I hate London!

Aller Anfang ist schwer "Beginning is the hardest" (Chapter 1)

It had only been a couple of weeks since the Scheinert family had moved to the UK.
It was safe to say that Eleonore wasn't happy about it.
Having been ripped away from her home, her friends... even her extended family was so much farther away now...

Eleonore felt lonely. These past few weeks she had only really spent time with her parents... everything was so different here. Having grown up in the German countryside, the British city life was... An adjustment. There were always so many people out and about at all times...

Wherever you went you got shoved, the British people weren't nearly as polite as Eleonore's English teacher used to say. Only when it came to the things Eleonore was doing wrong.
The other day she had accidentally walked the wrong way in the train station, and everyone had given her the death stare- British customs were weird... Eleonore struggled with adjusting.

So she spent most of her time holed up in her room. But that would come to an end soon enough.
School would start up soon... a new school, even more rules to learn. Like the ridiculous school dress code. Eleonore was still coming to terms with the fact that she would have to wear a blazer and a ridiculously small tie everyday... School uniforms were not a thing in Germany...

She had already tried her uniform on... it didn't look flattering on her at all.
Eleonore was short but chubby, so the uniform just didn't seem to fit right...
The skirt was either too long or too short... at least the Blazer was a nice fit, to her at least.
It was a bit too big, but she liked it that way.
She liked the dark blue colour of it too... it went well with her dark blond hair, and green eyes.

Eleonore was just glad she could wear her favourite Star shaped hairclip.
She had gotten it for her eleventh birthday, from her big brother, because she had been really into astrology back then.
Even now, almost seven years later, she still wore it almost every day...

Right now, Eleonore tried to forget about the fact that she would start school in a few days, and just tried to focus on playing an old Nintendo game. She was in the middle of a Pokemon battle, when there was a knock on the door.

["Ellie, I'm going shopping, are you coming with?"] It was her mother.
Eleonore shook her head. ["No thanks. I'm busy."]
Her mother sighed. ["Come on, Ellie. You have to get over it. We moved, and you will have to get used to it. Now get up, or I'm taking your DS."]
With a groan Eleonore got up. ["Fine. Geez."]

Taking the underground still felt weird.
In her old village, they did not have that.
Her mother seemed to be in her element. She grew up in the city, she was more adjusted to this.
Her older brother would love this, she also thought.
Before Eleonore's parents got together, he had lived in Vienna, with their mother, and his Dad.
He was still a city kid at heart, even having lived in the countryside for most of his life.

Jakob had stayed in Germany.
Lucky him.
Since Eleonore was just seventeen, she had to come with her parents. Jakob, being twenty-two, had a bit more say in the matter...

Even shopping was weird.
A lot of Eleonore's favourite food wasn't even available in grocery stores here.
Germany and Britain sure had some differences...

It was only a couple of days later that it was Eleonore's first day in a new school.
In the morning she was so nervous that she couldn't even eat a bite of breakfast.
She felt silly in her uniform. Back home she would never have to wear something like that. At least everyone would be wearing it...

Eleonore's Dad offered to drive her to school for her first day, since he could tell how nervous she was.
["It will be great, Ellie."] He said. ["You will find so many friends-"]
Eleonore crossed her arms. ["I had just found friends at my old school last year. How long do you think it will take in a country where everyone will laugh at the way I talk?"]