Holiday Decided

After much thought and Internet research, I’ve finally planned my short holiday for next week.

On Tuesday I’m travelling to Nîmes, where I’ve booked a room for three nights in what looks like a very nice hotel.

My plan is to see Nîmes on Wednesday, and go on a day-trip to Arles on Thursday. I’ll return on Friday.

I’m about to go to the station to sort out train tickets. Is that the right way round to do these things? I never know. Well, touch wood there won’t be any transport problems!

I’ve wasted a day or so sorting out this trip, but I’ve still got time to finish the proposal I’m writing. I need to get it in the post to Copenhagen by Monday at the latest.

Should I Go Interrailing?

In my early twenties I went Interrailing two or three times, but never in the traditional style of slumming it with a group of mates. Instead, I travelled alone and stayed with friends all over Europe. Where I went was determined by where my friends and acquaintances lived.

I see that adults can now go Interrailing. You can even get a single-country pass (German link), and pay for a certain number of days’ travel within one month.

I don’t know if it’s too late to get an interrail pass for next week. I’m thinking: the south of France. I’ve never been there. But I’ve just been reading about the area, and I think it could be good.

I quite fancy Arles, Nîmes and Perpignan. It seems that Montpellier might be full of beggars; half the trains in and out of Avignon appear to be buses, which sounds confusing; and I don’t know about Marseille(s).

I’ll give it a bit of thought overnight, and might look into it tomorrow morning. I note that hotels aren’t ludicrously priced in the region, which surprises me. What’s the catch?

Buzz

Why yes, I am back. I reached Stuttgart yesterday evening, after thirty one hours of travel. It certainly takes it out of you.

Upon getting off the train I was hit by a wall of heat. Moments later, while having a fag and updating Twitter, I was stung on the neck by a wasp.

Today I feel very tired. My limbs are aching and my head’s quite blurry. I think I’ll take it easy, and do some cleaning and tidying.

Starting tomorrow I have to really get stuck into what I’m writing. It’s all planned, and I’ve got lots of notes. I just need to actually write it.

I shall also be arranging a short holiday for a few days next week. It needs to be: outside of Germany, so that I’m not wasting official holiday time with health insurance that covers time spent abroad; and reachable by train, as I’m sick of all the palaver with flying. I’m thinking Venice.

Update:

Scrap the Venice idea. I’d like to go there one day, but not by myself. I imagine – perhaps mistakenly – that it could have the potential of being a mite depressing for a solo traveller to visit a city known for romantic holidays.

I’m still trying to think of a destination…

McClaren’s English

The Guardian links to a YouTube video of Steve McClaren speaking hilarious English.

Yes, it most probably is an example of ‘foreigner talk’, typically explained by Communication Accommodation Theory (formally Speech Accommodation Theory), whereby people subconsciously change aspects of their own native language production in order to meet non-native speakers halfway.

All aspects of your language can be affected, from areas of pronunciation and intonation to morphology, syntax and lexis. McClaren seems to have developed an interesting mixture of his own, with pronunciation and intonation being most noticeable.

‘Foreigner talk’ seems to happen typically, in cases when it occurs, for positive reasons: a desire to communicate and to show accepting to other people in your own country. Or, as seems to be McClaren’s case, to be accepted and liked in his new host country. He’s taken on a coaching role in Holland. Note that he doesn’t sound at all Dutch, though. He can’t even pronounce FC Twente, the name of the club he’s working for.

The good news for McClaren is that people producing ‘foreigner talk’ in another country usually revert to their normal speech after some time. The bad news for him is that the world has had another chance to laugh at him. But he should be used to that.

Your

Oh, the irony:

Just what you want from people promising to teach you how to write.

Disclosure: I once did a few translations for this company. They seemed nice enough.

Observations While Drinking

I went to Leeds yesterday. I had to buy my train ticket to Newcastle – and a jumper. Yes, I’d thought I could get away with visiting Yorkshire without a jumper. Haha!

As I had nothing else to do I had a few beers in the courtyard at Queens Court. Here are some of my thoughts:

• Pubs shouldn’t expect their customers to sit next to the skips. And especially when you can hear rats screeching at each other behind the skips.

• The aggressive beggars in Leeds are as bad as I remembered. But now they seem to be working in pairs. They come and accost you while you’re sitting outside bars.

• Happy hour beer prices are the same as normal beer prices in Germany. In other words: cor blimey, guvnah, ain’t Britain pricey? Or something like that.

• Leeds bus drivers still call you ‘luv’. It makes me feel wanted.

• Who was it that told ginger-haired people that green is their colour? For the record, it’s not – it really isn’t. But I didn’t say anything, as I didn’t want to offend the ginger-haired lesbian who’d smothered green eye-shadow all around both eyes, making her look like a particularly fucked-up panda.

• Getting into fun, light-hearted, casual conversation with other people is so much easier in pubs in (northern) England than on the Continent. You don’t even look for it. People sitting anywhere near you just start talking to you and include you in their group, like it or not. It’s nice if you’re up for it, and annoying if you’re not. Yesterday I enjoyed getting involved, and I chatted with a few interesting people.

• On the whole, though, Britain still sucks. Did I mention the aggressive beggars? I don’t think a beggar has every approached me in Stuttgart. In fact, I’m not sure if I’ve ever seen one there. Up in Copenhagen, beggars are certainly more noticeable than they used to be, but they’re nowhere near as aggressive as the ones in Leeds.

It was good to have a break. And now I’m going to go for a lie-down.

Do I Want to Be a Twit?

I’ve decided to flirt with Twitter. I’m not sure if it will turn out to be a long-term relationship or not. At present it’s just a one-night stand.

I am a little concerned that it’s the sort of thing I might get addicted to, especially as there’s a Twitterrific application for the iPhone. It’s not as if that device isn’t already surgically attached to my hand as it is!

If Twitter turns out to be fun I might consider starting a different account and using it with my students: not for my benefit, but so that they can get to know each other better, through English, outside the classroom, with the aim that it could aid classroom dynamics and the learning process itself. But we shall see.

How To Get Out Of Britain

I’m not into flying. Having chosen not to return on the flight I booked, I’ve been looking at my options.

I considered taking the ferry from Hull to Rotterdam or Zeebrugge. But I don’t own a box full of gold, and so I can’t afford their extortionate fares.

Eurostar’s website pissed me off big-time. They want far too much information, their pricing is ridiculous, their ticketing system sucks, and on every page they try to make you upgrade to first class. Fuck them, the cunts.

Here’s a little Eurostar screenshot. I think it tells you all you need to know:

Click for a larger version, of course.

So just how was I to escape from this prison island? Suddenly I thought of one last option: the ferry from Newcastle to IJmuiden (Amsterdam). And yes, it is cheaper. So that’s what I’ve booked. I’ll be in Holland on Monday.

Change Of Plan

I’m not going back to Germany!

Well, I am, of course, but not with the flight I’d booked for this evening. I just can’t face all those tannoy announcements at Manchester Airport, lol. Otherwise, I can’t wait to get back out of Britain.

I’ve never missed a flight in my life – and I still haven’t. I decided early this morning that I need to be here for one more week.

My dad’s getting an important result on Thursday, and it’s a good idea for me to be here at that time: has it spread to the bone or not? As there’s a shadow on the bone, my guess is that it probably has, with all that that entails.

I’m currently writing something important – I can’t tell you what right now, as I don’t want to jinx it – and it’s certainly quieter here than where I live in Stuttgart. I plan to finish it within a week, and then I’ll travel back by train next weekend.

How to Avoid the Almost-Inevitable

Come on, admit it: the cynic within you, the left-wing optimist who’s been burnt too many times, knows that elections have an unnerving habit of rewarding the right-wing parties.

Although you hope that won’t be the case in America this time round, part of you fears that it could easily happen.

Depending on how much you’ve been disappointed in the past, you might even believe it’s almost inevitable that McCain will end up winning.

That’s where I stand, you see, and so I was happy to find that the Guardian has published an extract from an election guide written by Michael Moore, and very good it is, too, I think.

Let’s hope Barack Obama receives a copy.