I have finally arrived in sunny St Pete! The flight over from Washington wasn't too bad and thanks to the beauty of internal flights no more flashing at border control was in store.
The heat pretty much knocked me sideways as we walked out of the airport. It always makes me a little excited when you feel the temperature of a hot country for the first time, as in England we're lucky if it gets over 19 degrees!
I made my way to my home for the next 6 weeks, a pretty one story traditional Floridian house with 3 bedrooms and a tropical back yard. It's set in a sweet and quiet neighbourhood just off 9th Avenue in North St Petersburg.
All the neighbours where invited over for a barbeque on my second night so I could get to know some of them and they could see who's hijacking their community! We made a stack load of food and went to the local cheap liquor store to stock up on booze. Everyone began piling in at 6pm and I've got to admit I found it a little overwhelming! They were literally lining up to be introduced and I'm not good with names at the best of times let alone 10 people's all at once!
They are a different kind of friendly over here, the English I think are typically cautious when meeting new people. They are friendly but always a little wary at first but Americans are full on inviting you to their weddings and son's barmitzvar before you got to shake their hands.
Although I began the night thinking I couldn't quite cope with the tooth rotting sweetness by the end of it I actually really enjoyed it. I met a guy who is a feature editor for the St Petersburg Times which was really interesting as well as a lad from Brighton who's married a Floridian.
One thing I will say though, these guys can eat! And drink! We made enough food to fed 50 and 20 people managed to polish it all off and I swear they drank a vineyard's annual yield!
The night ended with me having a pocket full of phone numbers and loads of invites to all different things, this time may well end up to be quite an eye opener...
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