So as you probably noted, my travel plans for last week changed and I never went to Paris as I originally had planned. My ticket was cancelled, so I ended up with another airline and so Paris didn’t work out this time. Which was OK because V was out of town anyway. Instead, I went directly to England and stayed with N, another Moldovan friend who lives in Oxford. It was actually my first trip to England in ten years, and I was quite excited about it. For about 2 seconds, I even played with the idea of checking out London as an option for relocation. Well-located in Europe, multi-cultural, with good universities, and lots of NGOs having HQs there, I thought it could be a possibility at least for a few years. Until I was met by the British weather. N claimed that it had been 20 degrees there just a few days earlier, and in fairness, also Skopje was hit by cold winds towards the end of our stay there. But the grey weather and especially the dampness reminded me of how heavy I find the winters in Northern Europe, and I immediately crossed London off the list. It was great seeing N though and to stay in Oxford for a few days (I had never been there before). Hopefully, it won’t be ten years before i go to England again! Here are a few pics:

Store where Alice Liddell, who inspired Lewis Carroll to write Alice in Wonderland, used to buy candy.

The inside of the Christ Church is apparently the inspiration for parts of Hogwarts. 

Does it get more British than the pub?