Since the weather has taken a turn for the better, it's been really lovely here at The Lawns. There's bird chirping everywhere, squirrels can be spotted running up and down trees and you almost trip over the amount of wild bunnies hopping around. It really brightens up the scenery.

I still need to do a lot for my courses; there's another essay due this coming week for An Introduction to Second Language Acquisition and I'm still waiting for feedback and my grade for the essay on The Rime of the Ancient Mariner I submitted over a month ago. Last Friday I also had to do a presentation for Writing Poetry Now. The task was to present a poem that's inspired your work or is otherwise important to you and to elaborate on it. I chose Walter de la Mare's Under the Rose, which I ran into when I was about ten while reading Tonke Dragt's Ogen van Tijgers. I really liked the mystery and dreaming it spoke of and I can still recite it ten years later.

Then last weekend I visited Nina (and Tessa, Nicki and Sven) in Birmingham. This is Nina:

Unfortunately, Birmingham is not particularly close to Hull AT ALL, so I had to get up at 4 on Saturday morning in order to be there at 9.

We went sightseeing for a bit, had sushi and pizza and went to the museum and library. While in the library, we found they had a partnership with Ancestry and offered a search through their database to find information on relatives. I searched a database from 1939, and found information on my grandmother, who was born in 1920. She was my age at the time, and I could see where she worked, who her siblings were, what her late mother's name was and that she became a Watkins upon marrying my grandfather, whom I never met. There was less information about him, just the location of his parish and his name, date of birth and age of death.

The Museum of Birmingham was interesting. We only went in half an hour before closing, so we just rushed through the important bit: sketches and artwork by Da Vinci. Incredible to see. Nina and Tessa also insisted on dragging me through the weirdest exhibit I've ever seen, something with smileys and the relationship between cute and ... murderous? It was unsettling.

I really miss those girls now though, and seeing them (and also the Hema they had at Birmingham station) actually made me a bit homesick.

The way back to Hull on Sunday was nice and peaceful. I read a bit, looked around at Sheffield's station during a 30-minute transfer and spent the first 3,5 hours relatively comfortably. That was, until I was back in Hull and had to get on a bus to get back home. It was around 11, so the bus was quiet and two girls sat on the seats next to me. That was fine, I just had my earphones in and was listening to music. Then I got the peculiar feeling they were talking about me, but just assumed my mind was playing tricks. Until I heard them say 'double-denim'. Then I went ah. You see, I was wearing both a denim pair of jeans and a denim jacket. Who cares, I liked my outfit.

I ignored it again, maybe they were talking about something else. They mentioned the phrase a couple of times again, but then they said something about red vans too. Which I just so happened to be wearing as well. They also mentioned Yorkshire pudding a couple of times, saying they hated it?

At this point, I decided I wanted to hear what they were talking about. So I turned off my music and took off my headphones. Of course, then they fell quit. So, I sent a voice message to a friend on Whatsapp in Dutch, to see what they would do. They didn't seem to be very bright, because I had a canvas bag saying Hull University with me prominently displayed in me lap, but alas. They then proceeded to do something that was just ... surreal.

They were busying themselves over their phones, until I heard Google Translate's voice saying: 'Je deteste le double denim'. I kid you not. They apparently thought I was French, and decided to do that?! And they didn't keep it at that one time, they played it no less than ten times. I was trying to make eye contact with them to say something about their behaviour but they wouldn't meet my eye. I sent another voice message in Dutch to see what they would do. They actually had Google Translate say' Je deteste le femme Francaise' ...... It was truly and out of body experience. When they had to get off, I called out Bye! to them, which they first ignored until they were nearly off the bus and then they shouted au revoir. When the bus started moving again they started laughing at me and waved at me, so I just smiled sweetly and waved back and went back to listening to Bowie. I found myself wishing I could have them stay behind at their school and write a couple of hundred lines.

But then I felt a tap on my shoulder from the guy behind me. He started what appeared to be an elevator pitch on his hat which was all the rage on social media and which no I didn't want to buy and no neither did my family or friends. But it turned out he didn't want to sell it, he seemed to be insecure about it. You see, the Yorkshire pudding the girls were talking about was in fact, his hat which they were making fun off.

We then bonded over the girls' idiotic behaviour and I told him his hat was awesome a couple of times until he seemed to be feeling better. We also discussed the trashy behaviour a lot of British people our age seem to display. He was actually and international student too, from Pakistan, but half-English as well.

I am still a bit astounded at what those girls thought to be able to get away with, but I also pity them because they must not have a lot going for them if they have to find amusement in mocking strangers publicly. Their remarks weren't particularly clever or cutting, so ultimately I don't really care. Now I have experienced true British culture, it seems.