Brumingham

Well I'm off to Birmingham tomorrow but I've just found out it's the Tory Party conference there at the moment. I wonder how many roads will be closed to protect our illustrious leaders in waiting from the the nasty terrorists? They probably need more protection from the brummie accent than anything else.

How come these politicians pick such glamourous locales for their conferences? I mean Birmingham? Why don't they just stay in London, out the way and where they all live anyway? I'm only bitter because my trip to Bournemouth was delayed because of the Lib-Dems conference. They seem to be following me round the country. I also discovered that both Bill Bryson and Terry Pratchett are to appear at the Tory shindig. I can't believe that two funny and apparently liberal authors, which I really admire, are closet Tories. How disappointing.

Pratchett I can understand, his mind is going, but what's Bryson's excuse?

Never Return

Well I'm just back from a trip round the south west, going to the places I used to go as a kid and I have to say it's been a bit of a dissapointment to be honest. 

The British seaside seems to be having a long drawn out death, well much of it anyway. The first port of call was Bournemouth. It has become really run down, generally grotty and full of people who you don't really want to be sharing a 99 with (that's a Mr. Whippy ice-cream with a flake in it if you're wondering). The move downwards was hit home by spotting a shopping centre, right in the centre of town, which consisted only of a Wilkinsons, a Lidl and a Peacocks. These are not good shops. In fact they are the cheapest and nastiest representation of a department store, supermarket and clothes shop respectively and are quite hard to describe if you don't know them. Take it from me this is not the sign of a healthy local economy. Then there are the pubs. They have all been taken over by the big chains (Brewers Fayre, Wetherspoons etc.) and turned into cloned, fake, crappy restaurants and drinking caverns. No soul, no personality, no individuality. This isn't just a problem at the seaside admittedly, but I looked in vain for an independent place in Bournemouth and ended up eating in a Harry Ramsden chip restaurant (another mighty conglomerate). The whole place was full of groups of people on stag and hens nights, clubbers from the north of England and bogans/chavs (delete as per applicable). In fact this is what really confuses me. The Bournemouth council seems desperate to attract the less lovely tourist to come and drink and party while at the same time trying to be upmarket, by building loads (and loads) of luxury executive apartments and trying to charge seven quid to park your car. They are even converting the old Overstrand building on Boscombe Promenade into "exclusive surf pods". The Overstrand used to be a 50's building on the front with some beach huts and a cafe and toilets. For everyone. What is going on here? Exclusivization in a town that seems to have no money. I can't imagine the Sharon and Kevins paying £50,000 for a beach hut. I would think that the town would do better trying to attract families back. The beach from Boscombe to Bournemouth is truly beautiful, long and sandy and with clean, clear water. Yet on the day I was there it was warm and sunny and deserted. 

The one thing that hasn't changed is the number of pensioners that throng to the coast here. I was staying in a hotel in Eastcliffe and it was like a time-warp. Very friendly and comfortable, but exactly like the hotels I stayed in the last time I was here. In 1981. Flowery wall paper, complete silence and people on half board. That's bed, breakfast and evening meal. Even that was like the 70s, I checked the menu and saw that the starters for the evening meal were prawn cocktail or grapefruit juice.  Twilight zone moment ensued. 

Next it was off to Torquay, much nicer but still more grotty than I remembered. Even the guy who owned the hotel was saying he thought the town had gone downhill and that there was a lot more poverty around. Which made it even more of a surprise to see multi-million pound yachts in the harbour. Apparently in Torquay, and especially Cornwall, there has been tons of money pouring in as people buy property on the coast but no life to follow it as most are absent residents or Russian gangsters, sorry, businessmen. More of that in a minute. At least Torquay had a bit more life and an excellent Indian. It even had a pub or two that didn't belong to Whitbread! The other thing you notice as you head further west is the increasing number of Pasty shops. I thought that by the time I got to Penzance in Cornwall that would be all there was. But luckily no.

Penzance was a relief after the other places, it still feels like a real town, like it could survive even if all the tourists disappeared. It was a joy to behold after the strangeness of Bournemouth and Torquay. The council still knows how to extract money from you though. I went to look at St Michael's Mount and paid £2.75 to park for 10 minutes. It's one of those "all day for so much" deals. Which is great if you plan to spend 8 hours on the beach, but a nightmare if you just want to take some photos. Penzance also finally had some proper pubs. It's always fascinated me how English pubs are so much part of social history. I had a drink in the Dolphin, it's fairly old. Well they used it to recruit sailors to fight the Spanish Armada so I suppose that makes it very old. Before 1588 anyway. And it's still there and still serving the same purpose almost 500 years later. It amazes me, I've said it before but anywhere else in the world places like this would be national treasurers. Here it's just the local and there are about a dozen others of the same period in a mile radius. It's not all roses though. Take St Ives. Actually just avoid St Ives. This is a prime example of a place being loved to death. Obviously it used to be a quaint little fishing village but it's been almost totally bought up by outsiders who use the place as a holiday destination, the Tristans and Grisellas who come down from the City for a nice authentic weekend, in their half million pound 2 bed fisherman's cottage, then bugger off back to London. There are very few locals left (they either sold up and made a profit, who can blame them for that, or can't afford to stay here) but the place is packed with tourists, a branch of the Tate Gallery (which all fishing communities have, obviously) bakeries selling £6 pasties and organic coffee shops and galleries. I think the place was summed up when I heard two men discussing their wives shopping "I wish we could just find a nice wine bar to sit in and meet them later". Wine bar? Sir Francis Drake must be weeping into his bowls shoes.

Still Cornwall was beautiful, I've put some more pictures up so you can see, but it does feel a bit like you are in a foreign country down there. It's full of weird place names with lots of zs, Zennor, Penzance, Marazion, Ludgvan and Gweek to name a few and also saints you've never heard of like St. Ives, St. Buryan or St. Just.

Martyred for putting the jam on their scone before the clotted cream maybe?

New pics posted

Some new photos here.

For some reason they all seem to be on a slope, must have one leg longer than the other in the northern hemisphere. And I apologise about all the Church pics, that's just what you do when in Europe.

Prague Autumn

Well my last post was half right. I didn't get stuck on the motorway, it took 2 hours to cover 2 miles through Chepstow because four divots had dug a two foot square hole in the middle of the road. The traffic queue was 15 miles long behind them but they seemed oblivious. Anyway I got to the airport eventually and I have to say EasyJet were great, on time, polite and comfy. So much for that terrible tv show that makes them all look like gits.

Prague is absolutely beautiful, everywhere you look is like a film set with fantastic baroque buildings on every corner, gothic spires and churches everywhere and, unfortunately, millions of tourists. On Wednesday I went to Prague Castle and while there was no one there at 9 am, when I turned the corner by the Cathedral at 10 am the place was packed with groups of people all following tour guides with umbrellas. It was unbelievable and I've never seen anything like it before anywhere. Most of the tourists seem to be German and Russian, I hope they realise they can't stay this time. You see the Czech's have had a bit of bad luck in the past. First the Hapsburg's came along and nicked the country, then the Nazi's came along and nicked the country and then the Soviet's came and nicked the country. It explains why a lot of the museums seem to be a bit empty: someone or other has already carted off all the treasures. All these things seem to happen in a year ending with an 8; in 1918 the first Czech republic was formed, in 1938 the Germans turned up and in 1968 the Russians turned up. They must cack their pants every 10 years. I suppose the arrival of Starbucks and KFC is the least of their problems.

The current Czech Republic is only 16 years old, it must be the oldest youngest country around, and still has a slight whiff of the workers paradise about it. For example the customer service is pretty terrible and the hotel I was in was a little austere. Take the towels, there's obviously no word in Czech for "fluffy". The part of town I was in was a bit grimy and unrenovated with quite a few soviet era buildings and roads. The people look a bit unrenovated too as there is still a fondness for nylon clothes and mullets much in evidence. This is probably more to do with the fact that they are central European than that they used to be commies, as the Germans' have the same style issues. Very friendly people though even though they don't speak much English and to be honest Czech is particularly indecipherable if you are used to western languages. This was particularly rammed home when I was waiting for a bus from the airport. I now know what the czech for "replacement bus service" looks like. Actually I don't, luckily about five different people, in various sign languages managed to let me know that I'd be waiting at that particular stop for a very long time before any bus arrived. The least appealing thing is the fact that the czech's all smoke their heads off all the time, all over the place. My hotel even rented hookahs! The food is a bit of a challenge too, very dumpling dependent and I don't think I ate a vegetable for the entire week.

If I'm making it sound still a little grey and communist then it really isn't. I find it hard to believe that only 19 years ago the place was a hard line communist state where now it's a capitalist heaven. So many shops, so much money around and all looking new and sparkly. This is what makes it all the more thrilling when you arrive at a spot and can see the old workers paradise showing through the veneer. Like the metro stations with the mosaics of the heroic proletariat and incredibly fast russian escalators (these go at least twice as fast as any western escalator you've ever been on but are slowly being replaced) or the Tesco supermarket which happens to be in the building which was the showcase store of the old regime. See, we used to be scared of Communism taking over the world, now we need to be scared of supermarkets doing the same thing. 

There is still in fact a Communist party here, it's trying to get seats in Parliament and I can't believe that anyone would vote for them when you consider how grim it was before. This is especially obvious this year as there are displays about the 40th anniversary of the Soviet Union crushing the Prague Spring in 1968 all over the place. I did wonder why there was a massive four lane road built right into the centre of the City and Wenceslas Square. It was so the authorities could always get tanks into the city to squash any uprising. Remember that when your local council tries to build a new ring road. About all that's left now of the old system are the few buildings and metro stations that haven't been renovated and the Museum of Communism, ironically above McDonald and next to the Casino. Stalin must be spinning in his tomb the old bastard. All this does however mean that you don't suffer the constant stream of nostalgia ads on the TV and everyone saying how great the good old days are, because they weren't. Now the Czechs are free to shop in Marks and Spencer, buy Crocs and watch My Family on the tv. 

Well perhaps not everthing is better now.

Driving me Crazy

I am lucky enough to have been loaned a car while I'm here, which is great as trying to get around is otherwise almost impossible. The nearest train station is 10 miles away and the busses run once an hour, as long as they don't break down. I don't think I've ever seen such an old fleet of busses that aren't London Routemasters. The newest one I've seen so far is 1994! 

So the car has been a god send but driving here is a bit of a nightmare. Firstly the roads are all a little on the narrow side, driving down what is allegedly a main road and not being able to see what's ahead because of all the hedgerows and trees is a bit worrying. Actually they probably aren't that narrow but after living in Kalgoorlie, where every street is as wide as a freeway, they sure seem to be. However some of them are very narrow. Like one lane wide if you're lucky. Now in most countries these would be merely back roads with one house on them, but here they are main thoroughfares to entire towns. The B4221 or B4225 for example. Two main roads to the town of Newent, both of which are a nightmare. You drive along thinking you are at the side of the road, as far over as you can get, when a huge truck full of sheep comes the other way, or a tractor puling an entire farmhouse, and expects you to miraculously half the size of your vehicle so it can get by. And believe me the locals don't crawl along either, as far as they are concerned the speed limit is 60 mph and so that's what they do! There are a lot of cars round here with missing wing mirrors. What baffles me is all the locals seem to bomb round these little lanes with out hitting each other but seem incapable of parking in the supermarket carpark with out hitting the car either side. Maybe they can only steer at full speed?

It's also been a bit tricky getting round because of all the rain, quite a few roads have been flooded shut and so you are forced to follow detour signs to get where you are going. Unfortunately the Gloucestershire county council roads department doesn't seem to have too many of these signs, so you follow the first couple, which send you along narrower and more underused roads, until you are completely lost and the detour signs run out.  Genius. This is why I now have a woman in a box suction cupped to my windscreen telling me where to go.

The last thing is all the roadworks. Not just the ones I've moaned about before.  They are everywhere. In fact everywhere I want to go. Gloucester? Roadworks - A40; Ross? Roadworks - Town Centre; Birmingham? Roadworks - M50; Bristol? Roadworks - M32; Cornwall? Roadworks - M5. The brilliance of all this is that, if you've worked out where I am at the moment, you'll see that EVERY route in and out, to go anywhere has roadworks. I would think that it would be better to finish one lot before you start the next lot so that all the traffic has an alternate route? Is that not bleeding obvious?

I'm off to Prague tomorrow. Wish me luck as the airport is off the M5...near the roadworks. It's ok though as the alternate route is through Bristol...and the roadworks.

Pomp & Circumstance

Ahh, it's last night of the Proms tonight. The only time the English are allowed to wave flags and be proud. I really think this should be a national holiday as people just love it. 

Got to go, have to air conduct.

Rwyf i ddim Cymraeg

Contrary to what some people think I'm not Welsh. Don't live there, wasn't born there. But in the last couple of weeks I have realised that my childhood home is pretty damn close to being Welsh. Now this doesn't bother me at all, I went to a Welsh Uni and lived in Cardiff for 6 years but being in the Forest of Dean, this close to Wales, means you do sometimes have to deal with the Welsh. I don't mean 'Welsh' the people as they are all lovely, so there's lovely. I mean 'Welsh' the language. I went to Monmouth the other day, just a few miles away, and only Welsh by a quirk of geography in that on this side of the river Wye it's England, on the other it's Wales. Cross the bridge and suddenly all the signs are in Welsh. Go into Waitrose supermarket and you are confronted with signs like this:

Not only are these signs a bugger to read but I can guarantee that if a native Welsh speaker was in Monmouth Waitrose and asked for the diaroglyddion there would be no-one in sight that would understand them. You see Monmouth, like Newport, Cardiff and Swansea, is what people round here call "English Wales" as opposed to Carmarthen and Aberystwth which are definately "Welsh Wales". My point is: why make everyone struggle with all the signs in Welsh? Especially in a town where one of the most famous Englishmen in history was born. Yes Henry V was born in Monmouth which I suppose means he's not English at all. Imagine that speech with a Welsh accent "Once more unto the breach, my lovelies, once more".

Actually at the moment the Welsh seem to popping up everywhere in my life. For example I was watching a TV show where Raymond Blanc is judging these couples opening new restaurants. Reality TV crap but quite funny. All the more hilarious as one couple are opening a Chinese and Welsh fusion restaurant. Can you imagine that? Laver bread wontons maybe? Stir fried welsh-cakes? The looks on the faces of the opening night customers were priceless. We can also get the Welsh language channel here; S4C (that's ess-pedwar-eck to you). I saw welsh manga for the first time the other day. Doesn't really work as there doesn't seem to be any welsh for robot. The man about to end the world is also Welsh: Dr Lyn Evans who is in charge of the large hadron collider at CERN. Remember that when we all get sucked into a black hole next week. 

I also found my old graduation programme while clearing out all the junk I've rudely left at my folks for the last 15 years. I though you might like to learn the hippocratic oath...in Welsh (click it to make it bigger):

It's a beautiful language but thank God I only had to say it in English.

Long long ago

I've been travelling round a bit for the last few days and noticed how odd some of the place names are here. You don't notice or think about it when you see them all the time but they are  a bit weird. There's Plump Hill for example. I've been hearing that name since I was born but it only hit me yesterday that it means "Hill that's a bit fat". Possibly. Or Wormington. Where the hell did that come from. Then there are the Slaughters; Upper and Lower. How pretty. Actually they are both gorgeous little Cotswold towns (think Chocolate box). No blood running in the streets or anything.  I even went to Gaydon. Not as gay as you might think as it's the British Motor Industry Heritage Trust Museum. Yes we did used to have one. It's probably the only museum I have ever been in that can cover the complete history of it's subject. They have the first ever Rover car and the last ever Rover car. All a bit sad really. 

I've been on a bit of a engineering history trip for the last few days as I was in Bristol yesterday looking at the SS Great Britain. This was the first iron clad, screw driven passenger ship and was the father of all modern ships. Well apparently, I haven't checked that anywhere but I can't believe that the museum would lie? She's is now back in the same dry dock as she was built 150 years ago, except all the old warehouses and factories that surround it which used to turn out British products to sell round the world and hold the fruits of empire, are all converted into 'luxury executive apartments'. Isambard Kingdom Brunel must be spinning in his tomb. The ship used to ply the emigrant route to Melbourne and I cannot imagine spending 2 months on board on the trip. It's tiny and claustrophobic. The first class bunks are about 18 inches wide. Worse than economy class 'plane seats. If you were in steerage you had to do the chores on the ship. Don't tell united airlines or they'll be getting the passenger to stock the aeroplanes. The weirdest thing on board now was the the fact that the ship felt like it was moving. I don't know why but it really felt like you were rolling in the oceans. Very odd.

The rest of Bristol was a nightmare as they are building a massive new shopping centre in the middle of town called the Cabot centre. I was told there were a few road works etc. but I wasn't expecting the entire side of the city to be completely changed. All the landmarks that were here 2 years ago which I am used to are gone. The problem was exacerbated by the fact that I was trying to navigate from a tiny map from the tourist office. The sort where you turn a corner and the road you wanted to drive down is suddenly a bus lane. Or a one way street. My advice is to buy a GPS thingamebob if you come over here. Bristol itself is a funny town, half is the usual British High St full of chain stores, burger vans and chav girls and boys. The other half is older and funkier. All gourmet grocers, farmhouse cheese and little shops selling t-shirts and other stuff that only students seem to buy. They also have this obsession with building attractions. I don't really understand this as the whole country is like a massive historical attraction as it is. 

For example today I was in Worcester and it looks like a film set. Lots of little narrow streets full of shops, old half timbered shops and buildings. In the cathedral there are a set of effigies of a Knight in Armour, a Squire and a Lady. They date from 1240. That's 850 years old and they are just tucked round a corner. In the US or Australia they'd be be a national historic monument. Mind you compared with the age of the rest of the cathedral they are quite new. I think the main part is 900 something. That's 900 as in the year. I also saw the tomb of Henry VII. He was Henry VIII's brother (these royals really need a bit more imagination, roll on Queen Kylie). When he died his brother Henry VIII married his wife, Catherine of Aragon. This was the start of VIII's problems as he thought he was cursed by God for marrying his dead brother's wife. So begins a great English story and lot's of beheading. King John is also buried here. That's "bad King John", to generations the persecutor of Robin Hood. How cool is that? 

I have to say he looked nothing like the Disney version.

In arrears?

What's been happening then? 

I left Manhattan on the 29th and arrived at the airport, as required, 4 hours before my flight. OK it's meant to be 3 hours but I like to be early. Just as well in this case as I was about to fall victim to Un-reliable-ted Airlines once again. My booking was from JFK to Washington then to London so I checked in then availed myself of the business lounge - back in the pointy end see - to check some email and have a few drinks. First revelation: You have to pay for drinkies in the United Airlines business lounge. It's the end of civilisation as we know it. Second revelation: you can't rely on aeroplanes. After I'd been at the airport for about 2 hours I hear my name being called over the PA, this is never a good thing. So I go to the white courtesy phone and find out that my flight from JFK to Washington isn't going to happen as the 'plane is late arriving in New York. This then means that I'd miss my London connection. And there are no other flights to London until tomorrow. "So what do I do?" says I. "You gotta go to La Guardia now". Now? How? "In a Cab, you've got 90 minutes, the cab takes 30. But it's a long weekend and a Friday evening so you better get going". Thanks for that, great help. So I run to get my bag, then I run to get a cab, almost get kidnapped by some dodgy tout telling me the taxi queue is for Manhattan only and I need to go with him. I realise as we head across the car park that this is not right. Picture me rushing and swearing at the git all at the same time. Eventually I get into a cab and he drives fantastically and quick to La Guardia. I run back in to the second airport in 2 hours and they check me onto the flight, then I run to the plane, grab my seat and spend 45 minutes on the tarmac waiting for take off clearance. Apparently it gets pretty busy at La Guardia on a Friday. So I still just made my connection in Washington, luckily running across the airport from gate 6 to gate 9 didn't take long.

I have to say that I am very glad that I never have to fly United again for as long as I live. 

It was quite a relief to land at Heathrow and you don't hear people say that very often. You always know when you are back at London's premier airport by the way all the lights are hanging out of the ceiling. And by the complete lack of any sort of ventilation or air-con. And by the 6 mile walk form the gate to the immigration area. And by the one immigration agent to process 200 people. Or by the massive mob of people all waiting, staring at one little screen trying to see where there bags are coming out. And by the complete lack of any form of Customs or Quarantine control. And of course by the nightmare road system to get back onto the motorway.

Ahhh, it's good to  be home.

Up and running

Well I'm back on line, I'll try and post this evening, let you all know what's been going on.