As mentioned in the previous post, we have made few trips around Manchester in past few days. To be more precise, we have visited four cities in four days: Liverpool, Sheffield, Chester and Leeds. Here are my impressions.

Liverpool

Beatles. And port. And Beatles. And ships, docks and warehouses. And of course John, Paul, George and Ringo! Of course Beatles are everywhere. You can get Beatles souvenirs in every shop, and there are several museums showing artifacts and things.

We arrived at the (famous?) train station on Lime Street. It takes less then an hour from Manchester. The city appears bigger than Mcr, and there are more of these suburb unified houses. (It's like copypasted city really, and I immediately started wondering. Many people say that the communist housing projects with panel houses etc. are horrible, with no schools, no shops etc., but this English suburb style seems to be exactly the same thing. The panel houses are higher (sometimes as many as 20 floors), and they are not made of bricks, but apart from these 'cosmetic' differences, it seems exactly the same. The houses in the suburbs (and not just Liverpool suburbs! We have this in Mcr as well) are all exactly the same, with nothing between them, just the same streets all over and over again. I don't really see how this is any better.

Anyway, back to Liverpool-specific stuff. We went to see the docks, and that is really nice. There is a promenade along the river. There is the river! And there are ancient docks, with old ships there. And warehouses. And more docks. And some modern ships (some of them go to Isle of Man, and some to Ireland).  The river is wider than any other river I have ever seen (but it's true that I have never seen delta of Danube, or Amazon...). And there are tides, because it's very close to the sea. The river went 5m lower during low tide (afternoon) than during high tide (morning). Which was a surprise for us, because we are from an inland country.

There is also a huge cathedral in Liverpool. From the outside, it looks like some communist building because it's all squares and it's so huge it looks really out of proportion. Exactly as the spectacular communist show-off buildings! (It reminds me of Hotel International in Prague - just compare the pictures! Cathedral v the hotel.) It would be enough to put a red star on the top of the building, and here we go, Moscow architecture...

But to be not that harsh: inside, the cathedral is beautiful. It's really impressive, the space, the stained glass, the side chapels, the organ (which makes sounds so deep that it hurts), and all the details, everything is the finest stuff. You can tell that these people were incredibly rich, and willing to invest the money into the Lord's house.

In Liverpool, the cathedral is not the only huge building. Some of them look like a New York architecture (roughly the same style as Empire State Building but a bit lower). It's just that the whole city is like that: it's spectacular. After all, they say that some 9 million people emigrated through Liverpool to the US in the old days, and the port and docks were there long before that. All the people, merchants, ships etc. must have left so much money there!

The city is rich even these days. There are fancy shops, art galleries, modern office buildings, etc. Money everywhere! And it is indeed very nice to see.

Sheffield

The city of stainless steel (previously), and of the Sheffield Hallam University (today). We went there between Christmas and New Year, and maybe that's why the city looked a bit boring... because it was almost empty!

There are two cathedrals in Sheffield, one of them (the smaller one) is catholic, the other one (the bigger one) is Anglican. There are some quite interesting steel statues in the Anglican cathedral, and the inner space is very nice.

There is also very good industry museum, where you can have a look on River Don Engine (which is huge!) and on other engineering stuff. They show you how the steel is made, and what the history of the steel industry was. There is also awesome kid's exhibition where you can go through the steel process yourself (pretending that you are molten steel, and get pressed, stamped etc.). If you ever go to Sheffield, don't forget to visit Kelham Island and the museum. (Bonus: there is a museum café where you can have quite impressive sandwiches!)

Chester

Incredibly photogenic, painfully cute, kitsch city. Everyone has to go to Chester and see it, because Chester is beautiful.

It doesn't seem to be at the first sight. The train station is a bit 'boring', just an ordinary station which is not bad, but it't not the most beautiful train station in the world, and you have to walk ca 1 km to the city centre. However, once you arrive there, you have to be impressed!

There was a Roman fortress of Deva in the old ages, and the old Roman fortification is still there. And you can climb up the wall and walk it! It's ca 3 km long, and it's a very nice walk around the city, with some medieval things, and a view of the castle. (That is funny, because 'Chester' means castle, so Chester Castle is literally Castle Castle. Lol!) The fortification goes past the river Dee, and a canal, which is itself quite romantic.

In the city centre, there are many cute white and black houses, some of them 4 floors high. In the city centre, there are many shops, and in the houses, there's also a shopping gallery which you can enter via stairs and walk as well, It's incredibly, disgustingly beautiful!

In the Roman times, Chester / Deva used to be a big sea port, and later it was a market town, and obviously a busy and important one. Which means that everything is sophisticated, decorated, and with a lot of attention to details.

Apart from shopping and building-gazing, there is again a cathedral (with fine stained glass windows (I especially liked the modern ones, e.g. this one), and a cloister, and an old church court equipment). And if you ever come to Chester, visit the Burger Shed 41, Marvellous burgers, and superb doughnuts and ice cream as a dessert. You have to wait to be seated, but it is well worth the struggle!

Chester is not at all far from Wales. Meaning that the buses sometimes end in Wales, and there are Welsh names of places written on these buses. It looks very funny; if you have never seen or heard Welsh, try the BBC Cymru. For example, this and this should be the same article in Welsh and in English, respectively.)

Leeds

Leeds is supposed to be the shopping centre of England (maybe the whole Great Britain), but we were less then impressed.

There is a cathedral which is closed, and some churches which are also closed. There is a canal which is mostly inaccessible because it's all private property. There are many shops, but right now they only sell stuff that they could not sell during Christmas (and we could not come across anything decent in our size). And there is a beautiful market place, which is very art nouveau, but which is full of cheap clothes and cheap home equipment.

The only positive thing is that there are two comics shops.

Summary

We will visit Liverpool and Chester again, and whenever someone visits us, we will take them there. and show them all the stuff.
We will probably visit Sheffield or Leeds only if there is something really interesting - exhibition, theatre, concert. And I guess that we will leave shortly after the event ends.

Edit: stinking, lousy Google has crashed in the middle of updating the blog, and the previous post (the one referred to in the current post) just disappeared. It contained few funny little stories about train travelling in the UK, and some interesting things about buying knives (and having to show your ID to buy them) and everyday things like that. Well, it's gone. I am not going to write it again. :( Hi ho.

Long time no post! Sorry for that, many things have happened in past few weeks.

Of course most of these things have been associated with Christmas. I will try to provide some details of English Christmas celebrations below.

1/ The Secret Santa
Very funny thing; maybe you know it and/or do it yourself. We did this in my company with some colleagues. It works like this.
You persuade bunch of people to participate. (I thought this to be difficult, but obviously this is quite popular here and may people like it and participate. In fact, I thought that this was some 'kid's stuff', something that only young people participate in. Then I was heard people from another company talking about who's secret Santa of whom and whether they have this sorted already or not, and they were talking about this stuff in the lift. Which in my opinion means that it's widespread.)
You put their names in a hat; people pick one name from the hat (if they pick their name, they have to give it back and repeat).
Everyone has someone's name, and has to buy a present for that person. (There's usually a cap on spending, to avoid people getting too cheap or too expensive presents.)
Not surprisingly, it was all fun. It showed that some people know some people quite well! Anyway, they know me well, because I got a gift that suits me.

2/ The Christmas parties
Endless. At least three of them in our company (which probably means that there are also at least three of them in any other group, club, sports establishment, etc. etc.).
Our company has a certain very stupid tradition which has to be observed by newcomers. (It's like an initiation.) I did not like it at all; I don't really understand why people are being punished and humiliated for joining the company. But as English people say: hi ho.

3/ Pubs full of people
This is closely connected to the previous point. Everyone is celebrating Christmas with endless parties, and therefore the pubs are exceptionally full, day and night. It all starts in early December, and continues to the Christmas day.

4/ Christmas crackers, crowns, and stuff
This is Christmas partyware. A cracker looks like a giant candy. Everyone gets one cracker. Two people sitting next to each other pull the opposite parts of the cracker. The cracker breaks under the pressure, but asymmetrically, and one of the people gets approx. 2/3 of a cracker - with some hidden little present, while the other person gets nothing. There's also usually a paper crown in each cracker, and these are distributed evenly between the people, so everyone gets one crown.
There are usually also other things on the table, such as balloons (better: elongated, sausage-like balloons, so that people can beat each other with it) and miniature confetti shooters (pull a string, and it 'explodes' and sprays papers on people).
In few words: it's a mess.

5/ Trees (and no carps)
Like in the Czech Republic, Christmas trees are sold on many places, usually directly in the streets. Obviously (as advertised), the prices start at £39. we did not buy a Christmas tree - as usually, we've bought a bottle of whisky instead. :)
There's one thing that is not there in the streets: huge blue tubs with carps. In the Czech Republic, the very traditional Christmas Eve meal is carp and potato salad, and people like to buy the fish absolutely fresh. This means that there are carp-containing tubs in the streets, where sellers have their stalls. You can buy the poor animal alive and kill it yourself, or you can have it killed by the fishermen who sell it. (I prefer the second option, and, frankly, I think that the first option should be banned. People usually don't know how to kill the fish quickly, and in the end it's like animal torture really.)
Well, no surprise that in this turkey eating country, people do not buy fish like this.

6/ Santa's grotto in Arndale shopping centre
Oh yes, there was an enclosed space which looked like something between an odd-coloured Christmas tree and a rock: Santa's grotto. We haven't been inside, but there's allegedly Santa Claus inside, and if you have kids, you can pay approx. £5 to £10 per kid to visit the grotto.
There were also elves, guarding the entrance. I wonder whether it was a coincidence that the elves were young girls with revealing clothes, and the kids were usually accompanied by dads...
(Just for the record: in the Czech Republic, it is not Santa Claus who delivers the Christmas presents. Therefore, I have never done this as a kid.)

7/ Christmas markets
Installed up to 21 Dec, with huge sales on the last weekend. Full of people up to the last moment.
Interestingly, there was a huge hanukkah 'candleholder' just near the Christmas market.

8/ Total shutdown
This country went through an absolute, total shutdown just before Christmas. In the week starting 21 Dec, there were very little cars on the streets, and not many people in the streets. The buses were half empty. Many shops were closed, or were only open for few hours a day. On 24 Dec, which is supposed to be a normal working day here, I went to work, but apparently I was one of the few. Then we were kicked out of the office at 3 pm, which was a nice surprise for everyone but me - I had stuff to do, and wanted to stay until 4 pm!

8/ Christmas Day
...is 25 December. That's funny, because in the Czech Republic, the most important day is 24 Dec (it is a holiday, and presents are unpacked on 24 Dec in the evening). Therefore I am usually confused when people start talking about Christmas Day!
Anyway, absolutely nothing works on 25 Dec. No shops are open, not even the huge ones which are normally open 24/7. There are no buses, and no trams, and no transport at all.

9/ Ho ho ho!
Santa's signature laughter. Can be seen or heard everywhere, written on the shop windows, buses and city halls, and said by barmen, shop assistants, bus drivers, colleagues at work, and everyone. The first thing we have heard on 25 Dec morning was our neighbor next door saying 'Ho ho ho' loudly. The automatic cash desks in Tesco say 'Ho ho ho merry Christmas' even now. O_o

10/ Bah humbug!
If you are disgusted or tired of all the Christmas stuff around, or if you just want to be less mainstream, you can say this instead of 'Ho ho ho' (see above). Many people do. Many shop windows etc. do as well.

11/ Christmas jumpers
Everyone wears funny jumpers with snowmen, reindeer, Santa Claus, elves, elf clothing, Christmas trees, or (the most conservative people) Norwegian designs. This year, some people had Minions dressed as Santa on their jumpers. Sometimes, there are things attached to the jumper: for example, fluffy spherical objects which are supposed to resemble snowballs, or orange pointy things that should simulate snowman's nose, things like that. I have seen a guy who had a transparent pocket for a smartphone in his jumper, and the smartphone showed a fireplace with fire.
If you want to be less mainstream, you can wear 'bah humbug' jumper instead.

11a/ Christmas jumper day
We have had this in our office. Everyone is supposed to wear their ugliest finest Christmas jumper, and donate to Charity. I don't have any suitable Christmas jumper, but my husband has a Swiss jumper (which I gave his as a present when I returned from a skiing trip), and this jumper has some deer and things on it, so it qualifies as Christmas jumper, and I could wear that.
People obviously take this seriously, because when my boss arrived to the office, and found that there was a Christmas jumper day, he went to quickly buy one to the nearest shop.
You are not supposed to wear Christmas jumpers after 6 January.

12/ Ugly Santa near the city hall
There's an incredibly ugly Santa Claus on the main square. I hope it will disappear soon. If we are lucky, it will get damaged, burnt and destroyed during New Year's celebrations.

13/ Christmas cards
Everyone sends or gives Christmas card to everyone else. You send cards to friends, parents, colleagues, doctors, lawyers, customers, suppliers, subcontractors, business partners, neighbours, your dog, and the guy you've met yesterday in Aldi.
The cards are usually quite ugly, with some Christmas kitsch Christmas pictures and things. Sometimes there are (stupid) things written in the cards, and sometimes there is an empty space so you can write your own wishes there.
I myself only gave one real, paper Christmas card, to one of our secretaries who helps me a lot (and I wanted to thank her for all that). I have personally received zero paper cards, and a few e-cards. We (me and my husband together) got two cards from friends in the Czech Republic. Our landlady got approx. zillion cards, in coloured envelopes of funny shapes.
It seems that this card business is a-booming here, they have cards for, like, every occasion. Not only Christmas, but also birthday, weddings, childbirths, new jobs, retirements, moving your house, your kid's first teeth, everything.

All right, that's that. I am kinda glad that it's all over now... but I also hope that next year, I will be able to participate in all this like a real English person! :)

Few more funny English words:

• craic - fun in a pub (comes from Irish gaelic, and the pronunciation is roughly similar to 'crack' - I was a bit confused when people started talking about 'crack' they had in a pub!)
• banter - same meaning as craic. Interesting fact: a person can be a good craic, but you cannot be a good banter. Being good craic means that the person is a good pub companion.
• hi ho - that's how it is and nothing can be done about it.
• sausage dog - dachshund (for my Czech speaking friends: 'jezevčík').

And one very interesting thing: the English people do have a special marker just for bingo! Really, seriously, a special marker for bingo, not suitable for anything else. I am not kidding. Try to google 'bingo marker' or something like that, and you will see yourself.

It has wide, flat tip, which is designed to make big dots. Which is very useful, because the numbers come quickly one after another, and they are scattered all over the page, so you need to be quick in marking them.

(Yes - indeed. I have played bingo. I think I've quite boosted my Englishness!)

I have learned few more interesting words/wordings:

• iffy: suspicious
• path of least resistance: the easiest option (we use this in Czech as well, nice to know that English people say the same thing)
• it doesn't smell very good: it's probably some dirty business (again, we use this in Czech as well)
• tissue of lies: lot of lies

Apart from this, I would like to make one observation. The Mancunian dialect is not very understandable, no doubt about that. However, I have no idea how does it sound! The other day, I was discussing with one of my colleagues. I mentioned that I don't understand one particular person very well; he replied, yes, that person has a particularly thick Mancunian dialect. Then I mentioned another person I don't understand. He commented in the same way. The point is, these two people speak so differently that I would never guess they come from the same city! What is this Mancunian dialect, then?

My writing has been suspended over past few days, because my mum was visiting.
(English people reacted like English people: when I'd told them that I needed two days off, they asked 'is it good thing or bad thing?')

Anyway, we've spent wonderful four days wandering around the city, visiting the canal, shopping, drinking hot wine on Christmas markets, and so on.

My mum also wanted to go for a trip by tram (anywhere... she did not care much), and so we went to MediaCityUK. This is part of Salford where the Manchester docks used to be, and all the cotton and merchandise used to go through there. Well, long time ago! Now it's a place of fancy flats, posh quays, and huge BBC studios. And the University of Salford!

There is also Imperial War Museum, which currently hosts exhibition about Blitz. The exhibition is based on Horrible Histories books, and is actually very good! Definitely worth seeing, and not just because it is for free. :-)

I liked that place. It looks very unique, a bit like something in Holland (because of the canals). Fancy. I would like to live there, but I am not rich enough.

I was not impressed by the trams, though. The whole system is called Metrolink (what a fancy name!), and it's probably supposed to operate like a rapid transit system, but - you wish! In reality, it is rapid between Deansgate-Castlefield and maybe the next stop. The rest of the time, it just turns in ridiculous curves, goes on single track, or does other stupid things. Plus, MediaCityUK is a 'final stop' (in a sense that if a tram comes, it only can leave in the direction from which it arrived), so the tram driver has to take his stuff and go to the other side of the tram to continue the journey to Eccles.

I have just now found the interesting and funny information that the Metrolink trams are operated by a subsidiary of RATP. I think this explains a lot.

Apart from this, we have also visited lot of pubs and restaurants. We are still searching for The Perfect Beer (search continues), but I think that we are pretty close to The Perfect Burger. It may be had in Byron Burgers, on Piccadilly Gardens, or on John Dalton Street. Yummy!

On the other hand, I think that we are also pretty close to the worst restaurant in Manchester. Avoid Slug and Lettuce at all costs! My husband had fish and chips there, and he was nearly poisoned by that stuff! The fish was not fresh, that's that. Plus, the staff is weird, and the beer is not worth. Never again, ever.

Yesterday, I have decided to become a more positive person! And to learn a bit more of English grammar.

I have a reason for that. English people keep correcting my stuff, and whatever I write, they don't like. And while I keep telling them that they cannot change me into a native speaker, because this has been decided quite some time ago, I can certainly improve my writings skill. So I will at least try, because them re-drafting everything just makes me mad.

(I have already started to work on my use of articles (a, the). I have discovered a simple rule: just put them anywhere you can, even if it feels that they should not be there. Just do it, don't question. English people are usually happy with the outcome.)

Apart from English language problems, we have still a problem with beer. Mostly, English people drink either ale (which I find awful, because it is sour), or IPA (which is in my opinion not much better). And to add to the horrible taste, ales and IPAs are served warm. Duuuh! As an alternative, each pub usually sells at least one lager - which is usually either local stuff (= nearly tasteless stuff which is served far too cold), or Heineken (weak, tasteless, and again served a bit too cold).

Therefore, we had to try almost immediately when we've found a pub with draft Kozel. I was a bit worried that this would be Kozel, English style (= could be better, to put it in English way). Yesterday, we gave it a go. It was not bad. I've had better, but considering local habits of drinking beer warm & gasless, it was excellent.

It rains all the time now, and the city is awfully full of people, because Christmas is approaching. Therefore the Christmas markets are kinda nightmare now. Luckily, English people are in general good people, so no one is trying to steal your wallet. (In Prague, your stuff would be stolen in ca 5 pikoseconds, especially in such a gathering of people.)

Speaking of  Christmas, there is one very funny thing we have also discovered yesterday. Christmas service of the public transport!

In Prague, the public transport during the Christmas festive season is usually very funny, trams and buses go maybe every 30 min - but at least there are some trams and buses! Yesterday, my husband picked a TFGM leaflet, which informed us about the Christmas services. It will be more or less like this:
- 24 December: buses run until 6 pm, then no service;
- 25 December: no buses (!!!!!);
- 26 to 30 December: holiday/Sunday schedules, with some services cancelled, some replaced by some other services, etc.;
- 31 December: no buses between 6 pm and 11 pm, then there will be (hopefully) something.

Trams have a very similar schedule, with no trams on 25 December. (Really. No trams. Just like that.)

Well, this is a joke, isn't it?

English people are funny!

There was a party last Friday, because one of my new colleagues was already becoming former colleague - he left the company, and wanted to celebrate this. (Btw, another word to my collection of new English words I did not know before: do. It means also party.) Anyway, we went for few drinks etc., you probably have a decent idea of how this works. During this party, I engaged in a terrible argument, in which I've discovered the following:
- parts of Greater Manchester where there is no tram connection to the city centre suck, and are considered inferior;
- people from Liverpool tend to steal things and stab other people;
- I myself am funny person because there is no tram going to the place I live;
- you are allowed to criticize things, and you are allowed to say things as above (...that Liverpool people are thieves, or that people like me are inferior because of no tram) - as long as you do not mean them.

To explain the bad things mentioned above - you can generally say nasty things light-heartedly, but you must not say nasty things if they are actually true. If you want to really criticize something (...you are really unhappy with that thing), you must not say it like this, you must 'wrap' it, present it in a softened, much nicer way. Example: my colleagues could not care less where I live. Therefore they can say that I live in dirty suburb. However, if I don't like some stuff that some people do in the office, I must not say 'you are doing lousy job, and the work product sucks'. I must say something like 'have you considered doing it little bit differently', 'I did not quite understand what you meant here', or something like that. O_o

(To be fair, I have seen funny things on the bus which seem to confirm the 'lousy suburbs' theory. For example, there was a lady who cleaned her teeth... with her jumper! She just grabbed the sleeve of her jumper, and cleaned her teeth. Duuuuh! And other disgusting stuff I do not really want to describe here.)

Apart from this, more funny things happen to me every day.
I am constantly offered milk in the kitchen of our office. Every time I am in the kitchen, making tea (green tea...), and there is someone else, the person is (i) pouring milk in his/her drink, and (ii) offering me milk before putting it back to the fridge. I think that one day I will give up, make a cup of black tea - and then use the milk. But I think that when it comes, I will ask some English people for explanations, and I will make them tell me how to do this properly. It will be fun!

The other day, we had a visit from Asia in our office. The guy came with some little Asian cakes and cookies. Well, I expected them to be more exotic, but nevermind; the funny part was that some of these cookies tasted like pineapple. English people told me that pineapples were pretty exotic. I told them that now it's 21st century, and pineapples are, like, everywhere, maybe even grown in Europe in some greenhouses or whatever. Well, they replied, pineapples were considered exotic in 18th century, and still are, and that's that. Like, seriously? O_o In case you haven't noticed, it's 2015 already!!

The English people also keep correcting everything I write. I mean, I write quite a lot in my job, and these English guys are very obsessive about many things - meaning that they usually say 'I have made few minor stylistic changes', and this means that all my sentences magically disappear and are replaced by their words and sentences. Which makes me kinda depressed, because I've never had problems like this (in particular, no one has ever told me that what I write had been unclear). I am also not that convinced that I would ever write like a native speaker (simply because I am not one, and I cannot change this).

But just to finish this - English people are not the only funny people around. My husband is also very funny sometimes. In particular, I don't quite understand why he struggles so much with local coins. English coins are: 1p (small copper circular coin), 2p (big copper circular coin), 5p (small silver circular coin), 10p (big silver circular coin), 20p (small silver heptagonal coin), 50p (big silver heptagonal coin), £1 (small and thick yellow coin, quite distinct), £2 (big bi-coloured yellow and silver coin, again quite distinct).
It's not that difficult, is it... but for unknown reason, my husband is absolutely unable to remember the coins, and every times we have to pay anything in any shop, it takes ages, because he has to check every coin value, and decide whether it is suitable for the purpose or not.
(My husband now insists that I add the following information: (i) the coins do not have the value written on them in one easy, big number, they rather have just text (quite small to be fair) that informs you that this one is 'one penny', 'fifty pence' etc.; (ii) it's not that the bigger the coin, the higher the value, and the sizes vary: 5p (the smallest) -> 1p -> 20p -> £1 -> 10p -> 2p -> 50p -> £2 (the biggest).)
And the funniest part is that every time I lose my temper and just pick the right coins from his hand straight away, he accuses me of being English person!

English expressions I did not know before coming and I now know them.

(I often learn new funny words these days. Many of them come from discussions with my colleagues, who use interesting colloquial words or expressions. I list some of them below.)

• quid - £. Used only in singular, even if there are many of them. When talking, £20 becomes twenty quid.
• dog's dinner - something really messy
• ish - approximately. If you want to come at ca 5 pm, you say five... ish. If you want to say that you are kinda happy, you say I am happy... ish.
• gauge - the distance between train tracks
• stick to one's guns - not listen to arguments and insist on one's opinion instead
• nifty - similar to cool, but not really. Definitely a positive word.
• the flip side of the coin - in pros and cons, this is the cons part
• cards on the table - stuff revealed. We have the same expression in Czech, but it is nice to know that they actually really use it here in the UK, too.
• he's the one to talk - said when someone criticizes something but does the same thing all the time
• cheers - means really many things, but most often it is used instead of and/or in addition to thanks
• see you in a bit - see you later
• you ok? - how are you? Often no answer is expected, or a simple 'yeah' or 'fine' will do. In pubs and shops, this means of 'how can I help you', 'what are you going to drink', etc.
• no worries - if someone thanks you, you say this in reply
• haya - hi (there probably used to be more words than just one, but I cannot tell what the other word(s) could be)
• take the mick out of someone - tease someone, make fun of someone
• literally - means anything but literally. People usually use this word to emphasize things, but do not really mean that it was really like that. (So if someone tells you that I literally pissed myself laughing, you can be pretty sure he did not piss himself and he just wants to say that it was really funny.)
• gay - gay. Must be used as adjective. Saying he is a gay is offensive.
• calling a spade a spade - not being afraid of saying the truth, and using real names of things instead of 'wrapping' them
• I say as I think - posh version of previous item

I have visited London for the first time! And tell you what: the city stinks.

We boarded a train leaving at 7.00 sharp. To my surprise, the train was not delayed, and really left the station at 7! During the journey, I spent quite some time watching the English landscape (very green, with brick houses and with sheep!). Then, we arrived at London Euston.

The guys immediately told me that Euston was, like, the most ugly train station ever. Dirt and concrete, that's what they said. They were not far from truth; the station is really ugly, but I'd say that it is so ugly that it's actually pretty good.

We decided to walk to the office. Of course there was a traffic jam, a smelly one. So, once again: London stinks. Literally.

Btw, the buses are also double-deckers, but they look very different from what we have here. Our buses have just one door, and look like boxes. And they are either purple (if they are First buses) or green or red (if they are Stagecoach buses). In London, the buses are red, they have three doors (the one closest to the back of the bus permanently open!!) and in my opinion they look like porcellio scaber. The story goes that London once wanted do buy these long buses which can bend in the middle, but then they decided that these would be dangerous for cyclists, and so they decided to get these red things. (The fact that every other European city runs long bending buses and cyclists are just fine obviously bothers no one in London, they know everything better!)

Unfortunately, we spent the whole day in meetings, so I cannot say much more about London than the above stuff. And in particular I had no chance to go anywhere by metro (which, as the guys told me, I should call the tube, not metro... well, I will call it whatever the h. I like...).

During the journey, I had an interesting discussion about milk. One guy told me that he's lived in Europe for some time, and he was shocked that the people there drank black tea, without milk. So I told him how English his attitude was. He did not quite agree. I described to him my surprise when I noticed that in our office, milk is delivered every day to our door. So English, I insisted. Now he was ready to admit that maybe that was English... And now imagine how surprised I was when I realised that they don't do this in Europe! he continued. No, we really don't do this in Europe, I assured him. So he told me (like it was a secret) that he would bring his own milk to the office every day. Like, really? So English!

Following the previous post (but not only...), I wanted to (i) share again some observations etc. about English people, (ii) tell you more about my trip to Europe. This time I am lazy to distinguish between the two topics or keep them apart - so I won't. :-)

These days, it rains a lot in Mcr. Which brings funny consequences.

For example, when it rains, instability of the internet triples. I tried to skype with people in various European countries during rain, and it was awful every time. Once, download was fine (so I could hear the other side well), but upload was practically non-existent (so when I wanted to say something, skype collapsed). Many times both upload and download went low, and the call sounded like a creaky landline.

Or the trains. The more it rains, the more anarchy there is with the trains.

On the other hand, I would expect the magnitude of the traffic jams to increase sharply when it rains (this is what happens in Prague), but surprisingly this does not happen. The traffic jams obviously follow some complex and sinister pattern which I still need to discover.

English people do not greet each other when they enter a lift. Or when they leave a lift. I find this strange. I was always told to greet people when entering a closed space where there are actually some people, or when leaving such space. Applies to rooms, shops, school classrooms, lifts. Does not apply to trams and buses, but applies to train compartments. And so on. But every morning I just wonder, because when entering or leaving a lift, no one says a word. (Afternoons are the same.)

The little fences which are supposed to block 'wild drinking' on the streets of Manchester were mentioned in one of my previous posts. But now that I've visited Europe (and Germany, of all countries...) again, I realized that the beer in Manchester is not really worth the trouble. First, it is too warm. Second, it has very little gas. Duuuuh! The Germans who sell the beer in Manchester obviously did their homework, and adapted their beer to local taste, but I would prefer if they had not. In Germany, the beer is so much better! And it is actually half the price! (Like, 3 euros for excellent beer compared to 4 quid for that warm, gas-free liquid which looks like beer, oh come on!)

When I came here yesterday, I had to cross Schengen area border. I am not used to that! I am not used to that. I am used to travel across Europe with my ID card only, no worries and no problem at all. But wait... yes, now I live and work in a country which talks about leaving EU all the time (and which issues no ID cards). Ah, screw that.

Btw, ID cards and permanent addresses are two things that you just won't find in the UK. Yes, everyone knows that... but I wonder whether people also realize how funny and silly the address rules are in the UK.

For doing nearly anything, you need a proof of address. To rent a property, to have a credit check done (which is also needed for everything from buying a house to buying a toothbrush), to open a bank account, to buy a cell phone and pay the bills for it, etc. etc., you need a proof of address. Which of course you won't be able to show if you live in a shared place and/or with a private landlord (because many institutions just do not accept letters from the landlords or tenancy agreements) and/or in a place where someone else (like your husband for example) pays the utilities bills. It's a bit like Catch-22 really.

Funny aspect is that every year, you get a letter which invites you to input the names of all people living in your house into electoral register. If you don't, you can go to jail and/or pay an unlimited fine. Wow!

Summarized: you need proof of address for nearly everything, and sometimes it is terribly difficult to get one. But of course, introducing anything loosely related to a permanent address is a big no-no in the UK.

I have also noticed, for the first time in my life, how cheap a country Germany is. :-) This is not a joke, and I am not trying to be disrespectful. I think it is a matter of perspective.

When living in the Czech Republic, one just sees everything through the filter of salaries and prices there. In the Czech Republic, the average monthly salary before tax is ~ 900 € (in local currency it;s 25 000 Kč. I would expect the average in Germany to be something around 3500 € (yes, I know that not everyone lives in Bavaria, but that's reality - in the Czech Republic, not everyone lives in Prague). The prices of things are in correlation with the average monthly income. Consequence? I always considered Germany to be rather expensive for us.

However, now. The exchange rate is roughly 1.5 € for £1, and some things cost little bit more in the UK (in pounds) than they cost in Germany (in euros). Stuff in the UK is expensive (kinda). So I got used to the 'high' prices, and now I am in Germany, and I am like, is this really so? Am I considering Germany to be cheap? What kind of person have I become?

Today, it was raining in Germany (or at least in the city I am in). It probably started during the night, and it continued throughout the day, with more or less the same intensity, and with grey clouds all over the sky. In the morning, I was like, oh this feels like home!

But then I realized just how wrong the rain really is here.

In Manchester, it rains for few hours, and then the clouds go away and we have sunshine, and then it rains again, and so on. So far I have not seen a day which would be like this: heavy grey clouds low above the city and endless rain. This is wrong! :-)

And here comes the most funny thing: right now, I am experiencing some kind of mild identity crisis. I feel like I do not belong anywhere. Cars go on wrong side in the UK as well as in Europe now. When avoiding people, people go to wrong side everywhere. The weather in the UK is ridiculous, but the weather in Europe is not right either. Things that were taken for granted (Germany is expensive for us, we are part of the Schengen area, you can get cheap and good beer everywhere you go, etc.) are no longer true. I miss stuff from Europe in the UK, but when I come here, I suddenly miss some UK stuff. Things seem unfamiliar there, and here as well. I don't like English people adding articles (a, the) everywhere they can in my English texts, but now I do it to other people. And I desperately need to eat sandwiches at least once a day.

I mean, am I the only expat who experiences this, or this is normal and will adjust soon?

(A frustrated post written in a plane, scribbled on tablet. Please excuse any typos etc.)

My first trip to Europe! Since I came here little bit more than one month ago, my longest trip was to Salford (which is just around the corner from Manchester). And now the time has come for me to enjoy a trip to Germany!

(Now they are threatening us with trbulence.)

Ok, so my plane was scheduled at around 5.30 pm. I am usually required to be in the office until 4 pm, but I got an exemption today. I checked the tfgm.com website for trains. The trains are supposed to go ca every 10 minutes. The journey is supposed to take ca 20-25 min.

Now, the reality is that UK rail operators are a mess. (One of my bosses has taught me an expression "dog's dinner". Well, UK rail operators, that's exactly that, dog's dinner.) I am not sure whether there is just one transport / rail authority or there are more of them, but it's a mess either way, and all companies are equally bad obviously.

All the trains were delayed, some of them terribly. There should have been train going to the airport from platform 13 in about 5 min. So I went there. (It's pretty far, 13 and 14 are the furthest platforms.) There was a train, weirdly standing so that its first carriage was in the middle of the platform. No one was getting in or out. The driver refused to let us in, claiming that he was only waiting for green light.

(Lufthansa gave me a sandwich! This hasn't happened to me for ages! My inner Englishman is delighted.)

The info given on the platform was that the train would leave in about 2 min. (There was no train at that moment.) After ca 10 min I decided to try to ask a railway guy. I was not the only one asking, and we were all told that the train was delayed (thank you cpt Obvious) and that in about 5 min, there would be train from platform 5.

So I went to platform 5, which turned out to be platform 4. At first, I was slightly optimistic, because at least there was a train. I boarded that train. Scheduled departure was 15.52.  Every 1-2 minutes, this changed +1 min. At 16.20, the train was still there, on that platform.

Someone then announced something like "we cannot leave because we don't have the driver, we don't know where he is, he is not here but we are chasing him and we should depart soon, and all passengers who really want to go to the airport now should go to platform 13, because a train will go from there to the airport at 16.29".

So I went to platform 13, and guess what. There was bunch of panicking, desperate-looking people, and a train which did not want to let anyone in. O_o

After some more waiting, a train finally arrived and it was announced that it would go straight to the airport. It was 16.36. (In the meantime, the train on platform 13 left, train to Scarborough arrived on platform 14a, and ca 1/3 of the desperate-looking people boarded that train. What was so critical about train to Scarborough, I don't know.)

The airport-bound train quickly filled with panicking passengers. Many had huge bags, and many wanted to stay as close as possible to the doors, and that created a mess. (People were basically tripping over each other.) But a miracle occurred, and we actually started moving shortly before 16.45.

Arrival to the airport was also funny. Luckily I was on the right side of the train, close to the door adjacent the platform (which was in fact the left side of the train...), and as I am not lazy to run a bit, I was able to arrive at airport security before almost everyone else. Therefore I had to wait for only ca 10 min.

(We had tail wind and would be landing shortly.)

And you know, the best part really is that due to strong winds, the Hansa plane was delayed! When I finally came to the gate, instead of finding empty chairs and nervous attendants waiting for the last few people, I found 100 Germans, nervous because things were not in order!

Like, seriously?

Last but not least... there's a portion of interesting things and observations (which do not quite fit into previous two posts, so they are separate).

The weather starts to be really funny. I guess it's because a) the winter is coming, b) the sea is nearby, c) this is England, but last few days were unbelievable. Thursday was very warm, it was maybe 18 °C, really a pleasant day. There was a rain in the afternoon, but not too long and not too heavy, just a shower. Then, on Friday, it was, like, 6 °C, windy, raining, absolutely awful weather. Saturday was very similar to Friday, f. cold. And Sunday? Back to more than 15 °C, and sunshine.
Like, srsly?

The weather also really changes several times a day, and it changes a lot. We are not quite used to this, the changes are slower in the Czech Republic. If the day starts with sunshine, then most of the day the sun is shining, and if the clouds come, then they come slowly, and then last for some time. If the day starts with low grey clouds, it usually ends in the same or similar way. Etc.

Here in Manchester, it's different. The day can start with heavy rain. Few hours later, we have a full and very optimistic sunshine, Then another couple of hours later and we have heavy rain again. And the weather can do this, like 3-6x a day! What!

One of our friends has told us that part of here family comes from Ireland, and there were so many Marys that her grandmother was the only girl in the class who was not called Mary.

English people think that Americans speak 'wrong English'. Which is funny.

The fact that English men can wear suit and fleece/windstopper jacket was already mentioned. However, I have seen them wearing suits and backpacks, and they have apparently done so even when talking to clients! Very interesting!

I have forgotten to leave the bus on time for the first time. It was one of the days with the worst traffic, and I started to write emails on my phone, and it was dark and raining and the bus windows were all wet, and I just missed my station. Which was really funny, because there are some highways which one needs to cross to come back to our station. It was all very funny in the heavy rain and darkness.

This weekend, the Christmas Market opened here in Manchester. Manchester claims to have the biggest Christmas market in the world, and the best Christmas market in Europe, so it's a big thing here. And of course we had to see it.

We've observed the setting of the stands. It all began shortly after the beginning of November. We, as regular visitors to the city centre, have observed the empty wooden houses being built, and the decoration put up. It started to appear in every other street (not just in front of the city council, but seemingly everywhere), and we wondered how big the market would be. Well, it's huge, it really is, and Manchester people say it's really the biggest market in the world, and after yesterday and today, we believe them.

Anyway. We have observed the following funny and/or interesting things:

- It is possible to buy beer and actually drink it (which, after we've been to non-alcoholic bonfire night, was a surprise), but not without any limitation. There are small fences which delimit the market areas, and every fence has posters on it which forbid bringing alcoholic beverages outside the area delimited by the fences. O_o

- There's a huge 'German beer German sausage' fashion, which we don't mind at all. But of course there are buts. The beer is warm and contains less gas than it should. Funny English people!

- The market really spreads through the whole city centre. There are maybe 10 main streets and 5 main squares with stand.

- The stands sell Christmas-themed stuff (uh oh), clothes (some of it appears not bad), bags, furniture, gardening tools and flower bulbs, bonsai trees, Buddha statues, French cheese and delicatessen, Swiss cheese, Dutch cheese and wafers, Spanish sausages and meat, Greek olives, million kinds of sweets, hot wine (with some rather odd tastes such as strawberry or amaretto, yuck), and so on and so on.

- There appear to be real French, German, Dutch, Spanish, etc. people selling the respective goods.

- People drop money all the time, especially small coins. It seems that they don't care at all, and they for sure don't bother picking other people's money from the ground! (Maybe they do not even see it.)

- I have also dropped money, £1 to be precise, and it fell in between some planks so I could not get it back. (Grrr.) But I've soon raised £1.18, coming from picking money lying on the ground, and returning one glass left behind by some guy. (There are deposits on glasses there.).

- There are, like, thousands of people there, but they are more or less polite, and no one sells junk Russian souvenirs there, which is a nice surprise compared to similar events in the Czech Republic.

- Overall, the experience is not so bad, but I suspect that I am biased already, because I've had two German wheat beers. :-)

After some complaints from fans of this blog, I've decided that I needed to stop postponing... so here it is, brand new post.
(To keep it all tidy, I will probably make more of them, just to be sure not to mix ideas and concepts. And I will tell you everything, don't worry. :-)

Sunday 8 Nov was Rememberance Sunday. We did not know (because we are not British, and, as explained previously, we don't care about Armistice Day and all that very much in the Czech Republic), and therefore we were surprised... well, more than once.

We wanted to go for a walk. So we boarded a bus. Which did not quite go the expected route. In fact, it seems that the main road from where we live to the city centre was closed, and the bus was diverted... through some unknown and obscure streets... seemed pretty odd, we expected to go to Manchester, and for few moments it seemed like we were going who knows where.

But we have seen a tiny military parade! People in military uniforms, everyone wearing poppy of course, marching through one of the streets. With music. And when the bus finally arrived to the city, and we came to the war memorial (that one behind the city council), we have seen a biker gang there (but not like hell's angels, no Harley Davidson and stuff, these people obviously ride scooters!) with some flowers and things. And an old man who seemed to be soldier himself during that time. Seeing that man, walking with sticks only but putting his sticks aside just to be able to stand at attention and salute to the memorial, that was actually pretty emotional.

And then all the poppies everywhere. I guess this is genuine British stuff. Since maybe half October, everyone was wearing poppies. Plastic ones of course, because poppies are no longer flowering in Oct / Nov. This whole thing is called poppy appeal, with the Royal Infantry (and maybe also someone else) raising money for modern war veterans (people coming back from Afghanistan etc.) and their families. Seems that here it is sort of obligation to buy one, and contribute,So I got one myself, just to be more 'British'. (I got one with added value, made of red hi-viz material, so that when I attach it on my backpack, it's going to make me visible to cars. Or at least I hope so.)

Then, 11 November was the Armistice Day.

I did not know what exactly to do, so I went to see the guy from the office next to mine to ask him about what is expected. He explained to me that there would be a gunfire at 11 am (except that here in Manchester it's a fake because Manchester does not have its own gun), and that people are expected to keep 2 min silence. Well, he said, it was not obligatory to do this, no one has to do anything he does not want to do, it would be just fine not to make any loud noises during these 2 min, just show some respect. Then, after two minutes, there would be another gunshot and that would be all.

So I decided to do like British people, and I actually really held the 2 minutes of silence. Like everyone else in the office; it was very interesting to actually hear no noises. We are really many there, so you can always hear someone talking, moving things, walking around, making phone calls etc. But not on 11th hour of 11th day of 11th month.

After that there were loads of  plastic poppies everywhere, all over the city. They could be seen around every single war memorial, no matter the size. Everywhere. Seems that British people really mean it when they say they want to remember the war!

After all this, people seem to be slowly removing their poppies from their clothes etc. (But not suddenly, some are still wearing them, especially those who have purchased the more expensive metal ones.

Interesting!

Today

Remember, remember
the 5th of November
the Gunpowder treason and plot!
I see no reason
why Gunpowder treason
should ever be forgot!

OK. So today is Bonfire night aka Guy Fawkes Day. We were really curious about this, and really looking forward to seeing it. And honestly, we were a bit disappointed.

There was a funfair, a bonfire and a firework show in one of the parks close to the place we currently live. So we decided to go there, and have a look. Yes, there was a funfair, with lots of kids' stuff. They were selling lightsabers there! And some burgers, and hot dogs, and things. There was also bonfire, that's right. And loads of people.

But we were missing one of the most important things: the beer stall. There was none! No one was selling anything at least mildly alcoholic, it was only coke etc. everywhere. Like, seriously? How about 0.5 l of beer in a plastic disposable cup? No? How can you ever have a celebration (or a funfair, or whatever) without beer? Incredible. This sucks.

Funny consequence of this 'prohibition': we have seen some skinheads drinking... mineral water. (!!!)

(And there's no way around. They just do not allow any alcohol there. There were some security people there at the entrance and they wanted to see everyone's backpack and/or insides of a jacket (or coat), just to check if people are not trying to sneak in (i) bombs (illegal), (ii) guns (illegal), (iii) knives (also illegal), (iv) alcohol (illegal in public, and illegal to carry in open containers), (v) own fireworks (probably illegal, and very much forbidden in the park), (vi) any glass container (forbidden in the park), (vii) porn (??), (viii) drugs (this is the only ok item). So: no way to bring your own beer and drink it in the dark!)

But OK, there was bonfire, and it was nice... ish.

Yesterday

Nothing very interesting, but: there was a dustbin action!

Every other Thursday, the dustbin collection people come, but there's a but (of course). Every house in our street has a small backyard. Every house in the neighbouring street has also a backyard. There is a small gap between these backyards, like a tiny street. Closed by some bars at each end, just for sure. There is basically nothing there, just some bins, because the alley (not even street...) is too narrow.

And now for the but: you have to take the bin out of the backyard (where it is stored in order not to be stolen), and bring it in front of the bars. Which seems easy, but doing it in the darkness of the night, when there are other bins all over the alley etc., that is just funny.

Of course, when the bin is emptied, the bin has to be taken back to the backyard. Through the alley, which is now full of empty bins, because the neighbors are quicker than us.

However, husband has shown his potential: mission accomplished, bin's empty! :-)

There is a reason why I haven't written anything since Wednesday, and that reason is my husband. On Thursday (yes, almost a week ago...), my husband arrived to Manchester. So I had to show him many things, share my collection of streets with him, etc. And then we did some discovering together!

We went to see the channels, the shops (there is a big Dr Martens shop where I intend to buy shoes very soon), Piccadilly Gardens, and things. We had cider in one bar (and it was not bad!). We had a burger (finally). We got a monthly bus ticket for him. And so on.

We were also victims of a full English breakfast. The girls made this incredible food for all four of us, and we braced ourselves and ate it. Well, eggs, bacon, sausages, more bacon, baked beans, more sausages, toasts, baked tomatoes, mushrooms, and some extra bacon. And an extra half of sausage! With HP sauce (basically tastes like something between ketchup and bbq sauce with extra vinegar). And, as an extra bonus, a tiny little bit of Marmite to boost the experience and make it unforgettably British. Wow!
The downside: we were only able to eat again at around 6 pm.
We also don't understand how they can eat it, and not have at least 0.5 l of beer with it.

During our city walk, we noticed something funny. All the restaurants announce that Christmas bookings now taken and things like that. Interesting! Means that a) people go for Christmas dinner to restaurants, b) they do so a lot, because booking in necessary already in October.

On the Manchester main square (the one with the city hall), there is something going on... there's a huge orange and red 'statue' of Santa Claus (or who...) on a huge construction, and there are announcements of Christmas markets and ice rink. Well, guys, it's the beginning of November now! Is it really needed to start Christmas prep now?

On a more funny (and more interesting) side, we've seen two people (probably a husband and a wife) riding a houseboat through the locks on the Rochdale channel! And it seemed like a pretty complex thing to do! The guy left the boat (with mug full of coffee), opened one half of the lower door, ran to the upper door, ran across the upper door, and opened the other half of the lower door. His (presumed) wife came in with the boat, the guy reversed the action and closed the lower door. Then he allowed the water to flow from above the upper door to the space between the doors, and then, when the boat came up, he opened the upper door (using the lower door as a bridge) and the boat went through. And then he closed the whole thing, jumped to the boat, explained to us that it was 31 October, i.e. Halloween, and that only a crazy person would stay with the boat in the city centre, and left for the next lock.

Yes, Halloween. We had a Halloween quiz in the office (lot of questions about Norman Bates, Freddy Kruger and folks like that, and some practical tests such as eating a hanging donut). My team did not win, and no wonder, I did not help them much... Also, some kids came knocking on our door on Saturday evening, but we pretended not to be here. (Because we were alone in the house, did not have any sweets, and did not know how to do it properly anyway.) After few minutes, they left elsewhere, probably to claim some Snickers from the neighbours.

I just hope that I will be able to find out how to celebrate the bonfire night - which is on Thursday - soon enough. (I will ask in the office, some English people might know something...)

Well, apart from these very funny things, not much is going on now. I still go to my office by bus. (Funny thing: there is a line in the bus, which says that no standing passengers are allowed behind this line until the bus stops. So I stayed in front of the line when I wanted to leave and waited for the bus to stop. The driver was confused, and did not know whether he needed to stop or not, because obviously there was no one getting ready to leave the bus. Yes, there was me, but I was not behind the line, getting close to the door etc.) I still occasionally walk along the traffic jam. (Just today I did so, selecting the bus I liked most.) My boss still corrects tiny English grammar errors in my work. (I accused him of being article obsessed the other day. He proudly agreed.) And so on.

And by the way: I think that maybe - just maybe - I am happy now.

Today, I will start from the end of the day, and go retrospectively towards the beginning. :-)

In the evening, there was a colossal, monumental, enormous traffic jam. I mean, it was really bad this evening, even compared to the other days. Instead of getting in the bus on my usual station, I walked a bit, and actually was able to overtake approx. 8 buses stuck in the traffic. (Then I thought I've had enough of that, overtaking a huge traffic jam is not the most beautiful walk in the world, However, I think that if I'd walked, I'd have been at home earlier than by bus. (But it's 6 miles, and I am lazy.)) Anyway, when I finally chose a bus, I went to the upper deck - a mistake, because I got sick there. :-( I hate buses.

Before that, I had a very funny day in the office.

I explained to my boss that today (28 October) is our Czech national day, an anniversary of establishment of Czechoslovakia. (Czechoslovakia is the state that we consider our predecessor state and in fact the first free Czech (and Slovak) state in about 300 years. So it's still pretty important, at least in theory.) I also explained to him that no one in Czech Republic celebrates 11 November (Armistice day) in any way, and 90% people do not even know why the day is important. This is because at the time the peace accords were signed, we were no longer interested in the war, we had our state, we were finally on our own and not part of Austria-Hungaria, and we had a lot of other things to do.
(Sorry my Czech friends to explain you the obvious!)

We also had a very interesting discussion about certain acts which by law have to take place before certain other acts. Well, so I asked my boss whether there is a way to 'repair' this problem, especially in the most unfortunate situation that these acts are carried out in wrong order.
No, you cannot repair that, the first thing must be effective at the time the second thing happen, was the reply.
Then I asked, and how about signing the appropriate agreement later, but just writing a date which is earlier? People in the Czech Republic do this all the time! Every time they miss the deadline, they just sign an agreement and backdate! (Disclaimer: I never do this, and I strongly disagree with any such practices... however, people in my country do that, and that's that.)
At first, my boss did not understand. Not at all; he just repeated that no, there is no way to repair this, the time limit is just gone, and the whole thing is invalid, because the agreement is signed late and that's that.
I asked whether the authorities would accept an agreement that is signed before the relevant act but filed later.
Yes, that would be accepted.
So I explained once again that there is a little cheat: the agreement is signed after, but made look like it was signed before the relevant date, because instead of the date you signed, you put another, earlier date.
But that's fraudulent behaviour, replied my boss, after he finally understood the (apparently horrendous) concept.
Yes, indeed. Well, I tried to explain to him that Czech people (and I dare to say that Eastern people in general) do not really see this as a fraud: as long as you are only cheating the authorities, it does not even count, it's not a real cheat!
No, this is not how it works in the UK, as my boss explained to me. We as a company never do such things, ever. We never even think about that. Because it's dishonest, fraudulent, and very bad.
Yes it is, I agreed, but people nevertheless do it, because they find it very practical. That's the East: people just do things like this, and they do not consider them bad or whatever, because that's how life goes, you've just sort of established what everyone wished anyway, so where's the point.
No, we ever do this in the UK. It's fraudulent behaviour, and we must not engage in any such activities.
I personally like this very much, this 100% pure and honest attitude, and in fact the constant cheating is one of the (main) reasons I've left my country, but this 'cultural difference' (as my boss put it) it just so funny! And, well, I think that the mere fact that it took me, like, 5 min to explain the whole concept to him, shows that these UK people are really honest, and straight lot.

In connection with the above described, I tried to explain to my boss the meaning of the Czech saying 'vlk se nažral a koza zůstala celá', which roughly translates as 'the wolf is fed while the goat is alive and well'. In the Czech Republic, this applies to the official acts in particular: authorities usually want you to do silly things, so you give up in small details (wolf is fed), but you try to keep the main points in exactly your way (the goad is ok).
My boss laughed very much.

During the day (and actually also yesterday) I noticed that my brain started to act funny. Usually, I speak good English, fluent, with no delays, gaps or funny difficulties. Well, now my brain started to cause trouble, and sometimes takes up to 1 sec to supply my mouth with an appropriate word. Which is annoying! I don't know why this is happening, but I don't like it. Brain, can you just stop it, and start speaking normally, as usual? Please?

During the morning, I went to HSBC, and now I have a UK bank account! There was a very nice lady who explained me things (I had to set, like, million of passwords and security questions, 60% of which I've forgotten already), and I got a small token which looks like toy calculator to get into my internet banking. But hey, I do have an account now!
Yaaaay! I am like a real British person now, I have NIN, a bank account, a real address, a monthly bus ticket, everything.

Before that, I've missed three buses in the morning, and had to wait for 10 min. Good start of the day!

Buses on Sunday are obviously twice as funny as buses on Monday to Saturday.

I went for a short walk in the city, just to have a look around, see some shops etc. On my way back, I waited for ca 20 min, on a totally deserted station near very ugly train station, and during this time (at least according to the timetable), ca 5 buses in my direction were supposed to come. Guess what: there were zero buses in my direction, but there were 5 buses in other direction, which were not supposed to come at all. Then, a final bad thing happened: when one bus in my direction appeared (at last!), and I wanted to show my interest in actually taking the bus by extending hand (exactly as everyone does, and as it is supposed to be done), the bus just ignored me, and did not stop! O_o

I was cold and hungry, and this did not make me a big friend of First bus...

But enough complaints.

The milk has 'wrong colours' here. In the Czech Republic, the milk bottles and boxes are like this:
red: full fat (3.5%)
green: skimmed (~ 0.5%; rare these days)
blue: semi-skimmed (~ 1.5%)
Here in the UK, it's like this:
red: skimmed
green: semi-skimmed
blue: full fat
orange: appears to be more than green but less than blue

Similarly, the still water and the sparkling water seem to be wrongly coloured (but I don't buy these, so I do not care very much).

And the the trash bins also have wrong colours. In the Czech Republic, it's like this:
yellow: plastic
green, white: glass (coloured, white)
blue: paper
black with orange lid: tetrapak
grey/silver: cans (metal)
brown: plant/veg stuff
black: all the rest
Here, they have far less bins than us. They also have black for 'nothing of the above', and it seems that blue is for paper (but I have never seen a blue bin, my landlady claims that this one's been stolen from her). Apart from this: brown is for all packaging (cans, plastic, glass), and there's obviously nothing for tetrapak (which is hardly ever sold here, they sell orange juice in plastic containers similar to the milk containers, would you believe it...) and plant/veg stuff (but maybe they do not need it, with their fancy houses and gardens, which can for sure accommodate a nice compost?).

I add this colour confusion to the list of confusing things, just after 'everything on the streets is on the wrong side, all the time, and all cars are driving in the wrong direction, and the buses stop on wrong side of the street, etc. etc.'

It is obviously nearly impossible to buy decent green tea here. In the shops, in the section marked 'tea', you have approx. one million kinds and brands of black tea, from English Breakfast Super Strong to a no-name box which contains 1000 teabags and costs ca £1.30. But green tea? If any at all, you have a choice between exactly one brand. Which of course only makes lemon flavour green tea - very artificial (IG Farben) lemon flavour, to be precise. O_o

There are cats in the neighborhood. Just today, I opened the front door, and there it was, sitting on the brown bin, a big brown cat. Peering at me, obviously wondering who the hell I was, and then even meowing at me (in a way, 'hooman where is my milk, gimme now'). I must ask the landlady whether I was supposed to feed some cats or what, because the cat was there already yesterday, and it's all funny.

Yesterday, I have also seen a black-and-white cat with a moustache! The cat looked exactly as the internet-wide famous cats that look like Hitler.

And btw, I hate changes of time. From now on, we no longer have BST, now we have GMT here. Well, while I am not an anti-EU person, I would love to abolish this one stupid EU-thing. Down with changes of time!

This is going to be a public complaint about Barclays.

As mentioned previously, I have now my NIN. I also have my passport and two nice letters from my company, proving that (1) I work there, (2) I live where I live. I thought this would be sufficient to establish and prove all the necessary information, and would finally allow me to have a bank account in the UK.

(Yes, I still do not have it. My company is furious, because they want to pay me for my work but paying people cash is difficult. I also had to send the first rent from my Czech account. My landlady was very surprised, and at first did not even know what information I needed, what IBAN was, what BIC/SWIFT was good for. Well, we all learn, now she knows...)

I therefore went to Barclays . It was a bad choice.

I entered the branch where there were, like, 150 people inside, chaotically moving around and waiting in various lines. Usually, there is a guy who tells people what to do and where to go to get what they want, but this guy was nowhere. So I chose one line randomly and waited.

After considerable time, I was able to speak to someone. The lady told me that it was necessary to fill in some application on some iPads downstairs. She asked me about my ID and my proof of address. I showed her my passport, she approved. I showed her my letter, she again approved. I asked explicitly whether the proof of address would be a problem, because after all it was not a utilities bill, but something else. She assured me that it would be fine, that my docs would be sufficient.

So I went downstairs to find the iPads. There were four of them - but only three of them were operational, the fourth one was just frozen, showing a blank screen with tiny 'error' appearing in upper left corner. The other three were occupied by some desperate people (obviously foreigners) who did not know exactly what to do with them, what information was required etc. There was supposed to be someone supporting people having difficulties with the iPads, but no, there was no one. Consequence: I had to wait ca 15 min before one of the iPads became available.

Once I acquired an iPad and activated the application, it almost immediately (step 3/1000) displayed an error message and assured me that staff were on their way to fix it. After another 10 min, no one appeared. In the meantime, one of the two people occupying the other two operational iPads finally figured it out and finished their application, so I could use their iPad instead.

So I filled in the form, which was very long and detailed and therefore a pain in the ** itself. But fine, I did that, expecting that all the ordeal would result in me having an account. After filling, like, one million boxes, I was given reference no. and assured by the machine that someone would come very soon to verify my details and finish the application with me.

So I sat down and waited. I was lucky enough to have a book with me, because it took another 30 min before someone started paying attention to me again. During that time, I was observing the members of staff. Some of them were running around desperately, because there were really many customers, everyone wanted something, everyone had questions, many people had bored kids with them, etc. etc., and obviously the staff could not lose a single second. In contrast, some of them were obviously absolutely incompetent, walking around for no reason, leaving clients for 20 min alone, taking unbelievable amount of time for most trivial actions like printing few papers, etc.

After ca 30 min, a lady from the info booth asked me something like 'and what are you waiting for'? (Politeness at its best!) I explained that I just applied for an account over there, and I was waiting for someone to come. Her first reaction - in a rather patronizing tone - was 'and do you have a proof of address'? So I explained her that yes, I did have proof of address. She wanted to see it. Fine, I showed her. She looked me like I was crazy, and I told her that this has been approved by someone upstairs. She innocently asked, 'and who told you this'? Well, how should I know? One of the ladies at the counter! They do not have names written on their forehead!

The info lady did not like this, so she asked another member of staff about my papers. And this second lady disapproved my documents very categorically, explaining me (again in patronizing tone) that there are specific requirements on the papers and that my papers did not have it, period.

(The only accepted docs are either UK-specific papers such as driving licence or mortgage statement (which you have when you live here since ever, and which I obviously do not have after 3 weeks in the UK), utilities bills or council tenancy agreement (I have neither because I only have a private tenancy agreement (bills incl.) which is not accepted by the bank), or NIN letter (but again my NIN letter is not accepted because it came to the company, not my current address (which I obviously did not have at that time)). Isn't it nice?)

Summarized, 1.5 hr lost, with no bank account at the end, all due to the absolute incompetence of the bank staff. Well, I am not going to recommend this bank to anybody, never.

I tried to file a complaint through the bank website, asking them to remove my data from their systems (they obviously do have all my data, and I no longer want to open an account there, and at this moment I hate them so much that I just want them to remove me from their databases). I wonder what's gonna happen next...

I find all this unacceptable. I have a job here. I make money (not huge money, but not little money either). I want to give my money to the bank so that the bank can do their banky things with it and make far more money. And instead of treating me nicely and politely and actually taking my money, they bother me, insult me, embarrass me, make me feel like stupid little kiddo, and finally tell me that I am not good enough for them because I do not have a utilities bill.

Like, seriously?

As expected, I have a lot to do in my new office, already after 2 weeks. (I don't mind, it's better than just sitting there, but... Well, uh-huh...) It also takes me almost an hour to get home from the office in the afternoon/evening, because around Salford Central, there is always a magnificent, monumental traffic jam. (It's supposed to be only 6 miles, and it takes almost 1 hr! O_o) Therefore the frequency of my posts is lower now, and probably this will continue for some time.

But, ok, to give at least some 'useful' info: brief summary of new things!

I have received my NIN today! This means that I exist, or at least that UK authorities sort of recognize my existence. But of course, the letter says that getting NIN does not entitle me to work in the UK, or be here, or whatever. It's just a number. and that's that. Funny. But it's fine as long as I have one.

I have received my smart card. The Smart Card! It's not operational yet, I am waiting for PIN (our admins expect that to arrive Monday or Tuesday), but still. My first card! Yaaaay!

My entry on The List has been changed, so that my address is the one in Manchester. Now I am very officially here!

My situation in the office is getting a bit better. Now I recognize maybe 1/3 of all the faces (success!), And I do not forget my access card all the time, only ca 30% of cases, which definitely is an improvement.

My stuff arrived today. The driver of the van came with funny stories about serious trouble in Calais (8 hrs waiting!), and some people trying to get into the van (even cutting the tarpaulin!). But fortunately everything's OK now, my boxes are here, which means that all my clothes are here (yay, I missed you so much, my dear little things). The boxes are now occupying 3/4 of my room, and I just hope that my landlady is not going to be pissed off too much... I may try to corrupt her with some Czech beer when she returns from her weekend trip. :-)

As I still haven't come to terms with ale (and English beer in general), I am celebrating the second week as well as arrival of my stuff with a rump steak (British breed, aged 21 days, incredibly good) a bottle of Tsing Tao. Who would've guessed...
Btw: one of my bosses is brewing his own beer. He's promised me one bottle, but so far nothing appeared. I think he's just afraid, because we Czech people are known for a) having good beer, b) knowing the stuff, c) fiercely criticizing everything that does not quite match the 'standard' which is very high for us. :-) I may be mistaken though.

There is also a quick list of interesting things I wanted to share.

Local men are obviously not afraid of wearing pink. Today, there was some breast cancer thing in our office, and everyone was asked to wear something pink. Girls have no problem with this, and obviously guys have no problem either. Good! In Czech Republic, men would absolutely refuse to participate in something like this, because in their opinion, wearing anything pink would make them look 100% gay. Men in Czech Republic are very afraid of being seen as gay. (I personally have no idea why.) Local men obviously do not care, because many guys from our office wore something pink (or at least pinkish). And I have seen at least two guys who have put a pink nail polish on theit little fingers! A Czech man would never, ever wear a nail polish, let alone pink one.

In our office, there's a kitchen, and almost every day someone brings some sweets there. Birthday, return from holiday, engagement, whatever it is, people just eat sweets all the time. And they of course complain a lot how bad this is for their slender fingure... :-)

Everyone drinks coffee or tea... with milk! In the office, milk is obviously delivered to our door, every day. Then, someone (usually the reception people) transfers it into the fridge, and there it is, everyone is pouring it into his/her tea. English people are very... English.

'Wrong' is obviously a very bad word. I was told today never to say that someone is wrong, especially not to that person, even if that person is so mistaken that being mistaken more is just not possible. Saying 'you are wrong' is a big no-no obviously. I was told that instead of telling people 'nasty things which would offend them very much' (?!), it is necessary to do it nicely and politely: 'Have you considered also this?' or 'Could you clarify that?' or 'I don't understand, can you explain a bit more?' would work here much better than saying 'This is wrong!' or 'That is not true.' (In this context, I guess that using the words 'bullshit' or 'crap' is also not possible.) Well... This is going to be difficult for me.

In the biggest Tesco market I've seen here so far, there is a 'Polish' food section. O_o There's also a good selection of beer, luckily also other stuff than ale. However, 'normal' beer (10°) is nowhere, all they have is lager (so 12°). Too bad, but at least they have Pilsener Urquell, Budweiser (the real one), Staropramen, and then a weird brand called Vratislav. (Never actually heard of it, but will try one day to see what it is; maybe this is some UK-specific brand? According to The Internet, it's made by Staropramen, but this is mentioned nowhere on the bottle.)

And a funny story to conclude. Today, I was not particularly impressed by the bus service. I entered a specific bus operated by First (the worst bus company ever, according to many; well...). I did so because it was the first bus to arrive to the station close to a hypermarket I wanted to visit. Well, just few seconds after arrival of this bus, two buses of another line (operated by Stagecoach and also calling at my station) arrived. I have already entered the First bus, so I obviously did not go to the other ones (why should I do that after all?). Then, the other two buses departed, while we stayed in the station. Well, nothing to worry about, this happens quite often here (the first bus to arrive gets most of the people waiting there on the station, and it takes a lot of time for them to enter the bus, so the second bus leaves first, only to become the first bus on the next station and to actually take all the load and depart later than the other one from that next station, and so on; it just keeps switching). But: my f. bus just did not do nothing. The two Stagecoach buses were gone, and the First bus was still just standing there. Then, the driver switched off the engine, left the bus - and lit a cigarette! What! O_o Outrageous, we've spent some 10 min there, waiting for the guy to finish his cigarette! Like, seriously? Ok, maybe there was some timetable issue, the guy might've been too early... but he could've said something to all the people in the bus, instead to just going, without a word, to smoke!
Well, as mentioned already: I am less than impressed.

I wanted to share another portion of interesting things I've met on my way. See below.

I like the fact that English people smile and act politely. In buses (when everyone is pissed off because s/he is stuck in a traffic), on the streets, in shops, people are just nice, they don't look like permanently angry people (like Czech people do).
I actually don't think that this has anything to do with communism, or being West rather than East. No, the situation here is also not easy (esp. for ordinary people), the rents are sky-high, for young people it is impossible to get their own place to live, the politicians are as bad as everywhere (in particular, half the people seem to think that Cameron is a real racist and fascist), things are expensive, the public transport is chaos... but still people are not aggressive and they are not making others feel their frustration (like they do in the Czech Republic, and possibly elsewhere).

Manchester lacks metro, or good tram system, or something that would provide the 'axis' of the city. In cities where there is a metro (or trams with similar function), it is much easier to be oriented, to know where you are and where you want to be (and also how to get there). You just think in the metro/tram network framework, and that's it, and even in places where there's no metro, you still know where you are.
Of course there's no such thing here in Manchester. Here, we have trams which go 'nowhere' (from the 1000 places they should go, they go to basically three). And we have a network of buses which are i) total chaos, ii) total anarchy. No wonder that there are so many traffic jams! I guess people just do not want to use the chaotic, complex bus system, so they go by car... which causes the buses to be even more chaotic because of the traffic jams... which makes people go by their own car even more... and so on... and so on.

I have discovered few new words. One of them is 'ish'. While my friend the linguist claims 'ish' to be a suffix only, I disagree. 'Ish' is usually preceded by a space/pause in speech, and sometimes there's a phrase 'well... ish'. I think this makes it separate word! :-)
(I have asked my landlady, and she thinks that 'ish' is a word too. And she's native, so she should know!)
(For those who do not know: 'ish' is something which makes the previous statement a bit ore vague, and bit less definite. It started as suffix meaning 'soft of' (e.g. pinkish is not exactly pink, it's just sort of pink), but it evolved. A lot.)
Another word I've discovered just today is 'quid'. That means 'pound' (yes, Queen Elizabeth money). But it's funny to hear such a word from someone like your boss. I'd expect this to be slang, but obviously it's just a normal, perfectly acceptable word. (Try to google its origins.)
Third funny thing is the right adjective from 'Manchester'. It's 'Mancunian'. And now I know how to pronounce it! :-)
Last thing: Mancunians obviously call 'trousers' 'pants'. I did not know that, I thought that this was the case only in the US, but obviously the locals think differently!

English men are very interesting when it comes to their dressing habits. Many of them wear suits, obviously only because they have to. There's a guy in the office next to mine who always wears funny stuff and only changes in the office (and very reluctantly...). Everyone loves the 'dress down Friday' here, and all companies seem to be doing it. You can also meet people in suit trousers and shirt, wearing a fleece sweatshirt! Real fashionistas, with pink shirt and brown shoes, and they are wearing fleece hoodies or bright red goretex/windstopper jackets. :-)
Like, seriously?

Second week in the office, third week in Manchester. and I am slowly getting used to the fact that this is forever (...for at least few years, and that is for me as much forever as possible).
Today, while working on my stuff today, I had the feeling that I actually belong to the office for the first time. Aw yiss!

I am now collecting my first experience with a) English houses, b) living in a shared house. So, what are the pros and cons of a tiny English house?
+ it is a house, and it's yours
+ you have two floors, so you can have a (relatively) big kitchen and living room downstairs, and all the other stuff upstairs
+ same for bathroom, you can have a big one, or even more than one (which is useful)
+ you can rent/let some rooms to help you pay bills
- there's a complex system of trash cans, you have at least two of them (sometimes three, each with different colour, and a timetable for each one)
- it can be rather cold there (you do not want to waste, so you only turn on the heating, let's say, 20 min before people return home in the evening or 20 min before they get up in the morning, and then only for 1 hr - meaning that the rest of the time, it's cold there!)
- it's usually either affordable and far from everywhere, or totally expensive
+/- the main windows are to the street, so you can see everything, but everything can see you

I will for sure think about other stuff later, don't worry.

What else do I find funny and/or interesting?
* There's a tiny concrete backyard, where you can have plants in pots, and do many things such as grill parties. It is all decorated by a bunch of cables. When I asked about that - it's landline! Phones! O_o Seriously, phones like this, on poles?
* There's even tinier concrete 'garden' in front of the house. The door is equipped with everything, there's a doorknocker and this little hole for mail.
* I can hear the neighbors' kid running up and down the stairs.
* The backyard has its own door, and in this door, there's a tiny trapdoor for cats. Really! It is there! (However, I examined it just now, and it appears to be one way only. Very interesting!)

Well, (probably) more interesting things to follow in few daus! Stay tuned! :-)

Since last Saturday (and my last post), I went through many adventures. :-)

One of them was moving to my new place. The house is located about 20 min by bus from the city centre, which is not that bad, but local people are already making funny faces when they hear that. On Sunday, my big moving day, I knew exactly which bus to take, and where this bus usually departs from... and all my knowledge was totally useless!

I came to the bus stop, and found a funny paper sellotaped to the booth, saying that due to reconstruction, the station was not operational, please use the next station which is on Oxford Street. Fine, well. Such notice generally triggers two possible questions: where exactly is Oxford Street? And, more importantly: where exactly on Oxford Street (which is very long) the station is supposed to be?

I was lucky, there was a guy in high viz clothes, shouting at people ('What are you waiting for here? There's no bus from this station today! My throat hurts so much from having to tell people all the time!') to go away, who was also able to tell me what to do. Basically, he initially wanted to explain to me how to get to the next station, then had a long look on all the stuff I was carrying, and then decided to tell me that there was a free shuttle bus to that next station. So I followed his advice...

...wrongly, of course. I left the shuttle bus approx. 1 station before I should've, so I had to carry all my stuff through the streets anyway. Then, I did not know where exactly my bus was supposed to stop (and it was a bigger crossroads...). So I decided to just stand on one corner and watch the buses, see where they go, and chase them when it comes - and in the worst case miss one bus and then jump into the next one. I was lucky, there was a nice driver who's seen me with all the stuff, waited for me to board the bus, and then waited for me to find the £1 for the ticket! I think I must've looked ridiculous and very foreign, because he was waving at me when I left the bus. (On the right station! Success!)

Then, I got to know better the girlfriend of my landlady. She is very nice!

Of course, I am Czech, and so I have to have beer with everything, including things like moving. So I got some Budweiser (the real one! I checked, and it was 'brewed and bottled in České Budějovice') in one of the shops in the city centre, and brought the beer here. We drank it together with my landlady, to celebrate that I've moved in. :-)

Next adventure was morning, and getting to work.

I got up, had coffee (marvelous coffee my landlady makes), and went for a bus. Of course one bus left just before I got to the station (no comment), and the next one took long time to come - that was not the worst. I was stupid enough to go upstairs, to the upper deck. It was cold and humid, the windows were all wet, and the bus is basically only a bit better than a ship sailing past Tierra del Fuego. Result? Motion sickness, of course. I was very glad I was able to get off the f. bus! Never again, ever!

Third adventure was actually getting back. Yesterday, when I came here with all my stuff, all the notices only informed about the station on Piccadilly Gdns being closed on Sunday. You'd expect everything to be sorted on Sunday, then, and a normal operation from Monday, right?  Because if there were any issues expected for the whole next week, they'd tell you straight away, right? They would not put the notice for Sunday only, right?

No. This is not how Manchester and its TfGM works. No no, you've been too naive! Of course that today, when I came there to that station, I found that the station is moved somewhere again... I did not have map to find where exactly to go... and I was short of time already! But fine, I went for, like, 15 minutes walk to find the next station (also because I had to cross two totally traffic-jammed streets and one huge construction site which is impossible to go through) - exactly the thing I want to do on Monday evening, when the only thing I want is to be at home already.

Well, this enhances my zen attitude to things.

Brief summary of what happened yesterday and today (only interesting stuff mentioned).

Yesterday, we had an IT training (which, for various reasons, I did not like very much).
Apart from this, we went for lunch together with people from the office ('welcome lunch' - and although the British people apparently say that 'there is no such thing as free lunch', this one was free!).
I got answers to some of my office-related questions, with no one telling me that s/he had no time for silly/useless/detailed questions on how the company operates. Yay!
I pinned a picture of one of Prague trams on my message board. One colleague immediately saw it, and was very curious about it!
I discovered one British beer I sort of liked; it was local and bio and organic, and unfortunately I forgot the name... What a pity, really.
I had Japanese beer in the evening, which was not bad.

I also opened some of the materials I need to study for my UK qualification, and I discovered that this would indeed be very, very funny.

Today, I took huge risk and tried to buy another English beer. And guess what: duuuh! I was not even able to finish the 0.5 l bottle! The label said 'golden ale' and 'contains barley'. I would like to know whether one of these is the one key phrase to avoid...

(I guess barley is not the problem. Maybe the 'ale' thing...? Any time we had something called 'ale' back in Czech Republic, it was ok, but this country is weird when it comes to beer, so maybe...?)

I also got my bus card today. It cost me £63 for 28 days, and it's only valid in buses, not trams! Unbelievable...

Tomorrow, I am moving to a new place. I sort of miss commuting, really; it does not have to be long, but at least 20 min is necessary to be able to read things in the bus. In the past week, I could walk to the office, which made me nervous - I felt like I had no time for reading, going through legislation, thinking and doing stuff I usually do in tram/metro!