Newcastle: Interesting Facts

For everyone back home here are some interesting day to day customs of the UK. Let's start with TV. Here in the UK, anyone who watches TV has to pay a yearly TV licence of 135.50 pounds (240 dollars) for a color TV and 45 pounds for a black and white TV. Back home we didn't watch much TV but they were a couple of shows we loved like The Office, Chuck and 30 Rock. So for the year that we are here there is no more Chuck, The Office or 30 Rock......sad! There is a truck that comes around and monitors the people who don't have a license. If you are caught watching TV without a licence there is a 2000.00 pound fine (4000.00 dollars!!!) Here the bathroom or restroom is referred as TOILET (way too graphic for me...ha!) and the elevator as the LIFT. When you go to the grocery store don't expect anyone to bag your groceries, you have to do it on your own. We went out to dinner about a week ago and we discovered that Sprite is referred to as lemonade. Last interesting fact, every store even supermarkets close at 5pm only few stay open until 6pm. By the way Matt was wrong about the church bells they seem to ring a lot whether there is a football match or not. Here are some cool pictures of the city. We went to Newcastle's castle and took some pictures of the city from the top floor. For those that have been asking about pictures of our apt we will post them this weekend...promise.