From a holiday diary I wrote in 2011
The hotel in Strasbourg was a few miles from the airport. It was quiet with barely another soul around, except for a rather disheveled looking young woman who insisted on keeping the lift from the lobby to herself; 'non non non' she mumbled along with something I suspect was undecipherable even if I could understand more French when I stuck my foot in the door, so I left it.
The hotel had English Sky News, with the Murdoch papers hacking scandal and the closure of the News of The World being the permanent rolling headline. This was big news on the French channels of course, but not to anything like the same degree. The rolling news had been as repetitive on the Continent as it is in Britain in America. But phone hacking was only a breaking story in the last few days. Subjects that had dominated the broadcasts for the past fortnight included a man lunging at Nicholas Sarkozy; an outbreak of SARS at Bordeaux university; the growing Eurozone crisis; 'DSK', and Wimbledon fortnight. 'DSK' being the universal shorthand for the ongoing saga of French IMF chairman Dominque Strauss-Khan, then sitting in a New York courtroom being charged with sexual assault, an event that was both fascinating and embarrassing the French media in equal amounts (he was cleared, but the reputation for being quite the caveman skirt-chaser wasn't).
It was interesting too see Wimbledon from a foreign perspective for once. Here in France there was barely a mention of Andy Murray. Their focus was on Richard Gasquet being beaten by Murray, Marion Bartoli beating one of the Williams sisters, and Jo-Wilfred Tsonga making it to the semi-finals. In Germany all eyes had been on the not very well ranked Sabine Lisicki beating the other Williams sister (the newspaper printed a rather charming big picture of her blubbing and jumping about like a five year old; you couldn't endear yourself better to a middle-England crowd full of mums if you tried). In Italy their best hope was Ms. Schiavone who couldn't beat a Williams sister because they had already been beaten by others. The Tour de France also merited much more attention than in Britain. It was interesting to see that Mark Cavendish probably spent more time after a stage speaking in French and Italian than English, since every stage victory required a statement to the rolling news.
But that's our neighbouring countries for you; some things are better, some of my interests are better represented in the media, sometimes I feel more at home there than in Britain. Seeing and hearing the noisy English hordes at the Eurotunnel terminal in Calais made my spirit sink a little. Back to crowded little England, seemingly populated by either obnoxious young men capable of communicating only by shouting, or middle-aged married partners constantly bickering quietly with each other. There was one father and son looking cheerful and they were American.
But then maybe France and Germany are full of these people too, it's just that the passing visitor rarely sees them, and if they do they can't understand them anyway. The smart, motivated ones end up working in hotels, restaurants and museums because they are the ones who could be bothered to learn English and be endlessly polite. The visitor spends most of their time in cities, not dull backwater towns, and to be honest not all of those cities were dazzling; Stuttgart's city centre is almost shockingly downmarket for such a distinguished city. There were many drunks sitting around on the kerb, and crowds of poor-looking people walking along pedestrian streets looking bored. Mulhouse had similar streets, lined with cheap -looking shops and decorated with spent chewing gum and litter. Perhaps actually living there is a different matter to just passing through for a day.
Still I wouldn't mind importing a few continental habits to the UK; the ease with which pedestrians and cyclists intermingle; the good-natured mood of evenings out in cities; the willingness of governments to provide infrastructure, either the high speed train lines in France (another one was being built to Strasbourg next to the autoroute), and the Monday to Saturday railways they seemingly have in Italy, or the speed-limit less motorways and honour-system ticket barriers of the metro trains in Germany; and the general politeness of the tolerance most people seem to have for each other. We can't import the scenery and the epic mountain road but maybe we in the UK could have some of the other things. Just a thought.
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