Thanks for reading about my travels and adventures! This blog now has over 1,000 page views! I hope you enjoy reading it! I am in Ireland now and I owe you a few posts about what I'm doing over here but first a few last thoughts about the UK and whatnot before I move on....
- Three words... Chip and Pin! On the credit cards here they have a chip in them (if you're active duty military it looks like what we have on our CAC). It's just a small square at the bottom and they insert the card into the machine instead of swiping it and then put in a 4 digit number instead of signing. Well, I like this idea, I do. It's nice not to have to sign over and over again, it's also potentially safer since who in the world checks signatures that closely??? WELL, the British do! So if you have a swipe card you can still swipe (you generally have to explain it because unless you're in a super touristy area they have no idea what's going on) then when they ask for your signature if you don't have the back of your credit card signed (both Allison and I have See ID written on the back of ours) they basically want you to sign your name in blood. Every single time I handed over a credit card (and I did this a bunch, I did a serious amount of shopping people) they would examined the crap out of my ID. I'm pretty sure one women wanted me to promise my first born child to her. I did buy coffee at one place where the guy literally had never seen a swipe card, he had to ask his supervisor what to do. Just interesting.
- I may have already mentioned this and if I have I'm sorry. The stick shift is the same here! The steering wheel is on the other side but the stick shift is in the same order. So instead of gear 1 being closest to you it's now furthest away.
- So far I have been to 3 new countries (actually 5 if you include Northern Ireland and Scotland) and each time I get to a new country I'm a bit bummed. When I got to England for the first time I was a bit sad, I had really gotten used to the Spanish culture, I enjoyed using my Spanish and I was having a great time! Of course I got used to England and loved it and felt the same way when I got to Ireland. Maybe this will just be how it's going to go!
- Major differences in my travels to Spain and the UK. In Spain I never once met a Spaniard, I met tons of people but they were all travelers from other countries. In the UK I met tons of locals! In Spain I saw A LOT of churches and Cathedrals, in the UK I think I went into maybe two and one was Westminster, I mean Will & Kate got married there, I had to go! Now that I've spent 3 weeks each in two different parts of Europe I enjoyed both immensely. They were very different trips but both fascinating and lots of fun. A major similarity in both cultures... They drink a lot!!! The big difference is the size of the drink. In Spain the beers generally come in much smaller cups whereas in the UK they don't hold back! I haven't been writing too much about the drinking here but I have been partaking in quite a bit of it. When in Rome, and well it's a great way to meet the locals!
Thanks again for reading and if you have any suggestions or tips for the places I am or am going please don't hesitate!
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