Those were the days...

Czech Dream

2007-10-11T13:01:00.001-07:00

There was an interesting short film on the other day on one of the more obscure digital channels. Czech Dream (all in Czech with subtitles) about a wry look at how consumerism has taken over.

It recorded a large-scale hoax on the Czech public, culminating in the "opening event" of a fake "hypermarket" called Czech Dream and created a massive advertising campaign around it. Posing as businessmen, two film students managed to persuade an ad agency and PR agency to create a campaign for them. Billboards appeared on Czech highways, and 200,000 pamphlets were distributed in Prague. A jingle was recorded and there was a series of television commercials.

The shoppers came in their thousands. What looked like a huge building from a distance was actually only a canvas facade backed by scaffolding. When the "customers" finally realised that they had been deceived, they reacted in different ways. Some understood the filmmakers' message, some tried to take it optimistically ("At least we had some fresh air") but most were angry and many decided to blame the government…..

Spain

2007-07-18T12:12:00.000-07:00

It’s soon come around and now is only a little over two weeks away. Belch sent me the address and I think I’ve found it on Multimap - On the coast a couple of km south-west of Fuengirola, about 25km SW of Malaga. I’m assuming that this place has bars nearby that we will venture into?? It’s just that I also have a vision of certain people wanting to stay in and play PES (OK slight exaggeration)...or being ‘too tired to go out'....or will Big Pete be the party animal out till 6am every night?!

Picked up a 2003 copy of the Rough Guide to Andalucia for £3 from a discount book store and there seems a fair bit of things of interest around. A few things that jump out at me are:
Malaga – is supposed to be a nice city with a good old town.
Ronda (recommended by my parents) should be quite easy to get to.
Gibraltar – and I think Big Pete and Markus are also keen on this one.
Cadiz is supposed to be really nice, but it’s a long way and there isn’t really a quick way to get there because of the mountains.
Some time on the beach would be good too but those with lighter skin may not be overly happy with this one.

Anyone else got many ideas?

Drink up!

2007-07-08T12:56:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Wikipedia here are some interesting stats regarding which countries are the king of beer-drinking in the world (per-capita). Leading the pack out in front on their own? The Czechs. Followed some distance behind by Ireland and then Germany. Anyone who knows their beers wouldn’t find this a surprise. But then (and it was a surprise for me) come Australia!? I though all they drank was Fosters and XXXX, but they have a large number of breweries over there apparently and Fosters is only produced for the export market. Interesting. Then (another surprise for me) comes Austria and finally in at #6 comes the mighty UK (perhaps slightly disappointing for such a beer-producing heavyweight). The US comes in at #13, Poland #18 and Russia only #23 (but then beer only comprises 11% of all alcohol consumption). Though if it was Alcohol consumption alone, the Ruskies would be leading the pack by some distance. The French snubbed the charts by not even coming in the top 35. Here are the full results if you’re interested:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_ordered_by_per_capita_beer_consumption.

There’s been a bit of talk about ‘safe’ alcohol levels recently. I thought that the world was unified in what was ‘safe’ and what was not. But this is not the case. The weedy yanks think that 14units per week is the max for males, with the hard-living Aussies thinking that it should be 28. The middle-of-the-road Brits and Germans think 21 units is the max.

Another case of global warming?

2007-06-27T11:56:00.000-07:00

Some years ago (probably around 1990 or so) before it became ‘trendy’ to talk about Global Warming I remember listening to the weatherman John Kettley describing what it was. Contrary to popular belief, it would not necessarily entail the same weather albeit warmer, but instead significantly more changeable and extreme weather...there's always records being made (Winter 1947 and 1963 and summer 1976) but June 2007...Moscow has it’s hottest ever June temp – 38C, Greece has its highest ever temperatures recorded of 47C. Sheffield has its wettest day on record (10 days after the wettest day for 35 years) during the wettest June on record. I’m sure the finger-pointing will start soon about who was 'to blame' and the local councils will be the easiest target to pick on.

I have to say full marks to Sheffield Council and the team of volunteers on Monday regarding the provision of emergency shelter for those of us that needed it. It was well organised, everyone got fed and watered and provided with a duvet. Joe Public seemed to be in fairly good spirits, though I heard the odd complaint that the food was too spicy(!) and that there was only 2 choices available, and that they should have provided beds for everyone. What do some people expect?? It’s easy to moan but I’m sure if it had been Albania, the police would have probably run off home and it’d have been a free-for-all with every man for himself.

The Battle of the Booze

2007-06-08T12:02:00.000-07:00

Forget Battle of the Buff, this is the real issue we have to worry about. It’s been in the air for a while now, but now the govt is planning a white paper on it. Basically the idea is to try and work out what will happen if they double the price of alcohol and try and make ‘drinking as anti-social as drink-driving or smoking’. Men who drink 4 pints in one siting once per week (surely this applies to 90% of the male UK population?) are now regarded as 'hazardous drinkers' The only reasons I can think of for this are:

1. The govt wants to a quick-fix scheme to save money on the NHS and is greedily eyeing up the money they think they might be able to suck out of drinkers.
2. It’s phase 2 of the campaign to turn the UK into an Islamic country?! Phase 3? Haven’t a clue – compulsory veils for all women over 15?!?
3. Gordon Brown just wants us all to believe he is (what we all think anyway) a dour, non-drinking, tight-fisted Scotsman who hates to see everyone else have a good time.

Prohibition has never worked in any country its been tried in. Just to name a few The US and Norway in the 1930s and the Soviet Union’s campaign in the late 1980s all failed…will the UK be next?

Review

2007-05-30T11:51:00.000-07:00

Wednesday 23 – arrived Oslo Torp at 9.30. Bus into centre 90mins (220NOK, 21.50), stayed at Anker Hostel, dorm (17pounds).
Thursday Oslo-Bergen Train. Amazing scenery at Finse 1220m, highest station in Norway. Thick snow, temp -1C. Arrive Bergen (Belson?!) 5.30pm, pouring rain, hunt out Montana hostel 5km from centre, marked wrongly on all maps. After much cursing and having to ask locals, eventually find it 7pm. Dorm of 20, mainly Norwegians, two French, one Scottish guy, only Brit I meet, mid50s, annoying at first then turns out to be quite interesting. Spending 6weeks in Nor. Earns (7.5k?!). Lives off peanut butter sandwiches. Montana hostel – Owned Norwegian YHA, no alcohol sold or allowed on premises. Bit like YHA and SYHA. Bit puritanical. Few independent hostels in Nor. Exact opposite of Friendly Franks, Riga, Latvia.
Friday – up 8am – weather better, Ulriksbahn hill (642m) before ‘Lunch’ – supermarket = bread and cheese.Wander round old town/fish market pm.
Saturday – early train, Myrdal, down to Flam and then back to Myr again. Arrive Oslo 9.30pm. Hotekilen YHA 13km outside centre. Totally dead.
Sunday explore Oslo, warm day, Sunday night back in Anker Hostel. Heavy rain late evening.
Monday – wet all day – get T-Bahn to Frognaseterin ski centre, altitude 582m, walk around a bit, inclement weather. Return on Ryaniar flight 1900.

So Norway. Second time I’ve been there though first time I’ve really visited cities, though if your going for cities and nightlife you’re going to the wrong place. Overall remarks not bad, but I didn’t really think Oslo was anything particularly special. Some quite nice buildings and very modern, but think I preferred Helsinki. Norway did look slightly run-down (for the richest or second richest country in Europe) on some of the back streets (particularly Grunerlokka – though I had one of the best kebabs I’ve had had from a Turkish takeaway) and maybe they are experiencing the usual problems of others European countries. I’d definitely go back, but go for the wilderness areas though (but then I didn’t expect it any other way). Overall the trip met my expectations but didn’t exceed them, mainly due to extremely high costs and poor weather (again no surprises). Having your own transport would be an enormous advantage. Costs are ridiculous in Norway. Oslo-Bergen train (120quid return, even with student card). Beer in supermarket 1.60. Managed to cut total spend back to 260quid, though this did mean not a single meal out or alcoholic drink the whole time. Interesting as a stop-gap trip, but I’m expecting greece and spain to be much better.

Scores
Ryanair 10/10
Lonely Planet 6/10
Norway 5/10.

Norway

2007-05-17T11:51:00.000-07:00

1p there and 1p back with Ryanair was just too tempting. Even with the £10 baggage fee I still saw change out of 50quid. A surprise as I'm probably one of G. Browns 'enemy of the people'.

Now I just need to find something to do over there. One idea was Oslo and Stockholm but I've decided to stick with Norway. Saw a bit of the Sognafjord and Jutonheimun National Park on a geog fieldtrip in 2001 so the mountains do again look tempting. I'll try and follow the taylor diet (tapwater, bananas and yoghurt) to keep costs down. But I won't be sleeping rough in graveyards. I hope.

Patriotism, Nationalism...and St George's Day

2007-04-25T07:54:00.000-07:00

St George’s Day passed on 23 April and I don’t recall seeing one English flag, or even reading about it in the free paper, the Metro (though that’s probably not surprising as it’s a rather “progressive” PC paper).

Not that I heard it, but the Jeremy Vine show on BBC Radio 2 today featured a debate on whether St. George’s Day is relevant in a multicultural society. Apparently the conclusion seemed to be that such a national day would be too Anglo-Saxon and did not celebrate the diversity of England.

So why are the English so afraid of celebrating their own day? Are the powers that be worried that we’ll turn into a bunch of rampant nationalists. What is the difference between nationalism and patriotism anyway- is nationalism just a stronger form of patriotism? Are they both bad? Can you be nationalistic without being patriotic?

Anyway, St Georges Day is also celebrated in Bulgaria, Georgia (of course that’s former Soviet Georgia, not the US) and Serbia. Maybe we should be looking to these nations for a bit of inspiration to celebrate our national day, or just to try and re-discover our identity?

Czechmate

2007-04-14T08:07:00.000-07:00

Returned to Czech Rep properly for the first time since 2002. It’s always been a place that I’ve been intending to go back to, though I’ve never got round to it. Baring a night in Brno and a day trip to Pilsen, I’d never really made it outside Prague until now. There are some real gems around. Cesky Krumlov was a real stunner, but even Tabor-not even in a lot of general guidebooks in this part of the world was really nice. Made Ceske Budejovice our base for the first couple of days and finished the last night and day in Prague. Prague is still amazingly cheap – considering it’s one of the most visited capitals in Europe – and many bars (even those close to the old town) are still cheaper or at least comparable to some of the more eastern cities….but I’d say Czech Republic is still an ex-Eastern bloc country though, although it’s very pretty there’s still plenty of Soviet-era industry and architecture around.

Shiz was particularly pleased to get the Budvar Budweiser brewery tour in, though it was all in German as we went round with an old-peoples coach party. It was that or nothing.

Czechoslovakia wasn't trashed in the war like Poland and Russia, so all cities still have an old town. And although the The Czechoslovak communists were austere, they weren't nutters and built most of the rabbit-hutches on the outskirts of towns rather than demolishing the town centres like the Romanians did. All in all an excellent trip.

Good TV. Bad TV

2007-03-29T11:19:00.000-07:00

6 weeks ago I had a daily TV intake of almost zero. My intake usually consisted of one dose of Newsnight per week plus a bit of sport when it was on and an occasional documentary about some war-torn ex-Soviet republic, or the continuing economic development of China.

After a couple of weeks in Mark’s place this has increased about 600% to quite worrying levels. I find myself gawping at the TV nearly every night. I’m grateful for being introduced to ‘Life on Mars’ a truly hilarious police comedy set in 1973. But the rest of it is a diet of junk. I never thought I’d be watching these property/home improvement shows. And I really don’t understand how I’ve developed a taste for Hollyoaks - I thought I’d be immune. I'm not sure if go to the Czech Republic, I'd miss too many episodes. What has Taylor done to me?!

Interesting places

2007-03-14T13:53:00.000-07:00

create your own visited country map
or check our Venice travel guide

John - to answer your question - that's where I've been. Though it isn't representative at all - I've only been to a tiny corner of North-west Russia. Been to Pskov, though (If anyone was watching BB2 tonight re the vodka poisonings that was actually chemicals, not vodka). 36 countries, 16% though I've only spent a few days in some, or only been to 1 city. Or just blatently cheated (i.e. the airport - Denmark, Holland!).

I would like to go back to Bosnia again this summer, but go to some of the lesser known parts in Republika Srpska. I suppose the only downside is that Sarajevo and Mostar are probably bursting with tourists now whereas even as late as 2001 Me and Mr T didn't see any other tourists. Here's an interesting video from some italian musicians who went to sarajevo in October 1996 - a pretty interesting time to visit. It's changed beyond recognition since then. Watch for the guy riding on the back of the tram!

3 March 1985 - the beginning of the end?

2007-03-04T04:56:00.000-08:00

Just a slightly political post again. 3rd March 1985 was when the 1984/85 Miners Strike - the longest and bitterest strike in recorded history - was lost. Thatcher could now do pretty much anything she wanted. Trade Unionism and Socialism were dead and the UK would never be the same again.

A different night in Reddish on Friday. Few pubs, mediocre beer and low-level anarchy that got worse as the night progressed. Still, the UK is in for interesting times ahead so sit back and enjoy the show...

New start

2007-03-01T13:02:00.000-08:00

Finally got Czech Republic booked after much procrastination. Should be a good few days. First point of call is Budjovice, home of Budweiser then Cesky Krumlov - only a few kms away. Then we're pretty much spoilt for choice...Telc and Brno....Hradec Kralove and Olomouc...or to head north-west up to the German border to check out Cheb and Karlovy Vary (where a fair amount of the lastest bond film was set).

Moved in to Mark's pad this week - I intend to give it a go for while, it's certainly nicer than living in a Sheffield bedsit. Not had a chance to properly check out the bargain basement stores of The Edge yet, but that'll come.

Free Fall

2007-02-18T12:14:00.000-08:00

I think I am the master of the constructive time waste - perhaps only Big Pete (and possibly Russ) is a contender for the grandmaster title. I had a nice long weekend to get my "Ethics and Planning" essay written - something which is tedious beyond belief...I don't really understand what exactly 'deontological' and 'consequentialism' are, nor do I care. But somehow I've got to write a 2500 word constructive argument on this before wednesday. I managed to get to 1200 words this weekend after optimistically predicting on Thursday that it would be all done and dusted by Sun...so a few long nights on Monday and Tuesday are looming - just what I want to do after a hard days work...

Russian has been in free fall over the last 6 months. I haven't made any attempt at any form of passive or active study since about October. In Moldova last year I really struggled getting a conversation properly going. I don;t think I could even string a few words together now.

This is why I know that it's pointless me even bothering with the Mcr Run. I just don't have the disipline to do any training....anyone have any tips??

Back on track

2007-02-14T12:37:00.000-08:00

This blog (like a number of others) seems to have drifted towards a more political slant recently, so back to it’s roots – travel for the next couple of weeks.

Hopefully use the couple of days off at Easter to go on a little trip somewhere using the absolute minimum of holiday time. Czech Republic, Austria, Hungary and Slovenia are the main contenders with CZ looking the favourite. Though if this was the case Prague wouldn’t feature on the itinerary much-although it’s very pretty it’d be heaving with tourists and it’s not really Czech Republic anymore, more a kind of Czech Disneyland. Cesky Krumlov, Cesky Budejovice and either Telc (or a poss trip to Vienna) would be the main attractions with a good mix of castle and brewery tour...maybe Mr T could pick up a few tips....

Hopefully a week in Greece in either June/July or September.

Spain in August. It will be the first time I’ve set foot in Spain since Menorca, 1989 and mainland spain since Almeria, 1987.

Then Northern Croatia/Slovenia looks appealing, to try and go a bit further up the coast than we went to last year…I was also hoping to re-visit Bosnia this year and could do with my annual fix with a trip to the former Soviet Union, but I'm prett much streched to the limit with holiday time and some tough choices will have to be made. Sweden may not get a look in this year...I probably won't be able to meet Borat in Kazakhstan for a year or two...and China will have to be put on the long-term waiting list.

10 Minutes

2007-02-04T12:41:00.000-08:00

I'm fairly new to YouTube, but stumbled across this the other day. I think it won the best European Short Film in 2002. The first two mins or so are a bit dull. The footage isn't real, but it has a realistic feel. I suppose the moral is, you've had a bad day etc...but in the grand scheme of things is it really that important...

Post #68

2007-01-31T10:49:00.000-08:00

Some musings

Chris put something on his myspace blog about he was becoming increasingly doubtful of capitalism.

Capitalism doesn't seem to be necessarily bad but the version that has evolved over the last 15 years or so seems to be the more aggressive US winner-takes-all version, rather than the older UK (or European or Japanese) version. The irony I suppose is that the power of the 'free' market seems to be far greater now under a labour govt than under the Thatcherite 1980s. I'm sure Tescos (along with the other supermarkets)never used to be so profit-driven and obsessed with getting total dominance in the market with such contempt for everyone else. Our football has become dominated by foreign mercenaries and in 5 years every premier-league club will be foreign-owned (how can this be a good thing?). And now every club seems to want to build a new stadium (despite having been at the old one quite happily for the last 120+ years) to accommodate new fans that are currently being cultivated somewhere. Then people seem to be told from a social point of view that everyone can get to the top, and it is quite realistic to expect Yeovil Town, say, will be a successful top-flight club….I just don’t understand it.

Big Brother

2007-01-24T10:53:00.000-08:00

Time for another rant. I'll make it short.

I'm surprised at the level of interest in this junk. And the papers (well the tabloids) are still putting this on their front pages every other day. Channel 4 must be laughing their socks off at the amount of publicity it's generated.

40 000 people 'offended' - yet they carry on watching. It even made newsnight where I heard these 'deeply racially offensive comments' for the first time. It just sounded like a normal everyday conversation that you hear taking place on a bus or in a pub between two rather thick people, rather than something sinister and shameful.

Why do people watch BB anyway? Is the intelligent conversation between the inmates, or the beauty of Jade Goody?

Jugoslavija

2007-01-07T12:43:00.000-08:00

Finland - very quick review. Really nice place and really nice people...and as always I wonder what has gone wrong with the UK...why are we a nation of such aggressive arseholes...anyway was an entertaining couple of days. Wasn't overly expensive, there was some snow, the weather was pretty nice, and I saw inebriated people being carried out of bars after indulging in a couple too many shots. And that was just the first night.

Have been currently reading 'Death of Yugoslavia' a BBC-commissioned book. A pretty good book that analyses the causes of the break-up of Yugoslavia well, though I'm sure most people would probably find it utterly tedious. The book starts in 1987 with Milosevic's infamous speech to the Serbs of Kosovo Polje, how Slovenia broke away from the federation and why Bosnia was so completely knackered. It does have an obvious 'it was all the fault of the Serbs/the muslims were all innocent victims' slant and generally seeks to blame the Serbs exclusively (though what would you expect from the BBC?!).

This comes on top of a few more Balkan reads 'my war gone by, I miss it so' about a war journalists frank account (who also also had a heroine addiction in the UK - Anthony Loyd) of what exactly what was happening in Bosnia, 1993. And General Michael Rose's 'fighting for peace' gives a good account of what Brit peace-keepers are facing on a daily basis. Good old Stocky library. But I think I will need another trip to the Balkans to try and satisfy my ex-Yugoslavia cravings (which I thought were under control).

Sometimes I think I should have joined the army, as I'd be getting all this stuff for free (or even being paid for the privilege). Me and Taylor did not do Sarajevo justice in 2001. The Jan 2007 Bradt guide to Bosnia & Herzegovina has been purchased from Amazon, along with a couple more Balkan war books...and flights Manchester-Sarajevo can be acquired for a bargain 235pounds, so another trip is looking very tempting...

Scotland

2007-01-07T05:11:00.000-08:00

Cottage near Drumnadrochit, 18miles SW Inverness, quite close to Loch Ness. Standard excellent, the last couple of times we've been spoilt a bit with the standard, quite a step up from the Crask Inn in 2001 when the temp never rose above 6degrees inside the house and there was one bathroom between 10. Weather slightly better than last year and was able to do a bit more walking - two Corbetts (mountain between 2500-2999ft lower than a Munro at 3000ft) climbed.

Trying to upload some photos of the windswept, snow covered summit of Beinn a'Bha 'ach Ard (pronounced Ben-a-vrach-ard). But my computer is having none of it, so you'll just have to imagine it.

A nation of shoppers

2006-12-27T09:39:00.000-08:00

Shopping seems to becoming an increasing obsession these days. Can anyone explain to me exactly what the pleasure of going to the shops with 100 000 other people in order to hunt for non-existant 'bargains' is?

News reports indicate that people started queuing up for the 'sales' at midnight on Christmas night. Madness. Even the Americans aren't as shopping-obsessed as us barmy Brits!

What's going on?!

2006-11-29T12:18:00.000-08:00

Just checked the current weather for Finland. Unfortunately it's unseasonably mild and set to continue that way for the forseeable future. +8 in Helsinki and even in Rovaniemi, at the arctic circle, it's +5 with no snow, almost unheard of for this time of year.

The Russian spy stuff was all over the news last weekend with most journalists blaming Putin, though he's never exactly been flavour of the month with the Daily Mail readers. I'd be surprised if Putin was behind it though, as he would probably go after bigger fish like Berezovsky. And to poison someone in such a bizarre way is calling out for media attention. Much better to shoot them in a bungled robbery or to have a nasty car crash which might make the bottom of page 16. I've never really understood why Putin gets such a bad press while Abramovic is portrayed as a decent and upstanding guy.

A cup of tea - Big Pete style

2006-11-26T12:20:00.000-08:00

Me and Big Pete went round to Mark's - the now firmly established Sunday routine, which also involves playing Goldeneye on Mark's creaking N64. Russ don't laugh!

Rather surprisingly Big Pete offered to make the second cup of tea. As this is such a rare occurrence, Mark immediately agreed to proposal. After a full 15mins had elapsed with no visible sign of progress we went upstairs to investigate. With a 7 year old, most parents are a bit concerned about accidents, but surely a 26-year-old man wouldn't find the task too challenging? Pete was pouring out 3 cups of tea (we'd previously had coffee and the mugs hadn't been rinsed, but maybe to mention that would've been unnecessarily critical. There was something that was slightly odd though, as there was no steam coming from the kettle. The tea's were stone-cold. The tea was then poured into some hot water that Mark had deliberately poured out for washing up. The result: 3 wasted tea bags along with milk and a rather stressed Mark vowing never to allow Pete near his kitchen again. Told you our Sunday afternoon's are full of excitement!

A good time to be a smackhead

2006-11-18T06:55:00.000-08:00

Even in this current Politically Correct climate there was an odd decision this week. Some bigwig lawyer decided that convicted criminals with heroine addictions currently in prison were given Methodone without the prisoners’ consent. This, therefore, was ‘assault’ by the government, degrading treatment/torture, breach of human rights etc etc. The govt paid compensation without a fight.

Am I totally out-of-touch or do people genuinely believe prison a gross violation of human rights. Maybe we should close all prisons and release all prisoners with the most violent and dangerous inmates given huge amounts of compensation and released first….

Winter

2006-11-10T11:19:00.000-08:00

It's about this time of year that I start wondering if we'll have a cold winter with some snow (and hoping we do). The last couple of winters have been very disappointing and it is now a rare event to get lying snow for more than a day. The last winter this happened to any extent was 1995/96 and the last properly cold winter 1986/87.

Anyway I'm fairly confident I'll see some snow in Finland in December. Even in Southern Finland snow isn't guaranteed in December (but it's about 80% likely). Average temperatures in Tampere are -2 day and -6 night and Helsinki a degree warmer which is actually slightly warmer than Vilnius and certainly warmer than Moscow at -5/-11 where December snow is guaranteed.

Travels with the Pig man

2006-11-08T12:27:00.000-08:00

All being well next August should be the first time I will have ventured outside the shores of the UK with Big Pete. Will this be an experience to look forward to or dread?! Come to think of it I don't think I have been outside the UK territories with any of the BRFC crew (with the exception of Shiz and Mark). What sort of traveller is Big Pete? A high-rolling-5star-luxury-$200-a-night-only-the-best-will-do (Russ), a scrimp&save-thrifter who sleeps rough in graveyards (Mark) or a middle-of-the-roader staying in hostels (Shiz)...

₤2.49. Can't complain.

2006-11-05T06:25:00.000-08:00

With it's bizarre pricing policies, Ryanair has now reduced the cost of flights to Finland to 2.49 each way, 15quid with taxes. Probably about the same price as two beers in Helsinki. I fail to see how this stands up in economic terms when it costs about 1.70 to go a couple of stops on the 378. Seems to go completely against all global warming concerns and govt policy, but enough with the moralizing, I'm there!

Only a morbid and sadistic soul like myself (and it looks like you may have to include Shiz in that category!) would get any pleasure in braving the potential sub-zero temperatures and darkness that Finland has to offer in December...

green taxes

2006-11-01T12:06:00.000-08:00

So these 'Green Taxes' that are going to come in. Does this mean that I'm not going to go on my annual 5 foreign holidays a year (think I've been abroad 10 times since start of 2005) and every time by plane. A trend I intend to continue. Or is it all a load of guff/hot air?

I better get that Tampere/Oslo/Venice/Rome flight booked pronto! I must say Tampere is turning me on the most at the moment, although Oslo is still in with a good chance.

Oh, and just a minor grumble, I've noticed that people are sometimes writing 'alot' when they mean 'a lot'. I've noticed this creeping into a few of the blogs.

December break?

2006-10-29T08:23:00.001-08:00

Just been thinking about a short break in December, as I can only carry forward 5 days holiday into 2007 (I currently have 7.5). So I either take 3 Mondays in December off work, or I try and squeeze in a little trip somewhere.

Other complicating factors are:
1) I can't take time off before 14 December as I've got to do a presentation on either 6 or 13th at Uni.
2) I've got an Christmas parties on 15 and 21 December, which gives me a window of 17-20th December.
3) I'd like to go somewhere cold and I want to go from a local airport.
4) I don't want to book til quite late and I want it dirt cheap.

A tall order, but there may be some possibilities.

Options
Liverpool-Krakow, stupidly expensive
Liverpool-Oslo, bargain 99p return flight. Total cost 36quid return!!
Liverpool-Tampere (Finland), cheap 55quid return.

Any takers?

Iraq - time to go?

2006-10-25T12:02:00.000-07:00

Yes!

I was never a fan of the Iraq war from day 1 – though nothing to do with it being ‘an illegal war’ (surely all wars are illegal?! Was it ‘illegal’ for Britain to declare war on Germany in 1939?!) or on being ‘mislead/lied to’ by Blair. I don’t think he or the intelligence services really knew what was going on, thought they could wing-it, and were caught out. Unlucky. It was a bad idea because it was clear there would be chaos after the overthrow of Saddam. Look at Vietnam, Afghanistan, Yugoslavia. I’m sure we could demolish regimes in Syria and Iran in a weekend if we needed to. And then spend the next 25 years bogged down in a long and messy guerilla war.

The idea of building a stable democracy in Iraq is a joke (it’s highly questionable whether there is one in the US or Italy) and the prospects of getting one in the Middle East in the near future are virtually nil.

Iraq is on the point of a civil war and it shouldn’t be the British Army being shot at or targeted in the cross fire. The army has had a pretty bad press from the media in relation to so-called ‘atrocities’ – they’re being shot at every hour of every day and if they catch and beat a few gunmen, so what? Are we supposed to give them an ice-cream and let them off with a warning?

To be fair, we’ve probably not made the situation worse than it was under Saddam, we’ve just let the lid off a pressure-cooker of inter-ethnic hatred that has been simmering for decades.

Pull out immediately and let the Iranians/Syrians get their hands dirty trying to sort it out!

Cameron

2006-10-19T14:56:00.000-07:00

Who?

The new tory leader. People seem to like him, though I don't know who and I don't know why - he hasn't got much going for him:
1) He's a Thatcherite (which will go down really well in some parts of northern England)
2) He’s straight out of the stereotypical ‘Eton-educated-very patronising-likes-hunting’ brigade
3) He’s liberal
4) He’s a wannabe Blair, without the charisma. And I’m not a Blair fan (though the more unpopular Blair has become the more I’ve started to develop more sympathy for him and his predicament.

Holiday in Grozny

2006-10-18T13:27:00.000-07:00

I'm wondering how long it'll be before Chechnya features on the backpackers trails.

A train service from Moscow-Grozny started up last year and seems to be running relatively smoothly. Although things aren't good at the moment (no electricity or running water yet and 90% of buildings destroyed) Grozny seems to be starting to slowly re-develop and make some sort of progress. Although it isn't exactly a place you'd go for some peacful relaxation, the heavy shelling has stopped and there seems to be some sort of stability.

I can't find any websites relating to tourism in Chechnya yet and I think I'll leave it for a couple of years. But maybe one day...

The Russian bear growls!

2006-10-07T06:33:00.000-07:00

Georgia looks very unlikely for a future wild east next summer.

Me and Taylor (and possibly Shiz) talked a while ago about visiting Georgia (and we don't mean America!). Georgia is in a mess at the moment, some say on the verge of civil war and there are shoot-outs between Russian troops and local militias at night. Problems have been exacerbated since the very pro-western, anti-Russian Saakashvili govt got in power in 2003 with hopes of joining the EU. Relations with Russia are at an all-time low and the Russian government has started deporting Georgians (and half of all Georgian males seem to be working in Russia illegally) from Moscow and St Petersburg. To be fair to the Russians though, why should they continually put up with a whole raft of illegal workers (who are only there to benefit themselves), paying no tax, and who are then hostile to the host country. Like most little countries in the world, the Georgians want all the benefits of being in an organisation like the EU, yet they'd comply with none of the regulations. And all the problems of the world are always the fault of big countries or 'colonialists'...

Poor 'ol Jack!

2006-10-06T12:05:00.000-07:00

Jack Straw was never a politician I particularly liked as he was far too liberal and PC for my liking, so it’s a bit ironic that he gets castigated for saying that he asks Muslim women to remove the hijab (or whatever it’s called) in his constituency meetings. I can’t help thinking that there are tough times ahead and in a worse-case scenario we could start to go the way of Yugoslavia, especially in northern England. Though France seems even more in a mess than the UK.

Romania circa 1992

2006-09-24T13:37:00.000-07:00

I’ve decided that Mark’s house is in fact comparable to an Eastern bloc country. Romania August 1992 is what I believe is the current situation (Sunday 24 Sept) is. Though to be fair, it has substantially improved in a week (last Sunday it was Romania late 1990), though even then there was a working toilet and cold water running from 1 tap in the household and a rather uriney-esque smell coming from 3 of the upstairs rooms (sorry Mark, not being critical, just honest!). The smell has gone from two of the rooms and the carpet has been cleaned to a level where you’d feel comfortable taking your shoes off. I can only wonder what Mark experienced when he collected the keys (Romania immediately after the revolution, Dec 1989) when there was no water, no electricity and the place was on the verge of a civil war. But I’ve noticed that the average beer price has risen from 7p a pint to 19p. All I can say is that by the time the Bramall Rangers crew arrive in a couple of weeks (probably the equivalent of mass-tourism, easy-jet flights and stag-dos) Romania will have progressed to 2005 and they'll be Gucci outlets, McDonalds and Starbucks coffee shops everywhere and 1.50 beers. The power cuts, water shortages, secret police and food queues will have long gone…

someone who was really in Romania, 1990
http://www.mendicott.com/bbbform.htm

Knivskjellodden

2006-09-20T11:23:00.000-07:00

It doesn’t roll off the tongue very easily but that's the name of the most northerly point in mainland Europe, though most people have heard of the more famous point nearby - The North Cape (Though there is a further argument that it's not even the most northerly point because it is technically located on an island off Norway connected by a tunnel)

Anyway it looks an interesting place and it can probably be done with a reasonable exploration of Norway in around 2 weeks. Ideally June-August would be the time to go and see the midnight sun at the same time. Norway is another place that I promised I would return to after going there on a geography field trip in 2001. We camped rough near a village called Gjerde and spent most of the day sitting in the sun or walking on glaciers.

Though holiday time is already starting to look very stretched next year as a trip to Spain with the Rangers is planned and I couldn't live without my annual pilgrimage of a week in Greece and a former USSR trip thrown in there.

And if you wanted to know where the most northerly Subway sandwich shop (Alta) or McDonalds is (Rovaniemi), here it is
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_world's_most_northern

Hrvatska

2006-09-13T12:12:00.000-07:00

An excellent week in Crotia saw me, Paul and Shiz visit Dubrovnik, Split, Trogir, Cavtat and Mostar. I would post some pictures on here, but that would take too long and I'm too lazy.

Goods
First time I've seen coastal Croatia and it really is as beautiful as people say.

Did some things I've not done before like eat Octopus (Dubrovnik) and go up to the top of a minaret (Mostar, Bosnia (and we went in with shorts and T-shirts on with noone being the slightest bit bothered) does this mean that muslims worship the US$/Euro more than Allah!?)

The view from our room in Dubrovnik

The climb up to the top of Srd Hill behind Dubrovnik

Bads
Having a sudden outbreak of vertigo on that minaret (or maybe that was Allah’s revenge)

The huge volume of tourists everywhere (in particular Americans)

The prices (3 quid a pint in Dubrovnik)

That Octopus was about 13quid

Arriving at the airport at 0655 to discover our flight was at 0710 not 0825 like we thought.

Overall though and excellent trip and I hope to be back soon.

Our happy, peaceful world

2006-08-26T04:03:00.000-07:00

There's been a lot of news on terrorism recently, and as usual, a lot of hot air and not much facts.

For instance, when the IRA was in a more active phase some years ago, most people were under the impression that the goals were fairly clear: 1) A united Ireland and 2) Brits out of Northern Ireland. The goal seemed relatively simple and realistic on paper and amongst most of the British populace there was probably some sympathy with the idea (even if they didn't agree with their methods). The rules seemed to be a campaign to be directed against the British govt with high-ranking politicians and members of the Royal Family legitimate targets. Every so often people would get caught in the crossfire or a splinter group outside of the main wing would commit an atrocity, but in general the ordinary population was not a target.

With Al-Queida however, nobody seems to know what their objectives are - world Islam? Total destruction of western civilisation? Which seem totally ridiculous aims. And now the civilian population is the target. Then there are people who say that ‘they’ mustn’t change our way of living (whatever that’s supposed to mean). The Industrial Revolution drastically changed our way of life, as did the invention of the railways, WW2, email and mobile phones, the motor car…so of course crime and terrorism is going to change our way of life. The only realistic solution is more security, more police and more police powers.

The Baltika invasion

2006-08-18T07:03:00.000-07:00

So Heineken is Europe’s most drunk beer and followed in 2nd place by the Russian beer, Baltika. I’m not sure whether I trust these figures as I thought Heineken was a bit of a yesterday’s drink (you don’t see their cans in supermarkets as often as you used to do) and Baltika seems to be a relatively rare sight outside of the former Soviet Union.

Beer doesn’t yet have a good reputation in Russia (with peak consumption 6-8am) and it’s scoffed at by most men, who consider it to be a homosexuals drink (with it’s weedy 4-5% alcohol). But Baltika is supposedly taking Europe by storm, so have a look at what you larger drinkers will be supping in a few years time!

http://baltikabeer.com/brands1-5.php

I’ve not had nos. 2, 7, 8, or 9, though Tesco’s have recently started stocking number 3. No. 7 looks interesting, 8 looks inviting and 9 with it’s 8% alcohol content looks more like a Russian’s drink than an effeminate westerner’s drink.

Or will it go the way of the poor old Lada (who had 2% of the British Market in 1988) and now must be nearly extinct on Britain’s roads.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lada

Darkness at Dawn:The Rise of the Russian Criminal State

2006-08-11T11:31:00.000-07:00

That's the title of a book I'm currently reading. And very depressing it is too. I didn't think there were many books that could be a whole lot more cynical than me!

But in a nutshell Russia is totally knackered - controlled at every level by criminals. It does give a good explanation of how the pyramid schemes worked to cheat people out of their life savings, why workers were never paid, why even after 10+ years of 'capitalism' service is still bloody awful, and why Yelsin wanted Putin to take over (and why if you're Russian your best bet is to go and live abroad, preferably somewhere like the UK or Ireland - I knew my Russian would come in handy one day!!).

“...I’d like to do you in the back seat of my car…”

2006-06-21T11:35:00.000-07:00

On second thoughts maybe I wouldn’t. Those aren’t my words, but in fact some of the lyrics of the latest hit that was playing in all the cafes in Tiraspol, Transdneistr.

Tiraspol was an unusual destination. The capital of an unofficial country which declared independence from Moldova in 1991 to try and remain a piece of the Soviet Union. It’s touted as being the last hard-line communist regime in the world (outside of North Korea), but there were a couple of adverts there, Coca-Cola was available in the cafes, there were cafes (and they looked to be privately owned). The bureaucracy was straight out of the USSR – it was impossible to stay in any hotel before we acquired a registration permit from the MGB (the re-vamped KGB) – which involved standing in at least 4 different queues filling various pieces of paper in.

Me, Mark and Shiz stood out a mile everywhere we went, but I enjoyed the attention that we got. Things very nearly turned nasty when it looked like Mark was not going to be allowed out at the unofficial checkpoint. I had a 10Euro note tucked in the back of my hand as a bribe, but the ‘border guard’ eventually let us go without much of a fight. I suppose one of the few benefits of being an official in a country that doesn’t officially exist is that you can do pretty much do as you please (Big Pete take note). But then you don’t get an invite to the Eurovision Song Contest or Qualification rounds in football. Or Markstock. I'll try and do a bit more of a detailed report on Moldova-proper in a few days.

In the doldrums

2006-05-10T13:08:00.000-07:00

I’ve never been to a last-game-of-the-season match before, but the opportunity arose when County played the league leaders Carlisle. It was billed as County’s most important game in their history and something mouthwatering enough to make even me part with some cash (or in this case, my Dad’s). the atmosphere was fantastic and Edgeley Park was the fullest I’ve ever seen it. I don’t want to upset the County fans but the quality of Stockport’s football was pretty dire. Carlisle opened the game with some attractive football and looked like worthy League 2 champions. Stockport, by contrast, looked like a conference side never able to hold onto the ball for more than a few passes before pumping aimless long balls forward. Things looked bad indeed when word came through that Oxford were leading against Leyton Orient and County were heading for the league trap door. Leyton Orient equalized a few mins later and we could all breathe again. At half time I made the long trek over to meet the nervous-looking Hornsby Clan and Justin gathered at the Cheadle End. The second half kicked off and Carlisle had sunk to Stockport’s standard and County started to match Carlisle being extremely unlucky not to score when a header struck the underside of the bar, fully deservimg their draw. But would it be enough? Luckily it was and the biggest cheer of the day came when the Leyton Orient result came in. A memorable day indeed. I’ve tried to work out how many county games I’ve been to and I think the answer is 17 which equates to an average of exactly 1 game per season since 1988-89. The first was a 5-0 win vs Scunthorpe in either May 1989 or 1990 (I went with Neville Road Junior School and I didn't keep a diary in those days) when Stockport were in the lower half of Division 4. Saturday was the first time I’ve ever seen a 0-0 draw, though the atmosphere and tension was worth it. However, Jim Gannon or no Jim Gannon I think next season will be a struggle and I don’t have visions of Stockport soaring into the play-offs.

Germany 06 vs West Germany 88

2006-04-23T16:07:00.000-07:00

Not done much since my last posting. Made my overly-late debut for the Rangers and really enjoyed playing. Went bowling with work and got my new personal best of 135.

So 100 000 England supporters are expected to make their way to Germany this summer. The world has moved on a long way since the last time (then West) Germany hosted a big tournament, the disastrous Euro 88 – being my first ever international football tournament I remember it well, though for all the wrong reasons – England were humiliated finishing bottom of their group, losing 1-0 to Ireland, 3-1 to Holland and 5-1 to the USSR. Only 3000 fans went over to West Germany, and it probably at least half of them were hooligans. This was at a time when English teams were banned from all European competitions after Heysel. There was a lot of trouble and everywhere England went the towns were trashed. The tournament got relatively little publicity on TV (and most people seemed to support the team England were playing against) followed almost exclusively by men. Games were played in half-empty stadiums with barbed-wire fencing separating rival fans. France had failed to qualify and were about as good as Wales at football. The Soviet Union was still a superpower (not a bankrupt 3rd world state with the living standards of Ethiopia!).

And now England have probably the best chance they’ve ever had of winning, Germany are a bit of a joke and aren't the feared machine they used to be, football is ultra-cool and trendy, swimming in money and footballers are worshipped and have more power than most world leaders. It’s a funny old game.

Aiming High!

2006-04-11T11:30:00.000-07:00

In Response to Mini’s question, yes the following towns in Poland now have cheap flights going there: Bydgozcz, Lodz, Poznan, Rzescow, Szceczin, Wraclow, Krakow, Warsaw – couple of tongue-twisters in there, but some go from Liverpool and Krakow from Manchester. Perhaps something for the future.

Traffic-permitting, I shall hopefully make my debut at football on Thursday. Though with some of the worst control, least experience and abysmal fitness levels on the BRFC side, my aim is merely to try and convince the opposition that we are not playing a man short!

I did play with work a couple of weeks back and it would be nice to inform you that I impressed everyone with my silky skills, but I’m afraid I was dire. I would also like to excuse myself from the recently imposed ‘no kicking a ball in the warm up’ rule, since my feet have not actually come into contact with a football since mid-2005 (with the exception of the little kickabout at work) and I will need to check I can still remember what to do!

Project management

2006-04-05T12:58:00.000-07:00

Considering the players of BRFC seem to take a generally negative stance towards region (and Christianity in particular) these blogs seem to be turning quite pro-Christian all of a sudden; people giving things up for Lent (and even knowing when Lent is); raising money for charity; supporting free speech…

I see ‘Europe’s last dictator’, Lukashenko of Belarus managed to win the recent elections with the help of a couple of rigged ballot papers and a bit of intimidation from his KGB mates (but lets face it, he would have won by a mile anyway and appears to be very popular) and this have caused a bit of a stir in the western media. Couldn’t help but think it was a bit hypocritical of the US to criticize, when Bush was elected on a very dodgy ballot!

Anyway, a further Markstock meeting took place on Sunday. My hope of ‘going back to basics’ i.e. just get a couple of tents pitched, a BBQ and some music and let everything else take care of itself seems to be drifting in the opposite direction. Big Pete has been issuing more ‘rules’ – no drinking of alcoholic beverages to take place before the fighting tournament, a revising of the rota so that the events scheduled more strictly, disappointment with the size of the ‘boulder’ etc. Not sure how smoothly all of this is going to operate after the consumption of large amounts of alcohol (pissed people throwing a rock around, possibly in the dark and people wrestling near fires and glass bottles) but all we can hope for is good weather…

Descent into darkness: Moldova

2006-03-30T11:50:00.000-08:00

Thanks for explaining about concord, John – at least now I understand why I’ve seen a concord sitting on the runway at Manchester Airport.

Anyway, it looks like Moldova is on for the early part of this summer. Managed to get flights for Bucharest for 200quid – in years gone by it’s been much cheaper, but at one point it looked like it’d be above 250, so I suppose we can’t complain.

In case you didn’t know, Moldova is Europe’s poorest country, a former republic of the USSR situated between Ukraine and Romania. Until WW2 I think it was part of Romania, before Stalin annexed it onto the USSR. The people speak Russian and “Moldovan” apparently almost exactly the same as Romanian bar the odd word or two. Moldova has not had an easy time. Poor even in Soviet times, in the mid1990s after independence (and a brief war in 1992) the economy was in free-fall, living standards have fallen below the levels of most African countries and 25% of the country lives abroad mainly working illegally in Romania, Italy and the UK. Still, it nevertheless looks set to be an interesting destination and Mr A Shirres has wisely decided to join me!

There is an unofficial country called ‘Transdneistr’ which occupies a little slither of land in eastern Moldova where the clock still remain firmly in the early 1980s. Outside of North Korea, this is supposedly one of the few places in the world where Lenin and Stalin have much influence. I’d never even heard of the place until I read about it in Tony Hawk’s excellent ‘Playing the Moldovans at Tennis’ circa 2000.

Transdneistr's economy isn't the healthiest in world. Sometime in 1994 they created a new currency; the transdneistrian Rouble and it was set at 1:1 with the Russian rouble. By 1998 you were getting 400 000 TRs for every RR and Russia doesn't have the most stable currency in the world...

Tough times in Slovakia

2006-02-22T12:22:00.000-08:00

Compared to Hungary and Latvia where everything followed the script pretty much perfectly, this was a more testing trip. The God’s didn’t always smile on us; the unavailability of Mark, a 6hour flight delay, bouts of food poisoning (I’m still not eating solid food yet!), insect (flea/bedbug?) bites from the bed, a mediocre quality hostel in comparison to the previous trips, castles that were closed, dangerous terrain underfoot, missed trains and surly waitresses greeted us on this trip…But thanks to excellent company and a good spirit, it proved to be a great trip and a worthwhile journey.

We set off in good spirits, but the first blow came when we were told the flight would be delayed by at least 6 hours. Not only did this mean that we’d be spending 8hours in Manchester Airport, but more disappointingly we’d arrive in Slovakia at 1am Sunday morning instead of 7pm Saturday evening and our plans for spending the night in the town were derailed. There were a lot of loud and very drunk men (presumably on a stag do) on the flight. At one point some of the guys got so aggressive towards each other that I had visions of a fight breaking out and the plane being diverted to another airport….We eventually arrived at the hostel at 2am and tried to salvage some of the evening by heading out for a few drinks, but thanks to poor information by the girl on reception, we didn’t find anywhere open.

Got some excellent views of the city from the castle and the viewing platform from the bridge at Novy Most. Walking around was slow and difficult being mid-way though a large thaw with large pools of water lying on top of hardened snow. Also, the Town Planners of Bratislava did not look upon walking highly and it must rank as being one of the most pedestrian-unfriendly cities I’ve been too, yet this is not unusual in ex-communist countries. We did however make it to the very communist suburb of Petrzalka where, at Shiz’s insistence, went for a beer in a local bar. I had visions that it would be a den of xenophobic locals hostile to outsiders, particularly rich westerners, but instead we watched Slovakia vs Kazakhstan in the Ice Hockey in a very civilized atmosphere as well as being a mere 38p a pint. Definitely a highlight of the trip.

Sampled a few of the excellent Slovak and Czech Beers that evening.

Late Monday afternoon I suddenly started to feel very ill, which culminated in me unexpectedly vomiting at the checkout in Tescos, before spewing up several times in the street outside. I spent the next 12 hours bedridden with a fever, feeling like death unable to even drink water before making a semi-recovery for the trip to Trencin the next day. I blame the Szeged Goulash I ate at lunchtime, though mysteriously Shiz also had the same dish and was fine. I can only assume that the gypsy-looking waitress took a dislike to me and cursed me (it’s happened before!).

Trencin castle had the most spectacular views I’ve ever seen. Unfortunately I was more focused on trying not to vomit or to soil myself (since I’d had been having copius bowl movements) rather than giving the surroundings my full attention!

Overall though an excellent couple of days despite a few set backs, though if I’d been alone it’d have been a pretty miserable time.

Bratislava!

2006-02-12T13:30:00.000-08:00

So it’s Bratislava next weekend with Shiz and Paul H. Unfortunately we’ll be fielding a slightly under-strength team with the absence of Mr Taylor, but it still promises to be an excellent long weekend and I’m looking forward to sharing the delights of Slovakia with Shiz and Paul, who are both Slovak virgins. I’ll flatter myself with the title of ‘Slovak Veteran’ as it’ll be my 3rd time in this great country. Went with Mark in 2000 where we only visited Kosice (see Wild East 1), again in 2002 (see Wild East 3) when we were diverted from Turkey and revisited Kosice and went to Levoca and Bratislava (where an unsuccessful attempt to find the conservatoire from the 1987 Bond film The Living Daylights took place).

Anyway, checking the weather it’s currently well below freezing with 15cm of lying snow at the moment. Unfortunately though, the long range forecast is indicating milder weather with rain and balmy temperatures of +5 by the end of the week. So here’s hoping the weather will turn a bit colder at the end of the week – Budapest was perfect last year with sun and temps of 0 during the day and –6 at night.

Bratislava is an odd place, the second biggest town in the old Czechoslovakia, located a mere 3km from Austria – hence the large number of hopeful escapees to the west during the communist era. There’s lots I haven’t seen like the infamous Petrazalka communist prefabricated concrete suburbs and Devlin castle. In 2002 Bratislava was one of the cheapest capitals I’d ever been to, so hopefully this won’t have changed much.
As far as running is concerned, I’ll hopefully get a massive 3 runs in this week and hopefully will be able to go above the 2km barrier in future.

The Manchester Run

2006-02-08T12:25:00.000-08:00

Just to answer a few questions regarding my non-participation in the above run.

I had made my mind up that I intended to take part in the Manchester run, but decided to leave it for a bit to try a couple of practice runs before entering so I could judge whether I would be capable of sustaining some sort of training regime. I didn’t want to sign up and then find I hated it, do hardly any running and then get a humiliatingly pathetic time in May. I (mistakenly) thought that as long as I was signed up by mid/late Feb, I would be in plenty of time (last year as far as I could recall, people were being signed up in April?). But, not being a runner myself or being the sort of person who ever seems to be ‘in the know’, I totally underestimated how popular the run would be. Anyway, I shall try and keep to a small-scale running regime till the end of February. More as an experiment to see if this does give me any side benefits, and to see if I could ever keep to a running schedule over a longer time period. If I don’t notice any benefits by March, I’ll quit.

A look at political correctness.

2006-02-08T11:53:00.000-08:00

Just stumbled across an article about Political Correctness in wikipedia the other day and found it very funny. I'll share it with you.

Hope Shiz won't find this too offensive!

The practice of satirizing politically correct speech took on a life of its own in the 1990s, in a satirical example of political correctness speech, the sentence

"The fireman put a ladder up against the tree, climbed it, and rescued the cat" might look like this:

The firefighter (who happened to be male, but could just as easily have been female) abridged the rights of the cat to determine for itself where it wanted to walk, climb, or rest, and inflicted his own value judgments in determining that it needed to be 'rescued' from its chosen perch. In callous disregard for the well-being of the environment and his and others health and safety, and this one tree in particular, he thrust the mobility-disadvantaged unfriendly means of ascent known as a 'ladder' carelessly up against the tree, marring its bark, and unfeelingly climbed it, unconcerned how his display of physical prowess might injure the self-esteem of those differently-abled. He kidnapped and unjustly restrained the innocent feline with the intention of returning it to the person who claimed to 'own' the naturally free animal. The firefighter later filed a lawsuit claiming compensation for unjustly suffering the undignity which happened to breach his Human Rights and exposure to possible injury that climbing a tree entails. He won 100% compensation, thus making tree climbing impossible forever. The council later cut the tree down to avoid such an incident occurring again.

Closed!

2006-02-01T12:03:00.000-08:00

Just checked out the rangers blog and saw that Russ hadn't made it onto the Mcr run, due to it being closed. And here was me thinking that they'd be desperate to sign-up people up on May 20 at half price rates! Oh well time to hang up my trainers for another year! I have to say I'm a bit surprised that it's booked out so early as we seem to be nation of shoppers, allegeric to walking, that drive anywhere and everywhere in the car. I blame last years TV coverage!

Anyway, I must get to Moldova this year. I can't afford to leave it any longer or there's bound to be some property programme highlighting the cheapness of flats in Tiraspol and I'll arrive to find about 500 000 Brits there on holiday.

The vegan couch potato vs the alcoholic athlete

2006-02-01T11:38:00.000-08:00

Well I have finally started my ‘training’ for the Manchester run. It kicked off on Tuesday with my little circular jog around Nether Edge in Sheffield which I’ve called The Circuit. It’s about 2.1km and going off the maps at work, involves 30m of climbing. I came in around 11mins and felt OK, which was good – when I attempted it last year for the first time I think it took me about 14mins and I had to walk some of the way. The Circuit Reversed is the more difficult way being mainly uphill for 75% of the way before a moderately steep descent to the ‘finish’.

My ‘training’ will hopefully occupy a position somewhere between Shiz’s ultra-methodical tightly structured approach and Piggy’s rather undisciplined disorganised approach. If I start to make some real progress I can run up towards Eccleshall, at a rather scary altitude of 200-280m (I’m at 95m!!). But that’s a long way off, I might get fedup and bored and give up next week.

Just something to keep you musing – if an ‘alcoholic sportsman’ who is overweight, smokes, drinks heavily, goes to bed late, eats junk food, but goes running for 5km 6-7days a week was in the Manchester Run against the ‘vegan couch potato’ who has an exceptionally good diet, doesn’t drink, goes to bed at 9.30 each night and sleeps for 9hrs, does daily yoga etc but hardly ever does any running. Who would win?

My money is on the Alcoholic Sportsman!

The way I see it

2006-01-29T14:56:00.000-08:00

Just a quick note on blogs, I enjoy reading them and so please update them people. I intend to update mine once or twice a week, though have been struggling lately. I think mine and John’s seem to have been updated the most frequently over the last month or so, though I go for the prose-only-no-pics-easiest-maintenance-sort-of approach.

Just a quick word on County – listened to them on Imagine FM like I do religiously every Saturday (I really ought to go more often, but I’m a fair weather fan) – and I have to say they do seem to be having the most incredible bad luck at the moment. You’d think that when you’re playing the top of the league and being in the lead until the 88th minute, and then finding you’ve dropped to the bottom of the league seems remarkably bad luck. Anyway, at least there is no gulf in points at the bottom. Although no team is ever ‘too good to go down’ I still believe Stockport will get out of it. I remember going to County on New Years Day 2001 watching them beat Fulham 2-0 (who were running away with Division1 at the time) though Stockport were relegated that season in about February….

On running. I am intending to do the Manchester 10k this year, since everyone else is and pride prevents me from dropping out. Only problem is I’m the most unfit I’ve ever been and May 21 is approaching fairly rapidly. I intended to start running last weekend (didn’t happen) then I took some trainers to Sheffield to start there (didn’t happen) and this weekend it didn’t happen either. Bramhall is too urban for my tastes, Sheffield is too hilly and I get back from work too late. Pity I’m not back in Vilnius - I lived right next a large forest and went for long walks there almost every weekend, which would be perfect for training runs. I’d want to do the Manchester 10k in under an hour so I’ll need to do at the very least 10runs before the event. On a slightly different tack I think I remember reading on Russ’s (or somewhere else) blog about going walking to improve running(?!). I have to say in my experience walking and running are two completely separate disciplines using completely different muscles and breathing/aerobic/anaerobic oxygen intake(?!) (though biology was never my strongest subject and I don’t know which is which) and being good at one is absolutely no help with the other. For example I can walk to Stockport Stn in 31mins without breaking into a sweat (about 3km) though if I were to run I’d be completely knackered and probably wouldn’t get there in much under 20mins…anyway that’s just the way I see things. Don’t know about anyone else, but I find running for the sake of running utterly unrewarding and that’s probably why I’m finding it difficult to get started. I suppose running first thing in the morning is the best time, though running and Friday/Saturday drinking with early morning running is not compatible and I don’t intend to give up drinking!

“Bosnia is still a desperately poor and unhappy place” BBC report December 2005.

2006-01-22T04:52:00.000-08:00

Just finished reading Andy McNab’s ‘Deep Black’ most of which is set in Iraq and Bosnia and it got me thinking about Bosnia again. It’s now 5 years since me and Mark went and Sarajevo has probably changed from being a burnt-out, bullet-ridden, wrecked city utterly devoid of tourists to somewhere that vaguely resembles normality. There are now backpacker hostels and within a few years it is supposedly going to become an ‘in’ place to visit. In 2001 I promised myself that I’d come back one day...

A slightly odd website, which is called ‘the Sarajevo survival guide’ and is about the more mundane but problematic issues of living through a war – dealing with an erratic water/electricity supply, ‘moving house’, how to make UN-food parcels last lomger and where people go out to socialise etc.
http://www.friends-partners.org/bosnia/surintro.html

My passport has arrived (within the week!) so at least Bratislava is now confirmed. After doing a few sums and working out the total potential cost of Belfast, I’ve pretty much ruled it out. As for the summer – it’d be nice to have a week or two with some of the BRFC crowd, though where to go hasn’t been decided. Norway, Portugal and Croatia have been suggested and sound good. I don’t think I’ll be able to sell Armenia though.

It seems like I’ll have to sign up for the Manchester run, though this is going to require some training. My only target would be to complete it within the hour mark.

waiting

2006-01-11T12:39:00.000-08:00

Just been reading a few of the blogs about the Cork trip and there’s some interesting reading. There seemed to be a few negative comments regarding the quality of the cuisine. I can’t help thinking that going to Ireland with the expectation of excellent food is a bit like going to Italy hoping for good whiskey, Saudi Arabia for a beer festival or Russia expecting good customer service. I thought Irish food was potatoes, potatoes and potatoes washed down with stout?!

Anyway glad you had a nice time.

Shock horror there may not be a Wild East this summer for me and Mark, as Mr T might have other priorities and may have gone off the idea of walking round destitute eastern bloc countries in 35-degree heat, carrying a huge pack with nowhere to stay for the evening having not eastern properly for the past 24hours….though there is the possibility of a small eastern bloc excursion in the early part of the summer.

Anyway, if this is the case, I may have to consider my own excursion somewhere although there are lots of possibilities. I’ve been leafing through the Lonely Planet guides to Laos and Cambodia and Laos in particular jumps out at me. The only real way of getting there would probably involve a flight to Bangkok (somewhere I’ve always said I’ll never go to, but I might have to reconsider that) or even via Hong Kong as direct flights are astronomical/unavailable. Anyway that’s a long way off yet. I don’t have a passport at the moment and am hoping that my new passport (minus all 64 stamps :-( will arrive in the next week or so)…

The end of the road?

2005-12-23T08:05:00.000-08:00

Markstock 5
Saturday 12 June 2004

Right from the start it was obvious that this would be a different sort of Markstock to the others. Up until now the Football Team had never been to one though I’m not sure of the reasons why, maybe they didn’t know of its existence. This Markstock welcomed BRFC and wives, Marple Phil, Naomi, Karen and Louise, and Big Rick (officially invited for the 1st time) as first-timers. Usually Markstock preparation was organised 2weeks in advance, but this one was ‘organised’ months and months in advance. The budget was greater than the previous 4 events added together, and there were luxuries that previous markstock generations had never seen before like colour TVs and trailer tents! Markstock had well and truly hit the big time. However there was a great increase in the level of bureaucracy and inefficiency. More worryingly the Charter was manipulated by Big Pete (the now self-declared Director of Policy) into a pseudo-political manifesto, who altered most, if not all, of the founding ideas. In a slightly sinister way Big Pete managed to brainwash a good number of people into thinking that there had always been a speech as he sought to eradicate/manipulate/deny the past.

Overall though Markstock ‘04 turned out to be my favourite markstock of all. A number of sports and games took place during the daylight hours. A few bouts of arm-wrestling during which Piggy came perilously close to losing to a girl (Louise). Piggy’s opening speech, which had never been don before proved to be controversial, not especially well-prepared and a bit nasty in places. Naomi threw water over him 2 or 3 times. A hideously drunk Romiley Rob took great offence, declared his unconditional support for the BNP, outed himself and disappeared along with the rest of the Marple crowd in the early hours of the morning. Group drinking games took place throughout the evening. After odd howling was heard from the woods some badger-spotting took place. Towards the end there was a good deal of loud, drunken singing and sports games were the order of the day. The weather was uncharacteristically good for Markstock. I don’t think John went to bed the whole time.

Markstock 6
Saturday 11 June 2005

Long before this Markstock took place, the level of bureaucracy had spiralled out of control with planning meetings taking place almost every week. Bouncy Castles (cost would have been ruinous), controlled fighting/competitive sports (rejected by me and Mr T) ruled out. The hierarchical structure, which had never really existed in the past, seemed to dominate Markstock Policy and was being rigourously enforced. A large number of new posts (such as diplomatic officer, womens officer etc.) were now being advertised and being a ‘markstock co-ordinator’ was starting to feel like a full-time job. Naturally, there were some disagreements and a couple of resignations took place before the BBQ namely by Shiz (which is all it was when it boils down to it) along with veiled threats of possible boycotts and strike action.

This event welcomed Jaya, Paul Hitchcock, Russel and Ann-Marie as first timers. With marple Phils kebabs the standard of cooking had improved enourmously since the dark days of 1998-2000. Pete’s speech wasn’t as controversial as I feared, though the masses got restless and ensured it terminated early. This event seemed to lack the spontaneouty of previous years though since there seemed more of timetable to it compared with the more easy-going relaxed atmosphere of previous years. Overall not bad, but not the best.

The future
Markstock seems to be at a crossroads at the moment – it could continue in its present centralised, top-down structure format or it could go back to the more spontaneous grass-roots level participation. One thing is for sure, Markstock will have to continually adapt to changing circumstances. Will Piggy lose his enthusiasm for speeches? The shock factor can very quickly become repetitive. Due to the sale of the trailer tent will we be sleeping under the stars in 2006? Or has Markstock finally come to the end of the road?

Markstock analysis

2005-12-21T11:44:00.000-08:00

Markstock 3
Tuesday 13 June 2000

Markstock had survived and had even picked up a few first-timers (Matt, Ollie and the first women[!] Liz and Jo). It still hadn’t pleased the authorities though who didn’t consider the event mainstream enough for a Saturday night slot and had moved it to the even more obscure mid-week slot. The plan had been to stick with the Monday, although the England vs Portugal (2-3) was on so there was a last-minute re-shuffle.

Closing time at this Markstock was again at 12. The Homebrew had been ditched and the dark periods of hardship, shortages and poverty consigned to memory. Again it was a World Cup/Championship summer, but no TV was provided. A badminton net was available and many a happy hour was spent playing badminton, which was even more fun after a few drinks. I think I drank about 6 cans, around the same as the previous year and I had work the next day.

2001
No Markstock this year, possibly due to Mark strawberry picking in Denmark in the early summer. He had also moved to Marple this year and the new venue might not be popular with the punters. I was also trying to get a dissertation done in Scotland and the Wild East trip to the Balkans started earlier than the previous summer.

Markstock 4
Saturday 29 June 2002

Markstock regained its Saturday night prime-position status and the venue was the larger stadium of Marple. However, the number of founding 8 members had dropped to an all-time low of Me, Pete, Mark and Mike. Perhaps the authorities had been right. maybe Markstock was destined to be a small-scale event, frequented by a few diehards. On the positive side, some of Mark’s new friends had appeared from Marple. It was my first encounter with Romiley Rob, his ‘friend’ Keith, as well as Jonno. Rob Whalley (who I hadn’t seen for several years) also made an appearance. There was also a friend of Mark’s called Ric Shalcross who appeared briefly.
The weather was more March than June and we spent a good deal of the time in the tent trying to keep warm (Pete, of course, wore shorts). Piggy later complained to me that Keith had spent most of the time trying to look up his shorts. Naturally, I assumed this was typical Big Pete vanity and dismissed it. Roughly two years later Romiley Rob, under moderate pressure, was ‘outed’ to my surprise and it transpires that Keith was a ‘special’ friend. Maybe Pete didn’t imagine the shorts incident after all....

Rob Whalley was mid-way through a gun-fetish and had brought 2(!) air-guns with him. The next day the only four left at the BBQ spent a good deal of time firing dozens of pellets at targets in the woods.

2003
No Markstock this year, perhaps due to me being in Lithuania most of the year and there being a reluctance among the others to cast-aside another “founding 8” member.

Opening the archives

2005-12-10T10:38:00.000-08:00

This is where you can go back to brush the dust off the archives

Markstock 1
Saturday 26 June 1998

I don’t remember how or why it all started, one idea is that it was an end of A-level celebration. The very first Markstock was held on 26 June 1998 at Mark’s old Ladythorn cresent house. We put the tent up on the Friday and then watched England beat Columbia 2-0 to go through to the knock-out stage of France98. There was a very definite Woolworths theme at Markstock that year Mark, Lee, Mike and Paul Tunnicliffe (was last heard of moving to a house in Bolton) were all working there. Only Me, Chris, Mark, Pete and Mike stayed over. There was also a character called Jim (aka Syph) who I’ve never seen since. The 8 brave souls who turned out that dark, wet and cold night will forever be referred to as “the founding 8”.

I believe this was my first encounter with Big Rick (who most people thought was a total stranger who’d crashed the party, rather than mark’s brother-in-law), who spent most of the evening watching the football indoors and only appeared only when food was available. The weather was dire (about 11degrees and very damp) and we unsuccessfully tried to persuade one of Mark’s next-door neighbours to come over, but her Dad was having none of it. One look at the drunken mayhem that was occurring next door caused him to mutter “Absolutely not!” and the door was slammed shut. That night we also ran out/forgot food and had to make a mid-BBQ dash in a Vauxhall Nova to Spar on Dairyground. When we returned the BBQ flames were about 20ft high with Lee and Mike pouring more lighter fuel onto it!
Big Pete pitched his own tent beside the main tent as he wanted his privacy. The next morning there was a fair amount of vomit outside the entrance.

Incidently, Pete attempted a “Petestock” rival event later that summer. The event only had 3 guests (Me, Mr T and Piggy) and involved drinking a sizeable amount of Rum (my Grandad loved the stuff) as well as Whiskey and watching Tomorrow never Dies till 4am. It proved to be a one-hit wonder that was never repeated and has long since been forgotten.

Markstock 2
Monday 30 June 1999
Second year on and Markstock was feeling the pinch – relegated to the unpopular and obscure slot of Monday night. In fact, things were so difficult that Mark had started brewing his own beer (whose name escapes me). The Homebrew must’ve been about 12%, was a blackish/dark reddish colour and tasted more wine than beer. But it was freely available on the black-market, no one complained and it kept the cold out!

The number of guests dropped to an all time low of 7, though Jack Baraclough (whom I’ve not seen since Dec99) was a new guest.

Pete’s mother later told me that Pete had emptied the contents of his stomach (mainly the Homebrew) on the kitchen floor that night and wasn’t best pleased about the whole thing. I struggled into work at the NEAB dazed and hungover the next day.

Would Markstock survive, or would it go the way of Petestock and vanish into the void of obscurity and cheap daytime TV…

Markstock: myths and legends

2005-12-07T11:41:00.000-08:00

Mark has mentioned that there might not be a Markstock in 2006. The shock and horror on Piggy’s face was a treat! However, in the grand scheme of things this would be a perfectly normal event in the Markstock ‘economic cycle’. I shall attempt an analysis of Markstock’s and dispel some myths.

Myth#1
“There has been a Markstock every year”
In 2001 and 2003 no Markstock events took place.

Myth#2
“On Big Pete’s orders, no women have ever been invited to Markstock”
Despite what Pete may say, there have been women coming to Markstock since 1999. The only women-free events were in 1998 and 2002. However the majority of the guests are male and woman are still excluded from full membership, even in these politically correct times!

Myth#3
“markstock is always held on a Saturday and involves a spending the night in a tent”
The records indicate that Markstock’s have been held on a Monday and have been terminated at Midnight.

Myth#4
“Big Pete has always done a welcoming speech”
This is actually a very recent trend starting in 2004

FACT
Mark, Big Pete and myself are the only guests with 100% records. Chris (in Skiathos in 2002) and Mike (Australia? 2005) are close behind on 5/6.

FACT
Markstock has only been held in the month of June.

FACT
There has always been a Markstock charter, though in recent years the theme has been hijacked through the efforts of Big Pete to become a political mouthpiece for beliefs that, to be polite, feature on the fringes of mainstream British Politics. The content of the first Markstock charter related only to BBQs!

FACT
Historically there has always been a genuine attempt to introduce everyone and make all guests feel welcome

the next blog will trawl through the Markstock archives.

Top of the class for Mr Shirres!

2005-11-30T13:20:00.000-08:00

As usual Shiz is top of the BRFC pile. Not only does he earn at least 15k more than anyone else, but it would seem that he entered the housing market at the right time and has probably made himself a easy 20+ grand profit on his flat in a mere 2 years.

Anyway my housing search has moved from rung 0 to rung 1 and I’ve at least got a vague idea of Rotherham’s prices – around 45k for a 1 bed flat in a mediocre area up to 75-80k for a comfortable 2bed place in a good location. I suppose I have access to all planning/building regulations history, know all the areas, where all the Council houses are etc and can always add in the extra ‘site visit’ when required.

I’m assuming Mini/Charlotte and Amy/Belch have gone through all the different types of mortgages/lenders info. But shiz has definitely made it. He’ll be in a city centre penthouse before he’s 30!

Piggy's soul mate

2005-11-23T11:16:00.000-08:00

I really don't mean to pick on Piggy but taking a quote from his blog has left me bemused. "It will spur me on for this season and along with my soul mate Mini I know we can begin to strke up a good...partnership."

Definition of soul mate: a perfect companion and partner in life.
Are Piggy and Mini hiding things from us?!

Anyway, it appears that Shiz may have new neighbours as Mini and his better half, Charlotte, have had an offer accepted on the flat next door. I hope everything works out well and it happens. I am in the very early stages of possibly thinking about aquiring a property in Rotherham. In other words, it's possible I may try and buy somewhere in the next year or so. But don't count on it!

Was just skimming through the Lonely Planet SE Asia book. It is recommended you visit Cambodia now before it becomes another trip on the tourist merry-go-round, but I started reading about Pol Pot. I'd always known he was a shocker and probably the worst dictator the world has ever seen, but theKhmer Rouge regime 1975-79 seems even worse than I'd heard: total evacuation of the cities, 15 year old wardens in charge of the extermination camps, electricity and money outlawed (corrupting western influences)...and now it's one of the world's fastest growing tourist hotspots...

an essay on Cambodian history
http://www.ess.uwe.ac.uk/genocide/cambear1.htm

bits and bobs

2005-11-15T11:59:00.000-08:00

Struggling to think of anything of interest to write. The Rangers awards have been throughly reviewed and analysed so I'll talk travel. Again.

The Lowedowns on Mark's website should show some of the travels in Albania.
http://www.taylorteam.plus.com/lowedownlvi.htm

Travelwise for 2006 some possible ideas include:
Long weekend in Bratislava, Slovakia with possible day trip to Trencin. Already been to Slovakia in 2000 and 2002, but would be nice to return and see if it still is one of the cheapest countries in Europe.

Week/10days in Romania/Moldova possibly in summer. Return flight to Bucharest and bus it to Chisinau

Mark has hinted about a desire to go to Libya in summer?! Not too sure myself - looking at continous 45+degree heat and return flights to Tripoli start at 450quid. I wasn't overly impressed by Tunisia and would imagine the rest of North Africa is much of the same. I'll see if I can persuade him to go to Moscow/Russia or to do Turkey in more detail.

I'd like another week in Greece, possibly September.

China/Laos (SE Asia) look interesting, but would need 2 weeks at the very least. I'd want to try and attempt to learn a few words of Chinese (though I doubt I'd even be able to count to 10 it looks so difficult), so maybe in 2007.

Balticisation

2005-11-05T06:22:00.000-08:00

Riga Report

A thoroughly enjoyable time was had by all – even more of a drinking weekend than Budapest - which saw the team visit a couple of large nightclubs, a ‘strip’ club (very tame) curtesy of our hostel owner and numerous bars. A vast quantity of alcohol was consumed, though the cultured theme of the trip remained central to the weekend with visits to the historic town of Cesis and the castle ruins of Bauska, two places I hadn’t visited on previous trips.

For better or for worse Riga is changing on a scale comparable with Vilnius. And even in the 2-3 years since my last visit it did seem visibly different and more geared to the international tourist market. Latvia has caught the Lithuanian disease and Maxima and Hyper-Rimi shopping complexes seem to dominate the outer suburbs of Riga.

For me some personal highlights were:
the unmentioned monument to the world war two heroes in the southern outskirts of Riga, one of the few remaining grand Soviet memorials in the Baltics.
The dictators restaurant with the statues of Lenin, Stalin, Mao Zedong and Ivan the terrible along with german WW2 uniforms and propaganda.
The bar on the 26th floor of Hotel Latvia.

The only downside a the possible drugs bust at Liverpool airport which we nearly got caught up in – Shiz’s M&Ms caused no end of problems!

Shiz has even expressed a possible future interest in Chisinau, Moldova (!?) though I'm sure this is an attempt to boast his tally of European capitals.

Latvija

2005-10-22T07:10:00.000-07:00

So me, Shiz, Mr T and Paul Hitchcock are due to go to Latvia on Wed for a couple of days, taking advantage of the new Ryannair Liverpool-Riga route – return tickets less than 40quid! It will be my 3rd time (March 03 with some Lithuanian students and July 02 with Taylor – see the Wild East - were the other times) though there were never many tourists around. However, now I hear tales of it being overrun at weekends with drunk Brits on stag dos. A very different situation from 20 years ago!

I had a great uncle who once owned a paper mill in Riga in the 1930s and he lived there with his family for some 10 years, though I think he had to leave in 1938 as the political situation was becoming increasingly bad with the threat of a Nazi takeover from the west and communist invasion from the east. Both happened, though I never found out what became of the paper mill. My Dad and some relatives once speculated about going to Riga and delving into the family history, though this was in the 1980s when the Latvian Soviet Socialist Repulic was locked firmly into the Soviet Union and it was effectively closed off for westerners.

Latvia is the most Russified of the Baltic States and in Riga there are more Russians than Latvians. Understandably the Latvians were a bit pissed off about becoming a minority in their own country especially when the Latvian language looked like it was heading for extinction in the 1980s. Now everything has turned round and the Russian influence is slowly decreasing. Nonetheless it's still the no.2 language and I’ve been trying to resuscitate my Russian in anticipation for the trip (which has seems like it’s been steadily getting worse over the last two years). Practice has dropped to a mere 1-1.5hours a week (vocab, reading and bit of listening to radio through internet) often on only 1 or two nights, so the last month I’ve tried to enforce a rigorous regime of 30mins every-day-no-excuses, but it hasn’t seemed to have made much difference, though my reading is probably no worse than it was two years ago. To have any success at any language though you really do need to live in a country where it’s spoken all the time. Trying to learn remotely is a difficult task.

Greece (II)

2005-10-05T11:42:00.000-07:00

So a quick review of Greece. Firstly, we couldn’t land at Skiathos airport due to a heavy thunderstorm – The runway is allegedly the 3rd shortest in the world and the Australian pilot made a few attempts before we were completely out of fuel and had to divert to Thessaloniki on the mainland. Eventually made it back to Skiathos about 4 hours late which was a bit annoying. Then there wasn’t space to park the plane, so we had to wait another 15mins for a ‘parking space’. Bloody Air Malta flight took ages!

The organisation at the terminal was very Eastern European. In fact Greece basically is Albania/Bulgaria/Romania albeit with a lot more money pumped in and thousands more Northern European Tourists, but under the surface things seem to operate with the same level of (in)efficiency.

Was a bit horrified at first to see ‘All day English Breakfast’ offered menus everywhere and dozens of English around, but after sinking the first Mythos beer of the afternoon in Admirals Bar started to feel a bit more relaxed.

In fact I really enjoyed Greece and hope I can return for a week every year. Of course I still want to rough it in Tajikistan and go to Moldova – Europe’s bleakest and poorest country – but there was something relaxing about a package holiday. And Skiathos did seem very stereotypically Greek.

Around half the bars were run by Greeks and the other half by English ex-pats. Everywhere very relaxed, no police around anywhere. Able to practice Russian with a Macedonian girl called Tamara working at one of the bars. Scenery much greener than I expected. Not as many English around as I thought and most people seeemed to have been several times before so there almost seemed to be a community of holidaymakers who'd seen each other at some point in the past.

Favourite bars:
Kazbar – Colin an English guy (Tottenham fan) plays live music every night.
Bembos – run by a Yorkshire couple – 60/70s themed.
Tamara’s bar (don’t remember real name)
Roof-top bar – on a roof. Fabulous views of the harbour.Jelly bean cocktails served. Only problem was terrible 70s cheesey music played all the time. I can only take so much of Dancing Queen...

The Helenic Republic

2005-09-28T12:27:00.000-07:00

JUst got back from a week in Skiathos, Greece. Not my usual choice of holiday destination, but very enjoyable nonetheless. In fact it made a nice change from the usual queuing for ages at a bus 'station' that has no terminal, timetables or prices anywhere. Lots of good beaches all over the island and generally good nightlife.

Prices came as a bit of a shock at first - beer was about 2.5-3.5Euros, some cocktails costing up to 5.5Euro and a meal and beer generally 10-12. Compared to the UK though, it seemed fairly reasonable.

Riga, Latvia is on for last weekend in October.

2005-09-13T13:01:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Albania

2005-09-13T12:55:00.000-07:00

The haunting beauty of Macedonia

2005-09-11T05:06:00.000-07:00

Nothing much to report over the past couple of weeks.

I see that Lonely Planet now do a Ukraine guide. It can only be better than the abysmal section in the Russia, Ukraine and Belarus book, but I hope that Ukraine isn't going to become too mainstream in the next couple of years.

Worked at the Rotherham Show yesterday, though was a total was-out, they couldn't have picked a worse day. Still, it probably meant it was quieter and able to go home earlier. Though apparently the Rotherham Show is the biggest free show in the north of England and regularly attracts 75 000 visitors...

Mr T has kindly leant me the first book of THe Lord Of The Rings, a series I've always intended to read. I remember reading The Hobbit at school back in 1990 and did start reading LOTR in 1992, but I never got very far, probably because it was too difficult.

Skiathos, Greece on Friday for a week.

The Tunisian Diaries

2005-08-31T12:28:00.000-07:00

Sometime around mid-2004 there was a programme called “Spy” on BBC digital directed by some former MI5/CIA operatives. The format went something along the lines of…11 contestants have to do various challenges in the world of espionage and they pass or fail each test which leads to them getting kicked off the show. The last test saw them in a foreign country which happened to be Morocco.

Anyway, this was how I started I took a slight interest in North Africa…a very different place from my usual Eastern European haunts. I was aiming to go for the first week in December 2004. Possible choices were Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Egypt. Algeria is seriously war-torn, Libya is scary (and I don’t trust Gadaffi) so that left the other 3. Flights to Eygpt and Morocco were v expensive, so Tunisia it was.

Places visited:
Tunis
Carthage
Douz (Sahara)
Sousse
Kairoun
Monastir

Overall impressions
Not as good as I’d hoped. Most descriptions seem to indicate that it was a western-looking republic. I was half-expecting it to be similar to Turkey, or a poor version of Spain. Found it to be much more Arabic/Middle Eastern/Islamic than I imagined. I kept thinking I was in Iran or Palestine. When people were nice to me I usually became deeply suspicious as earlier experiences lead me to believe that I was about to be ripped-off or cheated in some way.

Good Things
Carthage
Not many tourists
Very foreign
Excellent (very cheap) food
Ribet at Monastir (where they filmed “the life of Brian”)

Bad Things
Very difficult to find alcohol (even in tourist resorts). Very few cafes and no supermarkets sell beer. On the few occasions I did find it,, it was expensive.
Lots of false friends, being harassed for money, lots of scams, being ripped-off.
Being mistaken for a homosexual in a Douz hotel (and nearly having my arse-virginity taken?!).
The Arabic language is so alien that I was completely illiterate.

Tunisia’s place in my hierarchy? Unfortunately 34/34.

Personchester

2005-08-27T08:04:00.000-07:00

Went to Justin and El’s housewarming party on Sat 13 August in Cheddleton, Leek. Really nice house. Heavy rain most of day, much alcohol consumed and a good time had by all (except their poor neighbours) I think.

Aug 27. Manchester. Now don’t get me wrong, Manchester is a different night out and does have some very nice pubs and bars. But it is very over-rated and somewhat pretentious. I can’t think of any industry, apart from the night entertainment industry, that treats its customers so shabbily and yet still commands such respect from them. It’s quite normal to queue up for ages only to be turned away for wearing the wrong sort of shoes, wearing clothes that are “too dark”, being in a group of males or not having a girlfriend with you. Compare this with Tirana, Baku and most Eastern European cities where I can walk in with my trainers on, am not charged 3-5quid for the privilege of going there, pay the bill at the end of the evening and am treated with courtesy and respect. There aren’t any bouncers because people don’t cause trouble. And it’s not 2.40 a pint. Maybe its just Manchester has become a victim of its own success or people have too much money in the UK….

This is starting to sound like a rant so I’ll stop it there.

another way round

2005-08-10T11:29:00.000-07:00

Friday-Rangers awards in Star and Garter. Big Pete played a woman at pool who claimed she hadn’t played since she was 8. Bearing in mind that she was the wrong side of 30 and Piggy has had snooker lessons from a former England Champion, everybody expected Piggy to blow her out of the water. The atmosphere resembled a sort-of-Germany-vs-Liechtenstein qualifier with the crowd firmly behind the underdog. Germany coasted into a 3 shot lead and with just the black to pot it looked like even Piggy couldn’t mess this one up. But he did. With the help of some outrageously good fortune, Liechtenstein pulled a victory off and the roar of delight from the crowd nearly lifted the roof off!

Piggy then played me and got another thrashing, but, unlike pete, I won’t gloat.

Some quite good photos of some of the places we visited in Albania. At least until I can be bothered to upload some of our photos....
http://berclo.net/page03/03en-albania.html

Where next?

2005-08-03T11:40:00.000-07:00

OK so now I've been to 12/12 of the none USSR Eastern European countries and 7/15 of the Former USSR places. Where next for my main holiday? Don't know yet but Kazakhstan, Russia part 2, Armenia, Georgia and Kyrgyzstan all sound appealing. Turkmenistan -too hot, Uzbekistan - not good at the moment and Tajikistan too expensive - the 20p beers aren't such good value when you have to pay 800quid for a flight. China is a long-term goal, as is the 6month trip to Russia.

Top 10 things that remind me of Albania in no order:
1.Around 80% of the population driving a (stolen) Merc or BMW (often with its german or swiss plates still on)
2.Lots of attractive young ladies
3. Concrete bunkers located absolutely everywhere to protect the country from 'invaders/enemies'
4.People watering the tarmac
5.Everybody assuming I/we had to be Italian
6.The chaos that ensued when I asked for 2 of something (i.e. 2 beers)– usually both me and mark got 2 each.
7.Drivers always seemed to find the square of rubble you were standing on the same place they wanted to be.
8.Thousands of half-built buldings everywhere. And thousands of totally destroyed, looted buildings.
9.If you hadn’t changed money before midday, you were pretty much screwed since banks and most businesses only work half a day
10.Anarchic driving, even by E European standards. The yellow-bibbed traffic police seemed totally ineffective.

"Better to be a dog in America than a man in Albania"

2005-07-29T02:33:00.000-07:00

Went up to the north of Albania to a town called Shkodra. Was a bit more like the Albania I was expecting. Poorer, fewer cars almost zero tourists and quite Soviet looking. Didn't feel especially safe after dark, mainly because everywhere was deserted.

Back to Durres on the Albanian riveria and a few more days of more relaxing. Then went onto Tirana again and finished our last night in a town called Korca in the south-east, close to the Greek border.

Now back in Macedonia and it feels like Italy.

So far so good

2005-07-20T08:58:00.000-07:00

Albania.

Got in here OK. Passed dozens and dozens of the infamous concrete bunkers that were to guard against inavders. Spent yesterday in resort town of Pogradec. Probably one of the nicest hotels we've ever stayed in.

Albania is quite a bit richer and more developed than I expected. It's probably like Greece was in the 70s.

So far there haven't been any problems. Taylor hasn't been accosted by gypsies again.

Currently in Tirana. Quite dusty and grey. Hot and there are a few tourists around. Vodaphone, Nokia, Microsoft etc etc are well established. No McDonalds :).

Next stop Durres and then we may head south.

Tito's little secret

2005-07-18T09:06:00.000-07:00

Welcome to The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

Was the smallest plane I've ever seen in my life coming from Milan. Arrived in Skopje airport-quite surreal as there was only 1 other civilian aircraft and looked quite out of place among the other other aircraft here - all Military Helicopters.

have been quite impressed with Skopje. Isn't quite the backwater we were led to believe. Taylor has had encounters with a gang of gypsy kids who very nearly relieved him of all his posessions. And this was in broad daylight.

Now in a seaside resort of Ohrid. Really really nice. Something Tito kept safe from prying western eyes. Weather fantastic, nice place, girls, prices, mountains. the whole of macedonia seems to be here, but we've heard our first foreigners. We can see across the lake to Albania, our next destination which we intend to walk into tomorrow.

Lietuva

2005-07-06T12:27:00.000-07:00

Mid-June and time to make my yearly visit to Lithuania.

Unfortunately my usual Czech Airline flight had been booked up and I had to go with Lufthansa. My first flight with them and they were very ordinary indeed (although I've heard BA are pretty poor too), certainly no better than the budget airlines.

Didn't spend too much time in the centre, though it didn't seem to have changed much. Of course two of my favourite bars have closed down. The outskirts are changing rapidly though. Almost every patch of open space is being developed with new blocks of flats and retail parks. How the average Lithuanian can afford these new flats I don't know. Probably why most of them are lying empty.

It seems Lithuania is trying to escape its Soviet past by building anything and everything that would not have been tolerated under the USSR. But I can't help thinking that none of this is sustainable (all the brand new clothes shops have everything...except any customers, even on a Saturday afternoon) and will probably all go bankrupt in a couple of years. In a strange sort of way all the new development is starting to look as bland as the endless blocks of Soviet flats.

The Stag-parties have definately found Vilnius. There's some wierd contraption now where men peddle round on a sort of collective bike, continously drinking beer with loud music blasting out and a go-go dancer on the front!? The old (and some of the young) seem pretty horrified at the sort of freak show their country might be turning into.

In the 3 short years since I've been going to Vilnius, parts have changed beyond recognition. Anyway, it'll be interesting to hear the views of min-man (and his fairer half, charlotte) on this part of Europe.

The Wedding Present

2005-06-30T09:13:00.000-07:00

Sat 18 June – wedding at Michelham Priory, Lewes, East Sussex. It was obvious even at 6am that it was going to be hot and sunny day – forecasts were predicting in excess of 30degrees. A perfect day to wear a hot suit! Assuming everything went to plan I’d change at Watford and get on the Brighton Train, but I only had 10mins leeway and any delay would make it tight. As expected, everything didn’t go to plan, the train arrived 9mins late and I saw the Brighton train pull out of the station. Bugger! Time for plan B which meant Hastily getting back on the London train intending to go via the Underground and Victoria.

First time I’ve been on Underground since 2001 and it took me a little while to find my bearings. The wedding present was becoming a serious burden by this stage. Got to Victoria at 09.47. There was an Eastbourne train at 09.46 which I missed. Not for the first (or the last) time, I was starting to suspect there was a malevolent power trying to sabotage the day. Next train was at 10.16. A little while later and I was no further behind schedule than I would have been had I got the Brighton train. Things were looking up. The next part of the operation meant that I’d need to get a taxi from either a little station called Berwick or a bigger station (but further from the Wedding) called Polegate. First though I wanted to get my key from the guest house in eastbourne (and dump my scruffy rucksac- I knew this would be a very smart wedding!). The stations were observed in close detail looking for tell-tale signs of Taxi ranks etc as we went past. This must have looked odd behaviour (or highly suspicious terrorist activity) to the other holiday-makers in their shorts and T-shirts.

Unfortunately, there was no scale on my eastbourne map, but I guessed that it would be about 600m from the station. I bought another ticket going back to Polegate. Went outside into eastbourne to check into the guesthouse. It was 11.44. The wedding ceremony was at 1pm. Polegate (a 10min taxi ride from the wedding) was a 6min train ride away and there were trains at 12.00 and 12.09 from eastbourne. What could go wrong?

It turned out to be well over a kilometer to the B&B. I ran back on the station platform at 12.09 just to see the 12.09 leaving. The next train wasn’t until 12.28. I was hot, sweating profusely and stressed. If anything went wrong at Polegate, I’d be screwed. I was starting to think of my excuses – I’d just have to skulk in later and pretend to have seen everything. Got to Polegate at 12.38. There were no taxis in the taxi rank and a queue of at least 4 people. I would have to be very un-british and queue-jump when one came along. Then somebody mentioned that all the Taxis were in eastbourne because of the tennis. Arrrrghhhh.

Just then a man in a suit and a woman in dress and hat called me over – it transpired that they were also going to Sam and Tasha’s wedding. A friendly local informed us that we were better off going onto the main road. A taxi came along 2mins later and we jumped in, arriving in the grounds at 12.50. I had time to smarten myself up before casually strolling in at 12.57. Somebody had saved me a seat. Perfect. The wedding was very glamorous and people friendly, but I’m never at home on very formal occasions such as these.

Sunday

Had a walk round Eastbourne – it looked much smarter than when I was last here in June ’92. Spent the rest of the day in London. Although I berate my capital, I really think I could start to like it if I spent enough time here. Got badly burnt though – it’s never 32degrees in Manchester!

nothing much

2005-06-12T06:55:00.000-07:00

Stockport Beerfest friday night. Only got to try 3 different beers, but was introduced to a very good pub - Ye Olde Victoria. Thought it had closed down as the windows were bricked/boarded up on one side, but turned out to be a very nice old-fashioned pub, of which there are not too many of these days.

Just noticed that there are Elections to be held in Albania in July 2005- hope this doesn't mean mass violent demonstrations, police using teargas to dispell rioters, tanks on the streets. Albania now has ATM machines, whereas in 2004 they didn't, so maybe we've left it a year too late. I also hear tales that a Club Med resort is to open in 2007/8?!

Things on too good in Uzbekistan these days and the same goes for Kyrgyzstan (which had the reputation of being one of the most open and democratic former Soviet States).

Last man standing

2005-05-30T11:13:00.000-07:00

Mini pub crawl around Stockport on Friday pm.
Pubs visited:

The Crown
Black Lion
Spread Eagle
Queens Head
Pub on corner I can’t remember name of.

I see Big Brother 6 or 7 or whatever has started up again. I just can’t see the point of this programme. What’s next – people watching other people watching Big Brother?!

Stalybridge (or Staly Vegas) sat pm. Very large number of pubs/bars/night-clubs in a Las Vegas-style strip, albeit in a run-down part of Greater Manchester. Was an interesting night but I can’t really see how Staly Vegas will continue to be sustainable, since it seems to be an economy built on nothing.

So France has voted “non” for the EU constitution. What does this mean? I don’t really know and neither do a lot of other people. The idea of a United States of Europe is looking more and more remote. If the pro-European French vote No I just can’t see the anti-European Brits voting Yes.

On the other side

2005-05-21T06:01:00.000-07:00

FA Cup Final today and 10K Manchester Run tomorrow. My money is on Shiz. He, in my opinion, deserves to win through the dedicated effort and thorough preparation.

My Russian language hasn’t been getting any better over the last couple of months mainly because I never seem to be able to find the time to listen or read much these days. Also not being able to speak on a regular basis is a problem.

A quick report on Bajram Curri in northern Albania – one of the places me and Mark are considering going to. http://www.guardian.co.uk/Kosovo/Story/0,2763,207327,00.html

One more for the road

2005-05-11T11:22:00.000-07:00

16-31 July
Got the Skopje, Macedonia tickets booked. We fly out on 16 July via Milan, Italy.

No fixed itinerary - depends on if/when/where we can get transport. Personally I'd prefer to spend more time in Albania than Macedonia, not sure what Mark is thinking. Just reading a book called 'The Accursed Mountains- Journeys into Albania' about a British traveller's expedition to Albania in the spring and summer of 1996. Very interesting reading, but I hope the security situation has improved since then!

Vilnius 22-26 June 2005.
A short break to meet up with some friends/see how much the city has changed in a year. I think I'll try and make a pilgrimage to this city every year. Was moderately surprised to see it had changed a lot between September 03 and June04.

The afternoon after

2005-05-02T08:06:00.000-07:00

Day after the big Bramhall Rangers pub crawl. Feel OK, more bloated than anything else. We got a lot more drunk last year I'm sure- the curry must've soaked the alcohol up.

Haven't got the 'Hello' section of blogger yet, so can't upload any photos yet.

Waiting for Mark to get his University dates setup so we can finally book the plane tickets for the summer trip. At the moment the plan is to go Manchester- Skopje in FYR Macedonia which will involve a connection in Italy. We're hoping to spend a good deal of time in Republica Shripka - land of the Eagle - Albania. NOt sure what it'll be like - until recently it was Europe's poorest country with pretty much no private cars or private property and had the reputation of being the most Marxist country of all the Eastern Bloc countries. Was also the worlds only official Athiest country. Was completely closed off to foreigners from 1948-1990 after they broke with the USSR - the Russians were getting too westernised.

Regarding other trips
Hoping to do a trip around 6-8days in September. Got a few Lonely Planet books out of the library and am toying with the idea of China (Beijing), but it could turn out to be quite expensive. With China, it appears that flights get cheaper the nearer the time of departure - the exact opposite of Europe. Current prices seem to range from 350-450UKP. It also seems a bit of a waste to go all that way for just 1 week.

Other ideas are to get a flight to Bucharest, Romania and then head onto Chisinau, Moldova for a couple of days. There's a wine festival held at this time of year....

New beginnings

2005-04-24T12:52:00.000-07:00

Tried to set up a blog a couple of weeks ago and promptly forgot my password!

Oh well....part 2.

Don't really have many ideas about what I'll bother putting up here but a lot of it will probably be travel-related.

A few Statistics - first times I set foot in following countries

1.UK 1979
2.Spain 1981
3.Portugal 1983
4.Greece 1986
5.Italy 1990
6.Austria 1991
7.France 1992
8.Belgium 2000 (travelled through didn't stop, so doesn't really count)
9.Germany 2000(see above)
10.Czech Republic 2000
11.Slovakia 2000
12.Poland 2000
13.Hungary 2000
14.Croatia 2000
15.Slovenia 2000 (didn't spend night)
16.Norway 2001
17.Ireland 2001
18.Bosnia 2001
19.Serbia 2001
20.Bulgaria 2001
21.Turkey 2001
22.Romania 2001
23.Lithuania 2002
24.Latvia 2002
25.Estonia 2002
26.Ukraine 2002
27.Holland 2002(airport-doesn't really count)
28.Denmark2002 (see above)
29.Belarus 2003
30.Russia 2003
31.Azerbaijan 2004
32.Tunisia 2004