Interviews and the Egg

I ended up going to the Egg at the Wee Red Bar again Saturday night. It was busier than last week, though I did have problems getting in as it is supposed to only be open to members and students. Luckily, I ran into one of the girls I partied with after the place closed last week. Once again, I went to a couple of parties with her, Mark from last week, and a few other people. Luckily, I knew how to get back to the hostel this time. One of the girls, Kate, lives in Glasgow and offered to show me some of the cooler things in the city that I apparently missed when I was there before.

My interview didn't go very well yesterday. The place wasn't as far out there as the first one I interviewed for, but it was still out there. The clientele was predominantly older, and while I would have still taken the job had it been offered, it wasn't really for me (the manager certainly didn't seem to think so either).

Today, I go to pick up my keys for the flat that I'm renting for the next 10 days. I'm about to head out now and start looking for more places that are hiring.

Screw the busses in Edinburgh

I'm still in the process of looking for a job, having submitted well over 20 CVs to various bars around here. So far, I'm not having much luck, but I'm not too worried (yet).

The other day, I met this Spanish girl, Isaire (think that's the correct spelling), down at the computers in the hostel. She just moved here and is looking for a job and flat too. Last night, I ended up tagging along with her as she went to check out some flat, and while it didn't work for her, we ended up staying and talking to a couple of the tenants anyway. In line with the general trend I've noticed of Europeans not accepting any attempt at declining offers of hospitality, we were first treated (pretty much forced) to tea, then dinner, and finally desert. 3 hours later, we end up heading out to a pub for drinks with most of the people in the flat, and I'm seriously considering staying there for ten days while one of the guys, Lambert, visits his hometown in France.

I ended up having that first interview today, instead of yesterday, as I screwed up and hopped on the wrong bus, ending up on the wrong side of the coast. The place is 20+ minutes outside of the center of Edinburgh, which sucks, but it seemed like a pretty cool place. The interview went really well, but I need to get some paperwork filled out before I could start working there, so we'll see how that goes. Isaire came with, and we then went to look at another flat that didn't work out. We did kinda decide to start looking for a flat that we could possibly share.

We went for a walk after dinner and I was nearly run over by a bus (I'm not exaggerating). I had the green walk guy and started to cross the street when the bus went ahead and flew into the turn anyway, yelling at me in the process. That was the closest of a few close calls I had today, so I've been left a bit traumatized by the whole thing.

It's about midnight here and I'm trying to decide if I should go out tonight. Tomorrow is pretty much gong to be more of the same--searching for jobs and then heading out to look at more flats with Isaire and some other guy from her hostel.

Blah

This was going to be short anyways, but since I already wrote it out once before Explorer took a crap on me, it is going to be especially so. I've decided that I definitely did not give myself enough time to find a job, so I am going to try to reschedule my flight for the 27th at the earliest. If I don't find a job by then, I'm going to have to head home as my credit cards are not holding up all that well, especially not in the UK. I walked around New Town today, and though I only found one place to hand in my CV, I did send out at least seven through email today. Later tonight, I am going to go to what I believe to be (and have pretty much been told is) the biggest dive in Edinburgh, as they are hiring right now.

Last night, I went to the Wee Red Bar, a cool little place on the campus of the art college here for an indie night. While it was apparently unusually dead as there had been a big party on campus the night before, I did end up talking to a few locals, Mark, David, and Becca. Once the bar closed, we walked quite a way back to their place, and then Mark, David, and myself went to this party at the flat of this cool graphic designer from Canada. The place was so far out there that it wasn't even on my little map, but I somehow managed to find my way back to the hostel (after a 50+ minute walk), and got back just in time for breakfast-3 mini boxes of Frosted Flakes. Oh, how I have missed crappy American kids' cereal!

Who knew . . .

Looking for a job sucks. So far, I've turned in 4 CVs (yeah, bars here expect CVs from applicants), and am about to go back out and hand in a few more. I'm starting to think that it's going to take longer than I gave myself, so I'll have to call the airline and see what I can do about my ticket.

(Finally) Back in Edinburgh

Had another relatively hellish trip. When I was booking my flight back to the UK, some Brits assured me that there would be trains running to Edinburgh all night. I assumed that they knew what they were talking about and didn't bother to double check to make sure that I had time to make it from the airport to the train station to Edinburgh before things stopped running for the night. I got to King's Cross Station about 3 hours after the last train of the night to Edinburgh had left. I ended up spending a total of 6 hours in very cold, damp train stations this morning.
I am, however finally at the hostel this morning, and so far, it looks really cool. I'm going to do some laundry, sleep a bit more, and then start looking for a job.

Back to Edinburgh

I´ve spent the past two nights in Zagreb, which has been a decent experience. The people here are definitelz nicer than in Budapest or Belgrade. My first night in, the owner was absolutely no help with info on places to go, or even how to get into the main part of town. All she had to help me was a small map showing the locations of other hotels and hostels (which I seriously considered using), and a map showing the ?bars?around the hostel. Of course, they consisted of a cafe that was closed at that point. Last night was better as several people were having a joint birthday BBQ--I ate a lot of meat and then later, we went to this big party on the football field outside the student dorms.

I am heading back to Edinburgh, where I might meet up with someone who was staying in the hostel in Glasgow. It's weird, but because it's relative familiarity, it almost feels like I'm heading back 'home' (hopefully it will be for a short time).

Cyrillic Sucks!

Got into Belgrade last night and went out with a couple of the people from the hostel and some some girl who lives here. Went to get snacks and then to a pretty cool club/boat on the river for a while. Met some locals who showed me around a little bit (and pretty much forced me to smoke a couple Lucky Strikes too). Went to this cool park, Kalemegdan, which is right by my hostel, but because the street signs are all in Cyrillic and my map was in Latin, navigation was pretty much impossible. It ended up taking me 40 + minutes to make my way back to the hostel.

I got up relatively early (considering I got back at 5:00 am) and got some awesome pizza on Kneza Mihaila, a regrettably touristy shopping area right next to the hostel, where I had 5 little kids and eventually their mother come up and ask me for a piece of pizza. Then, I walked around a bit, trying to use landmarks to make sense of my half-useless map and find my way about. Think I'm going to this underground (literally) club tonight. It's pretty damned hot here (though I'm sure not really as much as Phoenix.