Sharon

So this is a story about loss. It's the first thing that came into my mind. Erm. When I was seventeen my grandfather died um he was my Dad's father and his name was Harold. But everyone called him H for short because. He. Couldn't be bothered for them to say the rest of his name. And um he used to be a taxi driver, he was very charismatic. He used to tell a lot of lies but they were kind of funny white lies like he used to say, he had a finger that was. um. Black I don't know why how he got it but he used to lie about this, the reason why he had that, the black finger. Um anyway so he. Died quite quite suddenly when I was seventeen and I didn't get a chance to see him before he died. Um but prior to his death every week he would save up a pounds worth of pocket money for me. Uhm and he. Would then give it to me in kind of a lump sum when I'd see him. um and the last instalment that he's saved for me, my grandmother gave to me after he'd died uhm and I remember thinking that I should spend it on something wisely but. At the time um a friend had invited me um to like a foam party at this shit nightclub in Bournemouth. Um. And. I had the ten pounds in my purse so. In the end like the ten pounds went on entrance to this horrible foam party and kind of erm like basically I don't know drinking Bacardi Breezers or whatever it was I was drinking at the time. And erm I think like. It was a pretty good night overall like. Ok I hadn't really thought about it up until now but. I think something that I'll always regret was not spending that ten pounds even though obviously I'd still have the ten pounds that he gave me it's just a piece of paper but not spending that piece of paper on something more significant. And that's what came to my mind. 

Honeymoon.

So. A Few years ago. Well it was many years ago now, seems so. Um. I was with this guy. We were quite. Madly in love with each other. And we used to have crazy adventures. And one night we went to a rave in Brixton. And in the early hours of the morning. We got married in McDonald’s in Brixton. With erm. McDonald's. Straws as rings. We didn't actually get married but. You know. It. It felt like that. And then we had a honeymoon in Crystal Palace Park on the sphinxes. That's it. 

Jalal

Wait how long is it supposed to be? As in? Ok. So I first heard about One Direction in March of 2012. I was watching SNL, Saturday Night Live, and they were on it, and I was watching it, and I said hmm, who is that cute Pakistani boy?And so I did some research and I fell in love. So I decided that we were gonna get married, so I learned his name Zayn Javadd Malik. And so I wrote them letters every day and I tweeted them. I told them lots of nice, sweet things. I said you're Pakistani, I'm Libyan, we could fall in love and rule the world. I am, I was 20, now I'm 21. He is. One year younger than me I don't care, I don't care. And I really wanted to go to their concert, but I was forced to go and see a piece of theatre instead, it was called Steptoe and Son it was really good I really liked it but I still wanted to see One Direction. But I got a poster and I got a little cute little flag. Let's see. What else can I say. I went One Direction hunting in London. I went. To Primrose Hill that's where Harry Styles lives. Zayn lives in. He does. Right. I'm really bad I say really nasty things about Taylor Swift because I really don't like her, she said lots of nasty things about Harry Styles on national television. And she did a fake British accent and I thought that was really rude. um. So I don't like her. um. Sometimes I watch cute little YouTube videos of them like when they get drunk on the street and they go to weddings and they sing and I really like it. And now I'm just waiting to meet them while I'm here and fall in love then we can get married.

Jade

Um when I started college at the univer-university of Oregon over in the States I thought I was gonna be a journalism major. So I applied I took, all the pre-requisites you have to take the pre-requisites otherwise you cannot take the major I took all the pre-requisites, and I talked to an advisor and she said. You are um you got you got straight A's in all your classes you're don't worry, about getting into the school you applied for, you'll be fine. I said well should I make a back up schedule for next term just in case she said no don't worry about it don't worry about it. So I. Got online and found out I didn't get into the journalism school. And I was like shit what am I gonna do I have been planning this it's gonna mess up my entire degree. And I was so frustrated and I started crying so I called my Mom and she said well maybe it's a sign maybe you aren't supposed to be a journalist just, just pick other classes and explore, some other areas. And I was mad and I was online and I read about a class and I thought it was an architecture class and I was like. Just like whatever I hate my life right now, super-dramatic. And the first day of class I went and I'm looking, I'm like this isn't the architecture building I don't know where I am right now. Turns out that I was in a theatre arts class. I'd never done theatre ever before in my life and. I ended up being in a play in the university and I loved it and I totally fell in love with theatre and that's why I'm here in London now setting abroad setting theatre so. Crazy how it all worked out, it was literally a year ago this happened, a year ago I had no idea what I was gonna do because I didn't get into the journalism school and now here for two and a half months with eighteen other people from my department who have the same passion that I do and it's absolutely amazing.  

Chris

Uh. I stopped eating vegetables uh. When I was three. I was at nursery school and erm one lunchtime we were given a big. Bowl of vegetable soup. Ahm. And I, uhm at the time. I didn't like carrots very much so I thought I'd eat them first that meant that the peas would be saved for later and I'd have something to look forward to. But of uh some strange quirk of fate that day I had an large, a large quantity of. Carrots in my bowl and I. Was ill and had to be taken and lie down on the bed. And I was sick and. I kind of. It was very traumatic so I kind of stopped eating. Vegetables and all sorts of things. Ah initially my parents. Didn't really know because I'd hide it in a hole I found. In the living room. Which I think was where the gas pipe came in. There was a little hole and I, I'd just lift the lid and put this food down and then after a while they kind of realised and erm. A-and I think it was err you know there was a moment an opportunity missed there when they could have maybe sorted me out. It didn't happen and uhm so I continued not eating vegetables uhm. Until about a month ago and I had my first carrot a-about a month ago. Uhm. And it wasn't as bad as I thought ahm. I basically I have a friend who's a psychi-psychologist and she's been ill and so erm she thought she'd take me under her wing and try and change me and so she gave me a project with a carrot which involved. Keeping it by my bedside in a vase. And er touching it and being able to identify it in a line up. You know like if it was in the usual suspects I'd be able to spot. My carrot. Amongst five other carrots uhm. And then to think about. How the carrot has uhm. Come into the world. You know what sort of life it'd had in the field what what what what what sort of thing happened in the field during that time and all the different other interactions of of life. I also had to sort of watch some youtube videos on the benefits of carrots. Uhm which was really there were some really great ones a piece about keratin and some really great jokes about you never see a rabbit wearing glasses. Uhm. And err. Initially uhm. It started with a smoothie. So we met up and and err. Had a carrot smoothie. And uhm e-e-I think it. It was a bit strange because it was a bit like. I'm used to sweet things and so it was like it tasted like it was coming from the earth. But it was ok and I-I-I. 'Cause in the past I'd had a, a sort of reaction to to occasionally and I've wanted to vomit you know just when putting things in my mouth or. Or erm. It's just...got a real fear. And then erm we went out for my birthday and erm. I ordered steak and chips with a side order of carrots. And I left the carrots 'til the end and erm. And I cut them up into tiny little discs like one pence coins and I when they were err talking about other things I'd quickly slip one in and see what it was like and err. And. It wasn't so bad it was er er er it's not you know ever gonna replace cheese and onion crisps or anything but ahm you know I can I can kind of cope with that. And now I regularly have like carrot and apple smoothies err juice juice drinks now every couple of days and erm. I'm working towards my first tomato.

Madani

Ok, upheaval. I. Recently moved from Yorkshire where I'd been living for thirteen years to London. And I. I've just had a cigarette so forgive me. And I. Yes so I recently moved from Yorkshire to London after thirteen years of living in Yorkshire so I returned back home essentially to London. And. I think in those thirteen years in Yorkshire I would learn what it was to be a man. I kind of grow. Err I fall in love. I kind of see the world from a different vantage point, not just because of the geography of Yorkshire just. Because I had a greater sense of. You know, I felt a greater sense of the world a slightly more travelled. Hopefully relatively well-read ehm. I mean that, yeah so I felt really powerful leaving Yorkshire then you arrive in London this great metropolis. Errm. And it felt. It felt great actually coming back to London. It felt great in that, you kind of feel like the world is here, amongst you ehm. In kind of the language you hear on the streets and all the rest of it uhm. But I think my heart still yearns for Yorkshire. Years for a. Yearns for space, kind of like physical and mental space. Erm Kind of. Yeah kind of. Remem- yeah I think one takes for granted sort of after thirteen years what those. That you invest in relationships. And thirteen years of relationships is a long time to build relationships. I'm not, not to suggest that one isn't making new relationships but. Suppose certain relationships are born out of particular situations like sort of thing. So I'm excited by new relationships but. Erm. Yeah still raw I mean it's twelve months. I mean you'd think after a year I would've kind of made my peace with it but. But there's still something in me that feels like elastic like kind of. When I'm here I'm happy but I think in that moment I could go back.  

Gareth

Right. So. I'm Gareth uhm. My story is that uhm I-I was born overseas in Dar es Salaam in Tanzania ahm and when I was. Eleven years old my parents uhm. Well. They can't. Emigrate because they had come from the UK and they'd never planned to. Settle in Tanzania it just worked out that way. But they decided time had come and we were to return to the UK I say return. I'd never been to the UK so this was this was a time my. two Brothers and I was a was a new a new uh. chapter for us in coming to a foreign country. We'd always imagined that Britain was a land a wasteland of snow but where you could get everything there were forever shortages in Dar es Salaam but we used to get the Beano and the, the Dandy magazines uh comic and the annuals and the Christmas annuals always pictured a massive. Christmas pudding with uhm with with uhm loads of snow around it. So so the im- the idea was that was planted in my head was that Britain was a cold, snowy wasteland with everything you could ever want and loads of things on the TV. There was no TV in Dar es Salaam. Uhm. We left. Probably. The eleventh of December so that was pretty much the hottest time of the year in Dar es Salaam. It's only six degrees south of the equator so it was pretty hot. Uhm to fly to Munich uhm. With KLM and we were then to. The plan was to take a skiing trip in the Alps. This was a, a treat that my parents thought would be good for us because we'd never seen snow before. Uhm. Uh. Things went well until we got to Munich when my Dad discovered he'd lost his passport. So that made it difficult to enter uhm Vienna which was our next stop which we were going to do this err skiing. Uhm we. Had to put ourselves up in quite a dingy hotel where my younger brother who then would have been seven years old uhm had. A raging temperature so. We had to take him. He had to be taken to a, a doctor whilst my Dad had to go to the British consulate to explain where his passport was. It's extraordinary that he was allowed into the country without a passport. What made it worse was that in those days uhm the children were on my dad's passport so. My mum was the only person with a passport and, of the five of us. Uhm. Anyway uh David transpired to have German measles bit ironic as we were in Austria. Uhm and it was decided that we wouldn't go skiing probably not a good thing to do. No. So we needed to get a flight to the UK because uhm we were now changing plans and were told things were difficult it was uhm 19. 73 so we had the uhm er it was not long after the the six day war in fact. Just. Backtracking. The plane landed in Cairo. And. we. Had. Tanks. Lining up either side of the runway. As we pulled up because of course we. The war was in October we're flying in December. There was a-a Boeing 707 in the colours of uh erm the American erm. uh.. President uh. And we think it was Henry Kissinger who was on his sort of diplomacy around the middle east in those days. Nobody was allowed off the plane unless you were disembarking in Cairo and soldiers boarded the plane and looked menacingly at us it was all scary stuff when you're eleven years old so that's, thats a diversion so erm this is a better story than I thought it was. So uhm we haha. So we're we're in ah Vienna. Planes, we can't get a plane there's the, the fuel crisis. Unbeknown to us the IRA started its uhm mainland bombing campaign in in Britain ehm and plus there were the inevitable strikes that you got in the 1970's that made things difficult the other end. So. We were told that the best bet was to catch er a flight from Venice so we got on the train from Vienna to go down to Venice and that was a great adventure 'cause I hadn't been on a train before so that, that was that was great. Uhm. Now er the, the other snag it is that was the the time the transition when British European airways and BOAC were joined to become British Airways so we needed a BEA flight uhm. Which was hard to come by because of the transition. So get the train. Get down to Venice windswept uhm Venice very exciting to see this uhm amazing city with with all the canals uhm and er trams traipsing around Venice to try and get a flight. And not successful. The only place we're told we're likely to get a flight is in Munich. So we stayed one night in Venice. Back on the train, back up to Venice. Caught a flight there took us to Heathrow. When we got to Heathrow you couldn't leave your luggage anywhere because of bomb threats. There was the three day week. Uhm also there was petrol shortages so taxi drivers wouldn't stop for families because they thought they were only going to get short journeys, they'd only stop for businessmen so my dad had to stand out on the road and wait for one while my mum and three of us was hidden behind in an alleyway with all our luggage when a taxi pulled in we'd all come out and into the taxi and away we go. Ahm We had to spend about four or five days uhm in London to book a train to Wales which is where my Dad's from uhm the trains were short of fuel so therefore they only ran on certain days ahm so you couldn't just hop on a train and go. It was a bit like a third world country having lived all my life in a third world country I was coming to a very cold very desolate third world country where things didn't work and there were threats of bombs which it didn’t have back in Dar es Salaam where it was nice and warm and sunny ahm. Not a good introduction to the UK. So we arrive in Wales on Christmas eve. Bridgend. Previously my Dad had a Welsh accent they told me, I'd never heard it. So we arrived in Bridgend ahm and er tramp down the now then of course this is my Dad's hometown he's from a, a small village to the north of, of Bridgend called Bryncythin. We spent Christmas in the Ship Inn in Bridgend and we had to keep quiet. We were told off by the landlord because we were making too much noise bearing in mind my brother was seven I was ten ah and my older brother was thirteen so it would have been a bit boisterous and we didn't have any presents my mum and dad had to go out and buy presents on Christmas eve which is always er a challenge a difficulty. We had presents but we didn't have them with us am so er. I remember it was a happy Christmas although fraught with the fact that the pub. Wanted. To erm run it's own. Business of course selling drinks and whatever and they didn't really want young children and of course in those days children weren't allowed in pubs like they are today. Ahm and er we weren't. We weren't. Allowed downstairs. We did have Christmas lunch how did we manage that? I think it was brought up to the room. Ah so and then. Uhmm shortly after Christmas day we then went looking for somewhere to stay in a rented house so on just before new year mum and dad managed to get us a rented house and things went well from there. But it wasn't a great, a great a good story but not a great start. It was a hell of a shock to discover what cold is. In fact I wore a parka coat all that year.