First few weeks in London

Again captured from emails with friends...goes backward in time to keep it more interesting :)
This weekend we got a lot of stuff done around the house so it's finally looking liveable. The girls trampoline is up and so is the garden shed where we can store the cycles. Our gym room is also set up. I'm meeting our neighbour for coffee on Friday when I'll discuss about our noisy treadmill and inform her that we would be making a lot of noise 3-4 times a week on the treadmill. Hope she doesn't freak out! Girls are finally going to school tomorrow. I can't say they are looking forward to it but over the weekend we met by friend in Hampstead who has a son A's age and the downstairs children who are all very nice so I told the girls that the children in london would also be nice. Keeping fingers crossed that they get nice classmates and teachers! We saw jungle book in 3D yesterday. It was excellent. N is travelling from tomorrow afternoon to Saturday - I think I'll use the time the girls are in school doing all the routine stuff - bank account, registering at a GP etc. would also like to walk around the area and figure out where stuff is. It's impossible to go browsing in a shop with the girls. 

Hello hello finally a sunny day here in london. Our treadmill is still not set up so I've started running on the road - from home to regents park, half a round there and back. It's about 6.5 km I think. It's much tougher to run on the road than on the treadmill I find, with the many ups and downs. The first 2-3 times I had to take many breaks but now I'm slowly improving. How is your jogging going - will you start again or is your knee still paining?


Today we went to the Hampstead Heath park which is about 1 mile from our house. The girls took their scooter but it was quite a steep climb up to reach the park. The park is lovely with a mini zoo with deer and rhea and kookkoburras. After that we had an Indian lunch and are back home and relaxing 😊 I went to open a bank account and they said they would not accept the lease agreement in nikhils name alongwith our marriage certificate and a declaration that we live together !!! I have to get a utility bill in my name..highly frustrating..

A random piece of info for you - I can throw all my recyclables - plastic glass cardboard etc into the green wheelie bin outside my house and they will pick it up on a weekly basis. No need to press and wrap the cardboard, lug the glass bottles to the recycling and go to coop with the plastic bottles 😊 I hope you are not sending glares my way now...

I must say its much colder in london than zurich - inside the appartment because of the single glazing and also outside its much more windy than zurich...

Car updates from London

Mail to a friend...
We got a car 😊 N found an Audi Q5 in the company pool and it was delivered on Friday. You know how much N loves driving so he got back from India on Saturday and we were already out on Sunday driving to Brighton - about 1 hr 45 mins away. He found it a bit tough adjusting to the right hand side of the road and was going too close to the cars on the left side but otherwise not too bad. I don't feel confident at all - firstly it's a big Audi Q5 ( I miss my small Clio), secondly it's manual and thirdly some of the roads are so small here..let's see maybe after a month I'll try.. Don't need it right now for school and not planned any activities as of now.

Hello from the other side

It's been a year since I posted. I thought I would capture our move to London through a series of emails I shared with friends...

Hello from the other side (of the Channel)..

How are you ladies doing? I really really miss you all so much and the girls miss their friends...

School started last Tuesday. Here's a photo of the girls in their uniform. I must say having a uniform makes life so much easier. No more arguments in the morning about what to wear! The hats are only for show, they are supposed to wear them to school and back but they were the only girls in school with the hats on the first day, so now the hats are in the cupboard to be taken out on a special day. The school is pretty strict about tying hair back, no nail polish etc (no earrings on PE day) but the girls have been quite cooperative. 

The school is completely the opposite of ICS. Its amongst the bigger ones in Hampstead which is why i was happy the girls got in with its own playground, but really its just one building with a playground. I won't complain though - they take the girls very week to Hampstead Heath for PE (we nearly missed the bus this week since i didn't know they had to come to school early that day). There's no parking allowed inside the school and nobody hangs around after school with the girls playing. Its just come and collect and go. About 50% of the people collecting are nannies and the other moms. I was quite surprised that its an international crowd- in A's class we had a coffee morning for the moms last Friday and there was not one British mum in the 8 mums who had turned up - a mix of Italian, Japanese, South American, Indian, New Zealand etc. Also quite a bit of students joining and leaving - certainly not as much as ICS but I thought it would be a very closed school with the same class together for all the years. 

The girls are still to settle down though -they really miss their friends. I thought A was ok but she told me today that for the last two days nobody was playing with her in the playground and today she went and found Akka and played with her. The teacher said A cried in class also the last two days as she found the writing and the science a bit tough. The positive is that A's teacher is really wonderful. She is very kind and open (i requested a short meeting with her and thought i would have to sign a yellow slip (yes that's how we can meet teachers here!) requesting a meeting but she just asked me to wait a few minutes and met me immediately after school. She said she was not going to out any pressure on A in terms of studies and in her view A was adjusting well socially but she would keep an eye out.

S's teacher on the other hand is a nightmare. She is very strict and quite unfriendly. On the second day of school, S was walking down with her at pick up time and I called out to S and she came and gave me her bag. The teacher shouted (yes shouted!) at S to get back in line and made her come back to me and take back her bag and blazer and I had to go to the hall after 5 mins to pick her up in the correct way! Seriously, for a new child? S was crying on the way back home. also when i asked her for a meeting to discuss how S is settling down she said she's very busy and not really spent much time with S yet so only after a couple of weeks more. Very reassuring!!

So when i asked A who S was playing with in th playground today when she went to her she said no one, and I could imagine the two of them playing by themselves in the playground. I felt bit sad but also glad that they at least had each other for company :)

Ok enough about the school. WE are slowly settling down here. setting up the house took a lot longer than expected. We are 80% there now - its livable but still too many things lying around the house and cluttering up all the rooms. We have a small garden area at the back where the girls now have a trampoline. Surprisingly the weather in London has not been that bad- its hasn't rained THAT much so the girls are able to jump on the trampoline at least every alternate day. The school is a 1 km trek from the house so I get a good 4 km exercise daily! For free :)

I like our neighbourhood. Its very close to the Finchley road high street and we have a tube station, bus stop and overground station all within 5 mins walk from the house. There\'s the O2 centre which has tons of eating places and a cinema and a gym/swimming pool and Sainsbury's also about 10 mins walk from our place. On the other side is Hampstead village which is very quaint with a village atmosphere and beyond that is the Hampstead Heath which is a lovely huge park. There are supposed to be very nice pubs around this area which we haven't got around to exploring yet- maybe when you guys come visit us :)

It's only been a week since the girls are back at school and i've been spending my days doing exciting stuff like getting a bank account opened, getting a mobile phone connection (I was rejected for a post paid connection since I did not have 5 years residence proof in UK so I've settled for a prepaid connection). I've also started running on the roads here- Regents park is about a 3km run from the house and Hampstead Heath is 1.5 km so its quite good for running. I met some of my old college and school friends. The moms in the school are not super friendly and as far as i know there are no school parent clubs like the book club etc which we had in ICS. Never mind. Maybe ill start my own book club :)

That's it for now. Do write back and keep me posted on the happenings in Zurich..