No Tyne like the present

The Millennium Bridge across the Tyne on the pound coin

I made my first trip to the legendary city of Newcastle-Upon-Tyne (or to give it its preferred modern moniker Newcastle-Gateshead, reflecting both the north and south bank of the river)  last week for a conference on records management – and didn’t regret it.  My limited knowledge of the north-east of England had been drawn largely from the popular stereotypes as depicted in Viz comic, The Likely Lads and Auf Wiedershen Pet.  Much of this depicts a rather grim, violent place, but I discovered a thriving modern city proud of its industrial past, steeped in history and looking forward to the future.  The city’s renaissance of the last few years is reflected by the recent developments on the south bank of the Tyne (ie the part known as Gateshead) such as the Sage theatre (which as one conference speaker pointed out resembles a giant silver slug), the former Baltic Flour Mill, now an art gallery and the luxury riverside flats which have sprung up.

And there’ also of course the marvel of post-modern engineering design, the Millennium Bridge, a curved bridge which lights up at night, regularly changing colour.  It was only on receiving change at a corner shop which yielded a pound coin, on the reverse side of which was the bridge itself that I finally realised that this image had been in and out of my pocket for all these years.

And one popular stereotype is in fact true – they do go out in t-shirts in freezing cold, wet weather.

University Challenged

I must admit to feeling a sense of schadenfreude on hearing that Corpus Christi College, Oxford had been stripped of their University Challenge title for fielding an illegible team member.  Much has been written about Gail Trimble the knowledgable team captain (and a lot of it quite unjustifiably derisory), but very little has been said about the real villain of the piece, Sam Kay, who was no longer a student at the college at the time the final was recorded.  It was for this very reason that I missed out on appearing on University Challenge for Sheffield back in the summer of 1999.  As I was a postgrad student at the time doing a 1-year masters course due to end in September of that year, I was ineligible as you had to be enrolled at the university for the next academic year.  This was made clear in the instructions the union received from Granada TV.  As no-one else seemed terribly interested, I was put in charge by the union officer and ended up as team selector/manager.  A job which generally involved doing as many pub quizzes as posible – or at least that was our excuse.  Ironically it would’t have mattered if I tried to cheat the system as we were eliminated in the second round at a time when I was still a registered student.  But as Jeremy Paxman says “rules is rules”. 

Being a champion of the underdog and with an anti-elitist streak runnng through me, I always tend to support the other team on UC, whenever a team from Oxford or Cambridge is playing.  So naturally my sympathies lay with Manchester rather than Oxford during the final.  There’s a great deal of snobbery about universities, particularly in the UK.  But the fact is that a degree’s a degree, no matter where it comes from.  A graduate of Boatrace College, Oxbridge may be in a better position on the employment market than a graduate of the University of Barrow-in -Furness (formerly Barrow-in-Furness College of knitting and upholstery), but it’s the talents of the individual tht matter nowadays, and what that individual does with those talents.

I look forward to the day that the University Challege trophy comes to Barrow-in-Furness.

BBC Sachs Jonathan Ross and Re-brands

If only the first part of the above statement were true.  Not entirely accurate, but it goes well with the crap pun.  To be blunt about it I can’t stand the bastard. He’s little more than an overpaid egomaniac.  As well as being (along with his mate Brand) one of the most obnoxious, arrogant, smug, irritating tossers on TV.

I was in Romania when the scandal broke.  I had no idea it would still be in the news by the time I got back to Blighty. And in fact I’m getting rather bored with the whole thing.  The latest news at the time of writing is that the BBC bosses are being hauled over the coals by a parliamentary select committee of MPs and getting a right bollocking for their trouble.  It’s vey simple really – sack Brand and Ross, slap them with a heavy fine and take out an injuction banning them from ever appearing on TV or radio again – and then move on and forget about it.

Predictably enough the apologists for Brand and Ross cite cutting edge comedy or pushing back the boundaries.  Any immature obnoxious schoolboy could phone up and elderly pensioner who masquerades as a Catalan waiter in a Torquay hotel and leave a message on his answerphone claiming to have fucked his grand-daughter. There’s nothing cutting edge about that.

I don’t find either Brand or Ross remotely funny.  Or remotely likeable for that matter.  But neither am I one of those Daily Mail reading types who enjoys being offended and gets their kicks by writing serial letters of complaint.  I’m very glad Brand and Ross pulled off this pathetic stunt though – as it shows them up for what they are – and gets them off our TV screens and off the airwaves.  Hopefully for good.

Northern Irish banknotes

A comedian called Michael McIntyre (a not very funny one though, like most of the stand-up so-called “comedians” you see on TV these days) did a routine about Scottish banknotes. His main point was that despite being sterling and thus legal tender in all parts of the UK, they generally aren’t accepted in England. Much the same as Northern Irish banknotes – an age old rant familiar to many who on crossing the Irish Sea find that their hard-earned Bank of Ireland, Ulster Bank and Northern Bank notes, although being sterling currency of legally equal value to Bank of England notes, just don’t cut it.

A few years ago, I was returning to London after being home for Christmas. Knowing that my local bank notes wouldn’t be accepted once I got off the plane at Stansted, I tried to get them changed at Belfast International airpport. On being told to my utter bewilderment that there was a charge (yes a fucking charge to change sterling notes into different sterling notes of the same denomination of equal value) I point blankly refused and walked way in disgust, resigned to the fact hat I’d have to wait till the next time I went home to use up these notes.

How fucking ridiculous can you get?

Even machines don’t seem to accept them – I’ve tried on ticket machines at train stations and at the self-service check-out in supermarkets, but the machines are just too clever.

So why the fuck do the NI and Scottish banks issue their own notes in the first place if they’re not accepted in the same currency zone? Ironically they’re more likely to be accepted in the Eurozone in places like Lifford, Letterkenny or Louth than in London, Luton or Leicester.

Now if we all adopted the euro, none of this would be happening…;-)

John Bull enslaved by Uncle Sam

The plight of Gary McKinnon who has lost his appeal against extradition from the UK to the US after hacking into top secret US security files is now the subject of a blog to campaign for justice against this ridiculous decision. McKinnon now faces a long sentence in the US, a punishment completely disproportionate to the crime. A ingenious letter highlighting the hypocrisy of the the US securocrats was published in The Independent a few weeks ago.  Its writer, PJ Parkins of Lancaster denounces the master-servant relationship between the US and UK and argues that the Americans should be grateful to McKinnon for exposing the flaws in their IT security arrangments, pointing out that if a computer nerd can find out such military secrets, it can’t be that difficult for the Russians and the Chinese.

But this paragraph (with no disrespect to reasonable-minded, rational-thinking Americans) says it all:

“However, intelligence organisations that could not work out why people of Middle Eastern appearance would want to learn how to fly aircraft, but not land them, that thought that allowing Vietnam to become a united country would produce a communist domino effect in south-east Asia, and went to war because of non-existent weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, are hardly likely to win many marks in an IQ contest. Remember, this is the nation that has vast numbers of people who believe in creationism.”

GAA and the People’s Republic of Finchley

Maggie Thatcher once famously said that Northern Ireland was British as her constituency, Finchley.  In cerain parts of Northern Ireland, especially in July, you’ll certainly see more British flags per square mile than in the said North London suburb.  Finchley, like many other parts of London has become something of a cultural melting pot.  If you walk its streets, you’ll find grocery stores run by Poles, Iranians and Indians, Turkish, Indian, Chinese,Thai and Japanese restaurants, ads in shop windows or in the local papers for Polish plumbers and various “massage services” provided by foreign girls.  Never mind the illegal trafficking and enforced slavery of young women of course  - as long as there’s a loophole in the law to be found and money to be made.

And like almost anywhere else in North London, you’ll also find Irish pubs.  This raises the more pertinent question – is Northern Ireland as Irish as Finchley?  The discerning GAA enthusiast who finds himself stranded in Finchley on a hot summer’s weekend of Championship action is somewhat spoiled for choice as to where he can watch the match.  Being the culchie redneck bogtrotter from Tyrone that I am, I was naturally keen to watch the red hands do battle against Mayo for a place in the All-Ireland quarter finals.  The highest concentration of Hibernianised watering holes to be found in the area is on North Finchley’s main street.  O’Neills doesn’t really count as it caters more for the plastic paddy than the genuine article.  Of the remaining three, The Wishing Well was experiencing a technical fault, The Erris (bizarrely for a Mayo-owned establishment) deferred in favour of the racing – which left Toolans.   It was a hard-fought battle with many a near-miss and a few scrappy incidents – but I managed to get served in the end.

The Keltic Kup and local variations

The Keltic Kup?
It was announced today that the football associations of Scotland, Wales and both parts of Ireland have agreed on a new annual tournament between their teams due to kick off in 2011. As the four teams involved rarely qualify for any major tournaments such an event can only be welcome and is long overdue. Like England, these four teams have all suffered from the foreign invasion of the Premier League as a result of which the opportunities to play at the top level are much more limited now than they were 20 years ago.

However, one bone of contention will be what to call this new tournament. They could take a leaf out of rugby’s book and call it the Four Nations. Another possibility would be the Celtic (as in “Keltic” not “Seltic”) Cup, but Rangers supporters would take exception to this. Whatever it’s called, it could be a massive money spinner for the broadcaster Setanta who never seem to miss an opportunity like this.

Local Variations
I notice the BBC website has a section devoted to the four regions, England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. England is simply listed as “England”, but Scotland and Wales are listed bilingually as “Scotland/Alba” and “Wales/Cymru”. Interestingly enough, Northern Ireland is just listed in English. I’m surprised the Irish and Ulster Scots lobbies haven’t been on the BBC’s case about this. But let’s face it – there just wouldn’t be enough room for “Northern Ireland/Tuaisceart na hÉireann/Norlin Airlann”.

Update:

* As a footnote to the first item above, I was baffled for years as to why the name of a certain Glasgow soccer club was pronounced as “Seltic” rather than the standard pronounciation “Keltic”.  I eventually found out that this was because the soft C pronounciation was in vogue in the 19th century when the club was formed, but the hard C took over as the accepted prounounciation in the 20th century.  This brings me on to a classic anecdote involving the Welsh actor Richard Burton.  Burton was allegedly asked in an interview with an irritating Hollywood hack “I suppose you would describe yourself as a selt?”

Quick as a flash Burton replied “Yes, and I suppose you would describe yourself as a sunt.”