Month: April 2018

A Grumpy Old Grammarian

/ graham3693

Oh, why can’t the English learn to

Set a good example to people whose

English is painful to your ears?

The Scotch and the Irish leave you close to tears.

There even are places where English completely disappears….

Well, in America, they haven’t used it for years!

 

Reaching Out

With the rise in online shopping and the ability to almost instantaneously communicate with others electronically, there has developed pari-passu, a new vocabulary of words, (often at times neologisms), phrases and acronyms that all generations since the Baby Boomers use with automatic ease and understanding. I am, I fear, as misogynistic and recalcitrant as Professor Higgins in “My Fair Lady”. The point of this rambling preamble is to bemoan the insidious use of the phrase, mostly emanating from businesses in the United States, but sadly in the past few years as well from Australia, of “reaching out”.

“Reaching out” to someone or some entity implies to me at least, that they are in a tiny spot of bother and  need help, so you can imagine that I am a little incredulous when there is a media article along the lines of

”Apple have reported that the dingle-dongle in the latest iPhone has been reported to come unstuck and dangles, in some instances causing bruising to the customer especially if carried in the front pocket. We reached out to Apple for comment.” 

So here we have an insignificant, minor and irritating journalist suggesting that they are sympathetic to a zillion dollar company and there is in the phrase surely an implicit undertaking that the journalist and the media organisation are there to  to help! I mean Apple needs help?

I am not a zillion dollar company but have invariably received such an email when I write to a company with a question, complaint or even a compliment. The phrase is somewhat ’touchy, feely’ and it implies that I am perhaps in a consequent state of suicidal depression and that the respondent understands completely my pain and were it in their power, would pay for psychological support, which sadly is not possible as I am in Australia and they  are in Des Moine, Iowa.

There may be perhaps one situation where ‘reaching out’ to me may be absolutely understandable, indeed appropriate. 

Hi Mr Norton, – Thanks for reaching out to us here at the ACME outdoor online store. We are sorry to learn that the “Yak” snow boot crampons which you purchased last month have come adrift from the boots so to speak and that you have reached out to us, having slipped and fallen into a crevasse on the South Col of the Kumbu Glacier on Mt Everest. As you are almost 13,965 miles from us, it is you understand going to be exceedingly difficult, if not impossible to ACTUALLY reach you, if that was your hope. I trust you understand. If you are able to reach up and grab the lip of the crevasse , is it possible that your sherpa may be able to reach out and grab you? We understand your predicament and once you return to Australia, reach out to us again and we will send you a replacement set of crampons 

What is wrong with the accepted and genuine response  “thanks for contacting us”?

Dresden – in transit.

/ graham3693 / 2 Comments

The train from Wroclaw to Dresden was a well appointment, clean electric train with individual seating and large panoramic windows, not unlike the modern metro trains in Australia. Again it was relatively empty on departure but progressively filled, especially once we crossed into Germany. At the border station, the driver and conductors all changed from Poles to Germans. Smart-arse comments will be ignored , you know what I mean.

At The Dresden Station, I turned left at the tunnel and ventured forth into sunlight, but was momentarily confused as the ‘Vienna Plaza’ , was obviously not before me, which the Apple maps app claimed it should be. I showed the map to a passing pedestrian. She looked a little bemused then suggested in perfect English that instead of turning left, I should have turned right. People who know me well recognise that by nature, I have always instinctively turned to the left.

How correct she was. Back into the tunnel and there in brilliant sunshine was a huge Plaza with the multi-storey Intercity Hotel just to the left of the square, 100m away. It was not in anyway the Dresden Intercontinental , but a large clean and basic hotel that serves as a transit hotel I suspect for local and international travellers. For me it served that purpose well. I meandered into the city along the pedestrian mall and shopping centres. I had been there is August 2013 as the setting off point for my months cycle trip along the Elbe and Moldau rivers into Czech Republic. These two photos are from that time and show that I travelled lightly! A new bike which I had pre ordered from Australia and collected from a bike shop in Dresden.

Again and possible even more so, I was absolutely overwhelmed with the awareness that this city more than any in Europe was obliterated by total and unnecessary bombing in the last months of the war by the British. So I stumbled again on the Dresden Opera House, at which La Boheme was about to start. I seriously thought about buying a ticket, but was definitely under-dressed when compared to the average Dresden opera going member of the public, and secondly Puccini in not my favourite opera composer.

I think I can safely say that in ALL of the cities and towns that I visited on this trip, in the town square there were 3 people (always 3) , members of the Jehovah Witness congregation with a stand and their literature in several languages. What reminded me about this was that in the Dresden shopping mall, there they were, but were forced to move along when a morbidly obese man sat himself down on one of the adjacent plaza seats and produced a guitar and amplifier and proceeded to sing, loudly and off key.

During my final packing today, and having as is my custom, discarded several items of worn and bleached spotted clothing as well as a pair of shoes, I found secreted amongst the various pockets and crevices of my luggage, the items of clothing that I confessed I had lost. Thus it is that I leave Europe, minus 5 shirts, 3 pairs of underpants and I pair of worn shoes, but with 4 woollen hats ( 3 more than I packed) and 3 neck bandanas ( 2 more than I packed).

The Wroclaw Railway Station – which is in a case you are wondering is No 5 on things to do according to TripAdvisor.

The Wroclaw Drama Theatre and Gardens.

A 2018 view of Dresden cathedral

Finally this is what an 8.7Kg back pack looks like minus 5 shirts, 3 pr underpants and a pair of shoes but with 3 additional woollen caps and 2 neck bandana, prior to being booked all the way from Dresden to Adelaide. I trust the Germans to get it right.

Slow Train to Wroclaw

/ graham3693 / 5 Comments

A journey of about 370 Km took from 11am to 7pm, 8 hours , so the average speed was 46km/hour. The train originates from Zakopane, was another all 2nd class train, but I had a booked seat, although there were already 5 hefty polish men in the 8 seat cabin when I boarded (two facing bench seats , 4 a side ) so I did what most Poles do in this situation, walked along the corridor until I came to an empty berth and settled in. Surprisingly I was alone for about half the trip, but then as it stopped at almost every town and village along the way for the last 6 hours, I shared my cabin with eventually, 7 others and a dog!

The contingent of friends and family who came to farewell the young woman and her canine companion, seemed to be more distressed and sad to see the dog depart, waving and blowing kisses to the pooch through the window. It is increasingly common now, for humans to travel with an animal, not just for friendship and the occasional lick, but allegedly such dogs provide medical support. I understand the fact that a dog may be valuable for those who have lost sight or hearing, but the list of seemingly miraculous abilities of dogs to detect or warn their owner now include such things as

  • A diabetic coma – too high or too low glucose
  • An epileptic fit
  • Narcolepsy
  • A panic attack
  • Migraine
  • And finally and by no means least and surely most impressively, cancer.

I would say that from the constant grazing of buns, cakes, doughnuts and chocolate bars, that the woman was absolutely in no danger of having a ‘hypo’ but rather that her blood sugars would be very high, a state that does not require Lassie to diagnose. Moreover some 2 hours later she suddenly lapsed into a deep sleep not in any way related to Narcolepsy, but simply a post prandial nap, induced by a surge of blood to the liver and concomitant severe reduction of blood flow to the brain. The dog, to its credit did indeed detect that things were not normal and spent the best part of several minutes licking her face, lips and ears, all to no avail and she remained semi comatose until we arrived at Wroclaw. Another woman boarded at the next station with a dog that resembled a Siberian Wolf Hound. I saw on one of my walks to stretch many legs, that she had a cabin to herself (and ‘das hund’) – which of course is a brilliant way to score an empty cabin. The dog might detect a panic attack in its owner, but sure as hell would provoke one in anyone else.

I am in my penultimate town, tomorrow is my last train trip to Dresden. Having now toured several of the recommended towns and cities of Poland and walked on average 15km a day, through the ‘historical old town’ of each and every one, I detect a profound sense of familiarity in all the old towns’ ‘ main square. Here is a photo of the Rynek Glowny of Wroclaw:

For those of you who wish to stay at home rather then cope with the crush of visiting all the European main tourist cities and towns and their ‘old town main square’, here is my analysis. Think of a large area, the size at least of a football field. In the centre will be a Town Hall and around the 4 sides are delightful 17 and 18th century, homes and small palaces, all of them a painted in different colours so long as the hue belongs to what an Australian colour consultant would classify as ‘heritage’ in type.

I have dozens of pictures of quaint town squares taken over the past few years and they are all strikingly similar. The sad thing is that what makes them even more so is that many of these medieval, baroque structures are now occupied on ground level by American fast food chains: McDonald, KFC, Starbucks, Costa Coffee, Pizza Hut, Hard Rock Cafe, Burger King, Wendy’s, the list is never ending. We surely are becoming ‘one world’ at least in terms of America culture.

The Old Town Hall in the middle of the square – at dusk

Two pictures showing some detail of the facade of the Town Hall during the day:

Now I will show you come of the photos I took on my day’s walk around Wroclaw ,

  • The streets around the square
  • The Old University precinct
  • The Cathedral Island
  • The Theatre district

I make the point that in the vast majority of European cities, those magnificent edifices that were constructed centuries ago, were ravaged by the destruction of the Second World War – and both sides the terrible conflict were responsible: Germans, British and Russian and in Poland I suspect that the Russians and Germans were the main culprits. So basically what we see as wonderful architecture has been lovingly and faithfully restored from 1947 onwards. Two pictures will illustrate this so poignantly;

Cathedral of St John the Baptist – 1947

Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist – 2018

Incidentally, have you ever wondered what happens when one is shooting a panorma with the iphone and suddenly a bloody car drives into view? One swears and stops the panorama.Note the Burger King outlet

The ‘Sand Bridge’ across the moat/river to Cathedral Island. It’s the most number of ‘commitment padlocks’ I have ever seen on one bridge and the other side was just as dense. I seem to recall there was a similar bridge somewhere in Paris I think that the civic fathers had to dismantle the rails as the structure was threatening to collapse under the weight into the Seine.

I stumbled across the Wroclaw ‘central market’ not a patch on the Adelaide Central Market.

The original Wroclaw University building now the University Museum of it’s history.

The National Forum of Music and Plaza. Essentially a Performing Space – similar to the Adelaide Festival Theatre.

I would be remiss not to include the Wroclaw Opera Theatre. I missed out on the opening night of Rossini ‘La Cenerentola’ by a day – it’s tomorrow.

Look Dad it’s snowing.

/ graham3693 / 2 Comments

To the a Pole, waking up to this is part of life and the weather’s riches. To a man who loves his sunburnt country, it was rather exciting. To remind you, this was the Tatra Chalet on arrival:

This was the Tatra Chalet at noon today:

Once the snow had ceased I rugged up and walked gingerly into the village

Once there I joined those perambulating along the mall, eventually diving into the warmth of a bakery where I joined in and had a pancake

The next course, to no doubt prepare oneself before venturing outside was the quaint custom of each and every local to finish off with a double scoop of ice cream. I felt it unwise myself.

Still on cuisine, here is the menu for dinner each night at The Chalet

and finally, finally here is the lamb saddle:

The Road to Zakopane

/ graham3693

Getting to this delightful town at the foothills of the “Polish Alps” proved somewhat of a nightmare. My Eurail Pass had the trip as taking more than 3 hours for the 100km and ominously in an all 2nd class train without allocated seats. Kraków Train station is modern and seemed to be extremely busy even at 7am on Good Friday. My train was to depart at 7.35 but I could not decipher “Zakopane” on the Departures screens. I joined a queue, apprehensive as I was about to interact with my third railway ticket officer. The train service to Zakopane has been replaced by a bus service. That seemed straightforward, but the extremely frustrating consequence was that despite several requests for help and directions, most of them provoking a curt response, such as a finger pointing UP, I was sent in all 4 directions of the compass as well as up and down several concourses and levels. At one stage I found myself in a football sized field of muddy quagmire – and hundreds of buses of all sizes and age but without any obvious humans that resembled potential passengers. The time approached 7:30am and I was no closer to finding the bus substitute to Zakopane Anyway I eventually found a bus station, not the correct one, but at least I found a bay which had “Zakopane” and which suggested that buses left very frequently, so you can imagine my relief. The final hurdle was that in an interaction reminiscent of my first encounter at the Warsaw station, the driver rejected out of hand the very official looking Eurail pass as hundreds of people queued up at the bus door behind me, waiting to buy a ticket. And so to get me there I paid 20 Zlt and boarded the bus.

The reason that there is no train to Zakopane became very obvious as all along the route, major highway and infrastructure works were being undertaken, so that within 5 years there will be a motorway and I assume high speed rail (Polish high speed) to this mountain ski resort. I am not sure that I will make the return journey to see it however.

I arrived within the 3 hours. I had not had any food or drink, so I went into a local bakery and had what I suspect is a Polish Easter Cake sort of like an Italian Panettone – the display case was full of them in all sizes and with various decorations.It had the taste and look when bitten into of a coarse butter cake.

The weather has been problematic, cloudy with breakthrough sun and variable misty rain. I hiked along a trail later that day – a local favourite obviously as there were lots of people rugged up and strolling along the ice and snow strewn path. It was not enjoyable for me as although I had walking shoes, I was not stable and slipped and slid, especially when descending, so much so that a local lent me one of his walking poles.

This was the sign at the entrance to the hiking trail, I did have second thoughts.

A couple of pictures of the scenery from the hiking trail

The second day, Easter Saturday I visited the 3 best ‘things to do’ in Zakopane according to TripAdvisor. The first was The Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima and as it was Easter, the place was seething.

There is a quaint custom that Polish people tend to fast on Good Friday or eat mainly fish then take a small basket of food to be blessed on the Saturday and once blessed, then that night and from then on, it’s the starter’s gun to indulge in gluttony: sweets, meat, meat and more meat. The Tata Chalet has a fixed dinner menu and then on Sunday there is a special Easter Breakfast. So I did venture in and out of the various churches if only to immerse myself in the Easter activities and the blessing of the food.

I also explored the Cmentarz Zasluzonycha na Peksowym Brzyzku (I can only assume there is no such thing as a low score in a game of Scrabble in Poland). It’s the local cemetery but as over the past few centuries, this mountain village has been the natural home of many Polish artists: painters,sculptors, writers, poets,philosophers and musicians, so the graves and headstones reflect the artistic talents of those interred. There were several musicians, but as far as I could deduce not an obvious Baroque Recorder player.

I also wanted to visit the Willa Koliba – a beautiful wooden villa designed by the famous architect Stanislaw Witkiewicz. It was closed but some pictures of the building reveal the detail and structure of what I can only surmise is the world’s biggest example of ‘tongue and groove’ technique? The building is situated along the original Main Street and all along this thoroughfare are beautiful examples of these wooden villas.

I then took the cable car up to the summit of Gubalowka mountain. Incidentally I discovered that the Polish way to say “return” as in “I wish to purchase a return ticket , please” is “up-down”. If only I had known that before. At the summit is a tourist Mecca of food and souvenir stalls.

The view from the summit

Overall a 20km walking day. I had a sauna upon my return. This is the Tatra chalet

And finally should we have moles in Australia ( not in the Russian embassy) but the Wind in the Willows type, then this how my back lawn might look.

A Food interlude

/ graham3693 / 2 Comments

It is now common knowledge that food is by far the most frequent subject snapped on the iPhone.

“Here is a snap of a dozen Crispy Kreme donuts”…. which can be blown up to be a feature on the kitchen wall as my iPhone has a resolution of a zillion pixels/mm.

Anyway here are the inevitable. Dumplings feature twice and the two with meat are in fact duck. The last is an Easter special called “The Pope’s Cream cake”.