Airports!

I've been struggling with an entry for a while now. It's still not going anywhere so I figured a change of topic might be a good idea - then I came across the World Airport Awards. If you're too lazy to look it up yourself, this year's Top Ten are 

1. Hong Kong

2. Singapore Changi

3. Seoul Incheon

4. Kuala Lumpur KLIA

5. Munich

6. Kansai

7. Copenhagen

8. Zurich

9. Helsinki

10. Cape Town

I've only ever been to Munich Airport on my way to somewhere else, but I had to look them up all the same. I love airports. Not planes so much - the only thing I could tell you about the plane I'm travelling on is its destination - but airports are great fun. A couple of years ago a friend and me would take the train to Birmingham airport on weekends, which isn't exactly next door, and spend the day there watching people and exploring the place.

Going home from uni now I have to fly via London, which secretly I'm quite happy about although it's a huge detour. I like Heathrow - it's big, it's busy, and you see people travelling to all sorts of exotic places. But now British Airways use a new terminal and waiting is nowhere near as fun anymore. There are much fewer people, it’s more of a waiting than a shopping area and it’s just plain boring, but I do have to admit that things run a lot more smoothly now. Before they finished this terminal you regularly had to wait an hour or more to clear the security checks, and the delays were really bad. I often spent four or five hours longer in Heathrow than I was supposed to, and waiting is not so much fun anymore when you're tired and hungry and they keep delaying your flight by thirty minutes at a time. 

Still, I like the whole atmosphere and I'm more looking forward to the airports next week than to seeing my family. Of course, that might just have something do with the fact that I haven't spent my whole life on airports.

There's one thing I really hate though - waiting for my luggage. More often than not I'm one of the last people to leave the plane and I don't have the heart to knock over little girls just to get to my stuff. I'll never understand why entire families have to crowd around the conveyor belt.

Snow in November - who'da thunk it?

It’s fascinating how year after year, snow seems to plunge the country into chaos. It snowed all day yesterday and some more today, and skimming today’s headlines it’s like we’ve been hit by some natural disaster. ‘Arctic blast hits Britain’, ‘UK colder than Moscow’, ‘Snow causes chaos on roads’, ‘Deep freeze’… last I checked there were two inches of snow on the ground, and Aberdeen is one of the “worst affected”* areas. Britain has been experiencing snow in winter for centuries, if not millennia, yet they’re closing streets and shutting down schools because apparently we are still unable to cope with 5 cm of the stuff. Why are they even complaining about Global Warming?

*Of course, I’m happy, the more the better. Sucks if you have to drive, but hey, bring on the so-called blizzard that was supposed to hit us today!

What being British really means

I just came across this article - researchers asked 5000 Brits to name characteristics that in their eyes are typical of this nation, and then came up with a list of 30 traits. 

Nothing much to say about it; I just found it rather amusing. It's very spot on too - if you want to know how much truth there is to stereotypes look no further, because any foreigner you ask to describe the British would in all likelihood come up with pretty much the exact same list.

Here it is, the article itself is not really worth reading:

1. Talking about the weather

2. Queueing

3. Sarcasm

4. Watching soaps

5. Getting drunk

6. A love of bargains

7. Curtain twitching

8. A stiff upper lid

9. Love of all television

10. Moaning

11. Obsession with class

12. Gossiping

13. Traffic obsession

14. Enjoying other people's misfortunes

15. Never complaining

16. Cheap holidays

17. Working long hours

18. A soothing cuppa

19. Meat and two veg

20. Bad dancing

21. Uncomfortable talking about emotions

22. Clever sense of humour

23. Obsession with property values

24. Pandering to political correctness

25. Road rage

26. Weight worries

27. Wanting a good tan

28. Being proud of where we live

29. Not saying what we mean

30.The ability to laugh at ourselves

I'm guilty of at least 19 of those... now does that mean that I'm more British than I thought I was or is it a rather universal list anyway? I can think of at least one person who enjoys a soothing cuppa more than I do, and who's not complaining about their weight these days?

Really just a Quantum - Spoiler Alert

Don't read this if you don't want to know what happens in Quantum of Solace.

 (Well, try to read it, it's not like I have an abundance of commenters)

I just got back from watching Quantum of Solace. I'd been looking forward to seeing it for months... years actually, ever since the day I watched Casino Royale. I love James Bond, I've seen every single movie of the series at least twice, and I didn't think I'd ever be disappointed, but today just that happened. It really pains me to write a negative critique but things went downhill from the title song on down - I couldn't quite believe my ears. It couldn't have fit the Bond series any less.

First of all:
James Bond
Who? Really, I don't know who that guy was. He wasn't funny, he wasn't charming, he wasn't nice, he didn't even manage to properly seduce a girl - that short, sad, lifeless scene when he did get a girl was painful to watch. James Bond certainly doesn't mercilessly kill people, and those storywriters want us to believe that he actually got so attached to a girl that he goes to those lengths to avenge her death? Come on.

Next up:
The Plot
Well... nothing much to say here. There wasn't one.

The Ending
If you don't want to know what happens in the movie, skip this paragraph. Though I promise you nothing actually does happen, so that warning is kinda moot.
Anyway. Okay... so James Bond sets out to kill/find the guy who was somehow involved in the death of Vesper (the aforementioned girl). I'll just call him her murderer for now. Bond then travels to Italy, Haiti, Bolivia, Austria, leaving a trail of dead bodies in his wake, and all the while I kept thinking 'Is this him? Is this the murderer now?' Well... no. It never was. In the end, everyone's dead, the pretty girl is home and safe, and then, suddenly, completely out of the blue, Bond flies to Russia, enters a flat and captures the evil murderer who doesn't even put up the hint of a fight. This, by the way, is the first and last we see of him. All that takes place in the last five minutes of the movie. I mean what? What was the point of the other 100 minutes?
Also, something that I'd rather not call a storyline was introduced at the beginning, something that I expected the movie to solve. At the end, the only difference to 105 minutes earlier was that a few more people were dead. I can't stress the lack of plot enough.

Action
Ahh there we go. I have something nice to say about this movie after all. There's nothing quite like the action scenes in Bond movies - car chases, people crashing through glass panels, people dangling off ceilings, guns, and this handsome smirking guy emerging from the chaos straightening his tie. Alright, no one smirked this time because Bond is Teh Evil Cold-blooded Killer now, but I can't complain about a lack of action.
Let me whine a little here too though - I'd like to have a word with the camera guy. There were so many close-ups that at times I couldn't even tell what was happening. Extreme close-up of wheel - extreme close-up of eyes - extreme close-up of steering wheel - extreme close-up of hand clutching gun - extreme close-up of enemy's moustache - extreme close-up of wheel - repeat. Zoom out already!

So...
I could have excused the lack of plot. Of course it's a serious deficit in any case, but they could have pulled it off if only Bond had been his usual self - witty, charming, good-looking, effortlessly disarming a villain with the flick of a switch of some ingenious little technical device (Q didn't even make an appearance this time), neatly dressed, clever; someone every guy wants to be like. I really miss Sean Connery, or Pierce Brosnan even.
I sure hope they sack whoever came up with this trainwreck of a script.

And trust me, I feel terrible writing this.

They('ll) put a man on the... Mars?

The NASA and other space agencies have been talking about sending a manned mission to Mars for quite a while, but now it seems they've actually taken a big step towards it. Last night I read that researchers have managed to find a way to create a force field which would enable the spaceship to withstand the solar storms in space, which used to be one of the biggest obstacles of manned space travel– how to protect the astronauts from radiation. The risk of them being exposed to a lot of it on the way to the moon is far slimmer simply because the moon is so much closer. Our planet is protected by the magnetosphere, and scientists think they have now found out how to recreate it on a small enough scale to be feasible for a space ship.
This is exciting news. It will still be years before they actually do it and if a lot of things go wrong they might not even do it in our lifetime, but we’re getting there. I’m very interested in all things space but lately things have been a bit boring – nothing really interesting is happening anymore. Space shuttles travelling to the ISS are still exciting and I do follow them, but they’ve turned into a bit of an everyday-event. I’m not even sure what they’re actually doing up there these days. Unmanned missions to Mars are a little more exciting – I still remember a couple of years ago when they published all those colour photographs in the papers. I still have the articles at home somewhere. But they too get boring. For one, they take ages. If they launched a mission now, you’d only hear from it again in 2010, and even then there’s quite a big chance of the thing just crashing or refusing to do what it’s supposed to do. Remember Beagle 2?
And then, sometimes the mission itself is boring. Pictures are nice, it was quite interesting when they found evidence suggesting the presence of water, but most of the rest is really only of interest to scientists. Now manned missions are completely different. I’m all for them putting another man on the moon, even though it probably wouldn’t serve much of a purpose right now – it’s exciting and I wasn’t round 40 years ago so it’s only fair they repeat that performance for me now.
But sending people to Mars… well! That’d really be something. And I really admire whoever is going to go on that mission. More than three years completely on your own in this tiny spacecraft, with the same handful of people every single day, and so far away from not just other humans but earth itself it boggles the mind… you have to be extraordinarily strong to cope with that.

No treats here

Alright. Happy Halloween. Am I the only one who doesn’t like this day?
It used to be fun when I was a kid, dressing up, getting sweets, the bonfires and all that. But for the past ten years or so it’s just been annoying me, but I seem to be alone on that. I was going into town yesterday, and halfway down this street which is usually quite deserted that time of the day because it’s mostly just bars and takeaways, I suddenly saw this crowd on the sidewalk. I thought something had happened and they were trying to get a good look because why else would there be so many people in one place, but it turns out they were actually queuing at a Halloween shop, out the door and down the street, in the pouring rain and freezing cold. When I got back two hours later, they were STILL queuing.
And costumes are getting boring. Okay, they’ve probably always been boring, but I just know that apart from all the witches/ghosts/pumpkins/black cats, half the people will be dressed as the Joker. That’d actually be a cool idea if it wasn’t for the thousands of other people dressed like that.
Also, kids are nowhere near as charming anymore nowadays. When I was little, we didn’t even trick people when they refused to give us sweets… sometimes, THEY even tricked US. One fine Halloween evening my friends and me were out trick-and-treating when this farmer guy didn’t only refuse to give us sweets, but proceeded to chase us down the street with a pitchfork .
Two or three years ago today however, I happened to be alone at home and, being the Halloween equivalent of Scrooge that I am, didn’t open the door when a bunch of kids rang the doorbell. I didn’t know where my mother had hidden the sweets to give away anyway so it’s not like I deprived those kids of anything. For all they knew, no one was home and it wasn’t anyone’s fault they weren’t getting sweets, but all the same, they decided to trick us. That took the form of them hurling raw eggs at the windows. Of course I immediately raced outside and I don’t think they’ve ever run as fast as they did then but I still had to clean up that mess.
Now you’re probably wondering why I’m devoting a whole entry to Halloween if I don’t like it in the first place, and you’re right, I’ve no idea. Sometimes it’s more fun to write about things that I don’t like than stuff I’m enthusiastic about.

Stuff you may like too

I recently rediscovered 'Stuff White People Like', which is a website where people (or one person?) take(s) a satirical look at, well... stuff white people like. Some of the things I don't really get because the site is mainly about Americans, but most things are funny because they're very true. There's lots of stuff on there that I could comment on, so there may well be a Part II in the future.


#99 Grammar
"When asking someone about their biggest annoyances in life, you might expect responses like “hunger,” “being poor,” or “getting shot.” If you ask a white person, the most common response will likely be “people who use ‘their’ when they mean ‘there.’ Maybe comma splices, I’m not sure but it’s definitely one of the two.”"
Oh yes :D My biggest annoyances are poor grammar and spelling. If you can’t spell you’re and they’re and think that “should of” is proper English, then you'll have a hard time earning my respect.
That said, I wonder about the person who’d reply ‘hunger’ or ‘getting shot’ when asked about their biggest annoyances. “Yeah, some thug just shot me in the chest and punctured a lung, it’s rather annoying... sigh”.

#90 Dinner Parties
Gah. My parents have so many dinner parties and brunches and breakfasts and “why don’t you drop by for a cup of coffee today, and bring whoever’s visiting you along”s every year that I can’t be bothered to count them. Usually they’re only minor nuisances because I can pretend not to be home. It only becomes difficult when I’m hungry and I know they’re feasting on a three-course meal and ice cream downstairs – that’s when I have to decide whether satisfying my hunger is worth all the obligatory ‘How are you? What are you doing? How do you like it? What do you want to do when you graduate?’ questions.

#89 Saint Patrick’s Day
Half the world celebrates Ireland’s national holiday – I don’t think any other country in the world can compete with that. It’s a nice opportunity to go on a bit of a binge and seeing as it’s two days before my birthday, I usually get treated to free drinks on top of that, so celebrating St Patrick’s Day as such is fine by me. But unfortunately it’s also a great opportunity for all those pseudo-Irish to celebrate their non-existent Irish heritage, which is a particular pet peeve of mine – everyone claims to be Irish these days on the grounds of some greatgrandfather who emigrated from Cork to Boston in 1896. No, sorry... you’re NOT. Someone way down the line in my family tree was born in Hungary – have you heard me claiming I’m Hungarian yet?

#59 Natural Medicine
I’ve grown up with root extracts and hot onions and potatoes and beet juice and the whole range of leaves and vegetables, and even now we have a wide array of herbal remedies at home that I can all administer correctly and discuss the pros and cons of sugar beet vs hot water and lemon juice for sore throats. Everyone’s really into that stuff, and it does work, but to my eternal shame I admit that if I do feel ill and no one’s around to crush chicory roots for me, I’m much more likely to just grab something from the pharmacy.

#55 Apologies
I wrote a blog entry on this but didn’t feel like it was finished, and now it may never see the light of day if I address this topic here. People here apologise all day long, me included. I don’t think they even mean it (I know I don’t always), it’s just the polite thing to do, and doesn’t depend at all on who is actually at fault. If someone knocks your drink out of your hand you’ll apologise all the same, simply because you were standing there. Those apologies aren’t very heartfelt, half the time they’re unnecessary if you really think about it, but it’s still kinda nice.

#31 Snowboarding
All my friends love snowboarding, and so do their parents and siblings and everyone else too. It IS fun, even though not a single person in my (UK/Ireland) family is into it and I’m cross with it ever since I sustained an injury which made me pretty much give up football, but the thing is, we’re in the UK. We have hills and lakes and meadows and it’s no surprise people like golf here, but snowboarding/skiing? I don’t know where that obsession comes from because it inevitably involves going abroad and lugging your heavy equipment all the way to Switzerland.

Tell me quick - who asks the questions during Question Time?

I find it quite fascinating how many foreigners living in the UK decide to become British citizens – 93% of Africans, and 87% of Indians. I did briefly contemplate the same thing when I became eligible three years ago, but only because it was an option, not because I was so keen on it. And I guess I have a little more freedom of choice anyway – Ireland is a member of the EU so I’m at no disadvantage to do with my passport. The thing about acquiring British citizenship is those citizenship tests though – if you want to apply for a British passport or want to settle here for good (unless you’re an EU national, but don’t quote me on that), you have to pass a test to prove you have sufficient knowledge of the UK. I don’t know how popular that test is in other countries – I know the US and Germany both have it, but I’m not sure about other places.
Anyway, I wouldn’t want any random stranger without the most basic grasp of English as my neighbour either, but that test is quite ridiculous. If your English isn’t that great you have to attend English and citizenship classes instead, but for everyone else, there’s no way around it. There’s a handbook to accompany the test so you can study just like for your driver’s license, and the BBC published some of the questions on their website. I got 9 out of the 14 questions wrong. Apparently I don’t know what to be British means, I don’t know where Santa Claus is from or where the myth of him originated, or what to do before engaging a solicitor (according to that test, it is more important to find out how much they charge than to ask if they’re qualified at all, and if they have a potential conflict of interest).
The test also asks you about such useful things like what to do when you spill someone’s pint in a pub, how the film classification system works and how much you have to pay to visit the Parliament. The title of this entry is a question too - I couldn't really detect much of a context. I thought they were talking about a TV show at first.
I don’t disagree with the concept of those tests as such, and I’d probably face some difficulties drawing the line between sensible and not-so-sensible questions too, but it’s not my job.
Like I said… I'm quite happy with my passport, but that doesn't really matter. I’d probably fail the test anyway since I have no idea how the process of buying a house in Scotland differs from buying a house in England.

Fixing a hole where the rain comes in

Aberdeen’s not really a very exciting place, and I don’t think a lot of people find it very appealing – In fact all the international students (and not just them) are rather disappointed with it. It doesn’t ever get really warm, people have weird accents, they lack a sense of fashion, and shops close at 5pm. But you know what I love so much about this place? It’s grey. This is without a doubt the greyest place I have ever seen in my life. The sky’s overcast a good deal of the time, the majority of streets are cobblestone, and nearly all the houses are made of granite, which gives the town a distinct ‘1960s working-class fishing-town’ vibe (if you like huge glass fronts and modern steel constructions, you may incredulously shake your head now, but I’m into this kind of stuff). And it’s so very nice when it rains.
I’ve done my fair share of cursing the weather, especially at home. Any city can pull off a sunny day – miserable grey weather, not really. If you’re sitting in Italy watching the rain fill your swimming pool to the brim it’s not beautiful or comforting, it’s annoying and a waste of money. Here, it actually tempts me to go out for a walk. I don’t fancy getting wet, but after all, there’s no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothes, right? As I was walking home from the library last night, it was pouring, and my friend opted to take the bus, like pretty much everyone else. I’m skint and in a fit of madness I’ve discovered that I actually enjoy walking. Walking home from the library I’ve to cross a hill, and from the top of that hill, I can see the sea. It’s cold, not very calm, and yet another shade of grey. Looking down on that grey town and the sea in the pouring rain is very peaceful, and oddly enough, really lifts your spirits.
Of course the rain doesn’t like me as much as I like it and I’m feeling rather ill today. Guess I’ll have to go back to complaining about the weather now.