Six Months! No, really, it's been six months!

Six months! It's been six months, now, since I arrived back on these shores.  It must be time to do some sort of list thing.

Marmite

The horror of squeezable Marmite lives with me still. The horrible oxtail soup taste…no…just no. Thankfully Vegemite exists here.  I know I have been told that Marmite exists in non squeezable form but the fact that it does exist in that fashion is just an….eeeuuurrggh.

Chocolate

Oh, for a piece of New Zealand chocolate!  Proper NZ Cadbury chocolate that tastes of chocolate and is creamy and smooth and delicious and not bitty and too sugary sweet and sticky on the tooth and … Cadbury is a British thing, remember?  And then the bastards go and shut the Dunedin factory! Bastards!

Running

Ok, Ok… So, the hills here mean that the leg muscles are getting a good workout but…but…the views from the top of the domain, looking out across the Sounds, and being able to run alongside the sea out past Waikawa Marina.  Giving the marae a nod on the way out and thanking it for still allowing me puff on the way back.  Yeah, nah…Gimme Picton, please.

That said…Sunshine

What it is to go brown instead of red!  What it is to be back in a climate where I can sit out and work and not just burn. Being turned into a tomato by overcast, grey weather in Dunedin is now gone, sitting in the garden and reading is now back.

And, of course, if there’s sunshine, you go out, so – Litter

It is rubbish, the way in which the (y)UK deal with this.  This morning I happened to walk past this marvellous tractor/mower contraption that was cutting back the greenery on the side of the road.  As it past, the detritus left behind had flicked coke cans and food packets out from the hedge line and out into the road.  The litter in this country is soul destroying.  It isn’t rocket science to fix, there just does not seem to be the will.  And, where there’s litter, there’s…

…Cigarette Butts

They form basic blueprint plans for the layout of town centre.  I’ve had need to go to Germany for work.  There, in certain towns at certain times of day, smoking appears to be compulsory.  They do appear to be better at extinguishing cigarettes in the bins provided.  Any way, along with the litter and the dog shit that lines the pavements, cigarette buts play a rich and comprehensive part of making the UK (y)UK.

Speaking of it – the Shit

There is nothing as edifying and uplifting to see dog shit spread along a pavement by the wheel of either a pram or child’s bicycle.  Maybe, perhaps, the smear of a shit from a sliding shoe.  Whichever; the sense of pleasure one gets from the ubiquity of shit on the streets and the fact Great Britain seems perfectly at ease with this is a little scary.  Again, not rocket science but seemingly beyond us here.

And it’s a real shame because – Britain Can Be So Pretty

Driving to the Cotswold Wildlife Park, the other day, the villages you encounter are so wonderfully picturesque.  Stroud, here, is a beautiful town.  Caerleon, just down the road from where I’m from in Wales, wears its Roman cape with distinction.  I mean, these towns are hopelessly inadequate to cope with modern life – you know, traffic and numbers, but they do look ever so nice on a sunny day.

Coffee

Black Book Café is a delight: brilliant coffee, very toothsome cake.  I haven’t yet found the café I would wait twenty minutes for a coffee in, though.  I’ve done that in NZ.  They do good coffee in New Zealand. However, one thing they simply cannot get the hang of – and I don’t understand why because pies are central to Kiwi existence:

Pork Pies

The Marmite may make me shudder but it has been something to come home to a pork pie.  Brown sauce on a pork pie.  It does not get better.

I miss New Zealand.  Tremendously.  Great Britain struggles to justify the adjective in the name. I wonder what will make the list in another six months’ time?

"Follow your spirit, and upon this charge..."

“He’s done it for St George!”

I enjoy sport.  I really enjoy playing sport but, over the years, laziness and an inability to do changing room and bar-room banter has prevented me from playing as much as I perhaps would have liked.  Coaching sport is always good fun, especially a sport like cricket because when it comes to playing cricket there isn’t a proper set time for the game to last, and it can drag on, and so there are fewer parents or supporters to speak with at the boundary rope.  I truly am awful at small talk, simply cannot do it.

Living in New Zealand for the last decade has meant watching the country grind to a halt three times for Rugby World Cups and then once for a Lions’ Tour.  The pressure on the All Blacks to win these tournaments or competitions is immense.  In actual fact, the pressure is absurdly immense because there isn’t merely the pressure to win: there is the expectation that you will win.  When they didn’t win in 2007 it was not well received.  When they drew with the Lions, again, the result was not well accepted…although a draw was better than a loss; and the fact we all stood looking at each other in the pub in bemused anticlimactic fashion, so getting angry about the whole thing would have been laughable.  Though I imagine some managed to do that.

This Football World Cup though has been curious to experience.  Now, being Welsh and after having lived in New Zealand for so long, I'm fully aware of the incongruity of someone like me even daring to have an opinion on this matter but: listening to the radio commentary on the first English game was just wonderfully entertaining for the way in which Chris Waddle conducted himself as the game went on.

We have all been led to believe that the refreshing thing about this World Cup is that there is no pressure and no expectation.  Gareth Southgate has a young side in his charge and they are there for experience; to enjoy their selves; to play some football, and; to come home, not too quickly if they wouldn’t mind, and then begin to gear up for a proper challenge to the next European Championships and subsequent World Cups after that.  And, to be fair to Chris Waddle, this party line was toed up until the first penalty claim by England was not referred for further examination by the new off-field refereeing assistant using video technology to review on-field decisions.  After that moment, Chris Waddle fought a conscious internal battle to not revert to type and start demanding that England play better and win the game.  He very nearly won, and it was a delight to listen to.

You can’t help it.  When you’re watching your team play a sport the visceral desire for the euphoria of victory is consuming.  As everyone knows: why be in the game if you’re not there to win it?  Whether you are actual world-beaters or not, no sports player crosses the white line with the attitude that they are so happy to be there to make up the numbers.  I would be furious if I knew that to be the case of any sports team I supported.

So, to hear Chris Waddle actually speaking through clenched teeth, to hear his incredulity when time was nearly up and the fourth official indicated that there would only be four minutes of added on time: “No way… No way… should have a zero after it…. That’s embarrassing.” Was beautiful to hear.  And, of course, when Harry scored, he did it for St George, so the commentator said.  It was a magical moment of Orwellian practice.  The commentator was overcome by the sweetness of last minute victory and gave way to a genuine emotional response that the previous 90 minutes of neutrality could no longer keep bottled up.

I don’t do TV, the radio is my company through this event. They have fashioned a glorious team. I know I couldn’t do banter with them but I’m glad they are broadcasting their own for people like me to be able to listen to.

On the right track.

I’ve just had to travel across to Germany for work. I found enormous pleasure being in a country that can in no way be described as foreign – how can it be foreign when there are Subway outlets and Sky Sports Channel stings all exactly the same as they are in the UK? – but is different enough for me to feel “other”.  I suppose that the anonymity that you feel as an alien is very different to that which you feel in your hometown.

Heidelberg

Emmendingen 

To get between the three places I had meetings I used the train.  Driving in Germany is brilliant (the excitement of being able to drive on a road without a speed limit mitigated by the sensible way in which the majority of drivers approach this fact – at least in the journeys I took), but my ability to park varies between being able to pull in at the side of the road and I’m not getting this vehicle in that space and I’ll cause less damage and stress simply by leaving it in the road.  So, I drive to find an empty street where pulling in and parking is manageable and then get a taxi back to my actual destination.  Anyway.  The trains.

Firstly, buying a ticket is always fun.  The automated machines are straightforward to use but do ask questions and I’m always conscious of making a mistake and buying a ticket to Patagonia or for the wrong type of train.  Where do you want to go? How many people are travelling? Which service are you thinking of getting on? Etc. etc. etc. as the King of Siam once said.  Being on the wrong service came to the fore on my first foray onto the trains this time.  I bought a ticket for the 10:14 from Frankfurt to Heidelberg and was told it would be valid for all services except the ICE service (The Intercity Express trains, all ice-cool and sleek).  The 10:14 was promptly cancelled, as was the next service.  The subsequent available service was an ICE train.  What to do?  Well, a quick enquiry with the help-desk, an official stamp and squiggled signature rendered my ticket valid and off I went. Efficient, no fuss: simply helpful.

Emmendingen has a snail fixation

Frankfurt Subway

After a misadventure on a school trip in France many moons ago, I’m always quite happy to check, double and triple check the route the train is taking without any sense of embarrassment.  So, having read the timetable, the platform display, asked the guard and then checked the on-board display again, I was relatively confident I was on the right train.  It sped south and soon the display in the carriage said we were going at 200kph.  Nice.

No other cancellations occurred and for the next three days I trained down from Heidelberg to Emmendingen and then back up to Frankfurt.  At every station stop and as I boarded every train I checked and double checked, becoming confident enough to only next directly ask the guard if I was on the right train for the journey back to the airport to fly home.  I must have looked more confident because as I stood slouched and waiting at a station stop on the way to Frankfurt, a man leant in and asked me whether this was the Stuttgart train.  No, I was able to tell him – after first letting him know that my German was Schlecht. “Are you American?”  He asked.

“UK,” I said.

“Ah, I used to live in London, many years ago,” he said.

“Me too,” I replied.

“Where in London?” He asked.

“Near Wimbledon.”

“Ah, you know Southfields,” He said, “I was there recently. It’s built up tremendously.”

We gave each other a wave as the train pulled out of the station.

A curious sort of comfortable anonymity.

River Neckar - Heidelberg

Frankfurt old and new

One thing I did notice immediately upon my return to the UK was the difference in tone of the train stations and on the trains.  In Germany, the only announcements were for train arrivals and departures.  In the UK I was asked to be on the look out for suspect packages, to report anything suspicious and not to leave my bags alone or they could be destroyed.  Speaks volumes…repeatedly.

So, it seems, simply anyone can score at Wembley.

I vividly remember when I scored at Wembley.  June 1995.  Late evening sunshine, well over fifty or sixty thousand in the crowd.  The roar a constant in my ears.  I wheeled away like an unsteady overweight Mick Shannon, windmilling arm, bathing in the cheers and chants.  It wasn’t too bad a goal, either, not one of those two yard tap ins that so often settle cup finals, but a nice piece of control a little over ten to twelve yards out, nice touch with the outside of the boot to set myself up, and then a right footed shot that beat the keeper on the inside post.  Memories indeed.

Tom Cairney scored at Wembley, last weekend.  A beautifully taken goal from a glorious through-ball by an eighteen-year-old Ryan Sessegnon - a wunderkind from Fulham’s Academy.  Such coolness under such pressure, from both of them.  It was a terrific victory: fine reward for a fabulous season’s work.  I even had my own Fulham shirt on in support of the team in their play-off final.  Thankfully, the snugger fit offset by the fact I’m less of an overweight Mick Shannon, these days.

I did have to breathe out eventually.

Sport is a curious thing.  It used to be that there were rewards commensurate with the performance of the team or individual.  If you won the First Division, you got a trophy and the chance to play in the European Cup.  If you won the FA Cup, you got to play in the Cup Winners’ Cup.  If you’d had a decent season and finished in the top five or six, you may get the reward of playing the UEFA cup, along with all the teams from the other European leagues that had had decent seasons too.  If you finished in the top two or three of the Second Division, you got promoted to the First, just reward for your year’s performance in the lower league.  Things change.

Now, of course, you can finish sixth and get promoted through the play-offs and after a fantastic day out at Wembley – and you get a trophy for that too.  You can have a fantastic season, finish third in the league and then miss out on promotion because a team that’s finished three places below you over forty six games nips a two yard tap in in the play-off final and takes your place as the third team into the next league up.  Due reward?  I’m not sure.

It’s the same with Super Rugby down under.  New Zealand routinely produce the best rugby teams and so the competition is fixed so that the top teams across the various pools of teams are guaranteed a place in the finals schedule of games – and with home advantage.  So, the teams from New Zealand that finish with more victories and bonus points than the teams from across the ditch win the reward of travelling to play their Australian or South African opponents, in their own backyard, after having slogged their way through an hugely competitive New Zealand season.  Due reward?  I’m not sure. Why work to get better and regularly beat the Kiwi teams if you’re already guaranteed a home place in the finals?

The play-offs in the football are a response to the monetisation of sport, and they have manufactured a big day out for their fans to Wembley.  Wembley used to be a special stadium, cup finals and internationals.  Not any more.  Tom Cairney scored there for Fulham, the other day… and then players scored for Rotherham, Shrewsbury, Coventry and Exeter.  The play-offs are popular, of that there is no doubt, but are they played out right?  Should a team that finishes sixth be rewarded with a day out at Wembley and a trophy when the teams that finish second and first don’t see the gigantic arch and their fans don’t get the big day out?  How about draw a line between the two play off finalists and play at the nearest suitable venue?  It spreads the money around, there’s still a big day out and keeps Wembley as proper reward for Cups and Internationals.  Now, pretty much anyone can score at Wembley... not just me with a beer can at a Bon Jovi gig.