Needless to say, the car became more of a priority as the days went by. The last day of December our pin numbers came in the "post," and we finally had access to our own money--YEAH!!! The money that we brought with us had run out, and we were trying to figure out how to simply stay afloat; so we literally did the dance of joy the first time we were able to withdraw money from the ATM! I can't remember being quite that relieved over something in a very long time.
Since we spent the first few weeks we were here doing the unmentionable --WALKING EVERYWHERE-- we're all very happy with it. (Actually, the mile-and-a-half walk in dress shoes to church was a bit much, but it was good for us and we survived just fine.) Add it to the character-building experiences list...
A wonderful brother in our ward drove us around to find a car and act as interpreter/U.K.-car-knowledge guy, and we couldn't have done it without him. Since we're only slated to be here for a year, we basically were looking for something reliable and inexpensive with low mileage--exactly what everyone else wants when they look for a used car. We very quickly discovered that cars here are not built with a family of seven in mind. The biggest type of car that's made in the U.K. is called an "estate car," which is basically a five-seater, short station wagon with two uncomfortable-looking pull-down seats in the trunk area. Since we knew we wanted to sightsee outside of the London area, those pull-down seats may not have been quite as wonderful as they sound for whoever pulled the short straw and got to sit in them for more than five minutes. So we started looking at alternatives.
We actually hit the jackpot when we found a guy who imports minivans from Japan, maintains and warranties them himself, and sells them at reasonable prices, so we bought one from him. Apparently Japan taxes people like crazy after their car hits 100,000 kilometers, so they sell them off cheaply to other left-side-driving countries. Their loss is our gain! The van is a 1999 Honda Odyssey (that the Brits call a "Shuttle"), only has around 60,000 miles, and is in great condition. It also has fun extras like seven real seats, a little bit of storage space behind the rear seats, parking sensors (so I don't hit anything while I'm trying to park in a miniature parking space or squeeze down a street originally built for a horse and buggy), and fold-in mirrors (also useful for narrow streets, and I've actually used them to squeeze through between the cars parked on both sides of a road, sensors beeping like crazy as I went). The best part is that the van comes complete with a built-in navigation system that will get you anywhere you want to go in Japan but nowhere in the U.K. and offers complimentary Japanese language lessons. Now if we could only figure out how to change the time on the clock...
During the car-buying saga, we even had a nice Englishman tell us that all Americans are fat because we get in our cars to go 10 feet and don't walk anywhere. When he realized what he had said, he backpedaled nicely by explaining that even though Americans are fat, we really don't have the infrastructure for public transportation and he supposed that walking really isn't much of an option with all that wide-open space. Though he's basically right on all accounts, we found it very humorous that he actually said it.
I also find it amusing that people keep stopping me "just to talk because they love my accent." We get the "you're from America, aren't you" query all of the time, and then there's invariably some form of wink accompanied with an "I could tell from your accent." I even had a guy from India tell me that he loves talking to Americans because we speak English so much more clearly than people from the U.K. and he can actually understand us; he obviously hasn't ever talked to someone who grew up in the deep south--sorry, Monica, big grin. Anyway, I don't know what they're talking about, since I'm not the one with the accent (big grin).
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