United Kingdom

Huddersfield - Sep 93-Feb 94

I arrived in the UK at the beginning of September 1993. I was used to travel by train (see Frankfurt and Hamburg pages), so I took the train up to Huddersfield...

The trip was so long... It took nearly 24 hours of constant travel to cover the 1700 km. I first had to take the TGV (French High speed train) from Dijon to Paris. Then I had to take the Paris tube to another railway station, to take the train until Dieppe to embark on the ferry boat. Arriving in New-Haven, I had to take another train to London Victoria Station, then change of station to King Cross Station, take the train to Leeds, connect to a regional to Huddersfield... to finally reach my destination

As always during train travels, I met people. This time, it was an African priest from Sierra Leon, on the way to meet his brother living in England. He told the story of his country in constant war, with so much emotion in his voice, that all my attention was kept. Unfortunately, I never heard about him again.

At arrival, an indian man took me in his white British taxi... and I my experience of the UK really started. At that time, I was student, starting in 2nd year of BSc European Logistics in that new University.

So as to know people and improve my English, I joined as many societies of the University as I could. One of the most active, was the caving society. We went caving several times in the Dale National Park on weekends, sleeping in freezing small houses with no heating, nor light. This was a lot of fun.

I also took part in the Medieval Society, with whom I spent a full weekend dressed in medieval costum... and got one of the worst flue I ever caught. I also joined Nightline, meeting a lot of nice people there.
I spent a lot of time at the University pub, and having fun with my crazy neighbours. This was a very fun time indeed... after 5 months in Huddersfield, I went to Kempten, Germany.