Accommodation

We (three fellow students from Regensburg) changed our bed & breakfast from The Times Hotel to South View Hotel. Only 20m down the road, but worlds apart. Finally clean bathrooms without the remains of the previous guests in, on and around the toilets/bathrooms. No breakfast there, but compared to the mouldy toasts we had next door that’s definitely a step up. The most important improvement – obviously – was wifi access in our bedrooms.

I sent out emails to about 15 landlords who had put up ads on gumtree.com and accommodationforstudents.com, three responded, but only to tell me that they were looking for tenants for the whole academic year. Success.

In an act of desperation, I went to a letting agency on Tuesday which also dealt with short term tenancies and arranged viewings of three different houses. One of them was fairly clean and in good condition. Two rooms left, a double and a single, however, both with the same rent.

Naturally, I was in a good mood when I went to the agency to sign the contracts for the double bedroom. I was just entering the office, when one of the staff members handed over some forms to another guy. I heard the address and was stuck with the single room. Great stuff. The fact that my VISA was rejected (I have no idea why) and I had to spend the entire afternoon texting with my parents (via whatsapp, fortunately I already had an O2 UK phone number with mobile data) to sort out a bank transfer didn’t exactly lift my mood.

At the end of the day, I was (more or less) happy with my overpriced single room. Two days later I finally have hot water and heating – the boiler was switched off and well-hidden. My three housemates won’t move in until the upcoming weekend, therefore, I cannot set up wifi yet.

The kitchen is in desperate need of a thorough cleaning.

Weather

Swansea: Rainy & windy, rainy & windy, rainy & windy, sunny & windy, rainy & windy, rainy & windy, sunny & windy, rainy & windy…

Music

Although incomparable to the awesome ELW autumn; I think I like Mozart’s:

• 28 September 2011: Night Birds + Ssssnakes + The Boneless Ones
• 04 October 2011: Static Radio + Nozzle + Antillectual + Hangmen

Actually not at Mozart’s but anyway.

• 09 December 2011 Mikey Erg! + The Arteries + The Slow Death

Food & Wifi

As mentioned beforehand, I don’t have wifi yet, thus you all have to wait a little longer for the Nothington, Jack Holmes, Todeskommando Atomsturm and Soey videos.

I have a kitchen now, but before then the take away restaurants (Chinese, Indian, Thai, Libanese, Japanese etc food) were a blessing.

I love Sainsbury’s for the vegan labelling of their home brand products.

Photos