out in Carly’s room. Although I think Carly and her friends were disappointed, I had fun because it allowed me to get to know them better.

The next morning, Carly and I woke up early and took a train to Cardiff. From Cardiff to Swansea is about an hour and fifteen minutes on the train. So we arrived in Cardiff in the late morning, and I wanted lunch. We walked around at first joking about going to McDonalds. We walked into O’Neill’s pub and they weren’t serving food yet. Then I walked around trying to find a mocha because I was feeling tired. After exhausting three coffee shops, I ended up having to buy a mocha from Starbucks (ugh…I can’t escape my addiction). However, I was much more impressed with the service at Starbucks in Cardiff than any of my London Starbucks experiences. They actually asked for my name! Good job, baristas.

Ok back to business. So Carly and I decided to hold off on lunch while we drank our Starbucks and went to Cardiff Castel. The Castel was a fairly short walk from the train station, and it was really cool because it was such a historical monument smack dab in the middle of the city. Admission for students was 7.5 pounds, and we picked up an audio tour guide. We roamed the grounds of the castle ourselves, exploring where we wanted to. It was really cool, and we were able to climb up into a big tower with very steep steps. Also, I hit up the gift shop and bought some Welsh memorabilia. Overall, it was a very fun landmark to visit.

After the castle, Carly and I went to get lunch. However, by then we had joked around so much about staying true to our American brands that we actually started craving McDonalds. So we went to McDonalds for lunch. Shame. It was pretty much just like McDonalds in London – same menu and everything.

After our McDonalds visit, we walked around the shopping district and found many quaint shops and alley ways to explore with a lot of cool shopping opportunities. I ended up buying two new tops that are for spring, since most of the tops that I brought with me to London are warm.
After our shopping, we got back on the train around 3:30 and went back to Swansea. It was a long trip home, but I felt like I had a great experience in Cardiff!

When we arrived back at Carly’s dorm, we took a short nap and then Carly fixed me dinner again (pasta, bread, and wine…yum!). She spoiled me. Then we got ready to go out for the night, since our plans were to go to Wind Street with her American friend Tom and her Welsh friend Ben.

The four of us took the bus to Wind Street and I was immediately overwhelmed. Everyone was young, as if it was a row of bars at a college campus, but everyone was dressed ridiculously! There were people dressed up in costumes for no reason. Some girls were in barely-there dresses and some in tutus. Again, just because they think it’s fun to dress up. I felt too plain in my jeans, heels, and black tank top. Carly and I joked that we were going to go back to America and think that everyone dresses conservatively after spending a night on Wind Street. Even the two guys agreed that it was nuts! We only went to two bars on the row, one was a vodka bar (where Carly and I ordered Strongbows – not vodka) and the other was a regular bar that did not seem very popular. We chose to go to the second one because we saw that we’d be able to sit down. The whole experience of the night was very over-stimulating for me, and I found myself just staring at people instead of engaged in conversation with my friends. That has never happened to me before.

One more thing – I find it very difficult to understand Welsh accents. I couldn’t understand what Ben said most of the night, and then anyone else who talked to me was a lost cause.

This morning Carly and I woke up at 10am and quickly got ready to walk to the beach. It’s about a 2 mile walk, but it was totally worth it. Swansea beach was beautiful! We went at low tide, so we found a bunch of shells. I kept one that looked shiny silver, but I may have squished it in the pocket of my North Face. We’ll see when I get home I guess. On our walk home, stopped for lunch at a restaurant with a Welsh name I couldn’t pronounce and then got some candy at a neighboring supermarket. We finally arrived back to Carly’s dorm around 2, and hung out until I had to catch the 3:10 bus to City Center in order to walk to the train station.

Everything considered, I had a terrific weekend. It was nice to be with an old friend and meet some new ones. Also, Wales is gorgeous, and a truly different experience from London. Basically, I felt I spent the weekend in a suburb. It was not a trip to the country-side, but definitely a break from city life. Also, I joked with Carly that I was actually able to see the wilderness out her window. I feel I learned a little about Welsh culture, too. Such as how they have a well-known song that sings “Always piss on the English side of the bridge.” There’s a lot of national pride in Wales, and I was able to ask Ben about his childhoold, life in Wales, and Welsh cultural traditions.

Now I’m getting excited for Carly and some of her friends to visit me next weekend!