tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-134885542024-03-08T07:32:49.758+00:00The Reluctant AnglophileWelcome to my London-based blog, where I'll be sharing some of my trials, tribulations, and hopefully--triumphs--while living life in London (again).The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.comBlogger36125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1134939750639074682005-12-18T20:33:00.000+00:002007-04-01T05:11:31.976+01:00First Prize in the Lottery of Life?<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/baby_crying.0.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/baby_crying.0.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />Due to the protracted distractions of multiple visitors, coupled with persistent flu-like symptoms which I'm still hoping are not of the avian-induced variety, the R.A. has been on an unforeseen temporary hiatus.<br /><br />Fortunately, the material for this week's post more or less delivered itself to my computer screen in the form of some lively ripostes regarding my blog on a thoroughly entertaining British expat forum. Many of the postings demonstrated more about that infamous British "sense of humor" than I could ever hope to articulate myself, so I thought I'd share some of those here.<br /><br />BritGuyTN: "Did anyone else notive [sic] that this silly tart complained about paying for sewage? is london the only place she has been apart from new york?... another candidate for needing a helmet before leaving the house."<br /><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">RA: This is the second time I've had the humorous distinction of being called a tart (BritSpeak for promiscuous person), which I have to say is a rather curious choice of insult to hurl at a complete stranger in cyberspace. The previous time was at a cocktail bar when an unseemly drunk man launched himself on me at the coat check and his equally inebriated girlfriend slurred this invective before making a beeline to get sick on the sidewalk. I must admit, it does makes me feel like I've really <em>arrived </em>here<em>,</em> sort of like in the fourth grade at Irving Elementary when Latrelle Jackson would bestow the name 'honky' on only the people he secretly admired.</span><br /><br />Rushman: "I was taking it all with a pinch of salt until the stupid [bleep] started knocking the East End. For her information, the "Angel" tube station is not in the East End. It's in [bleeping] Islington...NORTH LONDON. Just the self important ramblings of another American with a crap sense of tradition, history and geography and importantly, a complete stereotypical lack of understanding another culture."<br /><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">RA: And to think before now I thought we New Yorkers held the torch for being defensive and self-righteous...clearly, it's time to pass the baton. </span><br /><br /><span style="color:#000000;">AntJen: "Sounds like she has already picked up 1 british habit she doesnt realise - moaning about something and not doing anything about it."</span><br /><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">RA: Well, short of making like a Brit and just stabbing everyone that annoys me or alternatively drowning my troubles in drink, I opt to use my blog for a therapeutic outlet. Certainly if I could wave a magic wand to single-handedly improve the quality level of things over here and implant a motivation gene in the large percentage of the population that lacks one, I wouldn't hesitate. </span><br /></span><span style="color:#ff0000;"></span><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">While the English are certainly notorious for 'whingeing' amongst themselves, in other parts of the world, people actually complain straight to the source (i.e. the government, the transportation authority, the store manager, the landlord) and this is the impetus for much improvement and innovation. (As a personal aside, I think you'd be amazed how easy it is for foreigners such as myself to get action over here in the Land of Inaction, simply by speaking up and not being satisfied with "it's not possible" or "sometime next month" for an answer.) </span><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;"></span><br /><span style="color:#000000;">Neil: "And how can she be so critical of the tube, when the New York subway is infinitely worse - at least in the tube you have computerised signs telling you when the next train is coming (in NY it can be difficult to know if you're standing on the right platform); and you have an easy to read map; and you can get from one side of town to the other without having to go uptown on one train to then get another one to take you downtown again."</span><br /><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">RA: This could be the subject of many a blog in and of itself--suffice it to say that while we don't have fancy computerised screens in NY telling us when the next train is coming, that's generally because our trains actually do RUN so such a system would be an egregious waste of the money that's better spent on maintenance and new subway cars. I think I can speak for most New Yorkers when I say we'd rather be on the move than standing around watching a computer screen tell us <em>when </em>we might be moving. </span><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;"></span><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">Things have actually gotten so dire here recently that they've started making Tube announcements letting passengers know when there is "good service" on the trains, as opposed to the old announcements telling us when there's a disruption. No doubt some savvy soul in the head office clued-in to the time (and voice) saving practicalities of this strategy.</span><br /><span style="color:#000000;"></span><br /><span style="color:#000000;">BigDavyG: "Its a bit rich that she complains about public traansport [sic] and she seems to be paying $500 for her tv license - looks like someone has her figured for being one of those "dumb americans".</span><br /><p><span style="color:#ff0000;">RA: Let's see, I'm not sure what riding public transport and paying for a TV licence have in common, unless you're honestly theorizing that I'm so rich that I actually pay the mandatory TV licence so why should I be stooping to ride public transport?! I don't even know where to go with that one. And yes, of course everyone here knows not paying for the TV licence is only a problem if you get caught--just like shoplifting or illegal cable hookups in the States--but the fact is, it does happen to be the law (and not even one that I agree with), which it appears you're advocating we spendthrift Americans should be breaking. </span></p><p><span style="color:#000000;">If, as Cecil Rhodes once observed, "To be born English is to win the first prize in the lottery of life", I think I might do best to pass up this year's lotto jackpot and squander my savings at the craps table.</span><br /></p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1132085662011508932005-11-27T14:13:00.000+00:002005-12-11T17:34:16.753+00:00God Save the Queen<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/_40640964_ascot5.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/_40640964_ascot5.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />According to last weekend's paper, Al Qaeda has a new target, and this time it's not the usual suspects such as hapless commuters, sun-seeking tourists, or meddling Western politicians. Instead, the unlikely individual caught in their crosshairs is 79-year old Queen Elizabeth.<br /><br />While she's definitely made some questionable decisions in life, not the least of which was that unfortunate turquoise ensemble she wore to Ascot Day this year, does this diminutive English septuagenarian really merit being declared 'one of the severest enemies of Islam' by Al Qaeda in their recently released tapes regarding the July bombings?<br /><br />I've rarely heard the poor woman utter a sentence, let alone voice an opinion, and the monarchy hasn't made or even influenced public policy since the early 18th century. With only figurehead 'powers' to rubber-stamp legislation and church appointments, why waste precious time going after Queenie when surely there are more important targets at hand? Or maybe not. Maybe this last, desperate grasping at straws signals that Osama is finally running out of steam. Well, if all else fails and his foot soldiers can't penetrate the likes of Her Majesty's Secret Service, he can always fall back on softer targets like, say, the Golden Girls, Barbara Bush or Miss Marple.The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1132938302315734252005-11-26T14:54:00.000+00:002005-11-25T20:05:16.833+00:00Trivial Pursuit<p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/britishness.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/britishness.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />Recently, an American friend from Cambridge grad school days announced her intention to apply for British citizenship now that she's been a resident in the country for the requisite five years and intends on remaining here for the foreseeable future.<br /><br />Of course obtaining citizenship in most countries is no easy task and one must expect to navigate the way through mountains of red tape and reams of paperwork designed to weed out all but the most persistent and optimistic of souls. This is certainly true in Britain, where the rocky road to becoming a citizen is paved with more than a few unique hurdles.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/queen2.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/queen2.jpg" border="0" /></a>Not the least of these is the anachronistic requirement that applicants take a public verbal oath proclaiming their allegiance to the Queen, thereby becoming 'subjects' of the monarchy. With all due respect to Her Majesty, it seems a bit outlandish that circa 2005, one must pledge allegiance to a figurehead that has had no real power for over 300 years since the implementation of a Constitutional government. (Though since this country revels so much in its past greatness, I suppose this pledge is somewhat fitting within the context.) While admittedly, I find the Royals just as entertaining as the next person, and have in fact become bizarrely obsessed with reading about Henry VIII and his six wives, my fascination stops cold at the prospect of declaring myself a 'subject' of the monarchy, something which I suspect would deter many of the most Anglophilic of would-be applicants.<br /><br />Meanwhile, prior to this month, not even a basic citizenship test was administered to ensure aspiring citizens were cognizant of key facets of British history and politics. So essentially, applicants need not have known the name of the current Prime Minister as long as they hailed the Queen and could speak the mother tongue.<br /><br />This perversity finally appeared to catch the eye of someone in the Home Office, perhaps spurred on by the debate over cultural integration in the wake of the 7/7 terror attacks. In any event, as of November 1, a new citizenship test has been belatedly implemented, which all applicants must successfully pass in order to demonstrate "knowledge of life in the UK".<br /><br />So what exactly constitutes "knowledge of life in the UK" you might ask? Fair question, and the BBC offers a sampling of the invaluable tidbits that one may need to know before becoming a British citizen:<br /><br /><span style="color:#3333ff;"><em>According to "Life in the UK" (the study guide for the test), where does Father Christmas come from?</em><br />A: Lapland<br />B: Iceland<br />C: The North Pole<br /><br /><em>According to "Life in the UK", what should you do if you spill someone's pint in the pub?</em><br />A: Offer to buy the person another pint<br />B: Offer to dry their wet shirt with your own<br />C: Prepare for a fight in the car park<br /><br /><em>What or who is PG (again, according to the guide)?</em><br />A: One of the brand names for the national British drink, tea<br />B: A Personal Guide, a British-born mentor provided to each immigrant applying for nationality<br />C: Part of the cinema film classification system<br /></span><br />Other gems include "Do many children live in single parent families?" and "Do people tend to live in the cities or in the country?" To say the test is missing some essentials like, um, British history or how to register to vote would be an understatement akin to saying the Titanic was a few lifeboats shy of capacity. Because of these glaring omissions, the new test has already come under fire from many critics. Tony McNulty, the Immigration Minister, defended the decision not to include British history amongst the list of subjects by saying, "This is not a test of someone's ability to be British or a test of their Britishness. It is about looking forward, rather than an assessment of their ability to understand history." Huh?<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/180px-UK-Passport-Cover.0.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/180px-UK-Passport-Cover.jpg" border="0" /></a>Are we to understand that becoming a British citizen isn't about understanding what it means to be British?! And how exactly is one supposed to 'look forward' without any context from the past? Most likely the reason the test doesn't strive to ascertain 'Britishness' is because the question of what exactly it means to be British has been stumping everyone over here for years. </p><p>So in lieu of trying to answer the unanswerable, successful applicants must instead possess a mental database of trivial information pertaining to such schizophrenic topics as pub etiquette, movie ratings, and a holiday that a significant portion of the country doesn't even celebrate. Indeed, perhaps by very nature of its myopism, the test does after all manage to give applicants a flavor of that elusive Britishness it seeks so desperately to shun. </p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1131973359749734192005-11-17T13:13:00.000+00:002005-11-17T15:57:27.206+00:00The More Things Change...<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/time%20zones.2.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/time%20zones.2.jpg" border="0" /></a><span style="color:#000099;"><br /></span><div align="left"><em><strong><span style="color:#000099;">"When it's three o'clock in New York, it's still 1938 in London."--Bette Midler</span></strong></em><br /><br /></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left">Truer words were never spoken, Bette, especially when it comes to English legislation. (Well, when it comes to a lot of things here, actually, but nowhere perhaps more poignantly than with British politics.) In England, there's no faster way to ensure that things will remain exactly the same than by enacting a new law to effect change.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/ccalendar.0.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/ccalendar.jpg" border="0" /></a>This hit home after hearing this week that the conservative Torie party have attempted to derail the start of the new pub licensing hours--due to come to fruition next week--by asking the government to delay their implementation by another seven months. (Mind you, this is a debate whose cobwebs have begat cobwebs it's been dragging on so long, way before the law was even passed in early <strong>2003</strong>.) Thankfully, the Tories' last-minute bid failed, but nonetheless, I've come to realize that the new law is going to be a virtual non-event and that the multi-year debate leading up to it is grossly out of proportion to its actual impact.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/beer.0.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/beer.0.jpg" border="0" /></a>This is because each individual pub owner must apply to their local borough (neighborhood) council for extended hours, and it's a foregone conclusion that all of the councils in residential areas (read: 99% of London) will reject any bids for later closing times. Witness this week's justifiable fracass over the fact that Tony Blair's local pub has been denied a licensing extension. The Red Lion on Whitehall, yards away from Downing Street, applied for permission to open until 1am on Thursdays to Saturdays (those wild and crazy Brits--they really push the envelope). But the pub was denied on the grounds of "public nuisance" and "public safety". You can bet this precedent is going to pave the way for all local councils to reject the notion of later opening hours, leaving us--and every other Londoner living outside of Soho--(the tourist-clogged, Times Square of London), right back where we started.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/ciggie.0.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/ciggie.0.jpg" border="0" /></a> No doubt this does not bode well for the contentious new Smoking Ban legislation, which we were so thrilled had FINALLY passed here as of two weeks ago. But our shortlived excitement was quickly extinguished when we learned that naturally, it does not take effect until Spring of 2007, which means 2010 B.S.T. (British Standard Time), by which point we will have either died from secondhand smoke-induced lung cancer or moved back to the States. Similar to the new pub licensing hours, the new smoking ban is riddled with more loopholes than a piece of Swiss cheese. The official term they are using for it is a 'partial ban', which essentially means that smoking will not be allowed anywhere that serves food.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/smoking_pub.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/smoking_pub.jpg" border="0" /></a>In and of itself, this is at least a giant step in the right direction. Many restaurants here still do not have non-smoking sections (though thankfully more do than when we lived here five years ago) and there are few things more frustrating than eating an exorbitantly priced meal with someone at a neighboring table (who may as well be sitting on your lap given the close proximity of seating arrangements), blowing smoke directly onto your uplifted forkful of filet mignon as they puff away without a care in the world.<br /><br />So with the ban on smoking in restaurants, at least diners may actually be able to start discerning other flavors besides those of Marlboro and Merit Ultra Light. The eye of the debate, naturally, is centering on the pubs. Most, if not all, serve food, and hence will be forced to either stop doing so or enforce the smoking ban, which owners believe will dramatically reduce business. Many, including the R.A., view this 'partial ban' legislation as yet another example of the government's wishy-washy, easy way out stance on virtually every topic, which is why the laws here serve to do nothing but reinforce the current status quo.<br /><br />In any case, it's pub staff who will likely be the ones to suffer the most when their owners are allowed to choose smoke over food. This will especially be the case with pubs in poorer neighborhoods who will most definitely choose that option. And with the rampant alcoholism here, do we really want to encourage people to drink without food on their stomach? We all know that no one is going to set aside their beer long enough to make a run for the corner kebab stand, especially when they've only got precious few hours to drink up until 11:00 (unless of course they happen to be in that 10-block radius positively affected by the new licensing laws.)<br /><br />While NYC has successfully weathered the smoking ban, which everyone was sure would bring the demise of many bars and clubs, one could argue that with England's pub culture, a full ban here would be more difficult to implement. Which is why it's interesting to note that both Ireland and Scotland have imposed full bans (Scotland's takes effect in March), so that argument doesn't hold much water. But I suppose there's no point in getting all worked up about it, since in the end, full or partial, we all know that 2007 will come and go and the new law's 'impact' will be as temporal as, well, a puff of smoke. </div>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1131709599427084152005-11-11T11:10:00.000+00:002005-11-11T13:31:50.650+00:00Weathering the Differences<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/weather2.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/weather2.jpg" border="0" /></a>In follow-up to my recent posting, <a href="http://http://reluctantanglophile.blogspot.com/2005/11/contradiction-in-terms.html">A Contradiction in Terms</a>, I've been doing a bit of research to try and get to the bottom of some of the confusing, contradictory and downright non-sensical things about England.<br /><br />Similiar to how Jane Goodall might go about researching the behavior of chimpanzees in the wild, I've tried to be as scientific as possible, incorporating fieldwork (i.e. personal observation and inquiry) with established doctrine (i.e. literature written by or for British people.) In almost every instance, the latter manages to firmly substantiate my laypersons' point-of-view.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/howtobe.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/howtobe.jpg" border="0" /></a>For instance, from the hilariously tongue-in-cheek <em><a href="http://http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0952287013/104-0669072-8489559?v=glance&n=283155&s=books&v=glance">How to Be British</a> </em>comes this passage about the schizophrenic British sense of temperature control<em>:</em><br /><br />"It's 11:15 pm on a cold Friday night in the dead of winter. Two young women in midriff-baring crop-tops and mini-skirts with no tights underneath are strolling along arm in arm. This is an example of our famous British <em>toughness</em>. On the other hand, in summer, you may observe Brits sitting on the beach wearing jackets and pullovers with long woollen socks under their sandals. The important thing to remember is that the British dress to please themselves and to show their independence of fashion, weather, social convention and color theory."<br /><br />Only the Brits could find a way to spin their bizarre, weather-inappropriate dress so that it's a reflection of an unfettered sense of independence.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/watching.1.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/watching.1.jpg" border="0" /></a>From <em><a href="http://http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0340818867/104-0669072-8489559?v=glance&n=283155&n=507846&s=books&v=glance">Watching the English</a></em>, I also learned (albeit too late to salvage many a social encounter), "The worst possible offense committed by foreigners, particularly Americans, is to belittle the English weather. When the summer temperature reaches the high 20's (low 70's Farenheit), and we moan, 'Phew, isn't it hot?', we do not take kindly to visiting Americans scoffing and saying 'Call this hot? This is nothing. You should come to [insert American city] if you want to see hot!'<br /><br />Apparently, our comparisons represent "a grossly <em>quantitative</em> approach to weather" (if weather isn't quantitative, then what is?) but nonetheless, the English find this approach "coarse and distasteful". It seems they are very patriotic about their weather here, which I guess if you've got to grasp at straws to find something to band together on, will do in a pinch.The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1131101505953480632005-11-09T10:46:00.000+00:002005-11-09T14:20:52.883+00:00It’s a Jungle Out There...<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/MysteryMan.2.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/MysteryMan.2.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><div align="left"></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#3366ff;"><span style="color:#3333ff;">As promised, for the sake of representing multiple<br />viewpoints from other eagle-eyed foreign observers<br />who either live in or have recently visited this fine city,<br />the following is the first ‘guest post’ on the R.A.,<br />coming from “Private Dave”.</span><br /></span><span style="color:#3366ff;">********</span><br /><br /><br />As a foreigner living and working in London, I liken my stay in this country to a military exercise and so it is that I’ve begun my second tour of duty back in the trenches after having served an interminable 3-year term on my first.<br /><br />And it really is a jungle out there, not only in terms of navigating traffic on the city’s narrow, congested roads or the G.I. Joe-like maneuvers required to wedge yourself onto impossibly crowded tube trains during rush hour, but also when it comes to making your way along sidewalks and stairwells without sustaining grievous bodily harm. Who knew that walking could be a combat sport?<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/wrongway173.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/wrongway173.jpg" border="0" /></a>Perhaps it’s due to the large number of foreigners present, but it seems no matter what side you choose, you invariably choose the WRONG side. Thus in London, as in the military, you have to keep your head up and your shoulders squared, a lesson I’ve learned the hard way after being maliciously sideswiped--and then cursed at--on more than one occasion. Though it’s not unlike the behavior of New York cabbies that seem to spot a pedestrian and then hit the gas, only to slam on the brakes and scream obscenities at the offending victim they nearly ran down, here it’s a more of a stealth attack rather than a direct assault.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/CityWorkers.0.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/CityWorkers.0.jpg" border="0" /></a>Observing this behavior, I’ve become increasingly convinced that some Brits (mainly of the male persuasion) engage in these tactics as a covert form of exercising their pent-up aggression. Suited up in their battle fatigues (usually a colorful checked shirt and dark suit), they appear to outright target unsuspecting victims in their sights like hapless rabbits caught in the crosshairs. It’s just lucky for us they’re only armed with briefcases instead of bayonets nowadays.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/ccharge.2.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/ccharge.2.jpg" border="0" /></a>Though the weaponry of choice among the infantry divisions may have <em>pro</em>gressed, unfortunately, the battlefield on the London streets has just as inversely <em>re</em>gressed. A recent study determined that traffic in 1899 moved faster here than it does in modern times. Perhaps this was the justification the honorable mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, used to implement the congestion charge for the questionable ‘pleasure’ of driving on his city streets. In any case, it now costs the equivalent of $15 U.S. to drive to work each day, which the U.S. embassy, for one, is refusing to pay.<br /><br />Thanks to these measures, I will admit that I’ve noticed a difference in my daily commute: I can now move along at a clipping pace of 5.1 mph instead of my old average of 4.2. Nonetheless, I’m sure the money is being well-spent on…hmmm…wait a minute, just where is the money going? Oh yes, they claim public transport. Interesting claim, because last time I checked, the Tube was still a crowded, dirty, malfunctioning relic from the Victorian era. Maybe if they actually did upgrade the Tube, they’d finally stop people from taking to the roads and abandoning public transport in droves.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/knight.0.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/knight.jpg" border="0" /></a> The crux of the problem seems to lie in the fact that this is a nation so caught up in reveling in past glories that they’ve failed to notice we’re actually residing in the present. No matter what the subject, talk invariably turns to previous successes, even if it’s necessary to travel back in time to Tudor England to find an applicable reference point.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/fans23b,0.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/fans23b%2C0.jpg" border="0" /></a>Nowhere is this phenomenon more apparent than in the arena of sports, particularly soccer (or footie, as it’s called here in Blighty). When England plays Germany, the constant chant is "one world cup and two world wars, doo-da, doo-da!" Mind you, the last time they won the World Cup here was in 1966. Despite this, they were still bringing out these aging septuagenarians for quotes on the subject of heroism when England beat Australia in the Ashes cricket tournament for the first time in eighteen years this fall. But winning or losing aside, can you ever imagine the U.S. playing baseball against a team from Japan and the crowd chanting, "85 titles and two big bombs...doo-da doo-da"? Somehow, I don’t think so. </div>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1131108949437988492005-11-05T12:06:00.000+00:002005-11-05T14:49:46.300+00:00A Heroic Traitor?<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/fawkes1.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/fawkes1.jpg" border="0" /></a> Today is Guy Fawkes Day, this country's rough equivalent to our Fourth of July, though of course, this being England, it's necessary that the very nature of today's celebrations be wracked with a certain perversity and come couched in a cloud of uncertainty. In fact, rather than equating it to our Independence Day, a better analogy would be a cross between Halloween and if we were to celebrate, say, "Lee Harvey Oswald Day".<br /><br />You see, the holiday commemorates the night in 1605 when the country's most notorious traitor, Guy Fawkes, and twelve other men snuck 36 kegs of gunpowder into the House of Parliament in order to blow it up, thereby attempting to kill King James and the Prince of Wales. The plan was thwarted, and Guy and his co-conspirators were duly hung. On the night of the foiled plot, November 5th, 1605, bonfires were set alight to celebrate the safety of the King and the event has been commemorated every year since with fireworks and the burning of effigies of Guy Fawkes on a bonfire.<br /><br />Theoretically, these festivities are to celebrate Fawkes' execution, but many of the English themselves seem ambivalent about whether they are indeed celebrating his downfall or in fact honoring his attempt to do away with the government. On the occasions where the holiday has been explained to me, the latter is far more often the reason cited, usually along with a devilish gleam of pride.<br /><br />In any case, even today's monarchy seems uncertain as to the exact sentiments of their English subjects, because ever since 1605, the reigning monarch only enters Parliament once a year, for "the State Opening of Parliament". Better safe than sorry, apparently.The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1129029813806739112005-11-02T12:21:00.000+00:002005-11-03T10:20:42.326+00:00A Contradiction in Terms<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/waterbill3.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/waterbill3.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />While everyone knows that they drive on the opposite side of the road here in Blighty, this only scratches the surface of a host of other incongruities and contradictions pertaining to the English way of life.<br /><br />For instance, just yesterday I made the startling discovery--upon opening our Thames Water bill and recoiling in disbelief--that not only does one pay for water here, but one must also pay for the removal of the water, to the tune of nearly $70. I guess this falls under Newton's Law, "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction", but still, this discovery brought an all-new low point to my growing list of egregious things that "should-be-free but aren't" here in England. Heretofore, the list was topped by the annual TV license ($500) and the galling fact that you're charged 10 cents for a book of matches from the news agent (free in NY and possibly the rest of the civilized world.)<br /><br />While mulling over the new indignity of paying for "waste water" during my walk to class the other night at City University, I started realizing what a land of opposites England truly is. The U. is located in a dodgy section of East London accessed by the beautifically titled "Angel" tube stop (alternately, across town there's a tube stop called Icksworth and while I haven't been over there, I bet it's downright lovely).<br /><br /><div align="left"></div><div align="left">Walking down the forlorn street leading up to school, I passed the picturesquely titled "Arlington Estates", "Sutton Place Dwellings" and "Glendorn Garden Estates". Anywhere else, it might sound like I'd entered an exclusive gated community lined with posh McMansions, but these apartment blocks were government-owned low-income housing, a.k.a. council flats, which often go by the name of "Housing Estates", a moniker which belies with their frequently grim appearance: </div><div align="left"></div><p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/flats_combined_2_3_4.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/flats_combined_2_3_4.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />Another subject of curiosity is the English sense of temperature, if indeed there is such a thing as they seem to have no consistent internal thermometer. These are people that wear wool scarves when it's sixty degrees out, yet perversely go coatless in a tube top in mid-winter and crank the roof down on their convertibles the moment the mercury rises past 40. Two days or more above 65 is considered a heat wave and may result in hordes of British people fainting at outdoor events.<br /><br />Other incongruities that I still haven't managed to get to the bottom of yet are:<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/confusion.0.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/confusion.0.jpg" border="0" /></a>1) Public schools are called "private" and private schools are called "public"<br /><br />2) On your birthday, YOU pay for your own--and everyone else's--drinks and dinners<br /><br />3) If a burglar breaks into your home, you don't have the right to harm him in order to protect yourself, your family or your possessions and many burglars have in fact successfully sued homeowners. A victim can even go to jail even if he hits back "too hard" when attacked.<br /><br />4) Despite being an insanely private society when it comes to money, homes, jobs and almost any mundane detail about their lives, the British have no problem opening up to perfect strangers on other more 'colorful' topics...For instance last Friday night at a pub I was privy to having a young man, possibly in a misguided attempt at flirting, tell me and a friend about his colonic earlier that day. </p><div align="left">5) Speaking of pubs, giving a tip in one can apparently be considered insulting to the recipient because this might imply that they are 'beneath' you (this comes from a great book <a href="http://http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0340818867/104-0669072-8489559?v=glance&n=283155&n=507846&s=books&v=glance"><span style="font-size:85%;">"Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behavior"</span></a>, which I will be blogging about soon.)</div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"></div><br />Frankly, it's no wonder that the English bemoan their loss of national identity--who wouldn't be schizophrenic in a society plagued by this much confusion and contradiction?The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1130434293591745852005-10-27T17:19:00.000+01:002005-10-28T13:23:23.970+01:00Chickens: Going to the Dogs?<div align="left"><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/chickens1.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/chickens.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />They may be soon, or so implied the <em>Evening Standard</em> sandwich boards today, heralding in bold typeface the 50% drop in poultry sales here induced by the avian flu panic. Apparently, demand has dropped so low that at 25 pence per pound, chickens are<em> </em>actually "cheaper than beef tripe used for dog food." Appetizing thought, considering that a) I was on my way to the store to purchase ingredients for chicken stir-fry, and b) until this very moment, chicken was my UK dietary mainstay since I still hadn't fully recovered from our last experience living here when mad cow disease was rampant.<br /><br />Up until now, I'd been able to (sort of) keep a lid on my anxieties over the dreaded avian flu pandemic speculated to hit Britain this winter (largely by stockpiling the drug Tamiflu), but today's <em>ES</em> headline put the kabosh on any hope I had of remaining rational thru March, and of course necessitated that I rush straight into the newsagent and plunk down my 40p for the paper, barely able to contain myself until I got home to indulge in the doomsday fears I've been trying so hard to keep at bay.<br /><br />Many of you will recall my post this summer about the hazards of the ubiquitous <a href="http://http://reluctantanglophile.blogspot.com/2005/08/grannies-spared-in-subway-purge.html"><em>Evening Standard</em> sandwich boards</a> for the panic prone (which resulted in our accidental purchase of an enormous air conditioner during the New York heat wave, despite the fact that we were living in London at the time). I'm unhappy to report that, despite being once-bitten, twice-shy by their sensationalist sales techniques, they still continue to cause me repeated bouts of <em>HIPS </em>(Headline Induced Panic Syndrome).<br /><br />Playing right into the hands of the evil publishers of this paper, <em>HIPS</em> usually prompts those such as myself to buy this apocalyptic rag to read the trumpeted article (rather than leaving things to the imagination and hence winding up more anxiety-ridden and in extreme cases, burdened with unnecessary appliances), but the articles never exactly prove to provide the soothing balm that you're looking for. As expected, the chicken article was no exception and played right into my fears when I learned that I should not, if I had any sense at all, be eating chicken for the remainder of the flu season, or perhaps even through 2007 if I want to take into account the progeny of any potentially infected birds. (And I do.)<br /><br />The article noted that one of London's Michelin-starred French restaurants has even gone so far as to take all bird dishes--including (gasp) foie gras--off the menu. Another top restaurant interviewed has seen a slump in pasta sales because homemade pasta apparently is made from raw egg yolks. Pretty soon, there'll be nothing safe left to eat in this country. I'm sure if we're here long enough, something is bound to happen with the local fish supplies...after all, in a country beset by Mad Cows and Flu-ridden Fowl, surely Cholera Cod is just around the corner. It's enough to make even the most carnivorous among us join the ranks of Gwyneth and Madonna by going macrobiotic.<br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">**********</span><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">Please note that for your convenience, you can now reach my blog simply by going directly to </span><a href="http://www.reluctantanglophile.com"><span style="color:#ff0000;">www.reluctantanglophile.com</span></a><br /><span style="color:#3366ff;">Additionally, you can sign-up to receive updates on new postings via email using the "Notify Me" feature at right.</span> </div>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1124975780123745922005-10-26T23:15:00.000+01:002005-11-29T23:01:55.813+00:00You Know You've Been in London Too Long When...<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/hourglass.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/hourglass.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />Prudential insurance company recently estimated that a lifetime spent living in London will cost the average person 2 million pounds (over 3.7 million dollars). While admittedly, I love to collect factoids like this to bolster my case for getting back to NYC sooner rather than later, there are in fact many warning signs that it may be time to go home. And while I've only been living back here four months this time around, sadly, most of the below already, or in some cases, STILL apply. (These came courtesy of an e-mail forwarded by a fellow expat.)<br /><br />1. You say "the City" and expect everyone to know which one.<br /><br />2. You've taken so many relatives, friends and long-lost acquaintances that have mysteriously emerged out of the woodwork on The Original London Bus Tour that you can recite the 'live-guided' commentary by heart, in your sleep.<br /><br />3. You can get into a four-hour argument about the fastest way to get from "the City" to Gatwick at 3:30 on the Friday before a bank holiday weekend but still can't find Dorset on a map.<br /><br />4. The last time you witnessed a full day of sunshine was in June...of 2001. And in a cruel twist of irony, you’ve experienced--and now empathize with--the lobster-like condition of the same vacationing Brits you used to gleefully make fun of at the beach.<br /><br />5. You’ve found yourself wearing a scarf, boots or both…in August.<br /><br />6. You've briefly considered the merits of stabbing someone.<br /><br />7. Anything outside of Zone 1 on the Tube is the "suburbs" or "countryside" and the UK west of Heathrow is still entirely theoretical to you.<br /><br />8. You’ve given up on determining which side of the street or stairwell is actually the “right” side to walk on but take personal affront at foreigners who are ignorant of the “stand on the right/walk on the left” rule on escalators.<br /><br />9. You now consider eye contact an act of overt aggression.<br /><br />10. You’ve resorted to threats of legal action to get desired results with your bank, cell phone company, Sky Digital, British Telecom, or in extreme cases, all of the above.<br /><br />11. Popping out for "a curry" or kebabs have replaced "grabbing a slice" in your late-night food repretoire.<br /><br />12. You can identify the names and ‘claim to fame’ of more than three B-list British ‘celebrities’, such as Jordan, Jade Goody or Cheryl Tweedy.<br /><br />13. You refer to an 8' x 10' plot of patchy grass or even cement as a garden.<br /><br />14. You're paying £1,000 a week for a flat the size of a walk-in wardrobe and you think it's a "bargain".<br /><br />15. You pay £3 pounds without blinking for a pint of beer that cost the bar 28p.<br /><br />16. You see a crowd of people and automatically find yourself queing up.<br /><br />17. £50 worth of groceries easily fits in one plastic bag.<br /><br />18. You've mentally blocked out all thoughts of the city's air/water quality and what it's likely doing to your insides.<br /><br />19. You roll your eyes and say 'tsk' at the news that someone has thrown himself under a tube train, again.<br /><br />20. The phrases “severe delays”, “it’s not ready yet”, or “our next available appointment is in three weeks” no longer elicit a visceral anger reaction from you.The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1129641987318465942005-10-18T13:31:00.000+01:002005-10-18T17:15:42.733+01:00When Sixty Miles is a World Away<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/sea%20routes1.JPG"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/sea%20routes1.JPG" border="0" /></a><br />We're just back from Dublin, and what a breath of fresh air it was. The first thing that struck me was how friendly the people were, which was a refreshing change of pace from the state of affairs here in London. And not only were they friendly, but they also appeared to be quite a happy lot, as opposed to the beaten-down, defeated air of their English counterparts. It really makes me wonder what's being pumped into the River Liffey and if there's any chance of that substance being made available for export into the Thames.<br /><br />With such a narrow distance separating the two countries and the same depressingly overcast weather system shared by both, one has to wonder how the inhabitants on one side of the Irish Sea--separated by a mere 60 miles--ended up being so good-natured and the other being so full of sour grapes. After all, it's not like the Irish haven't endured more than their fair share of hardships, so one can't attribute the difference to a carefree history. Whatever the explanation, now it all makes sense to me why, whenever I inadvertently refer to an Irish person as part of the "English" or even "British" collective, they are so quick to (nicely) point out, as many times as is necessary, that they are actually Irish.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/irishguysinging2.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/irishguysinging1.jpg" border="0" /></a>The other surprising thing about Dublin was, despite the country's long-standing reputation for alcoholism and drunkenness (as well as the purported fact that there's a pub for every 300 members of the population), in actuality this is a nation of veritable teetotalers compared to England. During our evenings out, we saw only one excessively drunk person, and he was sitting in a corner by himself singing. In fact, they seem to do quite a bit of singing in the pubs there, which went a long way towards explaining away my recent surprise that Ireland was nowhere to be found in the recent <a href="http://reluctantanglophile.blogspot.com/2005/10/mcdrunk-mcdangerous-and-mcproud-of-it.html">U.N. study</a> citing Scotland and England as the most violent countries in the developed world. It seems that thankfully, the vocal chords are mightier than the switchblade in Ireland.<br /><br />Despite their comparative culture of moderation, nonetheless there are still hidden libational hazards for the tourist caught with guard down in a town comprised of so many fine pubs. I experienced this firsthand at the Literary Pub Crawl we attended Sunday night, which despite its seeming intellectual component, in retrospect appeared to have a secondary agenda of lining the pockets of the many publicans along our journey. I wish I could say my contributions were small and that I was the sole remaining holdout who maintained a modicum of sobriety, but alas, that would be dishonesty of a grand scale.<br /><br />I blame it all on the Guinness. Or more specifically, on the four (or was it five?) pints of it that were gulped down in quick succession along the tour's many informative stops. Despite it's lower caloric and alcoholic content than most beers (a perversity given its heavy constitution), it packed a heady punch for the uninitiated such as myself.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/guinness.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/guinness.jpg" border="0" /></a>Admittedly, I felt rather free to imbibe after learning that afternoon at the Guinness Brewery exhibit that in bygone years, among its other purported cure-all abilities, stout was billed as a natural sleep aid. Thrilled at the prospect that a pint (or four) might prove to be an antidote for my ever-present insomnia, I allowed myself to indulge in the name of medicinal experimentation. And while I did sleep like a baby that night, the sizeable black-and-blue bump on my nose from running into the bathroom door in the middle of the night may not have been worth those restorative zzz's.<br /><br />In any case, Guinness-induced injuries notwithstanding, we can't wait to plan our next trip back to Ireland and explore other parts of this great country, whose motto, "There's Something of Ireland in All of Us" should be well-heeded by the British.The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1128879752057840112005-10-09T18:15:00.000+01:002005-10-10T09:10:23.943+01:00On Disgrace, Denial, Delays and Dublin<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/threeflags1.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/threeflags.jpg" border="0" /></a> The many emails from those who wrote expressing concern about the disgraceful American showing made by "The Reluctant Anglophiles" at Quiz Night prompted us to take action and recruit a Canadian and British member to our team recently, effectively doubling our total score to 33 out of 40 and moving us up to fifth place from last! (Though out of respect to the Brit, we temporarily renamed our team "Three Yanks and Home".) Admittedly, we did use a few illicit "lifelines" to obtain our high score, such as surreptitiously dialing a friend in NY to find out what duet was sung by Elton John and George Michael, as well as using a wallet-size tube map to name the tube station where Buddhists might worship--"Temple". Though I don't necessarily condone cheating, I figured as long as it was instigated and sanctioned by a British person and we were on British soil, then we wouldn't technically be breeching quiz etiquette.<br /><br />I would be thrilled to provide documentation of our momentous accomplishment but did not want to commit another Quiz Night gaffe by asking to take our scoresheet home again, so unfortunately I'm unable to share visual proof of our spectacular turnaround with you. Additionally, I learned from some Quiz Night regulars sitting behind us on the team "One Man Down" (who attend THREE different quizzes a week) of an alternative nearby venue--The Devonshire Arms--where the material may be better-suited to my knowledge base as it incorporates a whole section on celebrity trivia. This could mean, after years of searching, that I've finally stumbled upon an intelligent-sounding justification for my <em>US Weekly</em> addiction (which blessedly has been kept on transatlantic life support courtesy of care packages from my friend Jen.)<br /><br />At any rate, the change of quiz venues is being necessitated by forces greater than just my aptitude for celebrity gossip because last week marked the start of the new writing course I'm taking at City University, which unfortunately conflicts with Duke of Clarence Quiz Nights, a real shame since we were finally starting to make a name for ourselves there.<br /><br />I am further saddened to report that any and all chance I had of making some new British friends (to add to my current tally of 3) went out the window on the first day of class when we were asked to divvy ourselves into groups and come up with a feature idea based on a recent news item. Things started off swimmingly when the group went with my idea about using the recently released U.N. study on Scotland, England and Wales being the most violent countries in the developed world. It was only when I proposed our story focus on tips for alcoholism prevention and treatment that things turned positively malevolent.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/absolute-denial1.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/absolute-denial1.jpg" border="0" /></a>I discovered belatedly that we shared totally different views on the survey data and that, instead of being appalled by the implications of it, my group members were adamantly in denial about its very legitimacy. Not only did they believe the data could not possibly be true--and hence our feature article, by a vote of 3 to 1, ended up being "How Surveys Can Be Misleading"--but one group member, who works in the Deputy Prime Minister's Office, spent ten minutes blasting the U.N. for having nothing better to do than conduct such a survey in the first place.<br /><br />Despite my newfound unpopularity, I found it rather hilarious (yet sad) to see the lengths that even the most astute British people will go to in maintaining a state of complete DENIAL about societal ills that are totally obvious to anyone who merely reads a newspaper or walks down the street. (Speaking of which, no, that was not ME getting sick in the bucket in last week's blog, and I take great offense to the question; that was a typical scene on the Tube on any given Thursday, Friday or Saturday night.)<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/Tube%20Delays1.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/Tube%20Delays.jpg" border="0" /></a>Possibly to pay for these insurmountable Tube clean-up efforts, the mayor announced this week that fares are being raised 50% to £3 (nearly $6) for a one-way, Zone 1 ticket starting in January, conceding that the new fares "would probably be the most expensive in the world." This price increase is all the more injurious when taken in context of how appalling the Tube service is here--not a day goes by where there aren't major "service disruptions", "staff shortages", "signal failures", and "severe delays" affecting several of the major lines, usually during rush hour. And when they do actually set about upgrading any aspect of the ancient system, it's no speedy undertaking. One station in the middle of central London is closed for an entire YEAR while they do cosmetic 'modernization' and the tube to the Heathrow British Airways Terminal is closed thru September 2006.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/tubedelays3.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/tubedelays3.jpg" border="0" /></a>Just as in NY, where we might tune into <em>1010 Wins</em> to check the Bridge & Tunnel traffic before heading out of town on the weekend, here it's an absolute necessity prior to embarking on a Tube journey to view the "Real Time Disruption" info on their website to see if you have a snowball's chance in hell of making it to your destination. Here is a typical sampling from today:<br /><br /><span style="font-size:78%;color:#3333ff;">The Piccadilly Line has delays occurring in both directions.<br />This will affect journeys from 14:23 on 9/10/05 until further notice.<br />This is due to non-availability of staff.<br /><br />The Northern Line has severe delays in both directions.<br />This will affect journeys from 06:21 on 9/10/05 until further notice.<br />This is due to problems connected with the signalling systems.<br /><br />Westminster Station on the Circle and District Lines eastbound has reduced facilities.<br />This will affect journeys from 04:04 on 9/10/05 until further notice.<br /><br /></span><span style="color:#333333;">Not inspiring, to say the least. And certainly not meritorious of a $2 fare hike (which by the way, comes on the heels of recently increased and expanded congestion charges for those opting out of the Tube chaos by driving to work). According to a survey (which I'm sure my British classmates would take issue with even though we were all late to class Monday night because the Northern line was down), 9 in 10 managers here feel that the performance of the London Underground has a very negative impact on their workplace: 50% complain of reduced productivity and 83% say that employees are arriving late for work more frequently. As one manager commented, "These problems are eroding London's standing as a modern business capital, and we will not be taken seriously if the current abysmal service continues."<br /></span></span><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/shamrock.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/shamrock.jpg" border="0" /></a>At last, a beacon of honesty in a city fueled by denial. In any case, we are happy to escape the environs of Zone 1 for the coming weekend by heading up to Dublin, where we've never been, to meet a friend in visiting from Chicago. Plans include a tour of the Guinness Brewery and a literary-packed Sunday (sorry, Steve) with visits to the Dublin Writers Museum, James Joyce Centre, and the Dublin Literary Pub Crawl, led by two actors who re-enact scenes from all the great Irish novels while taking us to six famous pubs with a literary tradition. As Leopold Bloom in James Joyce’s famous novel Ulysses mused, "A good puzzle would be to cross Dublin without passing a pub"--but why on earth would anyone want to do that?The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1127331668581969962005-10-02T20:40:00.000+01:002005-10-02T20:44:59.103+01:00McDrunk, McDangerous and McProud of It<p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/scotland.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/scotland.jpg" border="0" /></a>Recently the big news here was that a United Nations report named Scotland the most violent country in the developed world, with England and Wales ranking in second place for their high number of assaults per capita. (Curiously, Ireland didn't fall anywhere of note in the study.) The extreme rise in the number of attacks, which have apparently doubled over the past 20 years, is unsurprisingly attributed to England's heavy-drinking culture, picturesquely christened by one newspaper as its "booze and blades" mentality.<br /><br />A high-ranking commander with the Metropolitan police said "drunkenness is all we are ever dealing with", and he wasn't exaggerating just to get a bigger budget, as anyone who has ever spent any amount of time living here can attest. <a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/untitled1.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/400/untitled.jpg" border="0" /></a>There's even a documentary-style TV show airing nightly called "Booze Britain", which follows around barely vertical, slurring revelers as they hit the pubs and clubs for a night of hard drinking. Invariably, booze-fuelled anti-social behaviour results and we see the travails of the security staff, police squads, paramedics and hospital staff who are left picking up the pieces.<br /><br />Now admittedly, the gritty and illiterate American underbelly portrayed on shows like "COPS" and "Jerry Springer" doesn't exactly put our best foot forward either, as the British (who bizarrely adore these American imports) love to point out, but at least they reflect only a marginal subset of our society, unlike "Booze Britain", which captures everyone from sports stars to seemingly sophisticated Sex and the City-types <a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/Ashes%200031.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/Ashes%200031.jpg" border="0" /></a>getting falling down drunk as though it were a glamorous national pasttime.<br /><br />Case in point was England's recent victory in their annual, highly contentious cricket match against Australia, the "Ashes" tournament. Not only did the <em>Evening Standard</em> offer readers a free pint of beer to celebrate this rarest of victories, but they had a huge two page spread exclusively dedicated to proudly documenting--moment by moment and drink by drink--the 17-hour alcohol binge of cricket star Freddie Flintoff during what they termed his "heroic all-night session". I don't know about you, but I think it says a lot about a country when heroism is defined by drinking copious amounts of alcohol and remaining upright. </p><p><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/Ashes%20008.jpg" border="0" />The article went on to effusively gush: "During the marathon session, Freddie drank the rest of his teammates under the table. He started his celebrations with champagne, moved on to beer and knocked back both drinks for much of the night before switching to gin and tonic, then vodka and cranberry at 7am. With his teammeates sleeping off the night's excesses, the all-rounder continued to line up the drinks to celebrate Englands' stunning victory." With role models like this, what parent needs to worry about bad influences? </p><p></p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/tube23.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/tube21.jpg" border="0" /></a><span style="color:#000000;">From a personal standpoint, not a week goes by that my gag reflex doesn't kick into high gear when I have to give wide berth to someone getting sick from drink on the subway or a street corner. Full-scale anxiety sets in whenever I have to be on public transport or go beyond a three-block radius of our house past 10:00PM, in anticipatory fear of the moment when I'll witness my next stomach-churning enounter. Like harbingers of doom, beer cans litter the subway cars and streets because it's perfectly natural to have a beer in hand, even when travelling solo, whenever you're in between ports of call. I mean, why wait twenty minutes to get to the next pub when you can keep alcohol coursing through your veins without needless interruption? </span><p>Besides having to be on permanent puke-patrol, the unfortunate byproduct of this alcohol-saturated culture and legalized drinking in all manner of public places is the frequent and frightening eruptions of violence over the most innocuous of incidents. For instance last month, a man was stabbed to death on a London bus for having the gall to ask someone to stop throwing french fries at his girlfriend. It turns out that only in England can stoicism actually save lives. </p><p><span style="color:#ff0000;">*****************************<br />Please note my new 'notify me' feature on the right, where you can enter your email address to be automatically notified when the Reluctant Anglophile has been updated.</span></p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1126711001835374282005-09-25T16:16:00.000+01:002005-09-26T09:41:20.833+01:00Help Wanted: No Experience Required<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/quizsheet3.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/400/quizsheet.jpg" border="0" /></a><span style="color:#333333;">Quiz Nights are a legendary British pub institution, and that being the case, I decided I had an obligation to suss out just what this tradition was all about--plus, now that winter's coming on (yes, the heat's been on in our house since last week) it was time to seek out a fun new indoor activity that would provide a respite from those cold, rainy nights ahead. In NY, we often sought winter refuge in the lanes of BowlMor, but surely my trivia aptitude would prove at least slightly more promising than my ten-pin skills. Warming to the idea, it struck me that maybe I'd finally found a hobby I could excel at--after all, French study, gardening, cooking and recently, yoga, had proven unsuccessful (and let's not mention my hazardous forays into golf, pool and darts). Mental challenges really were more my speed, and besides, hadn't I always fantasized about being a contestant on <em>Jeopardy</em>?<br /></span><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/clarence-exterior-3502.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/clarence-exterior-350.jpg" border="0" /></a>And<span style="color:#333333;"> so it was that we found ourselves on Monday night at the charming Duke of Clarence, which my research had revealed to be home to a renowned Quiz Night with a hilarious Aussie quizmaster, ex-<em>Neighbours</em> star Andrew Burns, whom the promo materials said "would bring shame on those who do not know the date of Elvis' birthday". (<em>Neighbours,</em> apparently, is a hugely popular Australian soap opera.))</span></span> <p></p><p><span style="color:#333333;">Arriving early to secure a table, we fortified ourselves with some dinner and a couple pints of Hoegarden to stave off our encroaching nerves. While optimistic about our potential, we certainly weren't holding out unrealistic hopes that our team, The Reluctant Anglophiles, would win the the first prize of a free dinner for four--at least on our initial attempt. Being newbies on the Quiz circuit and knowing not a whit about British sports teams, B-list celebrities or any of the many bad TV shows that clutter the airwaves here certainly put us at a disadvantage and we knew we had our work cut out for us. Little did we anticipate just how much work that was. </span></p><p><span style="color:#333333;">At the start of the evening's festivities, our nervousness ratcheted up a notch when we noticed that most of the teams seemed to be returning regulars to whom the Quizmaster gave a warm and hearty shout-out. Futhermore, we learned there was an energetic and ongoing rivalry for first place between the Gloucester Roadies and the Mad for Marmites. Not to be deterred, we ordered another round of Hoegardens to fortify ourselves. Happily, Round One brought with it many questions that revolved around American topics and general knowledge, putting us on more equal footing with the locals. Or so we thought.<br /></span><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/picturequestionsfromquiznight11.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/picturequestionsfromquiznight11.jpg" border="0" /></a><span style="color:#333333;">In any case, I am proud to report that we started off impressively, whipping breezily through questions such as "What war was MASH set during?" and "Who is the man seated next to Gorbachev in Photo Two?" At half-time, teams exchanged papers for grading and we were thrilled beyond our wildest expectations that we'd scored 17 of a possible 20! (Let it be known that we were ROBBED of an extra point thanks to Steve, a V.P. of Currency Options for Morgan Stanley, not knowing the name of the Bulgarian currency.) It was then--in the midst of our heated battle about this critical and unnecessary point forfeit--that Round Two commenced and things started to go rapidly and irrevocably downhill. </span></p><p><span style="color:#333333;"></span></p><p><span style="color:#333333;">The trouble began when we stumbled on "What U.S. state is considered the Home of Dixie?" and ended forty minutes later by me mistaking Wayne Newton's jawline for that of Celine Dion in Photo Ten. In between, we managed to score a whopping three points during Round Two, bringing our final tally to 17 of out 40. We asked for our bill and prepared to skulk out in defeat, but not before doing a doubletake in disbelief that our Hoegarden count had risen to six pints, which might very well account for our rapid decline in Round Two. (Perversely, at BowlMor, our score was always aided by our cocktail intake.)</span></p><p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/dukeclarencebill4.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/dukeclarencebill1.jpg" border="0" /></a><span style="color:#333333;">I wish I could say that our agony ended there, but alas, it did not, because on top of our failure of immense and embarrasing proportions, I managed to inadvertently commit a critical Quiz Night faux pas. </span></p><p><span style="color:#333333;">When the Quizmaster came round to collect the score sheets, I asked to hold on to mine for blog purposes, innocently having no idea that, in addition to reading the winning team names, he also made a practice of giving a dressing-down to the lowest-scoring teams as well. Our score of 17 certainly would have put us at the bottom of the bottom-dwellers, but instead, our two neighboring tables (who'd both scored rounds of our answers and knew how abysmally we'd performed) got the dubious distinction of being called out as The Biggest Losers, despite their rather more respectable scores of 24 and 28. </span></p><p><span style="color:#333333;"></span></p><p><span style="color:#333333;">When this transpired, they turned to cast the Evil Eye on The Reluctant Anglophiles, accusingly pointing and shouting, like we were all back in fourth grade, "They didn't hand in their sheet!" Now it's no secret that British people love their rules, but even moreso, they absolutely hate to lose (a sad irony given the performance of their sports teams) and worst of all, they HATE being embarrassed and will go out of their way not to have any negative attention drawn to themselves. So by inadvertently committing this small breech in Quiz etiquette for the sake of this posting, we're now forced to avoid Quiz Night at the Duke of Clarence until things cool off for awhile. And frankly, perhaps that's for the best, at least until we've boned up on our recent purchase:</span> <a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/Signs%200051.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/Signs%20005.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">*****************************</span><br /><strong><span style="color:#ff0000;">Please note my new 'notify me' feature on the right, where you can enter your email address to be automatically notified when</span> <span style="color:#ff0000;">the Reluctant Anglophile has been updated.</span></strong><br /></p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1126546479796624152005-09-16T18:34:00.000+01:002005-09-16T10:31:14.136+01:00The Good, The Bad, and The Reluctant<p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/flag.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/flag.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />Recently regarding my blog, I have been asked by certain individuals (who shall remain nameless), "when do we get past the Reluctant and on to the Anglophile?"<br /><br />In fact my dear husband Steve has himself suggested that perhaps it would be nice if once in a while--for variety's sake--I were to write something slightly less cynical and more embracing of the English culture so that I don't let the latter portion of my moniker wither up and die on the vine. After all, being reluctant and being an Anglophile shouldn't have to be mutually exclusive states of being, should they?<br /><br />Well, this philosophical conundrum got me thinking, which is always a bit of a dangerous thing (though not as dangerous as some of my other pursuits involving cookery, feats of physical coordination, or weekly Pub Quiz Night with the locals--more on the latter in an upcoming post). Deciding I was up for the challenge, I sat down and tried to write a fun, informative, and not in the least bit cynical piece for the R.A.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/Signs%20013.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/Signs%20013.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />And I wish I could offer that impassioned literary gem up for you to behold, but alas, I must admit that I sat at my computer for the better part of two hours staring at the cursor flashing back accusingly at me on a blank screen, until I was finally forced to give up the ghost and accept defeat--for now anyway.<br /><br />It's not that there's a lack of good things to be said about my newly adopted home country--in fact, there are a lot of great things to be said about it, I'm sure--it's just much easier to write about the more annoying, unusual or unexplainable aspects of life over here. Hoping to give myself some room to maneuver, I looked up the Webster's definition of an Anglophile:<br /><br /><span style="color:#6633ff;"><strong>An·glo·phile (ăng'glo-fīl') n.</strong><br />One who admires England, its people, and its culture.<br /></span><br />Hmmph. Well, I'm certain there are things about England, its people and culture that I quite admire, or at least find interesting. After all, I quite liked Brighton, though it was rather cold, overcast and did cost $60 to get there. And I liked the Globe Theatre, though their choice of using 3 actors to play 12 characters still eludes me. And I absolutely adore the English people that I count amongst my friends (all three of them, one of whom is actually Irish and probably doesn't want to be lumped in with the English).<br /><br />In the interest of performing some unbiased market research, I decided to seek out the guidance of a former publishing colleague on striking the appropriate balance between the Reluctance and the Anglophilic. I quite liked the encouraging advice she offered up:<br /><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;">"You do try, but are usually stopped dead in your tracks...like when you went to that outdoor movie. Besides, it's too early to be Anglophilian--it will happen organically. When, or should I say--if--you have the epiphany that you are a full-fledged Anglophile, it will be and should be a BIG thing! You're there for awhile--you don't want to peak now!"<br /><br /><span style="color:#333333;">So until this organic moment of divine conversion transpires, another friend proffered up an idea which may serve as an interim solution to appease those who prefer a side of Anglophile with their Reluctance. We will soon be implementing intermittent "Guest Postings" written by both visiting guests and other expatriates living in Blighty, who may (or may not) have a sunnier perspective to offer up than the R.A., but who at the very least will provide readers with some alternate viewpoints, ensuring an accurate and unbiased lens into the British culture, such as it is. </span></span><br /><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;"></span></p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1126307770349880052005-09-10T00:11:00.000+01:002005-09-11T22:50:08.723+01:00Life's Little Luxuries<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/lodnenergy1b1.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/lodnenergy1b1.jpg" border="0" /></a> Luxury used to go by the name of Prada, Gucci and La Mer. In Blighty, it has a new name and it's called hot water. This information--like anything else here--didn’t come cheap. In fact, it came at a cost of ₤193 pounds ($355 U.S.D.) in the form of our recent quarterly electric bill. Too late, I learned the astounding fact that you’re not supposed to run your hot water heater 24/7.<br /><br />Who knew the hot water heater even had a switch? And more importantly, how does one live a life without hot water on demand? This would be challenging enough under any circumstances, but recall this is a country where doing a load of laundry in your combi washer/dryer takes all day and your dishwasher’s "speed" cycle runs about as fast as the Tube’s notorious Circle Line, which is to say, at a snail’s pace.<br /><br />Next came the grim and alarming realization that hot morning showers were apparently to become a relic of our past lives in New York. With a sinking sensation, I saw with new eyes the bidet they’d kindly furnished us with, which heretofore we’d simply thought was a neat conversation piece in our turn-of-the-century house:<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/canterbury%200315.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/canterbury%200313.jpg" border="0" /></a>So you can see firsthand the unappealing consequences of living a life planned entirely around the availability of hot water. Apparently, this basic necessity is a very expensive commodity here, as I learned upon opening that electric bill and finding its highly offensive sum glaring back at me in big, bold lettering. Surely that one night we ran our air conditioner this summer couldn’t account for even this vast sum? My "Guide to Settling Into the UK" handbook said that an average electricity bill should run no more than $320 <em>annually</em>. <p></p><p>Immediately, I rang London Energy to inform them of what was certainly a gross billing error on their part. The kindly-seeming Scottish lady (why is it impossible to be angry at anyone speaking in a lilting Scottish accent?) first asked me to verify our meter reading, which seemed to be in order. We then progressed on to other topics, eventually arriving on the subject of the water heater, at which point her tone changed from helpful customer service representative to shocked and chastising school marm: “Now rrrreaallly Missusss Rrrrennn-don, tell me ya 'aven’t been rrrunning yur wa-terrr 'eaterrr 24rrr hours a day now, 'ave ya?” she asked with incredulity.<br /><br />"Why yes, as a matter of fact we have. Is that...er...a problem?", I asked sheepishly, suddenly feeling about two inches tall. Well, apparently it was, because this energy-sucking vampire accounts for about 80% of an electricity bill over here, a fact drawn into sharp relief when I crawled under the stairs to inspect our water heater, and realized that it--like our 'portable' air conditioner--was the size of an Exxon oil-tanker. <p></p><p>Gloomily, I hung up the phone, accepting with defeat the grim prospect of WWII-style rationing vis a vis the hot water.<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/teaparty42.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/teaparty41.jpg" border="0" /></a> This indignity was further compounded when, later this week, I received a separate bill from Thames Water to the tune of $60 a month for the privilege of having the water itself. (And don't even get me started on the $250 annual TV license--separate from your cable bill--and the $2800 annual Council Tax assessment--unrelated to your paycheck taxes.) I was starting to look at the events surrounding the Boston Tea Party with a profound new sense of understanding as I gained firsthand insight into the painful economic injustices suffered by the colonists. In 2005 as in 1773, if the British government can find a way to impose an exorbitant levy on something that should be available for free or at nominal cost, they will gladly and gleefully do so. </p><p>By now, I truthfully thought I’d lost all capacity for shock and outrage over this country’s outrageous prices, having instead developed the necessary survival skill of zen-like acceptance. After spending three months visibly wincing every time I took a cab, went to the grocery store or picked up the dry cleaning, I'd finally stopped the defeatist practice of performing mental calculations in American dollars and moved on to the higher ground of thinking only in relativist terms of the British pound. </p><p>Now, however, the fresh insult of sky-high utility bills had brought on a profound relapse and yesterday I found myself obsessively tallying up in dollars (and quality level) the cost of every purchase.</p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/3combinespreliminary21.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/400/3combinespreliminary21.jpg" border="0" /></a>There was that $18 cocktail at Hakkasan served by a surly bartender after a 20-minute wait, the $7 spent on a stale, bite-size pre-packaged tuna sandwich, the $4 tube ride to go five stops on an overcrowded train that kept stalling, and the $30 box of medication needed to stave off allergies induced by London pollution. For the first time in my life, I began to realize that having a sense of perspective was NOT necessarily a good thing. In fact, if ever there was a time and a place to disconnect from reality in order to maintain my sanity, then that time had finally arrived, especially now with winter coming on and the looming prospect of our first gas bill to look forward to. One can only assume that heat, like hot water, will come with a luxurious price tag.The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1124676936346589682005-09-07T01:17:00.000+01:002005-09-07T12:54:21.960+01:00A Fine Line Between Stoicism and Insanity<p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/Brighton-misc%20001.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/Brighton-misc%20001.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />When the British abandon their impenetrable facade of privacy and <a href="http://reluctantanglophile.blogspot.com/2005/07/on-stoicism-st-szm-n.html">stoicism</a>, they really do so with gusto, as we found out last Thursday night.<br /><br />Just as I was dozing off to sleep at around two a.m., there came a loud crashing sound emanating from downstairs. Convinced we were in the process of being burgled and that the would-be sticky fingers had just dropped our new TV set (what else could possibly account for such an enormous shattering?), I hastily awoke Steve, who had alarmingly remained asleep. (Note to self: must get guard dog.) Tip-toeing into the hallway with Steve wielding a lamp base for protection--a vision that didn't inspire confidence, especially when complemented by the silk purple sleep mask he wore pushed up onto his forehead--we heard yet more crashing and through the hall window noticed four police officers in the alley suiting up into full-SWAT gear: bullet-proof vests, black padded body suits, and helmets with face visors. It was officially time to panic.<br /><br />What could possibly be going on to merit this type of Code Red police activity in our idyllic, sedate little Chelsea neighborhood? The crashing sounds intensified, and having safely ascertained that they weren't originating from our domicile, we made our way downstairs to investigate, my head filling with visions of a hostage stand-off involving an Islamic terror cell that had been roosting right under our noses.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/miss_marple_270.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/miss_marple_270.jpg" border="0" /></a> Infused with the kind of giddy rush that Miss Marple no doubt felt each time she was on the verge of making a momentous discovery, we peeped out our front blinds to survey the scene. Quickly it became apparent that what we were witnessing was the work of no Islamic terror cell, unless one of their number went by the name of Sharon. Two more police officers in full riot gear were positioned out front, accompanied by a civilian who kept soothingly yelling (if one can indeed can yell soothingly), "Sharon, please come talk to us. Sharon, what are you doing now?"<br /><br />Well, it was pretty obvious what Sharon was doing now because by that time we had abandoned all pretense of discretion and climbed out on our roof to get a better view, where we saw clearly that she was expelling onto the street every last household item that would fit thru her rather substantial 3rd floor windows. A desktop computer, microwave oven and remarkably, a full dinette set and chest of drawers lost their lives that night as we looked on in a mixture of awe and disbelief.<br /><span style="color:#ebebeb;"></span><br />In between running back into the depths of her flat to look for more possessions, she kept up an inscrutable litany of ranting of which we couldn't discern a word. This went on for the better part of an hour, until the police somehow managed to get in through the back entrance, subdue her in a straightjacket and whisk her away in an ambulance, restoring calm once again to Elystan Street.<br /><br />We later received confirmation from other neighbors (in addition to gardening and drinking beer, the British LOVE to gossip, a trait that admittedly makes me feel right at home, but demonstrates yet another incongruity of a culture that is obsessed with privacy) that Sharon had evidently suffered a full-blown nervous breakdown. Before I even had time to ponder this sad information, we also learned that she's already been installed back in her (furniture-less) flat, less than four days later.<br /><br />Now, I don't know much about nervous breakdowns (unless one counts that time in Chicago where I hurled a large portion of Steve's CD collection, Frisbee-style, over our 16th floor balcony--which, for the record, was entirely justifiable), but it would seem that someone who had experienced one might need more than four days recovery time under the care and observation of trained mental health professionals before being cast adrift back into society. But that's the British National Health System for you--there's no money budgeted for something as trivial as a nervous breakdown in the NHS coffers.<br /><br />When I recently explained to a friend's Irish husband that in New York, <em>not </em>seeing a therapist is the exception rather than the rule, and that therapy is considered a perfectly natural form of maintenance no more embarrassing than say, getting a manicure or going to the gym, he recoiled in horror as if I'd stuck him with pins.<br /><br />Probing him further on the matter, I learned that when the English have problems, their first line of defense is to try resolve things themselves, and failing that, they might "talk to their mates about it" over a couple of pints at the pub. But since the English seem so private when it comes to personal matters, I'm not sure how much this strategy accomplishes, though it does, however, explain this recent headline:<br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/fridgeandmoviepix%20047.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/fridgeandmoviepix%20047.jpg" border="0" /></a> I guess on the bright side, that's 20% fewer potential nervous breakdowns that the NHS will have to 'treat' in the future. </p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1125743811774350542005-09-03T10:49:00.000+01:002005-09-03T11:36:51.780+01:00Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/no_money.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/no_money.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />I was appalled to learn this morning, while watching the CNN coverage of the Hurricane Katrina disaster, that in the list of countries donating to relief efforts, there was a glaring omission from the list. Sri Lanka, one of the world's poorest countries still reeling from the effects of the tsunami, had donated $25,000, yet the big GB has offered up not a pence. Blair is apparently happy to send his people off to kill and be killed alongside the Americans in Iraq, but when it comes to monetary aid for his bedfellow Bush, his humanitarian spirit runs dry.<br /><br />Which simply goes to highlight how darn CHEAP the people here are. My friend Catherine was recently soliciting pledges for her Breast Cancer walk this month, and of the large multinational list she sent her email solicitation to, sadly lacking among the respondents were any of her British friends and coworkers. Meanwhile, the Americans were tripping over themselves in their efforts to donate. We spent a few minutes mulling over this curious fact in the pub one night, but were never able to reach any conclusions as to why there exists such a great cultural divide in the giving spirit.<br /><br />Meanwhile, my friend Meg and I were accosted in the tube yesterday by a lovely little old lady who noticed our accents and went out of her way to say how sorry she was for the disasterous state of affairs going on in our country at the moment. So I guess it just goes to show, humanitarianism here is not exactly dead, just hiding out in the hearts of British grannies.The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1125510423325426022005-08-31T17:45:00.000+01:002005-08-31T20:27:56.883+01:00Daily Gripe(s)<p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/aircon21.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/aircon2.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />Had to let everyone know that tonight, we FINALLY get to use our enormous air conditioning unit that I made Steve rush out and buy in June, which I've since been using as a bedside night stand...as some of you may recall, it's size is such that it could cool Belgium. Meanwhile, perversely, the appliances that you use here on an everyday basis were clearly invented by a midget hell-bent on revenge against the British race. Their fridges are little more than picnic coolers apparently only intended to house child-size condiments: </p><p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/FridgeandKetchupcombines1.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/FridgeandKetchupcombines1.jpg" border="0" /></a></p><p></p><p>(And yes, Rana, I know we'd have more room for food if we didn't need to dedicate the top shelf to wine). The ovens are what we at home would refer to more accurately as 'toasters'. The washer is a combi washer <em>AND</em> dryer unit that does neither job effectively and takes a full eight hours to do one load consisting of a pair of pants and some underwear. </p><p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/Washingmachineandstovecomined21.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/Washingmachineandstovecomined21.jpg" border="0" /></a></p><p>Anyway, I digress. It was 32 degrees today (89 Fahrenheit), which is a near record-breaking temp for Britain. I was at Shakespeare's open-air Globe theatre this afternoon, where two audience members fainted and had to be carried out on stretchers--Brits, no doubt. These people have no idea what hot really is until they've experienced NY--or anywhere else in the States--in August.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/globetheatre390x220.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/globetheatre390x220.jpg" border="0" /></a>It was a great production of <em>The Tempest</em> and seeing a show at the Globe was an amazing experience which I can now highly recommend to anyone here during the summer months. Embarrassingly, I have to admit that I've never actually seen a Shakespeare play staged before (I know, I know--how was I an English major who spent so many years in NY without experiencing Shakespeare in the Park?) Shame on me. </p><p>In any case, in this particular production (and if anyone wants to enlighten me on whether or not this is the norm in America, I'd be grateful), only three actors played all of the 12 or so characters. As there were no costume changes or any other telltale signs--and since my Shakespearean Olde English is on par with my French--it took me about a third of the way into things to figure out that this was happening. Meanwhile, I kept wondering why Prospero seemed to have multiple personality disorder and when the shipwrecked victims that I vaguely remembered from the character list were going to appear. I'm sure now that I'm "in the know", tomorrow's production of<em> A Winter's Tale</em> will be that much more enjoyable.<br /><br />Last but not least, I will leave you with an incredible and stunning (at least to me) fact about London that I discovered yesterday when I went online to subscribe for home delivery of the <em>Sunday Times</em>. Apparently, you cannot get the newspaper delivered to your doorstep here. You can get home delivery of your newspaper in a backwater town like Cheney, Kansas (population 1,783), but you cannot get home delivery of your newspaper in the cosmopolitan likes of London. So much for cozy winter Sundays spent curled up in my flat with a cup of tea reading the paper. Oh well, I'm not really much of a tea drinker anyway. <br /></p><p></p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1125257056195477692005-08-28T19:23:00.000+01:002005-08-29T14:24:27.753+01:00Coming Attractions<p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/stickshift01.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/stickshift01.jpg" border="0" /></a>While you can expect an updated post on our weekend's trip to Canterbury very soon, as well a posting on a strange incident that transpired recently in our neighborhood, it's setting up to be a busy next few days here in Blighty.<br /><br />For one, Steve is taking driving lessons (!). Hopefully in a week's time, he will at last, at the age of 35, be able to drive a stick-shift car. His lack of know-how in this area has been a repeated sore point in our relationship during every European vacation since stick-shifts are the norm here and I get stuck having to do all the driving (AND navigating) while Steve can leisurely tipple away on wine during dinners and casually make belated statements like "I think you're going the wrong way" five miles after the turn-off he was supposed to be watching out for.<br /><br />The situation came to a head after 9/11 when I had to drive a stick-shift with manual steering through the winding roads of Tuscany with my arm in a cast after being trampled on Fulton Street two weeks prior. Now that we live here and will hopefully be taking a lot of European vacations (hint to Steve), I've insisted that the situation be remedied so we can share in the hair-raising experience that is driving in Europe.<br /><br />While I will not be attending the lessons (which I know would make for some great blog material) since my weak nerves aren't up to that sort of challenge, I do plan on providing a full vicarious report from the driving instructor.<br /><br />Meanwhile tomorrow, my college friend Meg arrives from Seattle, and we have plans to take in two shows at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre--<em>The Winter's Tale</em> and <em>The Tempest</em>. Meg is a huge theatre buff and is seeing several other shows here this week as well, so the Shakespeare was at her impetus, which I am looking forward to with both excitement and trepidation.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/globe.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/globe.jpg" border="0" /></a>Although I'm thrilled to be attending my first ever show at this world-renowned venue--which is only open during summer and is a faithful reconstruction of the original open-air playhouse of 1599 where Shakespeare worked, I must admit my total ignorance and consternation when it comes to all things Shakespeare. While I did take an entire class on his body of work in college, I have no idea into which mental cravasse any of that knowledge has fallen, never to be seen again. While I'd recently bought the annotated editions of the plays we're attending in hopes of being able to make some erudite-sounding statements pillaged from the annotations, I'm afraid that was a bit of an optimistic goal and they've remained collecting dust on my coffee table, dog-eared at about page three, at which point they were forsaken for more interesting reading material, such as <em>Hello!</em> (the British equivalent to <em>US Weekly</em>).<br /><br />In addition to Meg's visit, our friends Mike and Rana Leibowitz, along with their three kids, are moving to London from NYC on Wednesday. Ironically, we all lived in London together before during 1999-2001, so this is a bit of a deja vu experience. Anyway, the Lebo's are loads of fun and I'm sure there will be many a future blog entry incorporating my adventures with Rana.<br /><br />Last but not least, this week I'm preparing to host my book group's next meeting, taking place next Wednesday. (My book group is comprised of a group of fellow expatriates, many of whom are from my grad school days at Cambridge.) You may ask why I'm preparing a week in advance for this occasion, but there is cooking involved and after Lourdes' Pollo Con Mole at the last meeting, and Catherine's Basil Chicken Salad at our recent<a href="http://reluctantanglophile.blogspot.com/2005/08/just-typical-night-out-at-movies.html"> picnic</a>, my original plan to serve take-out pizza has lost its luster. Besides, one of my many mottos is why worry next week when you can worry today? Anyway, this week I'll be doing a number of my infamous "test kitchens" to try out various recipes, one of which I hope will turn out to be edible enough to serve without facing the utter humiliation and embarrassment of resorting to Pizza Express. </p><p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/stink.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/stink.jpg" border="0" /></a>For anyone interested in London history, we are discussing a book with a fascinating topic called <em><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0151011613/qid=1125320665/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-4130017-9279965?v=glance&s=books&n=507846">The Great Stink</a>--</em>a novel set in Victorian London about the birth of the city's modern sewage system. It seems that in Victorian days, sewage flowed from underneath rotting tunnels directly into the Thames, and in the hot summer of 1858, the stink from the river became so unbearable (even worse, apparently than the smell of the NY subways in August) that the members of Parliament were driven from chambers. Afterwards, they hastily approved funds to modernize the system, which became one of the greatest engineering marvels of its time and is still in use today--something for which, I, for one, am very grateful. </p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1124970725619621802005-08-25T12:40:00.000+01:002005-08-25T13:06:56.620+01:00Security Levels<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/_40904179_police203_pa.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/_40904179_police203_pa.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />This comes via my friend Jen...<br /><br />As the British are feeling the pinch in relation to last month's bombings, the security level has just been raised from "miffed" to "peeved". Soon though, the levels may be raised yet again to "irritated" or even "a bit cross". Londoners have not been a "bit cross" since the blitz in 1940 when tea supplies all but ran out.<br /><br />The public reaction to this heightened level of security has ranged from "pretend nothing's happening" to "let's make another cup of tea". In all instances, one must "remain resolutely cheerful".<br /><br />Terrorists have been re-categorised from "tiresome" to "a bloody nuisance"; the last time a "bloody nuisance" warning level was issued was during the great fire in 1666.<br /><br />Be aware that the French government announced yesterday that it has raised its terror alert level from RUN to HIDE. The only two higher levels in France are "Surrender" and "Collaborate". The rise was precipitated by a recent fire that destroyed France's white flag factory, effectively paralysing their military capability.<br /><br />But it's not only the French that are on a heightened level of alert, the Italians have increased their alert level from "shout loudly and excitedly" to "exhibit elaborate military posturing". Two more levels remain, "ineffective combat operations" and "change sides".<br /><br />The Germans have also increased their alert state from "disdainful arrogance" to "dress in uniform and sing marching songs". They have two higher levels, "invade a neighbour" and "lose".<br /><br />Seeing this reaction in continental Europe, the Americans have gone from "isolationism" to "find another oil-rich nation in the Middle East ripe for regime change". Their remaining higher alert states are "attack the world" and "beg the British for help".The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1124677920988047842005-08-22T03:15:00.000+01:002005-08-22T16:01:20.636+01:00Just A Typical Summer's Day at the Beach<p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/Brighton-misc%20005.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/Brighton-misc%20005.jpg" border="0" /></a> I really should have learned by now, but I haven't. In the spirit of testing last week's theory that good weather is in the eye of the beholder, I thought we'd venture down to the beach this past weekend.<br /><br />Once again, I bought tickets a week in advance. (As you can probably tell, I really don't do well with spontaneity). And once again, it was a week of veritable sunniness that ground to a screeching halt the day we were due to be beach-bound, glumly holding our $60, non-refundable "cheap" day-return train tickets. So, up we were at the crack of dawn (well, at 9:00 anyway), and off we trudged to catch our train to Brighton--England's first seaside resort, dating back to the 1700's when sea bathing first became fashionable. <a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/vic1.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/vic1.jpg" border="0" /></a>Conveniently located just an hour south of here, I cheered myself up by picturing future summer weekends (or at least the sunny ones) making like the Victorians did and escaping to this nearby oasis to experience the delights of sea, surf and sun. Smugly, I envisioned everyone back home stuck in a three-hour traffic snarl on their way to the Hamptons or Jersey shore while we could be beach-bound every weekend with relative ease. </p><p>As we arrived in Brighton and made our way down to the seafront, my smugness quickly dissipated as did my foolish fantasies of ever cultivating a bronze-goddess glow while on English soil. While this was certainly an adorable beachside community evoking a bygone era (like a much cuter version of Atlantic City only reminiscent of the Victorian age instead of the 1970's), I discovered that the term "English Beaches" was an oxymoron of the highest order. At least to anyone who equates beaches to sand, sun, swimsuits and the achievement of a glowing tan. This beach was ROCKY, freezing and virtually deserted. </p><p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/DeckChairs.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/DeckChairs.jpg" border="0" /></a>Determined once again to make the most of things, we resignedly rented two cheerful stripy beach chairs and joined the few hearty (and pale) English folk around us enjoying a typical summer day at the beach sporting pants, sweaters, and jackets. The next few hours were spent participating in a bizarre and synchronized group ritual involving the hasty removal of clothing items every time there was a break in the clouds that might signify a two-minute window of UVA rays for our pasty limbs.<br /><br />Eventually tiring of this game of "Here Comes the Sun", we decided to hit one of the attractive seaside restaurants for a spot of lunch. Fortified by our fish and chips and bottle of rosé (an admittedly incongruous combination, but it helped fuel my new fantasy that we were soaking up rays in the south of France instead of wearing windbreakers at an overcast British beach), we went to go out check out the town's main attraction, the Royal Pavillion. (Note below how once we abandoned the beach and embarked on an indoor activity, the clouds miraculously started to disperse.) </p><p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/Brighton-misc%200063.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/Brighton-misc%200063.jpg" border="0" /></a>Built by Prince George in the 1700s as a retreat where he could host wild parties and carry on his scandalous, Camilla-esque affair with an older, non-blue blooded femme fatale, this palace was unlike anything you might expect. A world away from its traditional, stuffy English counterparts like Buckingham, Windsor and Hampden Court, this palace was a fantastically bizarre white-domed Oriental structure straight out of Arabian nights. The inside was just as surprising, decorated not with portraits of pompous-looking dukes and earls, but instead in a lavish Chinoiserie motif dominated by dragons, bamboo and silk wall coverings of geisha girls. Transporting us back to a different time and place, the palace made us feel as far removed from the beaches of England as we possibly could be, which was a very rare gift indeed. </p><p>For next Saturday, I've officially abandoned any pretense that it might be nice here on our last summer weekend and we'll be avoiding all beaches, barbeques and outdoor movies. Instead, we're headed down to Canterbury where at least the rain will serve to complement to the town's foreboding medieval ambience. </p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1124108978395229142005-08-15T12:14:00.000+01:002005-08-15T20:21:47.480+01:00Just A Typical Night Out at the Movies...<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/moviepix%20022%20copyb.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/moviepix%20022%20copyb.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />Outdoor festivals are all the rage here in Britain--this past week alone there were four of them, including Glastonbury, The Big Chill, Fruitstock, and The Grolsch Summer Set. I find their immense popularity rather puzzling given that this is a country where lack of rain is the exception, rather than the rule. (And no, the incessant rain is not a quaint, overblown stereotype but instead a harsh reality, although if you come to visit, those will probably be the nicest days we'll have all year, just so you'll have the opportunity to say with incredulity, "I don't know why you constantly complain about the weather, it's really not that bad here.")<br /><br />But the British seem to pay no mind at all to this state of affairs and if anything, seem to blossom under conditions that would give normal people scurvy. Even their weather forecasters are unassailably perky as they dish up the daily dose of bad news. <a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/BBCcarol.jpg"><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/BBCcarol.jpg" border="0" /></a>Witness BBC meteorological Carol Kirkwood, an insanely cheerful Scot who delivers the morning weather in chipper pink suits and a lilting Scottish accent that makes everything sound wonderfully enchanting and straight out of a postcard, even as she's gleefully trilling on about "the spitting rain out in the west country, the spot of fog descending over the southeast and the wet spells expected over the Midlands indefinitely." What did this woman possess that I didn't, enabling her to look out at all that gloom everyday and turn it into pink lemonade? <p></p><p>I was determined to find out, and what better way to do so than by dipping my toe into the puddles of one of the country's ubiquitous outdoor events? As I'm not much for crowds or porta-potties anymore given my claustrophobia and germ-aversion, I thought we'd ease into things by trying the more sedate venue of an outdoor movie. We'd tried to attend one the week prior on a beautiful Saturday evening, but it was sold-out, so this time, we did the smart thing and booked a week ahead. The movie was Alfred Hitchcock's <em>Vertigo</em>, and the venue was lovely Kensington Gardens. I even convinced two friends to book advance tickets as well and suggested that we make a night of it by doing a picnic, which my friend Catherine generously agreed to cater (no doubt in mortal fear of my cooking).<br /><br />It was beautiful the week leading up to the movie because naturally, we had a guest visiting. The morning of the movie dawned beautifully as well (or at least it was beautiful when I got up around 10:30) and then the sky became increasingly black and menacing, at which point it began to rain...and rain...and rain. Panicked, I rang Catherine, who'd already made her basil chicken salad and decided that we should just carry on as any self-respecting Brit would do. Right. So armed with our Hefty bag rain ponchos, a plastic tarp, jumbo-sized "brollies" and winter coats, we arrived at the movie venue. Which was deserted. </p><p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/fridgeandmoviepix%200154.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/fridgeandmoviepix%200153.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />It really wasn't heartening as we looked around in dismay and the British chap tweaking the sound system told us we were "a courageous lot." What did it spell for the conditions if we were even heartier, or make that, more foolhardy, than the British themselves? </p><p>Nonetheless, it did clear up long enough for us to eat our delicious picnic and for the screening area to sparsely fill up with a few more courageous souls, some bearing pup tents, ski caps, and even bigger umbrellas than our own. Soon after this brief respite, it began to pour again but in true Carol Kirkwood spirit, with one of us even sporting a chipper pink ensemble, we decided to ignore it and soldier on. Maybe good weather really <em>is</em> in the eye of the beholder.<br /></p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1123856168765784552005-08-12T13:44:00.000+01:002005-08-12T22:48:51.213+01:00London Nightlife and Other Oxymorons<p><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/wickedcoolstuff_1856_123929265.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/wickedcoolstuff_1856_123929265.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />London is blessed with many things: lush green parks, quaint Victorian and Georgian-style architecture, an endless variety of interesting pubs, loads of cultural activities and a geographic location that makes it a perfect launchpad for European travel.<br /><br />Despite all this, there are times when I feel like I've been secretly spirited away back to my home state of Kansas, a place where 'cow tipping' is considered an exciting form of nightlife. Like Kansas, London is not the best place to live if you're looking to walk on the wild side by staying out past 11:00. If you're a self-respecting New Yorker who considers 9:00 PM a good start time for a weekend evening out on the town, you are in for a rude awakening the first time you hear a pub gong resounding in your ear at 10:45, signaling an abrupt and premature end to your festivities.<br /><br />Perversely, it is the pressure of this draconian closing time (dating from WWI when they needed the workers sober for their shifts at the munitions factories) that doubtless explains why Brits feel the need to get so staggeringly drunk. One is forced to race to the pub as early as possible in the evening and cram in as much fun as possible before 11:00, the time at which Cinderella's coach promptly turns into a pumpkin. After that, entertainment prospects are bleak and even if you're lucky enough to find some late-night libations, good luck getting home afterwards. The Tube shuts down around midnight and taxicabs disappear magically as if being sucked into a mysterious vortex of Temperance.<br /><br />My own Cinderella moment came on Saturday night when my friend Annette was visiting and we mistakenly tried to show her some London 'nightlife'. After our 9:30 dinner reservations, we went in search of a nightcap. One hour and four thwarted attempts to find an open cocktail bar later, we were finally forced to give up the ghost. It seems that the few lounges that exist as renegade destinations after the pubs close down are open only until 1:00. Since it was the scandalous hour of 12:30, we weren't allowed access. (The British like to close up shop at least 1/2 an hour before official 'closing time' so as to ensure they don't end up working 'overtime'.)<br /><br />Accepting defeat and heading homewards, we spotted a cluster of people standing outside a seedy looking, bordello-esque set of red doors and went over to investigate. After some inquiries, it appeared that we had indeed stumbled upon some actual London nightlife. Paying our 10 pound entry fee, dodging the barely-vertical British drunkard stumbling into our path, and making our way down a narrow flight of stairs, we found ourselves in a dimly lit, dungeon-like room with blood-red cement walls. </p><p><img style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/200/bar%20001.jpg" border="0" />It was completely devoid of any charm, atmosphere or more importantly, a means of quick escape should the whole place go up in flames--a distinct possibility due to the large number of drunken smokers haphazerdly brandishing their cigarettes amidst the sea of flammable discowear in the room's cramped confines. The whole establishment had a definite unsavory flavor (and a reconnaissance mission later this week in fact revealed a 'cease and desist' notice taped to its door) but at least I wasn't cow tipping back in Kansas.<br /><br />I was heartened to hear, after complaining to everyone within earshot about the sad state of British nightlife, that changes are afoot with pub licensing laws and the hours are going to be extended as of this November! Apparently this is very contentious due to a huge national debate over whether this will help or hinder the nation's drinking problem. Only time will tell, but at least it will alleviate the need for the rest of us to spend our evenings out on the town in condemned basement hovels, hunkered down over our cocktails in illicit, Prohibition-era fashion.<br /></p>The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13488554.post-1123331051930712052005-08-06T12:36:00.000+01:002005-08-06T19:29:19.156+01:00Reluctant Anglophile on temporary hiatus<a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/1600/annette&joni.jpg"><img style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4998/1187/320/annette%26joni.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />The Reluctant Anglophile will be on temporary hiatus through this Wednesday, August 10th, due to the unforeseen arrival of Annette Terkaly from Paris (pictured above with the RA above during a toothy-grinned moment after imbibing one to many glasses of wine in a Parisienne brasserie). Annette was there taking the annual creative writing course taught at the American Academy by my high school friend, travel writer <a href="http://vagablogging.net/">Rolf Potts</a>.<br /><br />The last-minute itinerary I've cobbled together for Annette's visit includes lots of fun things, such as an outdoor movie & picnic at Kensington Gardens, tapas at that rarest of beasts in London--a BYOB restaurant, a shopping trip up to Camden Market, and a Soho pub crawl. We might also make it to the <a href="http://www.camra.org.uk/SHWebClass.asp?WCI=ShowCat&CatId=235">Great British Beer Festival</a>, where you can even do tutored beer tastings. But lest you fear that life here in London involves entirely around the imbibing of alchoholic beverages, I've also planned some cultural activities as well, such as the Freida Kahlo exhibit at the Tate and viewing of the Buckingham Palace State Rooms, open only once a year during August.<br /><br />Given my hard-won knowledge of British culture and my love for seeking out all that my new city has to offer, readers will be happy to know that I'm soon going to be putting all of that to use by working part-time for the expat organization FOCUS, where I'll be doing magazine writing, marketing and website work. Unfortunately, I won't be granted the same editorial freedoms (read: cynical liberties) that I have with my blog, but at least my experiences will hopefully help other expats adjust more readily to their new life here in England, by warning them about such insidious things as roosting pigeons, abysmal customer service and alarming newspaper headlines.<br /><br />Blogging will resume this Wednesday and I'm sure there will be lots of blog-worthy moments during Annette's visit, especially if we attend the Beer Festival on 'Funny Hat Day'. Looking forward to having everyone visit and having some blog-worthy moments of our own!The Reluctant Anglophilehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03055933047843343644noreply@blogger.com0