I’ve just been visiting New Castle with my mum. We decided a while back to go on a trip together, and since I love Britain and mum has wanted to visit New Castle for a long time, we decided on going there. Little did we know at the time that New Castle is a great place to go shopping. Well, we didn’t mind when we found out. Stuff in Britain is quite a bit cheaper than in Norway, and they also have brands and stores we don’t have, so I decided to take advantage of the great shopping opportunity by saving up some money to spend there.
We had also heard that New Castle is not particularly pretty. I disagree. It might not be the most spectacular and classy city I’ve seen. After all it’s a city based on industries like for example coal. But I found it very charming with all its pubs and restaurants and its elegant Grey Street.
Here are a few things I found interesting about our trip:
1. In New Castle old people go out shopping and visiting cafes. They seem to be all over the city during daytime. I felt this created a relaxed and enjoyable atmosphere. We need some old people in our lives to keep the pace down. ;)
2. There are all kinds of people in New Castle. I saw traditional, tea drinking, nicely dressed, typically polite and smiling English people. I also saw girls (and guys) in short skirts and no jackets at night, heavily made up girls with a double dose of mascara and too much foundation, kind of like the cover girls from the sixties… I saw several people with pink and purple hair, some of them over fortyfive. I saw even more tatoos than in Norway. I saw black clothes along with dyed hair and piercing. I also saw fewer redheads than expected; I thought my hair color would make me fit in. The city lacked of the main stream, nicely dressed style or the sporty style that often dominate first impressions of Norwegian cities. But I don’t see that as a bad thing. I like diversities. All the different styles I noticed matched my impressions of the British culture. It goes all the way from classy to tacky, new to old, all revealing or concealing what’s behind the clothes inside people’s hearts.
3. We ate at Friday’s one evening. We ordered Sizzling chicken with mashed potatoes, which was a great success. Our waitress was a extraordinary nice girl, showing interest and even telling us her name. She reminded me a little bit of Cheryl Cole with her looks and sympathetic behaviour. We came back for dessert the day after, and when I got the wrong type of Sundae the same waitress gave me a new one with extra ice cream and my money back!
4. We also talked to a Romanian guy, selling The big issue. I bought one for two pounds, and my mum gave him another two, which he gladly kept. His English was bad, but I think he tried to tell us that he’s got three children to feed and a high house rent. After contributing the four pounds we promised to pray for him, which didn’t seem to comfort him very much. I told God I hoped he would surprise him with his goodness after we left, and I trust he did.
5. There are lots of clubs and pubs in New Castle. The city is famous for being a party town, which we easily could tell even at 10pm. Even that early people were raving drunk in the streets and some couldn’t even stand on their feet, so they just laid down on the pavement instead. Some evenings we passed “Sinners” and “Babylon”, two clubs in the city centre. I didn’t know whether to cry of laugh – I think I did a bit of both on the inside while thinking to myself that this city must be a good place to evangelise…
6. On the flight home on Saturday the crew consisted of four male flight attendants in addition to the pilots of course. I’ve never experienced that before in my life. I must say they did a great job, just as good as any female attendant, only with a masculine touch. One of them I’m pretty sure was Scottish, judging from his accent, and his smile reminded me slightly of James McAwoy.
After my four days there I have concluded that I liked New Castle for its charm, but I loved it for its diversity. I’d love to go back sometime.
HildeLautenHalvorsen 