Sand Dancer Goes Stateside

My American adventure and what had arguably been the best (and craziest) summer of my life thus far was drawing to an end and our last destination was Atlantic City. I was particularly excited about visiting 'The Las Vegas of the East' since I'd watched it so fondly in 'Boardwalk Empire' and was looking forward to a few days strolling along the promenade and looking out over the sea.

Although the weather was cold and drizzly - we had picked the worst possible time to visit Atlantic City - our hotel room was the size of an apartment and we had a swimming pool and hot tub up on the roof. And even though the woman at the desk was off her rocker and conducted familial conflicts via telephone in front of the hotel guests, La Renaissance Suites was probably my favourite hotel of the whole three weeks.

The fact that we couldn't sunbathe didn't really bother me - it was nice to get wrapped up and have a walk down the boardwalk without the added irritation of millions of tourists. The thing I liked the most about Atlantic City was its quirkiness, which was demonstrated in spectacular water and light shows held throughout the day and night.

My initial expectations of Atlantic City was that it would be a bit like Blackpool - cheap and nasty. But I couldn't have been more wrong. It was kind of majestic, in a way: all the casinos stood grandly along the boardwalk, boasting glitz and glamour, and I found it quite beautiful (minus the flocks of seagulls and pigeons that dive-bombed everywhere giving me frequent heart flutters).

Of all the places I've seen over the past three and a half months, Atlantic City is top of the 'revisit list'. I would love to go back in peak season to see how different the boardwalk is and to see the hustle and bustle that summertime brings.

After recovering from the stress of Washington DC we travelled onwards to Philadelphia to stay in a cottage in the woods for $20 a night. We were met by an oddball of a man who asked us if we were married and when we replied negatively he proceeded to warn us that there was a ‘no love-making’ policy in our room. He then let out a nervous laugh and uttered, ‘Just kidding – fornicate all you like!’. Upon seeing our blank faces, said man – who was coincidentally named Aaron – burst into a tirade professing how lonely he was and made us promise to give him a cuddle to impede his mid-life crisis.

We kicked off our one and only full day in Philly by dipping into our limited finances for the privilege of walking round a graveyard containing the bodies some blokes who signed something to do with American independence. Benjamin Franklin was the only one I’d heard of so I decided to conform to the behaviour of the crowds and throw a penny on his grave for the bants. I’m still yet to Google him to find out what the big deal was but, for now, I can tell everyone back in Blightly that I paid $2 (and a penny) to stand above his bones. We also saw the Liberty Bell, which was something else to do with American independence, and after waiting 40 minutes in a queue I wasn’t even that fussed about it anymore and focused my attention on some retail therapy. 

Well, well, well. Washington DC. Where do I even start?...

I’ll set the scene by saying that the journey from Chicago was an epic 20 hour marathon on the Greyhound bus, which hoyed all the passengers off in random parts of the USA at two and three o’ clock in the morning for hours at a time so the bus could be ‘serviced’. The best part of it is that the driver had clearly never driven to Washington DC before and every hour we’d hear an announcement over the microphone saying ‘Sorry, folks, as you can probably tell I’ve made another wrong turn’ as we drove through wilderness with no civilisation in sight. We finally arrived in DC THREE HOURS later than planned after a passenger took it upon himself to direct the driver to the bus stop after he drove, obliviously, right past it, much to the dismay of everyone on board who had already started hurling abuse at him such as ‘What is this guy DOIN’, man?!’ So when we eventually got off the bus after a journey that ended up taking nearly 24 hours, we went to collect our luggage and be on our merry way to our accommodation. But, as I keep saying, this is my life we’re talking about and nothing is as simple as getting on a bus, getting off said bus, collecting your luggage and going to your accommodation. In fact, when we got off the bus there was no luggage in sight. We approached the man who had hauled all the bags that had made it to DC off the bus and we told him that ours must still be on there. His only response to our panicking was ‘There are no more bags on the bus’, which he shouted in our faces approximately ten times. It is at this point in the story, my friends, where my most favourite American woman thus far enters my life for the very first time. I invite you all to meet Dianne: a huge, black American woman with no soul and not really much enthusiasm to even live, only to chew gum directly in your face as you beg her for help. Dianne greeted us with an almighty sigh as we were beside ourselves with panic due to the fact that nobody had a clue about the location of our possessions and – besides us – nobody even cared. Dianne carried on chewing her gum and sighed some more as we demanded to know what her company had done with our bags. Her only response was ‘I don’t know what you want me to do about these bags’. Erm, find them, perhaps, you silly mare?!?!?! We were eventually passed over to a woman who was equally as unhelpful as she suggested that she gave us a number to call to see if anyone could help, which was particularly useless since we didn’t even have a phone between us. As in all emergencies, the only thing I could think of doing was contacting my parents back in the UK and, after a ‘don’t mess with me’ geordie threat from my dad to Greyhound, our bags were finally back on the map in Cleveland, Ohio, after they had been removed halfway through the trip. Since Cleveland, Ohio, is miles and miles away from Washington DC, we had to spend the night in our dirty clothes for the third day in a row until our bags arrived the next morning. And at that point I had pretty much accepted the fact that we were probably never going to see them again.

Soldiering on, we made our way to the hostel we had booked to stay at for our three nights in DC. I say ‘hostel’, it was more like a grand old mansion that seemed too good to be true...We were greeted by a man named Joshua whose face dropped when we told him that we’d booked a private room online. He responded to our arrival by shaking his head profusely and muttering ‘no’ repeatedly before telling us that the website had gone mental and, well basically, there was no room at the inn. As if things couldn’t get any worse for us, we had had our bags swiped from underneath our noses and now we had no bed for the night. That was the final straw that broke my patience and I lost it with this Joshua guy, demanding that he find us somewhere to stay for the night for the same price, which proved a rather difficult feat in the centre of Washington DC at such short notice. The outcome of our heated ‘no nonsense’ exchange somehow resulted in him suggesting that we stay in a $300 a night hotel in the poshest part of DC that night and in his mansion for free the next two nights, effectively working out at $100 per night that we were meant to be paying anyway. My lack of faith in humankind made me force him to put his promise in writing so he couldn’t accidentally-on-purpose forget about our little chat the next day. And off we went to Dupoint Circle, spending another $20 on a taxi and smelling – and feeling – like crap.

After a luxurious night’s sleep in an actual real bed with soft sheets and fluffy pillows, we awoke to reface the nightmare of the Greyhound bus. We made our way, once more, to the Greyhound terminal to collect our bags and – to our delight – we were once again filled with the joy-inducing, radiant smile of – yep, you guessed it – Dianne, who, this time, was slurping on a can of Sprite to compliment her chewing gum. Her eyes rose to the heavens as she saw us walk up to her and she let out another almighty sigh as we said, in our most cheerful voices, ‘Hi, it’s us again. You lost our bags yesterday so now we’re here to collect them’. As if it was an effort to talk, words slowly dribbled from her mouth that were, apparently, directions to the old Greyhound terminal where our bags had been carted off to. In the middle of this, the full bottle of Pepsi I had in my bag somehow managed to escape and explode all over the floor of the ticket office and all over the smart, business attire of the gentleman behind me. As the room burst into commotion and everyone rushed to find napkins to wipe down the poor man who was covered from head to toe in Pepsi, Dianne failed to even look up from her computer and survey the chaos. Thinking that she hadn’t realised what had just happened since she was continuing to give us directions, we reiterated ‘We’ve just spilled Pepsi all over your floor, do you have something to clean it up with?’ to which she replied ‘I heard you the first time’, her eyes still on the screen. We then asked, ‘So, do you not want us to clean it up?’ before she stared at us (or through us – not sure which) and simply said ‘No’, as if we had just asked the most ridiculous question in the world. 

We did eventually get our suitcases back, no thanks to Dianne’s shoddy directions to the old bus terminal that was completely closed off apart from a dodgy, little door round the size through which we had to go. The rest of Washington DC was stress-free – believe it or not – and Joshua kept his word and gave us a swanky room with a jacuzzi bath completely on the house. We also met the coolest bus driver in the US, who beeped his horn repeatedly as he mowed through a row of taxis that had parked in his stop. He then threatened to vacate the bus and batter some guy who had shouted through the door ‘Do you have to beep?’ before he drove off, sounding the horn in his face as we went. However, our trip to DC was not complete without one last visit to the Greyhound bus terminal as we left for Philadelphia. We hoped and prayed for that familiar face behind the desk as we walked in to check our luggage and, lo and behold, she was there, gum and all. As we bid our farewells, I was secretly sad to see her go and you know what? I’m really going to miss Dianne, the little rascal. We’ve had our ups and downs but now we know where we stand with one another and, given the chance, we could have had a beautiful friendship*…

I will briefly skim over my Chicagoan events, primarily because they didn’t provide me with enough material to write anything worth reading. In fact, to make it easier for us all, if you really want to know about Chicago you can have a look over these here bullet points. (Don’t say I’m not good to you).

1) Upon buying our tickets for the Chicago metro and failing to understand how to run them through the barriers, we were greeted by a smiling, bubbly, friendly, American woman (!) who screamed ‘OVER! OVER! OVER! OVER! OVER!’ repeatedly in our faces as we struggled to work out which way to insert our tickets.

2) Our ‘private room’ consisted of a bunk bed with a metre of space to walk around in and was located right next to the front desk meaning that we could hear every single conversation that went on through the paper thin walls.

3) Chicago pizza is epic and is too humongous to even fit on the table.

4) We went up the Willis Tower and walked along the Magnificent Mile and I bought some nice clothes in Wicker Park and we drank beer and we watched the Man United game and we played pool and it was really good and we had a nice time.

After an eight hour bus followed by seven hour layover in Atlanta followed by another eight hour bus, I was not the happiest of campers and was pretty much ready to throttle the next person who crossed me. We had already been given grief by the Megabus crew who said our luggage was too heavy and so we had to empty half of it into carrier bags and take them all on board with us, despite the fact that the bus was almost empty. The first thing we were told as we settled down in our sleeping place for the night was ‘You are GOING to be cold. Don’t ask me to turn the air off because I have NO CONTROL over it’. As the peasant wagon departed, I reflected upon my decision to travel America from underneath my blanket AKA wet towel.

Just as I thought I had lost all faith in America and had Rule Britannia on a loop in my head to keep me sane as I counted down the hours until I returned to warmth, comfort and friendly people, we arrived in Memphis, Tennessee. I couldn’t believe what was happening when we weren’t accosted on the way to the motel by beggars or lunatics and, upon arrival, we were spoken to as if we were actual, real-life, civilised human beings. What a turn up for the books! We were moving up in the world. After cursing ourselves for only having a day in this wondrous city, we decided to make the most of it by being the only people under the age of 50 to visit Graceland. It was amazing to think that Elvis Presley actually lived where we were standing and was buried right next to our feet. And I’d never noticed before but Mr. Presley was actually quite a handsome and charming young fellow. A success all round.

Perhaps my most favourite event of the whole summer took place – completely accidentally – in Memphis. The Peabody Hotel, unbeknownst to me, is a place for high-flying celebs to hang out and every US president there has ever been has stayed there. They have a world-famous water fountain in the lobby, which is host to a lovely little family of ducks who happily swim around in there all day. Through complete luck, we entered the lobby just as the ducks were preparing to do their famous march out of the fountain, down the red carpet, into the elevator and back to their hotel room. Google it, I dare you.

We also got the chance to visit the old motel site at which Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated – also by complete chance as my American history is so bad that I didn’t even know he was assassinated in Memphis.  Although it has now been transformed into a civil rights museum, the actual room in which he stayed and outside which he was shot has been maintained and a wreath marks the spot where he stood on that day. As I stood there being humbled, I couldn’t help having a cheeky look around to make sure there were no snipers waiting to take me down. Well, you never know.

I knew I was going to hate New Orleans as soon as I stepped off the plane and into the world of Crazy Taxi. Everywhere I looked I saw cars that were on the verge of being written off and I leapt straight into the clutches of a madman who had no regard for those around him and was hopping across the massive stretch of lanes like there was no tomorrow. As I keep reiterating, I am a nervous passenger, but this was no overreaction; I have never felt so close to death before and having my limbs scattered across a New Orleans motorway is a far cry from the comfortable bed in which I see myself departing from this world 60 years down the line. The only redeeming factor was that the taxi windows were wide open and, coupled with the sheer velocity at which we were travelling, there were very few moments at which my face was not masked by my windswept mane which shielded me from impending doom.

The moments I did catch a glimpse of the place I would be staying for the next five nights were – for want of a better word – soul-destroying. We appeared to be driving through a third world slum where people were almost jumping into the car and tearing the clothes from our very backs. In fact, the inhabitants of New Orleans reminded me of Shaun of the Dead; I didn’t want to get too close in case I was sucked in and became one of them. Every car park was a makeshift home for the homeless and every building was being left to rot after Hurricane Katrina struck five years ago. It seemed as if everyone had given up on rebuilding New Orleans just for it to be demolished by the next hurricane that struck but let me just say that there is a reason the third little pig built his house out of bricks. Have a think about that one when the next bit of wind blows your community down, New Orleans.

When we eventually rocked up at the building we were staying in and realised that it was not actually abandoned, the first sign we encountered read ‘no refunds’. Now, I guess that should probably have been a warning sign for us to up and run there and then and, wanting to know more about what I was letting myself in for, I logged onto TripAdvisor and came face to face with a review entitled ‘Nightmare on Magazine Street’. Once I started reading I couldn’t stop and I trawled through thousands of terrible reviews of St Vincent’s Guest House as the reality hit us that we had made a terrible mistake. Our room was on the second floor and looked out onto a balcony of rotting wood, which looked like it could give way at any moment. Not that the lovely people at St Vincent’s even bothered to tell us that. In fact, I would have welcomed the early escape from the house of terrors and looked at the veranda most fondly as the days went on…With us as the exceptions, the nightmare on Magazine Street appeared to provide a shelter for the waifs and strays of New Orleans with its employees being plucked from the roadside and given a roof over their heads in exchange for their services. Call me prejudicial but I was rather concerned about leaving my MacBook, iPad, Kindle and Beats headphones in my room while someone from the street with no possessions of their own came in to have their wicked way with them. And the lack of hot water in the shower required me to bathe myself by filling up a Burger King cup with water from the tap and pouring it over my body several hundred times. Ahhhhh, luxury.

With only the tiniest sliver of my soul still in tact, I headed into the town centre thinking that it would be rich in pretty architecture, shops and restaurants that a young, British woman such as myself could enjoy. However, as it happened, we managed to stumble upon Bourbon Street – New Orleans’ most famous street, in fact – and within seconds it was clear that we had come face to face with a monster that was tackier than Blackpool Illuminations. There were neon signs, strip joints and cheap booze everywhere: the pervy old man’s oasis. I can see why Tennessee Williams chose a backdrop so steeped in broken dreams for A Streetcar Named Desire. After roaming the streets in dismay and fearing we would starve to death if we dismissed any more of the restaurants New Orleans had to offer, exhaustion prevailed and we dragged our tired feet into a café in the French Quarter. As if things couldn’t get any worse, I was threatened by an army of pigeons who refused to vacate the area around my feet after I accidentally dropped a chip on the ground, which led to a massive scene in the middle of the café where I was driven out of my seat and refused to return until the pigeons were gone, as people looked on with smirks splattered across their smug faces. And some wise-guy had the audacity to look at me when I was in a blind panic and on the verge of mental collapse and say ‘You don’t like the pigeons, huh?’ Well, well done, Sherlock Holmes. Big gold star for you. 

Returning to the streetcar theme, we thought it only right that we experienced one for ourselves, thus we hopped on a streetcar named ‘Cemeteries’ to check out the graves of those who had plummeted to their deaths from the balcony of room 65 at St Vincent’s. Because of the potential for natural disasters in New Orleans, nobody can be buried below ground. Instead, everyone gets a grand ol’ tomb to lie rotting in so that when the land floods the corpses aren’t brought back up to the surface and swept across the city. Although, I doubt anyone would even notice if they were, considering how downtrodden the area is in the first place. It would probably give it some character. 

The only time I really felt safe in New Orleans was ironically on a tiny boat wading through an alligator-infested swamp. Since I had already carried out a spot of whale-watching, my affinity for the natural world was at an all time high and I fancied seeing some ‘gators in their natural habitat (and possibly throwing myself in as bait). I already mentioned that my whale-watching experience wasn’t the best but the swamp tour was incredible, despite some posh English bird responding to the tour guide ‘Someone falling in’ when asked what she had come here to see. I was ready to volunteer to make her dreams come true and push the silly mare in myself. However, I was distracted by the hoards of alligators all over the shop munching on the marshmallows and hotdogs that the tour guide had to offer. The thing that made me happiest was that I forgot about St Vincent’s for a good few hours as I considered myself the next Steve Irwin. After a good long think, I decided that I actually like alligators more than humans. They are a lot less hassle and a lot less rude.

An unwelcome 4am alarm call on Wednesday morning signalled the end of my beautiful friendship with The City That Never Sleeps in favour of pastures new - the place I’ve been dreaming of ever since I heard Will Smith’s emotional tribute when I was eight years old; the time had finally come to party in the city when the heat is on, all night on the beach ‘til the break of dawn (and nothing had ever been more up my street…) 

Now, 4am is never a good hour for me to be awake but having to faff about transporting luggage hither and thither on fifty different methods of public transportation made it all the more unbelievably depressing. To add to our misery, when attempting to vacate the bus with our worldly possessions in tow, the bus driver decided to lock us in and drive off from the stop at which we were so clearly trying to disembark: the airport terminals. After banging on the door and prompting loud Americans to shout ‘Driver, stop the bus! Open the back door!’ we were eventually tossed out of the moving vehicle into a puddle that came up to our knees with our luggage following closely behind like when someone from Eastenders is caught cheating.

After an hour’s delay (naturally - this is my life we’re talking about here), we landed in the ‘sunshine state’ and began the two hour journey to the motel in Miami Beach, a time spent putting all our greatest efforts into stopping that infamous rucksack of mine from tumbling down from the rafters and bludgeoning some unsuspecting victim on the noggin. I am a nervous passenger at the best of times but having to watch over an unruly rucksack while the bus you are on is speeding through the streets of Miami at a million miles per hour with no regard for its surroundings sent my stress levels soaring through the roof.

That afternoon, we decided to go to the beach, which was uncharacteristically five minutes from our accommodation. However, those five small blocks of sixty seconds apiece still managed to bring with them another typically disturbing event in the life of Devon Bianchi. As we approached the beach, we saw what appeared to be a scarecrow pushing a shopping trolley full of props that seemed to have been lifted directly from the set of Stomp, bin lids and all, on the horizon. As the figure moved closer step by step, her bare feet dragging across the hot sand, she locked her eyes on ours, paralysing us with her Medusa stare. Then, she took a deep breath, leaned in towards us, so close that we could feel her warm breath on our faces, and broke the deadly silence with a single eerie whisper: ‘There’s a storm coming’. Then, just like that, she wandered off into the distance while I attempted to work out how and when Shutter Island had become reality. 

Luckily, we escaped being murdered in our beds that night and lived to experience the ultimate lads holiday destination that is South Beach, Miami, the following day after being yelled at by another crazy bus driver (‘YOU sit down and YOU pay’). As we wandered through the streets that were littered with topless men and orange women we succumbed to the temptation of alcohol and joined the masses in a spot of civilised light refreshment that took the form of an ultimate litre-sized margarita cocktail that was bigger than our heads and complete with two bottles of Corona sticking out the top. Each. Two hours (and a lot of willpower) later, we left our empty glasses (well, glass bowls) behind and stumbled back to our room, falling into an alcohol-induced slumber by 10 o’ clock.

Other highlights of the Miami experience include accidentally befriending a mentally unhinged Australian maniac whilst waiting for the bus who screamed in a beggar’s face, ‘WE ALREADY TOLD YOU WE HAVE NO MONEY! GO AWAY AND LEAVE US ALONE!’, having to get a taxi back to the motel after the bus we waited half an hour for drove straight past the bus stop without us on it, and seeing a man break his face by walking into a lamppost he failed to notice. And, yes, America is pushing me in favour of Oxford comma usage, so sue me. 

The past few days in NYC have constituted the most bafflingly crazy time of my US adventure thus far. On Wednesday, I thought it would be a nice idea to hang outside the front of the apartment and soak up the sun whilst indulging in the latest Sherlock Holmes novel on the ol' Kindle. Now, I will probably never know what possessed me to sit outside on the street when I am perfectly aware of the gangstaz that congregate there doing their dodgy dealings and illicit substance smoking. I say 'gangstaz' as opposed to 'gangsters' because I am under the impression that they might not necessarily stab you without reason, the little tinkers, although I don't think I could have been more out of place: a young, white girl quietly reading on the front step surrounded by massive, black men blasting rap music from their car windows whispering 'Ooooh, ain't you pretty?' and 'Enjoyin' the sun, huh? Can I sit witchoo?' whilst grabbing their crotches. Well, gentlemen, I'm afraid the answer is no.

Thursday was a day that brought with it a ticket to the America's Got Talent final. One of the friends I made during the summer who was performing at the Story Land circus actually got through to the finals with his act, Olate Dogs, and so off I went to Newark, New Jersey, to mingle with Sharon Osbourne, Howard Stern and Howie Mandel. Despite being told off by security for taking pictures and having to sit through a painful attempt at humour by Joan Rivers, the night was thoroughly enjoyable. The craziest part was when Nick Cannon announced the winner and it was only bloody Olate Dogs! And it just made me contemplate what kind of warped summer I've had when someone I sat chilling with in the Linderhof chalet was crowned - on live TV in front of the whole of the United States - as the winner of America's Got Talent...Absolute madness, I tell you.

My appearance on American TV didn't stop at America's Got Talent. Oh no. Now that I'd had a taste for it I wanted more and on Friday one of my lifelong dreams finally came true...I was a member of the Jeremy Kyle Show USA audience - the place where dreams are made. I have applied to be on the UK version of the show so many times, purely for comedy value, and, let me tell you, if you think the UK show is bad you should see the US version. Everything is amplified by 100% so shouting becomes screaming, crying becomes wailing and fighting becomes punching each other in the face. It is wonderful. To my delight, as we took our seats and prepared for an hour and a half of pure entertainment, we were informed that the first story of the day involved a DNA test. Brilliant! None of this family reunion nonsense, I was getting women who had cheated while their husbands were in prison and surprise fathers - the lot. And I couldn't believe my luck when next up was a lie-detector! What's better is that the guy was lying and Jeremy was shouting in his face 'You're a LIAR and you know what? You should have put something on the end of it!' Oh, good old Jeremy, the smarmy, horrible, arrogant, little man that he is. He came up with some great one-liners that day including 'Don't talk to me about family values, you can't even spell the word 'value'' (cue cheering and whooping from the audience, myself included). All in all, being a member of the Jeremy Kyle Show USA audience, I feel, was an extremely enriching cultural experience. And I even had a bit of banter with Mr Kyle himself about being from the north-east, after which I was applauded - I think purely for just existing - by the rest of the audience. Bloody marvellous.

Friday night was the night I was most looking forward to in my calendar of events: the night of seeing Russell Brand perform in Long Island. Now, first things first, Long Island really isn't as glamorous as it sounds. In fact, after a 45 minute train ride into the big, wide open we found ourselves traipsing through what can only be described as a 'Latino slum' in a two-mile pursuit of the venue, me wearing sandals that I kept tripping over and my friend, Tom, carrying a huge, empty piece of luggage that he'd just purchased. When we finally arrived - and successfully got through an interrogation as to why we were bringing an empty suitcase into the show with us - we took our seats, seats that were probably around 10 metres (at most) from the stage. The venue was tiny and the show wasn't sold out meaning that Russell came right up next to us and even gave the girl next to me a cuddle, to which I responded by drawing as little attention to myself as possible and pretended that nothing of any note was going on around me - you know, never meet your idols and all that? Mr Brand was hilariously charming, as usual, and I hasten to add that the intimacy of it all rendered it one of the best shows of his that I've seen - certainly a lot better than having to watch him through binoculars in the UK (if it's even possible to get a ticket).

For someone who isn't a sports fan, I have been seeing a vast number of sporting events during my time here in the US; on Sunday it was the turn of American football to make an appearance in my life. Despite not knowing the rules, I happily went along to see the New York Jets take on the Buffalo Bills at their stadium, which, naturally, is situated in the state of New Jersey (?). I thought that if I'm capable of obtaining a first class honours degree then theoretically I should be capable of picking up the rules of the NFL, right? Wrong. It transpires that American football is actually not the same as rugby (yet both sports require helmets and a rugby-shaped ball - weird) and is fundamentally based on distances, measurements and 15-minute 'quarters' that somehow turn out to last an hour each, rendering a game which, technically, should last an hour last four hours. And the action that took place on the pitch was minimal. Throughout the game, there was one thing I found extremely impressive (beyond the ridiculous amounts of money these players are given for doing bugger all): the sheer size of the stadium. I've never seen anything quite like it. Because we were on the third level, we took three sets of escalators to the top and I'm positive we took a trip through a sheet of clouds. It would not be advisable for anyone suffering from vertigo to buy a ticket, I'll tell you that much. Instead of watching the players on the pitch quibble over whether they'd thrown the ball an inch shorter than they were meant to, I spent the afternoon pondering over the architecture; how do you even start to build something that big?! Do you just put a brick down and go from there? And then there's all the bars and toilets to think about. Mind-blowing.

On Monday, I was eager to visit Robert Indiana's iconic LOVE sculpture, something I had hitherto failed to see in NYC. The magic of its printed photographs was, however, stamped straight out when I arrived there to see a man marking his territory right in the middle of the sculpture by munching on a 50" never-ending pizza, thus preventing anyone from taking a picture without him being slap-bang in the middle of it. The ignorant swine. However, the afternoon more than made up for it when I was taken to New York's best kept secret: the Roosevelt Island aerial tramway, i.e. a cable car connecting Manhattan to Roosevelt Island and offering amazing views of the city, all for the price of nada with an unlimited MetroCard.

Another sight I've been dying to see in New York is the High Line: an aerial park built on what used to be an elevated railroad which ran through the lower west side of the city. New York is full of innovative, artistic ideas and the High Line is certainly one of them, boasting water features, sculptures, sun loungers and, most importantly, a place where you can purchase an ice cold pint of beer to enjoy in the sun.

Boredom, loneliness and a niggling awareness that my lack of blogging is beginning to spiral out of control has driven me to do a spot of the ol’ writing whilst seated on a Megabus from Boston to New York City. I say ‘Megabus’, I mean a coach that they have found out the back somewhere and hijacked because the real Megabus never showed up. And this shaky piece of rusty metal has been squeaking for the past hour and will continue to irritate the living daylights out of me for the remainder of the journey. But, let’s not begin at the end a la Benjamin Button, let’s start with my first day of freedom from Story Land…

I left the comforting familiarity of Glen, New Hampshire, on a one-way ticket at 8.30 on Tuesday morning. It was sad to wave goodbye to the place I’d called my home for the past two months but the main reason I came to America was, well, to see America (and because I’d watched that programme where Stephen Fry visited all the states and it made me insanely jealous). Before I’d even got on the bus, I was already regretting my most awful decision made since birth which was opting to take a RUCKSACK to the US with me instead of a suitcase that, may I add, would have been no trouble whatsoever owing to the fact that it would have been on wheels. ‘Would have’ if I’d been a sensible human being and realised that there is no way in a million years that carrying a ten tonne rucksack on my back is in any conceivable way easier than wheeling a suitcase along behind me. Jesus ain’t got nothing on me.

After arriving and dumping the godforsaken offending item in what is possibly the swankiest hostel I’ve ever stayed in, we took the subway to Cambridge, MA, i.e. the home of Harvard University. Since Harvard is the university of all universities, I was expecting great things. things, in fact, akin to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. However, there were no castley buildings with turrets, it was just nice. The town was nice, the buildings were nice and the people seemed nice. Saying that, it didn’t stop me feeling a million per cent inadequate after considering just how intelligent the students must be. If only I’d read a few more books when I was younger…

On Tuesday night, we all went to the ‘Cheers’ bar. Having never seen a single episode of the aforementioned show, I was unable to appreciate who Rebecca, of ‘Rebecca’s fish and chips’ menu fame, actually was. I didn’t, however, dwell on it too much as it was our last night together as a group and it was quite emotional saying goodbye to people I’d seen every day for the past two months and knowing that when I woke up in the morning they wouldn’t be there anymore. All good things come to an end.

Wednesday was Cape Cod Day – aka, the day Becky and I travelled to Provincetown for a wee two-day vacation before Wales summoned her US departure. As the bus drove us to the Cape, the weather took a turn for the worse and I’m not exaggerating when I say that I’ve, quite possibly, never seen rain like it. As we moved further and further away from Boston, the rain got heavier and heavier. The sky was pitch black, even though it was mid-morning, and I felt like I was being driven to the scene of a horror film, never to return. The development of gills was mandatory for stepping off the bus and maintaining the ability to breathe. Since Cape Cod is a seaside resort, we ended up in bed at 10pm watching ‘Toddlers and Tiaras’, ‘Teen Mom’ and ‘So You Think You Can Dance USA’. Standard.

By the next morning, the storm had cleared and the sun made an appearance long enough for us to catch a few rays by the beach (which afterwards became the pool due to an insect infestation and a plethora of new leg bites to enjoy). In the afternoon, we caught the shuttle bus into town to embark upon a whale watching adventure, about which I was both excited and sceptical. What I learned from the trip is that there is an extremely fine line between getting your money’s worth and clocking up a satisfactory number of images in the old whale watching memory bank and freezing your arse off in order to see whales being whales and bobbing above the surface sporadically for three whole hours. I think the experience would have been a lot more enjoyable had I not worn a sundress for the occasion and exposed my knickers my fellow whale watchers throughout the whole windy journey. Still, I managed to take what is effectively the same picture a couple of hundred times. The folk back home are sure to enjoy that.

The evening brought a beautiful sunset and the most delicious chicken burger I’ve had to date. Oh, and did I mention that Provincetown is the gay capital of the US? Let me expand upon this as I tell you that it is an extremely odd feeling to spend your night with a fake baked Louis Spence character playing ‘Don’t Cry For Me Argentina’ on a piano while his mate prances round the bar seeing every so often how high he can raise his leg. By the end of the night, I had been won over and was all about gay pride and rooting for gay solidarity. Maybe it was the Cape Cod Blonde Ale I drank…

Yesterday, it was back to Boston, where I remained until present. A few of us managed to get tickets to see the Boston Red Sox against the Toronto Blue Jays and approximately ten minutes before the game was due to start, we got stranded in the Fred Perry shop when a horrific thunderstorm caught us off guard. I’ll tell you something about America, if anything’s worth doing it’s worth doing to the extreme. We ended up dripping wet for the entire duration of the game (the situation would have been no worse had we swam there with our clothes on) but, after asking an old American couple to explain the rules to us, I actually had a really good time. Even though I fail to understand how baseball is, in any way, different to rounders. Apart from, maybe the trendy gloves they all wear.

Which brings us to today, where I was left all alone to have my wicked way with the city of Boston. And how did I choose to spend my morning? Taking part in the walking tour of the Freedom Trail, of course, even though every other participant was with their partner or family. Even the tour guide felt sorry for me and tried to befriend me. The tour was actually really good fun, despite the lack of familiar faces, and I really feel like I saw some great sights and learned a lot of interesting things in the hour and a half. A wise decision by oneself.

As I lie in bed on the eve of my Story Land departure with my 89¢ Walmart candle about to burn out, I can only ask myself where the time has gone. I remember being terrified of coming to work in the States and asking every individual who had the patience to entertain me, ‘Is three months a long time? Will it go fast?’ but now, two of those months are over and my secure, little Story Land bubble is about to be burst; I am about to be thrust into the big, wide world with all 50 states at my fingertips, a daunting prospect given the current size of my rucksack.

I spent my last day at Story Land in Miss Muffet’s Market - the place where it all began - and, because I’ve been on Duck so often, I became a Duck trainer for the day and felt real authoritative. My last shift on ‘Toys II’ was spent recreating the opening scene from The Lion King with hundreds of stuffed animals. The winning members of the cast had to go through a rigorous selection process to make the final cut. In the end, it was decided that a parrot would play the role of Zazu, while an unforeseen lack of warthog stuffed toys engendered a fortunate farmyard pig winning the role of Pumbaa. Things got rather dangerous when a customer considered purchasing a potential Simba candidate but all was resolved in the end and Simba was raised in front of the whole pride by an orangutan Rafiki.

Although I was riddled with homesickness in the first few weeks of American life, I am actually rather sad to be leaving. I’ve met some lovely people who, despite not being able to understand my accent, were a pleasure to work with. And the fact that I am a massive enemy of change adds to my reluctance to leave my trusty motel room that I have become so fond of over the past two months. My life here has become the norm and although I moaned about the job (a lot), I enjoyed the routine I settled into. However, nothing ever stays the same and I will soon be back in Blighty having to deal with being a real grown-up. So, as one chapter draws to a close another one opens. 

For some reason, I have found myself at Duck more often than not the past few days. This is both positive and negative since it means I can top up my tan (rather than contracting pneumonia in Let's Pretend) but the potential for being sent home early is 0. The one day I wasn't at Duck, I was at Yum Yum. However, I actually enjoyed (well, in the loosest possible sense of the word) being there this time because I spent half the day organising everything so that it looked perfect and the other half learning how to juggle. I am actually rather infuriated that I appear to be the only member of the population who can't juggle. And it is a lot harder than it looks for someone who has above-average catching skillz...I currently remain at the 'plastic bag stage' and it is incredibly flaily. Watching me trying to juggle is akin to watching cartoon characters fight; all you can see is dust and a random arm or leg popping out every so often. I have yet to decide whether I will have the patience to pursue this valuable life skill to the end or whether I should accept defeat. We'll see.

A new Thursday brought a new day off and this time I arose bright and early to venture into the town of North Conway with Becky. North Conway is the nearest town and the closest thing to civilisation the White Mountains have to offer. However, I'm sure we must have driven through a time portal on the way there and been transported back to the early 90s. Every shop was exactly how I remember the Post Office being on my weekly trip with my nanna when I was little. Except I wasn't being pulled around in her shopping trolley (more's the pity). It was nice to get away from the Story Land grounds, however, and we we ended up going to a cafe that overlooked the town for lunch. Before I came here I thought America would be great for yummy, greasy food. I couldn't have been more wrong. And they really don't have the art of a fry-up down. After being presented with 101 options as to how I wanted my eggs cooked and telling the woman 'whatever' in exasperation, I was ultimately presented with weird beans that had bits of vegetables interspersed amongst them and extremely mediocre potatoes that were falsely advertised as 'home-cooked fries'. And the 'cold' chocolate milk was warm. 

To end an eventful morning, we decided to save $20 on a taxi by hitchhiking back to Story Land. Since Becky and I are new to the art we had no idea about hitchhiking etiquette. After spending ten minutes at the side of the road with our thumbs up to no avail, it was obvious what we needed: signs. And what better to make them on than the back of a 50-page council benefits application booklet that we'd thieved from the local library? After five minutes of holding up our 'We need a ride to Story Land' signs, a harmless-looking woman answered our prayers and pulled up at the side of the road, beckoning us to jump in. Throughout the whole experience, all I thought was how hilariously mental the whole situation was and that in the real world I wouldn't dream of getting in a car with a stranger. Especially a stranger who made two stops en route to buy equipment capable of murdering a chipmunk in cold blood...I'm happy that I lived to tell the tale.

I haven't blogged in a good few days because I am always too exhausted when I come in from work to think of anything mildly entertaining to say. However, I'll give it a go and see what happens (even though I could quite easily sleep for a week).

Thursday was my day off this week, which was spent sunbathing on Old Orchard Beach in Maine/trying not to be pelted with seagull excrement. Within the first ten minutes of being there I had just finished reading a book named 'Me Before You' about a man who becomes a quadriplegic after being hit by a motorbike and goes from being a high-flying businessman to a shell of a person who wants to end his life in Switzerland. The story is told from the point of view of a girl who is employed as his carer but with whom he falls in love. She has six months to change his mind and give him something to live for. But she can't. And the result was me turning into a quivering wreck in front of a beach full of people and trying to channel the tears back into my skull. Onlookers must have thought I was distraught over the group of teens that were being ordered to pour their alcoholic beverages out onto the sand by a local policeman. They paid good money for that! The best thing about Old Orchard Beach is a little shack by the pier which serves a drink named a 'Fro-Ho-Cho'. It tastes exactly like hot chocolate but frozen. Which is pretty handy given the name of it. I used it as a means of cheering myself up, kind of like when I got my ears pierced and my mother bought me a Happy Meal to stop me from crying.

Friday was the second of my two days off (yippee!). I intended to visit the local post office before lounging in the garden and catching some rays. Because I am currently living in an area as rural as Mars, I did not expect my visit to the post office to be problem-free. Sure enough, I got there to find a huge sign on the door saying that they were closed for lunch from 12.30-1.30pm. And I arrived at 12.50, which meant I had to spend 40 minutes sitting on the doorstep of the post office waiting for it to open. What made it worse was that the post office employees were sitting approximately two feet away from me eating their lunch and discussing how little they knew about the US postal service. When I eventually got inside they did not appear to stock anything I required and so god only knows whether my packages will arrive at their destinations. 

In the afternoon, we went down to the river to swim. I hadn't been to that part of the river before; it was the foot of a huge dam, which created a big waterfall. It was quite relaxing. Until a raving lunatic came along and started fishing in my presence, reeling them in then strangling them with his own hands before hoying them into his backpack to take home for tea. That's enough to put anyone off the whole entire country.

Saturday was Duck day and the day I realised I've lost all patience with customers. There is no more Mr. Nice Guy and instead I endeavour to be as blunt as possible:

Three-year-old girl: I want a snake, I want a snake, I want a snake, I want a snake 

Me: You can't have a snake, it's one of these three or nothing

40-year-old man: It's a fix; all the ducks have 1 on the bottom of them 

Me: No, they don't

Five-year old boy: I don't like any of the prizes 

Me: Okay. Next?

Small child: Can I play? 

Me: If you have two dollars

The final thing that is just worth the kinetic energy involved in producing this text is the fact that I have been given a pair of shorts with a darned crotch every day for the past week. Also, each morning I wake up with ten more bites than I had the previous day. Some nasty, little critter is having a good ol' feast on me while I sleep.

When I returned to Let's Pretend yesterday, the offending fly couple were continuing their mating ritual right in front of my very eyes. I wholeheartedly blame the ill-designed human reaction mechanism for my inability to swat the blighters into oblivion with a rolled-up Story Land map. In other news, a man pulled a flick-knife out on me as he insisted he cut the tags off his purchases himself, a little boy submerged himself in a rail of princess dresses, to which his dad responded with, 'Get out of the dresses, son, you'll have plenty of time for that when you're older' and a woman asked me if I was from Spain. Just another standard day at LP.

It was my token Duck day today, which I actually quite enjoyed. I realised that - if you stick your arms out a bit - the tanning potential of the duck pond enclosure is unexpectedly high. It was certainly a welcome change from the LP air-conditioning chilling me through to the bones. However, my sun worshipping was rudely interrupted early on by what is possibly the saddest spectacle I have ever seen: a daddy long legs caught in a spider web. Since being at Story Land has made me lose my marbles a wee bit, I stood for a good half hour contemplating the plight of the poor creature and freaking myself out over the complexity of living organisms (bear with me if you think this is getting a bit too deep). The poor sod could not, for the life of it, get one of its legs free from the web. It was there for ages wriggling and writhing and using its, erm, arms (?) to try to pull this leg free. A couple of times I thought I had seen life depart entirely from its body but it fought back; it was like 127 Hours unfolding before my eyes. I saw the panic in its eyes and thought, 'You know what? Daddy long legs really aren't that much different to us'...Anyway, the end result was that it flew off leaving its leg behind so the moral of the story is: don't be daft enough to fly into a spider web if you are a daddy long legs.

On Thursday, I received some rather good news - extremely good news for a member of the Bianchi family, i.e. the most unlucky family in the history of this wonderful planet. On Thursday, the sponsor of my Work America programme emailed me right up to tell me that I'd only bliddy won an iPad! I, Devon Bianchi, the person whose laptop took an alcoholic shower the second she stepped off the plane, have only gone and won myself a brand, spanking new iPad. Apparently, my name was picked out of a hat but I truly believe that it was time for justice to be done and it has magically appeared in the form of one of Apple's greatest creations. I honestly believe my luck is changing!...Sorry, 'believed'. I believED my luck was changing. Got a bit too over-excited there.

I mentioned in my last blog post about being in Yum-Yum Junction. There, I had a fine view of Becky - and all the other buggers who had been lucky enough to land themselves a day in Miss Muffet's Market - dancing away outside in the sunshine to the daily 'dance party' hosted by the Story Land characters/people dressed in massive costumes that make their bums wiggle when they walk. My experience can only be compared to serving a life sentence whilst being forced to watch videos of your friends getting on with their lives and having fun without you. In fact, I believe it is EXACTLY the same. However, it appears that YYJ is not as bad as it gets! Oh no, my last two days in Let's Pretend have given YYJ a run for its money. The highlight of yesterday was forgetting the Emmerdale theme tune and having to phone up every Story Land Brit in their respective gift shops in the hope that somebody out there would end my suffering by singing it to me. Today wasn't so eventful as I spent the full nine hours watching a couple of flies executing some kind of mating ritual right there on my register. They could have got themselves a room, the cheeky swines.

Things went from bad to worse last night in our weekly Sunday party. Some of the girls had decided to buy sparklers from the shop, even though it wasn't bonfire night, and light them on the balcony. Now, given the smallness of the balcony space and the number of drunk people on the balcony, introducing sparklers into the equation was never going to end well. Especially for a Bianchi. The night ended with sparkler shaped holes in my top and a trail of burns over my skin after Becky managed to drop one half of her sparkler down my vest while it was still alight. And, let me tell you, it's not easy to stop a burning ember from frying your flesh when you, yourself, are holding a lit sparkler and you are wearing a belt around your waist which prevents all chances of a smooth exit passage.

As my luck (and mood) deteriorates, I believe it is time for me to wave goodbye to the land of the free (pah) and run back into the arms of good ol' Great Britain. My employment at Story Land seems to have run its course (after one full day of working there) and I have decided that I do not enjoy spending my days being controlled and told off by people who are half my age. And I do not enjoy earning a meagre $8 an hour for the pleasure. I simply do not have the mental energy to combat any more sly digs or power trips and I would rather not be patronised until the cows come home. So, if it's all the same to you, Britain, I've learned my lesson and I'm ready to reunite in being miserable with you all once again. 

One thing that has amazed me about being at Story Land is the mood swings. One minute I am embracing the American culture and telling every one I come into contact with to 'have a wonderful day' and the next I am back to having a face like a smacked arse and the radiance optimism of Jack Dee. I feel like a character in The Sims: for approximately one millisecond per day I have a bright green diamond above my head before I am completely deprived of entertainment and comfort and start refusing to get out of bed, crying into my hands and wetting myself in public. If only someone would drop me into a swimming pool and remove the steps... 

I was at Let's Pretend yesterday where I happened to be on the 'pirate'/'boy' section, purely because I failed to get out of bed in time to demand control of the princess section. However, my creativity knows no bounds and a few blown up beach balls dangling from the ceiling later I was like a proud mother admiring her newborn child. I was also advised by my manager to rethink my potential career in speech therapy in favour of one in the vein of visual merchandising. Now, as much as I love standing on my feet for 10 hours a day to create something that will be destroyed five minutes later, I don't think that's for me. I do give it my best shot at Story Land though; you create your own entertainment in the land where fantasy lives.

Today was a different story. I walked to work quite contently after my 8.30am lie-in (even though in my old life 8.30am would be far from a lie-in) and was surprised to find I had been missed off the schedule. Now, logically speaking, I thought that since nobody had even noticed I wasn't on the schedule until I got there at 10am they had enough staff to cover everything meaning I could walk straight back out that door and back into bed. My dreams of an all day Corrie marathon were soon shattered when I was told that a place would be found for me, which just so happened to be in my all-time favourite candy shop: Yum-Yum Junction. My hovering diamond turned to red in an instant. WHY?!

Story Land welcomed me back into the working world after my four days of readjusting to civilisation with a lovely little 9 hour stint at 'Duck'. Before I even got to the duck pond (well, 'duck pond') I was informed that a frog had been living in the vicinity, which was just what I needed - wildlife jumping out to frighten me when I least expected it. Thankfully, I didn't see the frog all day, although it didn't stop me thinking that I had seen it out of the corner of my eye and running into things as I tried to make a hasty exit from the building. Kind of like when people see shadows and tell everyone they've seen a ghost. I say people, I mean absolute mentalists. But I, digress. At the start of the day, I tried my hardest to make the prospect of picking two rubber ducks out of some water for the prize of being lumbered with a soft toy that would give any one the heebie-jeebies in a dark room as exciting as is humanly possible. At the end of the day, my introduction to the game went something along the lines of: 'Two ducks. Two numbers. Prize.' 

Several of my favourite regular Duck occurrences are as follows*:

1) When an awful Veruca Salt of a child wins a small prize having just witnessed the child before them skipping away with an extra-large one.

2) When said child throws a temper tantrum and lies down in the middle of the floor refusing to move.

3) When I sit said child down and explain to them that the only person who is ever going to win in this situation is me because all fairground games are designed so that there is a one in a million chance that you ever win anything worth winning. And that they must accept that, even if they stand there all day and pay me thousands of dollars, they are never going to walk out of the gates with a huge inflatable duck under their arm. And that the duck game, as a whole, is simply a metaphor for life itself and sooner or later they will have to accept that life's a bitch and then you die.

4) When the park's closing announcement goes off at 6 o' clock and I can run for the hills. (Before they catch me and drag me, kicking and screaming, to Yum-Yum Junction to stay until the bitter end).

Today, I was in Let's Pretend. Or as I now like to call it: home. My day started off on a positive note: a man came over to me and said, 'Hey, you were at the ducks yesterday, weren't you? My son loves you!' I immediately turned around to see who the devil he was talking to when I realised that there was no one behind me and so the only person in the firing zone of his vocal emission was me. Little old pessimistic me who fails to radiate any waves of joy or happiness had become the subject of a toddler's loving. I could barely believe my ears. I went over my new buddy and we had a right old chinwag before he attempted to shoot me with a toy gun.

The rest of the day was spent protecting my works of art that I had created throughout the store by shouting after the children, 'YOU LOOK WITH YOUR EYES, NOT YOUR HANDS!' (in my head, naturally). I consequently had a great idea: the Let's Pretend princess section would be a lot better if I constructed a picket fence enclosing me and my displays whereby children could form a neat line around the fence in order to take a look at what's available. Then, when they were ready to make a purchase, they would ask me nicely to lift their item of choice out from within the display and pop it into a bag for them to carry out of the store. Everyone's a winner. And mucky fingers will be kept from closing every single trinket box I have deliberately left open and ruining my 'scattered treasure' effect. (Other effects include giant, flying, cape-wearing unicorn, distressed teddies falling out of barrel and fairy wand floral (-esque) vase arrangement. You have to see it to believe it).