Saturday, January 10, 2009

Exlporing some of Preston

Preston is in the northwestern portion of England, in the county of Lancashire. They symbol for the region is a red rose (I should probably know why, but I don't), hence the red flowers on everything in Preston, including the UCLan symbol. By train, its about halfway between London and Glasgow, Scotland. The population of Preston is about 130,000, but it doesn't seem that big. The main place that students get food is ALDI, a German discount food store. There is one in Hoptown, and its really cheap. I get a kick out of British food names. Cheerios = Hoops (hahahaha). A bottle of honey = squeezy honey (once again, hahahaha). They sell wine and beer in ALDI as well, some for only 2 pounds, which blows my mind! It is really easy to take little American things for granted here. Like cold beverages. I haven't had a satifactorily cold drink in...well, since I got here. And knowing which way to look when crossing the street. This has serious, life altering consequences (lol). The best thing is that everyone is very eco-conscious...they are hyper-recyclers and reuse ALL their grocery bags.

I had a fairly lazy day today, but I managed to get to ALDI and take a few pictures of Preston and UCLan. Whitendale Hall...I live on the third floor with three other flatmates (I just loving saying flatmates). We share a kitchen and a bathroom, but each have our own room.


The Equator Cafe (haven't been there yet, but I will!) and the corner of the library (very nice...lots of Macs!).

A typcial street in Preston. Anywhere in England, really.

A big, friendly, orange pub...The Ship. Right next to campus.


Getting closer to the city center (downtown). It freaking gets dark here around 4PM. How depressing!

Here starts my humo
rous food pictures:

Not a good picture, but its Marmite Yeast Extract. What the heck IS that stuff? Any ideas?


And no one seems to know what "brown sauce" is. Definitely NOT barbeque sauce (trust me).

...And the fabulous wine/beer section at ALDI. And, no, I didn't get any. This time.


1 comment:

Petronious said...

Fantastic post man. I also stayed for one year in Preston (2001-2002), as a foreign student from Southern Europe, and I agree with your opinion and views. It is a bit depressing up there with such bad weather and dark conditions. I prefer Southern England. While in Preston I used to go to "Tokyo Jo's" (the fashionable club in Preston in 2001) for fun. It might not even exist any more. Take care.