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SEPTEMBER 1998 - MAY 1999 PART 3

This part will be about family, school and friends. Let's start with the place I lived at. It was in Coxheath - 20 minutes by bus from Maidstone.

I was lucky because in my street there was a elder guy who I used to go to very often. His English was very good and he kept correcting me and teaching me English customs and habits and that helped me a lot. His name is Phil. It always stank in his place so I wore just one kind of clothes when I went to see him. He loved dogs and cats (as all the people there) and since he was old and single he didn't care much about cleanliness of his place.

The family I stayed at consists of 3 people and a dog. John, Liam and Nathan. When I came there Liam was 12 and Nathan 10. The dog's name is Max and they got him from a shelter so no one knows how old he is.

As I said we lived in Coxheath but half a year later they moved to Maidstone which was better for all of them. Mostly because of the kids' schools. For me it would have been also better because I had to take a bus to Maidstone and one way cost a bit over a Quid which is funny because I pay 2 Pounds to get from Prague to Brno which is 130 miles.

I liked the family and I hope they liked me. The kids used to come to my room to watch TV with me, we played keyboards, Playstation and stuff. Needless to say, sometimes it was boring during weekends when we didn't go out or to a trip but I could practice my favourite activity - sleeping (usually till midday). Those days I was lucky we had Sky Digital and even though I don't consider watching TV the best activity I watched TV often as it was in English and it again helped me improve my English knowledge. The biggest problem was there were weren't many people to hang out during weekends. All of my neighbours' kids were much younger so I couldn't be with them during weekends. And because I didn't have a car I couldn't see the rest of my schoolmates who were bored as well.

I suppose I should say something about my schoolmates because they were the people I always looked forward to seeing.

Although I put here some pictures with them I'm sorry there are not all of them. I hope they won't get deeply hurt if they read this (I don't suppose anyone reads it anyway) and don't find themselves on any of those pictures.

Our favourite place was the Muggleton's Inn which is a huge 2 storey pub which gets crowded every night. It's just in the town centre and the best was that a pint of our beloved Guinness or Pilsner Urqell or Bacardi Breezer/Metz cost around GBP 1.50 which is really good for England. So usual Friday or Saturday night started in this pub and then we moved to the Liquid Lounge which was a cool club with oldies music and where the admission was for free. Now, I may look like a cheap person who always thinks about where to economize but before I started working it had been hard for me and after I started working we had to bear in mind the others who couldn't afford it and we wanted to be equal.

If there was no trip and we felt like going out our favourite activity was meeting in the town centre and go to the movies, swimming pool, walks or to Moat Park which is a big park with a pond in the middle.

Well, this is probably all I can say. I really miss the people from there and not only my schoolmates. I have been to England a couple of times since I then and I'm really happy to always come back. I'm glad that we haven't forgotten one another and keep visiting. We spent last New Year's Eve with my schoolmates from England together and I consider this a proof of good friendship.

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