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Back from England
02 octubre 2011
Spent the past two weeks in and around London, England, on my first vacation to that country. Visited a lot of fascinating places, mostly historical, others more contemporary: museums, historic homes and castles, great parks. And a few pubs.
First impression: Britons have manners. Everyone still says please and thanks. Even people leaving the bus say thank you to the driver, school kids included. Since those kids wear school uniforms, there are no backward baseball caps and baggy pants among them. I saw very few teenagers in school uniforms smoking.
There are no cars blaring eardrum-splitting rap "music" on the roads. No boom boxes, either. Everyone seems to have an Ipod or MP3 player and keep their music to themselves.
There are almost no oversized pickup trucks on the road (we saw only two pickups during the entire two weeks, only one of which was as long as we see here), Only one motorcycle (and there are a LOT of them) we saw had loud, open pipes. We often saw drivers pause to let other drivers edge into traffic.Most cars are tiny - much smaller than we see here and even familiar models of SUVs appeared smaller than ours. We saw very few large minivans, too.
Didn't see a single incident of a vehicle running with its idiot ('fog") lights on in clement weather to annoy other drivers (I see that many times a day here).
Cyclists are also many, and almost every one that approached from behind either rang a bell or called out to warn pedestrians who may not be aware he or she is coming. Happened a dozen or more times - here it might happen once every hundred cyclists.
Shopkeepers and staff were almost universally helpful, friendly and polite. Almost everywhere I went someone asked if they could help me (the only place I recall that I didn't get asked was in HMV stores but at least the cashiers were pleasant).
Food was great. They have wonderful selections of sandwiches and yogurts. Among the many yogurt flavours I tried were rhubarb; wild heather honey and stem ginger; hazelnut; lemon curd; mango and passion fruit; banana and papaya; and coconut. Sandwiches included Wensleydale cheese and carrot chutney; tuna and corn. Although hot sauces were difficult to find (I brought a bottle of my own, a habanero sauce), I did discover a tangy jalapeño-hot pepper relish in a squeeze jar that was a bit like a pico de gallo salsa run through a blender. Lots and lots of Indian food to be had, as well as many Thai restaurants. Curry is a favourite food for the Brits, but we only got to one Indian place. Had fish & chips only once, too, but it was very good. Even the selection of chips ("crisps") was highly varied. We tried a Thai green curry chip for example.
Every food store sold beer and wine, which was very civilized and convenient. It's nice not to have to travel to a separate, government-authorized sales outlet to get a bottle of wine for dinner. There are many small, cosy neighbourhood pubs scattered around, even in residential areas, and most have a selection of both national and international beers, usually with some interesting local or microbrewery draughts.
Pubs (indoors) and restaurant patios (outdoors) allowed dogs, which was equally civilized and gave the places a very warm and comfortable feel. Most dog owners seem responsible and conscientious: they clean up after their pets, since we saw almost no evidence of dog poop on streets and sidewalks, or in the many parks.
Will blog soon with more details and some photos. Have to organize my 2,000 or so images and videos first, read through my notes and the literature I collected. I did come back with come ideas for our town, too. Nice to be back - i missed our cats and dog, but I'd go back - there's a lot more to see than anyone can fit into a mere two weeks.
First impression: Britons have manners. Everyone still says please and thanks. Even people leaving the bus say thank you to the driver, school kids included. Since those kids wear school uniforms, there are no backward baseball caps and baggy pants among them. I saw very few teenagers in school uniforms smoking.
There are no cars blaring eardrum-splitting rap "music" on the roads. No boom boxes, either. Everyone seems to have an Ipod or MP3 player and keep their music to themselves.
There are almost no oversized pickup trucks on the road (we saw only two pickups during the entire two weeks, only one of which was as long as we see here), Only one motorcycle (and there are a LOT of them) we saw had loud, open pipes. We often saw drivers pause to let other drivers edge into traffic.Most cars are tiny - much smaller than we see here and even familiar models of SUVs appeared smaller than ours. We saw very few large minivans, too.
Didn't see a single incident of a vehicle running with its idiot ('fog") lights on in clement weather to annoy other drivers (I see that many times a day here).
Cyclists are also many, and almost every one that approached from behind either rang a bell or called out to warn pedestrians who may not be aware he or she is coming. Happened a dozen or more times - here it might happen once every hundred cyclists.
Shopkeepers and staff were almost universally helpful, friendly and polite. Almost everywhere I went someone asked if they could help me (the only place I recall that I didn't get asked was in HMV stores but at least the cashiers were pleasant).
Food was great. They have wonderful selections of sandwiches and yogurts. Among the many yogurt flavours I tried were rhubarb; wild heather honey and stem ginger; hazelnut; lemon curd; mango and passion fruit; banana and papaya; and coconut. Sandwiches included Wensleydale cheese and carrot chutney; tuna and corn. Although hot sauces were difficult to find (I brought a bottle of my own, a habanero sauce), I did discover a tangy jalapeño-hot pepper relish in a squeeze jar that was a bit like a pico de gallo salsa run through a blender. Lots and lots of Indian food to be had, as well as many Thai restaurants. Curry is a favourite food for the Brits, but we only got to one Indian place. Had fish & chips only once, too, but it was very good. Even the selection of chips ("crisps") was highly varied. We tried a Thai green curry chip for example.
Every food store sold beer and wine, which was very civilized and convenient. It's nice not to have to travel to a separate, government-authorized sales outlet to get a bottle of wine for dinner. There are many small, cosy neighbourhood pubs scattered around, even in residential areas, and most have a selection of both national and international beers, usually with some interesting local or microbrewery draughts.
Pubs (indoors) and restaurant patios (outdoors) allowed dogs, which was equally civilized and gave the places a very warm and comfortable feel. Most dog owners seem responsible and conscientious: they clean up after their pets, since we saw almost no evidence of dog poop on streets and sidewalks, or in the many parks.
Will blog soon with more details and some photos. Have to organize my 2,000 or so images and videos first, read through my notes and the literature I collected. I did come back with come ideas for our town, too. Nice to be back - i missed our cats and dog, but I'd go back - there's a lot more to see than anyone can fit into a mere two weeks.
