Latest treatment for overstressed people

Since my latest days have been really painful for the reasons stated in my last post (house hunting if you are not reading my blog), and since basically if I dont get a positive answer today or tomorrow I will be homeless soon (in two days), and since I am a PhD student, a scientist, and I enjoy developing new methods aka inventing stuff, creating, put my imagination to work, bla bla bla, I just recently developed an instantaneous formula to finish the stress of a working day by combining yoga, selfservice massage and high tech in light and power generation!



In my personal opinion the results were quite good and overcame the expectancies!! I personally recommend this treatment invented by myself ;))

To wait or not to wait (although the last option is not an option)

How horrible is the act of waiting???
To wait is like something is already set up, everything is ready for it but it doesn't happen due to one or some certain circumstances that need the time to pass.. that's the WAITING TIME..
The WAITING time is very subjective of course but it is usually very painful either for good or for bad. It is an assumption that inevitably something is going to happen after a certain time subsequently it just enhances the expectancies of the person who waits..

Examples from the quotidian:
I feel hungry at 12:00 but the lunch break is set for 1pm. Have to wait for the lunch time. The stomach aches, the head is felling dizzy, sick, I am so hungry that I cant work anyway.. But I have to WAIT!
Queue for the tilt in the supermarket.. thats fair enough but if it is too long?
Wait for the exam.. driving exam, any exam.. its like an exam is going to be done after a certain time.. but most of the times would be just better to do it straight away instead of counting down the days and get more and more nervous and anxious.

there are so many things we have to wait for everyday.. wait for the bus! thats one of the worst for me specially because in the morning the bus is always late and there are periods, long periods, of waiting time, thats wasting time..

Prisoner is waiting for he's dead sentence.. that must be very hard waiting time, in this case I reckon he would rather wait forever but if that is going to happen anyway maybe it would be quicker the better.

But why all this speech?? Because I had to introduce the topic that is most present in my mind and life at the moment!

Basically in the end of January/beginning of February I started looking for a new place to move in, I wrote a post (here) about it as well. That means that since then I am WAITING to get a new home and move there and start my life there, get use to it, make it look nice and comfortable and like a really nice home.. That was almost one month ago when I chose the place to live, paid a massive amount of money just to reserve it and I am currently still waiting to get in there!! Can you believe this? Remember my post about the shoes and Amazon and the incompetency of certain human beings (check it out)... its just again the same thing I think. I think one again I am confronted with another bunch of incompetents crossing my way of being happy... grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr, that's so irritating! Its like, I am just renting a flat, ok? I am not buying anything. I am renting a little 1 bedroom apartment for a miserable amount of money (it is not cheap but I cant imagine if I would be renting a house with a few rooms or simply buying one...).. The agency advertises that this should take three day and eventually going up to one week.. But no, that's a lie!

And now you wonder that maybe I screwed up with my documents like I didnt get them all the information, or something like that. That's not true, everything is fine and right from my side since the beginning of the month, but still waiting! This waiting time is very very painful, like any waiting time of course, but this was something I wished so much, I want so much and is being delayed God knows why!
It is so annoying... but I have to be patient, thats what everyone would tell me and what comes to my mind just like a way to be civilized and not to go straight to the agency and start shouting and eventually biting them up... That's actually how I feel..

And thats it, I keep waiting with the hope in my hands that is is gonna be sorted soon and then I will show you my little beautiful Aquarium ;)))

Twilight

I actually didn't post anything about valentine's day, what is actually a shame because it was awesome! I am not going into detail, of course, but thanks to my awesome boyfriend I got a very nice time, as always, but we did some special stuff for that day and I got some presents :)

One was an incredible massive bunch of flowers, beautiful, awesome, that still lasts beautifully in my room; another present was what gives title to this post, three books, the Twilight saga by Stephenie Meyer.

We had watched the movie some time ago during our holiday in Portugal, and I loved it and loved the story. I quite fancy vampire stories and the romance is very enchantingly beautiful. I became very curious about the books and the story that doesnt end in the movie giving space for a few more.

Therefore, Pedro took my wish for reading as an idea for a present and bought me the Twilight and other two, the new moon and the eclipse. The Twilight is now 10 cm from me, I am reading it and enjoying very much, reads very well, I'm reading english version, the story is great but not much added to what I saw in the screen. I want to finish this and go reading the others, they must be good.

Love story for an in love person, a hidden and shy romantic girl (blush).

The sad story of a pair of trainers and the incompetency of certain human beings

Once upon the time…

…The story I am going to tell you is a true story. It is almost unbelievable how could a pair of shoes be so desired and then so difficult to get rid of...

And the story begins...


Filipa and Pedro were talking about Pedro buying some trainers since his "collection" was getting old. Suddenly they thought there were those trainers with rollers, called Heelys, very appreciated amongst the kids and all generations I think, with an exception for the very old ones, I hope, but everyone knows what I am talking about, trainers with rollers, really nice to slide on a mall's floor or here in my department they would just work perfectly!

Me and Pedro we got quite excited about getting some shoes like that, for both, but since they are expensive I decided to offer Pedro a pair as a present for him being so nice; and because I didn’t get him many Xmas presents ;)

So I told Pedro I was gonna buy the shoes, we did some internet checking for him to decide which ones look better, we went for some black ones (very expected, Pedro wears in darkish colours usually)..
So I knew what to do.

Next day I came to work and went to the Amazon’s web site to buy the shoes, they had them in a few sizes and I got the size 8 (Pedro's size), paid and ordered. And it is here where the shoes' story begins.... the funny part!

Ok, as usual, Amazon works quite well, so in 2 or 3 days the shoes arrived, free of charged, very nice though. I decided to get them from Amazon because any shop I know so far here wouldn't have adult Heelys therefore I could only get them from Amazon or eventually from the Heelys web site. Moreover, I did order some stuff from Amazon before, like Pedro did and we have good impression from them besides Pedro had to return things before and it worked out fine for him. Thus, I thought Amazon would be, and I still think it is, the most reliable source for these sort of things (read unusual things).
Resuming.. The shoes arrived and Pedro tried them up, but unfortunately they didn’t fit him. Apparently the size 8 on those shoes is shorter than usual, so they were too small. Ok, decision was immediately made, the shoes had to be returned..

I haven’t returned any item before, so I didn’t know how it would be, I had to go to Amazon's web site and read the returning policies, and that was what I did the next morning when I got to work..

Amazon works with DHL for retuning purposes, I did work with DHL before too and everything was fine so I thought that was good to have DHL to do that. However, it happened that DHL works differently for different costumers..
So, as an Amazon costumer I couldn’t ring them to arrange the date for collection, I had to do it online by filling out a form and giving them an address and a date. Because I work in a quite complicated building (it is a hospital) I thought that would be better to ask them to go to my home. Pedro told me once, they would come in the morning almost for sure so I thought that wouldn’t be a problem to stay at home during the morning and wait.

On the arranged date, I stayed at home waiting for them.. the day passed and nobody showed up so far. The DHL people didn’t come, I rang them, 2 or 3 times during the day but I have been told that there is no costumer service for Amazon returning services and I just had to wait and wait and wait. The last time I rang them up, that was after 5pm, so after the time they were expected to come to me, and just by that time, never before, someone told me that the DHL driver had come by 11am!! I can promise you that no one came and knocked the door at all!! From their side no one said I was wrong, what makes me think that it happens that sometimes they don’t come but say they do, and in the end I just had to arrange another date... Of course I got very pissed off with both Amazon and DHL they made me stay at home the whole day, even doing some work but still very unpleasant to be waiting for nothing..

At this stage I already knew this was gonna be a complicated story..

And the shoes were still sitting there, waiting for some attention.. something to happen...

No chance to stay another day at home waiting, I thought, so I had to make them come to my working place. I had people collecting items from my lab before, but that’s true they rang me before asking for instructions how to get here. I wrote an email to DHL asking them to pick up the trainers from my work and additionally I left them some clues how to get here and not to get lost. I came to work with the trainers, asked everyone in the lab to be attentive on someone from DHL looking for me and told them the story too... (embarrassing)

Another day passed and no one came again... This time I wasn’t so pissed off since I didnt even realize the time passing as usually when I am working but still, when the day was done and I realized the trainers were still there, sitting in one of my lab’s chairs, waiting for me to take them home again, or to do something about them, that made me cry, grrrrrrrrrrr!! that’s irritating, bloody hell!

Ok, I went home took the trainers back again, understood that no one would ever come to fetch them and I would have to look for an alternative way of getting rid of them. Pedro suggested calling Amazon on their costumer call centre asking for help.

That was then the most logic thing to do.. Next day, and notice that since the trainers arrived has now been more than 2 weeks, trying to arrange dates for collection and bla bla bla, and the trainers were still there..

Ok, so I rang Amazon on the next morning, fortunately their call centre works pretty well didn’t get on hold for a long waiting time, and the person who I talked to seemed very useful. I told them my story and the problems with getting DHL to collect the trainers and they said that would be ok to go to the post office and send them back to them just by telling the post office the story because according to that person I was talking to, the Amazon and the post office had an agreement and the post office knew what to do.

Following these hopeful instructions on the next morning before going to work I went to the post office which is fortunately just on the way from my home to the bus stop. I popped in the post office and talked to the people there. They told me that they couldn’t return the item like that, because I had the labels for DHL, that the Amazon call centre supporter said would be ok, but it turned up that the post office cannot take Amazon items with those labels and require a special one done for them...

Ok again (grrrrrrrr) I rang Amazon again, actually from the post office to disclose the truth about that and indeed the post office woman was right and this time the Amazon person said I couldn’t return it like that.. but well I then asked to be sent another proper label (that should have been sent before of course), and the women on the phone (from Amazon) said she would do so.. So I took the trainers back again, home..

Once I got to work I went to see my email expecting a new label but NOOOO... the labels I had got were AGAIN the DHL ones.... OH NOOOO, such a pain coming all over, no one deserves that, like could everyone be so incompetent???? like DHL people incompetent. Amazon people incompetent.. bloody hell, I just wanted to return the bloody trainers and another week was going to pass... Ok...

Breath in, breath out (just as like a friend of mine uses to say :) and call them again.. Explain my ridiculous story once again by the fourth??? time and this time a guy told me to take the bloody packet to the post office, pay myself to post it to Amazon and then ring Amazon to tell them the postage expenses that they would pay me that and he also told me not to use any labels and to send it back to another address different than what I had before.

Ok, it seemed promising then, since I was going to pay there was no reason why the posit office would refuse to take the item, and I saw the light in the end of the tunnel :))) finally I would get rid of the trainers and most important get my money back! That I could then use to buy another pair of trainers to Pedro and give him a present he could wear!

Ok, next morning, this was Friday, so maybe 4 weeks since I had got the shoes and I consequently started trying to get rid of them, I went to the post office, and sent the trainers to Amazon, paid something like 6pounds but I was happy to pay that and didnt even think about getting the money back from Amazon.. I was happy just by solving the whole story !!

And then was Friday and I got to work and the story could just end here, but no!!

On Saturday morning… me and Pedro had slept at my place, since we still haven’t moved out :( we end up staying at mine or his and that night we slept at mine. I woke up earlier than usual for a Saturday morning but it just happened that because we had spent the week looking for our new place I didn’t manage to get much work done so I decided to go work just like in a normal day, so I got to the lab by 10am.

At about 11.30am Pedro rang me (I left him asleep in my room, that he didn’t have to wake up so early), and he rings me with very surprising voice tone and his first saying was "The trainers are just outside your room"!!!!

WOW I was wondering, "which trainers???", I asked, and he said that the box containing THE TRAINERS... those trainers, yes the ones I had just paid 6 pounds to send back to Amazon, the ones that I had just got rid off, and the story had just been finished had just started over again!! Can you believe this.. it was like a curse, apparently I couldn’t get rid of those trainers!!!!
That would be just perfect if they would had fit Pedro at the first place, but instead they took me and even Pedro through a long journey of how to get rid of a pair of shoes and get your money back!!

Ok I couldn’t really believe the shoes were there, I laughed for a while but since I was at work I couldn’t do anything but wait until Monday to go back to the post office and ask why did they send me the trainers, basically why did they send the post to the sender???? How stupid is that??? (there was my address as the sender with a "FROM" before to mention that I was the sender not the destiny!!!, how could someone be so dumb??? like I go to the Beeston post office 1 yard next to my home to pay 6pounds to post something to myself???? it is incredible again the incompetence that I was talking about, so to add another incompetent person to those already officially incompetents from Amazon and specially from DHL!!!)

It was with some calm and relax that I popped in the post office on Monday morning to slightly complain about the mistake done by them. The cashier was a bit ashamed, apologized and took the pack without even asking for the receipt.

A few days later I got an email from Amazon acknowledging the trainers and promising the refunding soon.
In the meantime, I got the money in my account. I bought Pedro an ordinary pair of trainers, Adidas in sale, but of course that was not what I wanted to buy..
Before that I still bought another pair of trainers that were this time, too big for him, so then we went to the shop (but this time it was in a shop ... uffff), and he exchanged them.

I am still looking forward to buying some nice looking trainers eventually with some funny feature like wheels but certainly I am not getting anything like that from Amazon, not anything that it is likely that I am going to return.

And that is a very big story, but it is a story not a little post, is the story of a sad pair of Heelys trainers that were looking for a home but I could’t shelter them, and they insisted to stay and they became my nightmare, they made people arguing, but they made people know each other better, they reinforce the idea about how the world is full of incompetent workers and how that can affect single people's life’s and ultimately the world's economy, in a world wide perspective!

Friends

I cant believe I left a horrible photo on top of my blog for such a long time.. I have been no time at all and not much inspiration too, but since I have got some photos from the time I was in Portugal with my friends (One of my friends just posted me a cd with very nice moments from my christmas holiday in Portugal, where me and my best friends and very much loved boyfriend went to a place called Vila Nova de Mil Fontes. I went there once before for a lunch with my family but didnt much realized how nice it is. And this holiday there, well, just three short days, with these people were so much fun!!! Cant wait to repeat something like that! And thank you for the photos, Margarida :)).

A tribute to my best friends :)

Ilha do Pessegueiro on the Background, Rui, Pedro, Boavida and Motinha.

Ilha do Pessegueiro and the shore

The girls, framed, Joana, Margarida, Raquel and Me.

Me and Pedro running down the dune to the sea

Me, Joana, Boavida, Raquel and Margarida, "The old friends"

Pedro, Boavida and Mota ("the very new friends.. or the boyfriends and the friend")

Two girls and a boy, a threesome and a friend reading the garfield apparently in french, this was waiting time

Me and you, with love:)

New year's

The chocolate eaters

A sight by the sea, cold winterful sea :)

What the Hell ??

Wine menu in a restaurante in Nottingham... Scaring.. no one deserves that!!

The PhD, The Viva and the house hunting

Has been a while since I wrote my last post and thats a shame coz there has been a lot going on but so much to do then that it has been difficult to update my blog though. From the topic you wonder what is going on I think. Basically all starts and ends up around my PhD busy life that squeezes most of my time, so much to think about, so much to do and read and etc...

And regarding PhD life a week ago I officially finished the very first step of a PhD (in england), passing the first viva checkpoint, just like in a cell cycle one can only progress under proving of success and reliability to get into the next checkpoint. That just happened very fine, got an excellent viva (although I was very scared, because of all that mystery about it, like no one really talks about it and the criteria is not very clear, nothing is written or stated anywhere.. but in the end of the day everyone says that is just very easy, and indeed it is!).

So I am now an official PhD student, in england before the viva exam one is officially and MPhil candidate, and this degree is awarded after the first year with a successful performance, therefore I am now a Master of Philosophy!! The title is a bit funny but oh well... better than my sort of Bsc. (which is actually a bit more than that but not defined, therefore MPhil looks nicer)

So with all that thing with the viva and so my time to write here was shortened, but additionally to that comes the house hunting. That was a hassle and painful thing. Lacking time and patience and still having to look for the house was complicated. Its bloody hard like first looking in the internet for advertisements then calling and booking appointments, dealing with the others' convenient times or going to see the flat and no one shows up or get it cancelled and have to re-book, bla bla bla, go and see, shitty places, crap after crap, bureaucracy, asking things and things, details, bank, letter from the university, bla bla bla, its just crazy. Finally chose one flat, it is nice, I will detail it later because I am still waiting to know whether I can move in since there is those investigations to see whether one is corrupted or so, so I am waiting until that is done. Then will be the moving on, and I cant wait, I am so much anxious to get my own place!

Oh well and thats pretty much everything.

In the meantime there was snow in Nottingham, loads of it, it snowed for 2 or 3 days there were up to 10 cm snow, everything is still covered with snow, there are snowmen everywhere, most are pretty scaring though. I didnt managed to make one, again no time, but I guess there will be more occasions very soon :)

Also, I could have taken a few nice pictures but rather I decided to get a few rubish ones, there you go, a sample:

6 Months smoke free

My post today is really short and I am just writing because I think this deserves attention.

Today is meaningful since it has been 6 months since the last time I smoke a cigarette and I haven't even touched one afterwards. This is a message specially for those who would not believe I was able to quit and to encourage those you may be thinking of stopping being a human chimney :)

I dont think I will ever smoke again and I feel really good now, a lot better at different points, speacially my circulation improved a lot and I dont feel easily tired anymore.

Today is special, I am happy I achieved this goal!

Moving out, new home, new life :)

Its official,

I am now looking for a new home, another nest to live :) hopefully and certainly much better than the one I have.

When I came to Nottingham, the decision about coming and the time I had for moving and settling were very short, therefore I didnt have enough time to plan it and to spend some time looking for houses and/ flats. Everything had to be done quickly. I came here 15 days before I started the project and stayed for 3 short days to find a place to live, that once I would come to start everything would be entirely ready. By that time I wanted to live in town, in Nottingham city centre, but since many people from work suggested Beeston as the best place to live, I just looked for houses around Beeston. Being new here I accepted the suggestion since as you can see on the map I am posting below, the university is far from the centre and being in Beeston is easier to go to the university, but just by walk, because by bus the centre is 10 times better (but I didnt know that). On the minus side Beeston is far from the city and is a little tiny shopping area, with supermarket and other shops but nothing special.

Meanwhile, I end up choosing a 5 bedroom house in Beeston village centre which is where I still live, sharing a house with another 4 people. On that beginning I didnt think I would stay here longer than my original contract, there is 6 months. And that was why I was not very picky because the plan was to stay here temporarily until I would have some more time to look for something more decent.

But it just did not happen before, but now it is time! Finally I am on the way of changing homes, and hopefully close to get my own space, private and specially clean.
I do quite like the location of this house and that was why I did not think about moving straight after my contract was finished but the worst problems about this place are indeed not the place at all but the people inside.

As the only child I am, I am of course deeply spoiled in several ways and I am not used to share things. Also despite me being quite social (when I want to), I am not, when I am at home, I just dont have patience to socialize with the people from the house just because they live here. So I tend to stay inside my room, sometimes I dont even bother not eating not to face anyone and the dirtiness left behind them.. That is the very worst part of this story, people have different concepts of hygiene and cleaning and that is troublesome. I am fed up with most of the things around here and I am so so happy I am moving out soon :)

On the plus plus side, I am gonna have a much better house to welcome my friends visiting and on the plus plus plus plus plus top side, I am going to live with someone I love. Thats just genial! I can wait to see this dream coming true and in a way to start saying good bye to the house where I am still typing this post I leave a map showing where I live, where I want to live and where I work, dont get confused next time you visit me :)

Girly gangs and chavs

Today I went for a coffee with two girlfriends here from Nottingham, both doing PhD, but both foreigners like me, so of course we end up sharing a lot of feelings about the life here.. and one subject that got into debate today was exactly the question about the "girly gangs" in Nottingham and in general, but in Nottingham it is just more appreciated...

I think I slightly pointed out that in the past but basically for those who dont know the girls here in Nottingham, from Nottingham, or God knows where from, they tend to have very particular behaviours which I would say are far from one would think as normal. Lets be more specific... Girls here, like in most other countries go out in groups, there is nothing new about it. Those girls and each group tend to follow a style or a standard that means that all girls in the same group look more or less similar.. thats what I mean by gangs.. basically similar styles stick together and form a group...

Usually there is that group of fairly pretty girls, a group of girls that look like they read the bible before going asleep, group of girls that are a bit overweight, etc... there are a lot, BUT:

The awkward funny thing is that in Nottingham those "girly gangs" vary a lot more than our imagination could eventually think of, and thats the funny part!

Yesterday I went out and suddenly recalled how does Nottingham night life works... I have forgotten that since I spent a long time not going out here.. So basically I should first introduce you to a general concept of "chav". This is a slang british term according to the dictionary: Brit slang, derogatory a young working-class person who dresses in casual sports clothes, but actually it is a lot more than that..

watch the videos to get familiar!







Ok, so chavy girls go out in gangs, but unlike the other girls they are not simply fat, or simply pretty or simply ugly, or whatever because these girls have no simplicity at all!! They are a mix of dirty bitches with cheap chicks, look all very easy, very drunk and brainless no matter how old they are. Bear in mind that you find chavy gangs from all age ranges, from youngs to mums and grannys! Of course it is very hard to describe them better without any photographic material, but for example during the day the dress code is very sportive whereas by night their looks vary from when they organize to dress a specific costume, usually very very dirty or if not they will dress as less clothes as they can and there will always be a lot of make up and they usually look orange... its a must see! But they are not found in London for example, while here in Nottingham is like the chavy land.. apparently there are a lot around the midlands like birmingham and also in Liverpool (I saw)..

Conclusion, girls hang out together, thats fine, but when I see a group of chavs I know I am gonna be impressed, trust me, it is disgusting!

Anatomy of a chav girl

I know one day you see one you will remember my description or in case you already know what I am talking about you probably wonder why do this people have no taste? how can someone be like that?

I sometimes over criticize things and people but this time one has to agree with me, inst it weird?

Friday post

Thats a quick post to say...

Friday should be... the day before the weekend, right? and indeed it is. Friday is also the day before many people get two days off. But not if you are a PhD student.. Friday is just another day before a working day..


Thats me back, mourning again about PhD life.. And indeed (again) it is hard.. I could just be in Portugal at the moment and I am here, working my ass off , grrrrrrrrr, I had to write this, its just me crying out loud to someone not to eventually shout someone around me here at work.. The other thing is if I had a normal job I could not probably go to Portugal anyway, but the frustration is.. I can go, legitimately but I cannot because I have loads of things to do..
I am so so busy.. Ok, now calm down and relax, and lets listen to music :)



Song just more on the mood of an easy life, like university or so, but I like it, it makes me happy :))

And Hey Pedro I miss you a lot!!



Oh the wind whistles down
The cold dark street tonight
And the people they were dancing to the music vibe
And the boys chase the girls with the curls in their hair
While the shy tormented youth sit way over there
And the songs they get louder
Each one better than before

And you're singing the songs
Thinking this is the life
And you wake up in the morning and your head feels twice the size
Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?

And you're singing the songs
Thinking this is the life
And you wake up in the morning and your head feels twice the size
Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?

So your heading down the road in your taxi for four
And you're waiting outside Jimmy's front door
But nobody's in and nobody's home 'til four
So you're sitting there with nothing to do
Talking about Robert Riger and his motley crew
And where you're gonna go and where you're gonna sleep tonight

And you're singing the songs
Thinking this is the life
And you wake up in the morning and your head feels twice the size
Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?

And you're singing the songs
Thinking this is the life
And you wake up in the morning and your head feels twice the size
Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?

And you're singing the songs
Thinking this is the life
And you wake up in the morning and your head feels twice the size
Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?

And you're singing the songs
Thinking this is the life
And you wake up in the morning and your head feels twice the size
Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?

And you're singing the songs
Thinking this is the life
And you wake up in the morning and your head feels twice the size
Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?

And you're singing the songs
Thinking this is the life
And you wake up in the morning and your head feels twice the size
Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna sleep tonight?

Where you gonna sleep tonight?

Monday Whatever post.. includes trip to Liverpool

Ok, I haven't been writing here for a while, I have been missing interesting topics to discuss, but I want to write something today so I can talk about the weekend and the time spent in Liverpool :) Yes, I went to Liverpool last Friday, after work, just for one night and a day, because some friends are getting married then they did an engagement party. That reason took me to Liverpool. Despite of lacking time to properly see the city I saw enough to do a little comparison between Liverpool and Nottingham.

Liverpool(not by me)

I like Nottingham a lot, and I think that might be one of the best places in England to be a student and to do a PhD when combining aspects such as the University, with the town, the life style and the prices it’s a fairly good combination. The city is tiny but that means that it's cheaper to live closer to the centre or in the centre, and still it has everything needed. And the rest is all positive, like the uni is well rated, the campus is awesome and the life style is very student friendly (since there are two universities and the University of Nottingham has over 20000 students/year everything is somehow done in function of the students). Liverpool was quite a surprise for me, as I thought it would look a lot more industrialized and "dark" but it shown up as a modern bright city. The very good point about it is the large presence of water, either the wide river or the sea nearby makes it nice. Nottingham has just one river, the Trent, which is almost inexistent, being just a tiny narrow course of water, there is almost no water around anywhere in Nottingham.
The second nice thing about Liverpool is the shopping area and the huge and nice buildings around, from the begging of the XX century showing that the city used to be exceptionally wealthy thanks to the money coming from wharfs and factories of the region. Another thing is that because Liverpool is more a city than Nottingham there are shops that one can’t find in Nottingham and that I miss a lot sometimes.

Liverpool(not by me)

In conclusion, Liverpool was worth visit. I enjoyed the party very much (got sick in the end.. but was ok, lololol .. ) and AH! And I can’t forget there was something worse in Liverpool than in Nottingham there is the coldness due to the wind coming from the ocean, ice cold blasts of wind made me freeze... brrrrrggg...

I would like to show here some photos of Liverpool but I still haven’t got them (they were not in my camera).

There are some last things to point out about Liverpool such as the people there. Mostly everyone was exceptionally nicer and more sympathetic than any where else in England! That is really strange that liverpudlians were talking to you without any problems they broke the silence on the train, they made jokes while one was waiting for food and even the taxi driver talked during the journey, that just reminded me about Portugal and made me mark Liverpool as a very nice place!
These same people seem to be all football fans, everyone seems to enjoy football and they are fanatic. One negative thing is the accents; a proper Liverpudlians will talk in an incomprehensive way.. Very bizarre accent though .. known as scouse... mostly everyone that talks like that also might think that Liverpool is not part of England but rather something apart, so they say that they are not English but Liverpudlians (from Liverpool) !!!

Liverpool(not by me)

And now I should get back to work on my Monday working mood, never very happy, of course, monday sucks (like Garfield says and I agree)..

Liverpool(not by me)