Sitting in Hospital So I thought I'd Write Part 2 (London)

For three months I carried on. Went out with friends and carried on working. I was still in constant contact with Heather over seas via SMS. I was considering going over but had trouble deciding to actually go for it. After all, I had a job and a life that I had to leave behind.
I got to work one morning and after a meeting I could only describe as being ridiculous I went home fuming. The next morning on my way to work I took the wrong off ramp, heading towards Head Office instead of to the client. Walked in, typed, printed and signed my resignation and a month later I was on a plane on my way to London.

I got work fairly quickly, I didn’t always like the content they were selling with the systems I was writing but the pay was decent and my new boss agreed to pay me weekly for the first six weeks during a probation period. This was especially a help since I landed in UK with little under 400 pounds on my name. Considering I was planning to stay 2 years and that the average cost per week for cheap accommodation is 70 to 80 pounds. I had to find something quick or get back on the plane.
Heather at the time did not want to get back together straight away. So my first couple of weeks there I spent in the city not really knowing anybody. Going out with the people in the hostel who Heather instroduced me to, clubing every now and then and working. I made some good friends however, 2 of which I had actually met in the british embassy in South Africa while applying for my visa.
After a month or two me and Heather started talking again and one thing led to another. We started out as “friends” but after breaking that off, getting back together like that again, breaking it off again, and again. We eventually got together as a couple around 6 months after I landed in London.
We started slow, moved in together eventually and all went well. We had quite a social life in London, helped on by that fact that Heather, after a couple of bad temp jobs, got a very nice position at Ticket Master and with that. Free tickets to shows in London.

We saw everything from We Will Rock you to Lion King and unfortunately a Tribute to George Dilan. Last would forever be our gauge when we saw a bad play. It was worse the Tribute to George Dilan or it was better than Tribute to George Dilan.
The restaurants in London are quite interesting. You never really got good meat tho. It was mostly bearable to alright, however Browns in Canary wharf graced us with a fantastic 150g steak that knocked us back 20 pounds each.
Heather had a very interesting talent for Picking weird and wonderful house mates. From an ex soup star to an verbally abusive Durbanite and the very next house a manic depressive one. It made life interesting at least.


I stayed with 3 Aussies. Now if anybody ever told you that the only thing wrong with Australia are the Aussies. I wouldn’t fight them to hard. The one guy we nicknamed Hamish the Horrible, because we could always see at least 15cm of his but crack stick out was the worse of the 3. Aside from him was a quite’ish guy who was actually the best of the bunch and then there was the tall typically Aussie guy who made for a good house mate but a not so good dosser. When he left the house share and then came back to sleep on the floor for 3 months, he deemed himself a more authorise housemate than Heather who had been dossing with me at the time.

Most of the Aussies got replaced eventually and 2 Cape Town girls moved in, one who was not very shy about her body at all. The other was always looking for some fun. Hell of a step up from the Aussies.
I always ended up knowing Heathers house mates better than my own tho, I think it was mostly because I didn’t like talking to people just as I got home. I would go into my room and unwind or sit on the couch not really trying to make conversation with anybody. Later at night when I loosened up a little and felt more sociable everybody had already pegged me about being in a bad mood. I don’t think they realized that they would probably have a much worse opinion of me had a talked to them just as I got home.
The house was in Canada Water (97 Redriff Road), in the docklands in London zone 2. the biggest problem I had with the house was that I could see the Gherkin building in central London out my window at home and at work.
After my first year I used my return ticket to South Africa and went home for a visit. When I left I also gave my room up at the Aussies and apparently a drunk durbanite took it over from me. (You getting the impression that we don’t think to highly of Durbanites)
Actually one of my friends in London also turned out to be a Durbanite (I know their everywhere!)
When I got back I moved in with Heather in South-Fields just up from Wimbledon in zone 3. It was supposed to be a temporary arrangement but we eventually decided we liked each others company allot more than any house mate we could find, so we moved into a halfway house for a month while we waiting for a room one of my best friends in London offered us.

The last 3 months in London where the best and I think had we gotten to that point earlier, we might still be there now. But as it where Heather surprised me one morning in December with the announcement that she is going home at the end of January, and wanted me to come back with her. The choice was mine to make and made it without a second thought however I did stay behind for three months after she left.