American Escapade

I have met so many people over the past month that the conversations are getting muddled in my head - who lived/travelled/worked where, favourite towns/foods/music, studies, stories, siblings...whew!

So anyway, Friday night housemate G and I went to the Embassy party at the Marines House and I had a wonderful time (although she is English she worked there last year). I had not been there since we applied for emigration. Somebody paid our entrance cover, which gets you a Marines stamp on your hand for the bar. I had forgotten how interesting international Americans are. I felt like...I was..."back home" BUT also that I was at all the college parties I had never been to (our university was Catholic and had no Greek system). The only difference here being that everyone was well-behaved and no one was noticeably drunk despite the drinks being free, and it was all over by 1am. No one even paid attention to the "last call"!

The bartenders were Marines and looked like grown up frat boys, but they were considerate in that they did not put too much alcohol into my drinks, they said so :) Hehe, Malibu and coke...which brings me to my next point - the loos, as I had to go quite often :)
You may laugh, but I couldn't help but notice that, after a while the M and F toilets were soon in use by both sexes, but what amazed me was that everyone without fail closed the toilet lid before leaving. I began to wonder if that had become part of basic training or something.

G and her ex-colleague J introduced me to a guy called R, highly attractive in a preppy ex-Army sort of way. (I've never met an American who served in Iraq before.) Also, I did not know I could have anything in common with a boy from Tennessee but I found that I do! Catholic uni education, Italy, art, psychology, intelligent conversation. I have to take notice of someone who compliments me for using the word "dichotomy". It's funny how when you're at a buzzing party, what people say just falls out of your head later on. He hadn't explored "downtown London" yet and mentioned that he wanted to go to the Tate Modern. Said something about the Marine formal ball, and embassy cars being fun! Argh!

All I know is, I wish I had given him my number when I thought of it. I keep learning, when you think of something, never hesitate or you will miss out. (G wouldn't stop asking me if I liked R, and observing how straight down the line he seems. Yes.)

I had also forgotten that well-educated southern boys were brought up to be such gentlemen. I would not know most of this because in Texas I was only ever friends with them. But a day after I told G, "He was like the grown up version of all the boys I knew at university" I slapped myself because I realised that they were all very lovely boys! Some of you may remember how excited I was about the Aussies. Well, now I am all excited about Americans. Ha, as if I didn't spend enough time over there. So to be finally treated like a woman worthy of notice by one....I was absolutely impressed.

After the party, the four of us went back to J's flat - gosh, the embassy puts its people into some lush properties - in our neighbourhood there are lots of Americans because of the American school, so you can imagine how nice it is. This place was impeccably decorated, with original artworks and sculptures. Couldn't see too much as it was dark and I only found the bathroom light switch after I left, hehe! But even in the bathroom there was a ship in a bottle on the window sill. All so picturesque.

We collapsed on the comfy sofas and fell asleep watching Seinfeld on DVD (I hadn't remembered it was SO funny, I thought I was going to turn inside out). R was out like a light as he'd been up since 5am the day before. G and I snuck out at 2am and walked the few minutes back to our house. :))

Next day my mother (yes I tell her all the gossip) in short, said, "Why didn't you do all that when you were at university?!?!?"