Brits are Tough

It might not shine through their friendly and caring behaviour, but Brits are tough. Way tougher than me. Even the women. Also they are way sexier than me. Well, not all, but they compensate with astonishing self-confidence. They wear so few and tiny pieces of clothing that I can only assume that their immune system must have evolved in the isolated environment of this rainy and cold island to fit its very special weather conditions.

On Saturday I arrived in Manchester. After having found a nice hotel with classical English furniture, thick carpets everywhere almost drowning my trolley's wheels and a bed with a really distinct odour, I went out to check out Chinatown and immediately went straight back to my room to get my cap, so freezing cold was it.

Soon I encountered women which seemed to wear less the later it got. It felt like going on holidays in the Antarctic and it looked like going to the Bahamas. Two of them actually wore light summer dresses, floating about in a tight breeze.

This was really confusing my brain. And besides such lightly dressed ladies, there are more crucial things to get used to like looking to the right side (which is on the right) first thing when traversing a road, which made it really difficult altogether.

Please take a look at the following picture.

If you look close enough, you will recognize two weird creatures. One is in the background, a dragon made of metal, and the other one might have popped into your sight straight away. The latter specimen is found in Germany usually only in summer. I guess they travel to the UK to hibernate, so that's why I never see them during winter. Thing is, they don't seem to realize it's even colder and wetter in the UK than it is in Germany right now.

Brits seem to like bricks as well. Bricks are tough. Just take a look at these:

Besides that, Manchester is a really fascinating place. Old buildings from the Industrial Age are mixed with new and shiny ones. Everything seems to blend together somehow. I found myself turning corners and facing enormous buildings so many times: there is the library, the Town Hall (which I mistook for the cathedral at first), two huge shopping malls, the Hilton tower and many more. The buildings are very well kept and have a very clean, elegant and majestic look, but once you follow a small allay, you feel like being transported back to the industrial times, surrounded by broken pipes, rusty ladders coming down tall brick walls and other weird metal devices fixed to them, possibly once used to lift heavy weights from carriages.

One thing about the people here I find very charming is the self-irony they tend to display. Several times I found it all very surrealistically Monty Python-esque. It’s the way they speak and act, which can be unbelievably funny just below the surface. It breaks the ice and they seem to know it. It's the easy and intelligent way of life.

Take a look at this slideshow for more pictures of Manchester!