Absolutely Worthless Musings

When you are in a place that doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving, and try to read Web sites from a place that does, you realize what it means to "phone it in." What a bunch of worthelss sludge made its way across the column inches of cnn.com et all. And then I realized that when there's no real news to cover, and no one to read it anyway, well you just kind of make stuff up.

And so in honor of Thanksgiving, I present useless content that has no rhyme, meaning or artisitic value.

Things about Manchester that make me smile:
- Grown men cried (I actually saw one) when former Manchester United star George Best died last week. Since I didn't understand it, they explained to me that it was like Michael Jordan dying. But if you said to them, "Well, kind of, except Jordan didn't quit at age 28, then drink himself through both his original liver and the new one they gave him," they look at you like you said the queen was a prostitute.
- However, we must give credit to Mr. Best for his legendary quote, "I spent a lot of my money on birds, booze and fast cars. The rest I just squandered."
- The girls here have accepted that its cold, and now wear leg warmers under their mini-skirts.
- I live between 2 train stops (Oxford Road and Deansgate) which are each about 300 meters in opposite directions. I have travelled by train to Edinburgh (north), York (East), London (South) and Liverpool (West) and not once has the train I needed to be on been scheduled to stop at either of these stations.
- Our apartment has a combination washer/dryer which I have dreamed about for decades. Just think how it easy this would be! You can maybe wash a pair of jeans, 2 pairs of boxers and 2 t-shirts at once, and the whole cycle takes 3 hours. And the machine locks itself shut, so there's no way to heht anything in or out unitl the process is complete. Mucking with the dials just pisses it off and it shuts down until you apologize and leave the flat.
- We had a huge Tree Lighting festival last week in the Town Square to celebrate the beginning of the Christmas season. Huge event here - kind of a poor English version of Rockefeller Square. And the celebrity guests to throw the switch were.....wait for it......the characters from Madagascar. Yes, the 90 minute Disney movie. About zoo animals lost in Africa. Connect the dots for me here.
- The same town square is now hosting the crafts fair that it does every year. Full of German food, crafts and gifts. German marketplace. In Manchester. For Chrstmas.
- If you want to get Internet access from a company that is not British Telecom, you are certainly able to. But to sign up, you have to give them your BT number. Which means in order to get a service that competes with BT, you first must be a BT customer.
- I love English TV. Some shows start at 6:20,some at 7:10 and some at 8:30. There seems to be no such thing as the half hour block.
- The big TV show here is Coronation Street, which is a half-hour drama that comes on at the randomest times during the week so I don't know how anyone watches it. And since there is no such place as Coronation Street in Manchester, as there is no Wysteria Lane in the U.S, they create the street for the opening credits. Except I swear it's a model town shot with a macro lens, just like Mister Rogers Neighborhood.

Ok, so that should be enough words to get me past my drunk editor who is probably asleep watching football anyway.

Birthdays and Thanksgiving

Ok, let's be honest. Getting lost in places you've never heard of is WAAAAAAYYYY easier to make funny than a writing papers in rainy Manchester. There are only so many ways to make fun of the people trapsing through my house every day. So once again we're going to have to combine two days into one and pretend it all happened together.

In an incredible quirk of fate, Augustin and I share the same birthday, so we threw a little gig over here at The Hacienda. People are slammed right now with school work, so we expected a nice, small affair. And it was your typical night at our flat, where a variety of countries showed up with wine bottles and a few stories. But then it differentiated itself.

My roommate Guillaume has elevated himself to the level of "Nicest human I know" without even meaning to. I wish we could clone this kid , who I already liked before. We've had a number of birthday parties this year, and they are all the same, just a reason to hang out and eat cake. No one ever gives presents. But just as Gus and I blow out the candles (a task made significantly easier when there are 2 people), here come the Chinese girls with two wrapped boxes. Guillaume had gotten everyone to pitch in and give us Manchester United and Manchester City jerseys with our names and #107, which is our flat number. In the world of unexpected nice presents, this ranks near the top for me (even if they did accidentally get the old jersey from a few years ago...)

And so it was with a feeling of international satisfacion that I awoke on Thanksgiving Day, or as the Brits tend to simply call it, "November 24." Earlier this year I met up with some other Americans, Courtney and Kimberly. They're from Virginia and Alabama, and you really don't here many southern accents out here, so they tend to stand out. Anyway, I headed over to their place to celebrate proper Thanksgiving with them and about 10 English folks.

The only problem with such a strong class full of international students is that you forget you are in England. It's like moving to Manhattan and working for the United Nations - you don't actually meet any New Yorkers. So this was really one of my first true experiences in a British flat with a roomfull of British blokes speaking real British. I gotta tell ya, I couldn't understand a bloody word they said. One on one, they sound fine. But when they all start blabbering without even bothering to mix in a consonant for variety's sake, well they're damn near unintelligble.

Of course, we Americans lose all credibility when we try to answer the simplest questions like, "How did Thanksgving start?" First off, they are puzzled why we celebrate a harvest in the beginning of winter, which is a valid point I didn't have an answer for. Then you have to run throught he whole Native American debacle and try to explain the legalities of Tribal Casinos. By the time you get through trying to explain how marshmallow yams could have possibly been around in 1621, you're ready to stick the bird on someone's head.

But the Brits thoroughly enjoyed the Thanksgiving feast Kimberly and Courtney whipped up, and I must say they did a fine job. Saturday we're hosting our own belated T-Day Saturday for the exchange class, and everyone can be thankful that I have absolutely no responsibility whatsoever. It's Dan's project and our place is simply the environment. Apparently my poor cooking skills are now so legendary, that I wasn't even made aware when dish responsibilites were being doled out. I mean, even the Canadians have responsibilities for certain entrees. But me, well I just gotta unlock the door when everyone gets here.

Unfortunately, this week is more of the same - papers, papers, papers - then I get interesting again in Paris, Rome and Florence the week after.

A Night at Old Trafford

Let's face it. If you are going to call yourself a real sports fan, and really sit down and debate sports with guys who think they know their stuff, there is a certain list of requirements you need to have accomplished in order to qualify.

For example, despite what you'll hear from people in the Pacific Northwest, you cannot make blanket statements like, "Husky Stadium is the best place to watch football" if the only places you have been are UW and Bellevue High School.

There are some events you have to see in person to make honest comparisons and some places you have to go for actual context. For example, in baseball, it's Wrigley (check), Fenway (check), Yankee, and you can maybe add Safeco and Pac Bell (check check).

But if you really want to have legs to stand on in the International scene, there are a set of stadiums worldwise that must be experienced. I know I'm leaving a bunch out, but Barcelona, Madrid, Milan, Arsenal and Liverpool spring to mind - and of course Old Trafford, the home of Manchester United.

Earlier this year, I attended a Manchester City game, and at the time I identified them as the White Sox to Man United being the Cubs. And now, that comparison still holds true. Going to a White Sox game is a good way to sepnd a Sunday morning, but going to a Cubs game is a true experience. Ditto Man City and Man United.

It's not just the history, the 66,000 people wearing red, or the constant singing. It's the entire, unreplicable atmosphere of being somewhere famous. It's that look of nostalgia that comes to a colleague's face when they say, "Oh, you've been to Old Trafford you have" just like two baseball fans reminiscing about an afternoon in the Wrigley bleachers.

And so a 0-0 tie did nothing to damper the enjoyment of landing in one of sports most hallowed fields for 90 minutes of football. There's no question I'd be a Man United season ticket holder if I lived out here. I honestly tried to go the way of "The City's team" but there's a reason Man Utd is so popular worldwide. You can't help but get chills in that stadium, listening to those fans - who according to the people next to us were a "terrible crowd." There's something you can't describe when an entire stadium spontaneously combusts into song.

(I have this argument with my good friend and US Soccer supporter all the time. When 66,000 people are singing the same song, it's cool. When 66 US soccer fans are singing all game long, it's annoying. So Sam's Army, I implore you, teach other people the songs before the game. And please, take a few minutes before launching into them consecutively like a musical AK-47 gone awry. We don't need them for 90 minutes straight.)

Although I couldn't understand one cheer from another, I swear they were singing, "Take me home Country road at some point." And if someone can explain to me how a flippin John Denver song became a staple at Manchester United football games, I'll happily buy you a beer.

So despite the fact an American owns the team now, and that it's the EPL "All-Star team" I have to tip my hat to Man United. If the Yankees had so much character, they'd be hard to root against as well.

(Unfortunately, the pictures turned out like crap - must have had the camera settings all fouled up. But here are the couple worth salvaging)

This Manchester Place is Kind of Cool

I think it was either Isaac Newton or Alan Greenspan who said that for every action, there's an equal and opposite reaction. Then by definition, by spending 4 straight weekends out of town, my knowledge of my adopted hometown is few and far between. So, thanks to a weekend full of class and dwindling back account, I finally got to spend a weekend here in Manchestah. And this really isn't a bad place.

On Sunday, we were forced out of City Centre to attend the Memorial service for Amit. There was certain Nick Hornby feel about 15 people who didn't know each other 2 months ago, taking a bus route we didn't know, wandering through a suburb we've never been, to visit a house where we didn't know anyone, to attend a service for a man we had only recently met. The only real common thread was the fact that it just didn't seem possible that someone our own age could just die in his sleep.

Earlier in the weekend, I was able to explore some other corners as well, as part of showing around a friend from Univ of Washington who was in town from Copenhagen. There's something nice about going out in groups of 15 people, but there's also something comforting about 2 friends wandering around a foreign city and telling old stories from UW, and find little places that don't need to satisfy a group en masse. It was a great excuse to duck into dive clubs playing loud music and chi-chi lounges offering overpriced drinks and the beautiful people.

The long and the short of it was simply getting to see where the non-students go in this town, and to be honest, it doesn't really look too much different than Belltown and Fremont. Some fun places in the Northern Quarter to look up if you get here are Centro, Odd, Bluu, and Night and Day. And if you have a good group and want to see a colussus dance club, check out M2.

It's hard to believe that school is in its final weeks, and everyone is kind of looking around the corner now. There's an unspoken feeling of disappointment as we see the real world trying to nudge itself out of the locked box we have it trapped in right now. So it's hurry up and panic time for a bunch of things.

Thus, I'm indulging on a birthday present tomorrow to see a Champions League match between Man Utd and Villareal. Man Utd needs the win and Villareal is on top of the group, so it should be a pretty exciting match. Plus Man Utd is fresh off the upset over Chelsea, so people are excited about them again. And I just couldn't forgive myself if I was in Manchester for 3 months without getting to Old Trafford. It's like living in New York all summer and not seeing The House that Ruth Built.

I'm becoming more and more fascinated by this $100 laptop MIT Media Labs and Nicholas Negroponte are trying to get built. In our current assignment we have to write a strategic plan detailing how Microsoft will respond. Let me know if you disagree, but we've decided they will publicly support it while going behind the scenes to absolutely destroy it through skunkworks, negative analyst reports and forcing key distributors to abandon it. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, go to Google and type in "Negroponte $100 laptop Microsoft." It's a pretty interesting story.

That's all I got this weekend. Augustin and I share the same brithday (many, many years apart) so we're throwing a 70's/80's party Wednesday to celebrate Gus getting one year closer to my age (apparently, there's a loophole and if you' re in grad school AND over 30, you don't actually age.) Two weekends left in Manchester then two in Paris/Rome/Florence/Copenhagen/Amsterdam then I'm back in the States on the 20th, Seattle on the 24th. Has it really been 2 months???

A Tale of Two Cities

So, part out of laziness, and part out of a lack of creativity, I thought I'd combine Dublin and London into a single post.

The fact is that each one of these two towns are actually thriving metropolises. Dublin, as opposed to small Irish villages like Galway, is actually quite large, with a giant downtown shopping area and district called Temple Bar that rivals what used to be the French Quarter.

Temple Bar is so big and so touristy that it begs the question of whether visiting Dublin is really a representation of Ireland, or if you visit Dublin for the atmosphere of Temple Bar itself. Again, New Orleans comes to mind. For most people, a trip to New Orleans meant Borboun Street and a cheesy replica of a Paddleboat. The real New Orleans was quite different, but no tourist would enjoy the rest of what New Orleans had to offer. So I wonder if Dublin is the same way.

On Sunday night, Lisa and Pauline decided they wanted to take Dan to Gay Bingo and asked if I wanted to join. Now, I think this shows my maturity. I would have been perfectly justified if I had stared at Lisa for a moment and exclaimed loudly, "Are you flippin crackers? I'm sorry, has someone reached inside your skull, snatched your brain, and replaced it with a pint of Guinness?" But, I politely mutterred something about going to watch Irish bands. I felt bad for Dan who came over to me to me later and said, "You don't play bingo and you're straight, so I'm not sure why they thought you'd want to do that on your last night in Dublin." So, common sense seemed to prevail.

While the rest of the crew hit Gay Bingo, I ventured about 15 minutes out of downtown Dublin up to a local music venue called Whelan's, where I was soothed with the sounds of Irsh rock and rollers playing Johnny Cash. But the people were friendly in that "neighborhood out with their friends" kind of way. It made me think Dublin would be a pretty ok place to live.

Now, if you've been to London, then you know exactly how big the place really is, and I really don;t need to do any explaining. It's basically New York with older buildings, nicer taxi cab drivers and people driving on the wrong side of the road. If you've never been to New York, London or I imagine Tokyo or Hong Kong, you can't really get a sense of the scale.

We did the cheesy tourist things - Buckingham Palace, Parliament, Big Ben, the London Eye, etc...and you really feel the chasm between tourist and native. Tourists (like us) wander around without a clue, while Londoners are on guest lists at bars and plan nights out with precision so they don't waste money on excess cabs and trains. Nowhere have I ever felt so lost and hopelessly out of control of a travel situation - and we even had a great tour guide leading the way.

So I can understand why people live there and choose to stay forever. It really is an amazing mix of smart, talented people, in a city that's a 3 hour flight from EVERYWHERE, and where you can make a ridiculous salary. I definitely added it to my list of places to send resumes. It's expensive as hell, but the good news is that wherever you travel, you're getting a discount.

Here are some quick stats from the trip to London:
Citizens of London: 8 million+
Places to see: Thousands
Price of Zone 1 Daily Underground Pass: 4.70 pounds (US $8.50)
Favorite Underground Stop Names: Chalk Farm, Mornington Crescent, Elephant and Castle, Tooting Bec, Mudchute
Underground Miles Travelled: 2.6 million
Cost of Average Taxi ride: 10 pounds
Cost to get into a good club: 20 pounds
Cost to get into a bad club: 5 pounds
Amount of money we spent: Who knows?

I'll try to put more effort into the pictures, because words don't really adequately describe either city.

I'm in town this weekend for the first time in a month, so I'll try to find some funny Mancunian trouble to report on.

A Very Sad Day

It seems unbelievable to even type this, but today (Monday, 11/14) we learned that our exchange classmate Amit Gupta passed away in his bed in Manchester.

Amit was enrolled at Rotterdam Business School fulltime and a native of India. Of course, you can't really know someone that well in 2 months, but Amit seemed to be a very nice guy, 34 years old, looking forward to completing a Western MBA and return back to his wife and children.

We don't know anything further about what happenned because MBS has not released any information. Hopefully they'll tell us something soon.

But after all the joking about getting kidnapped in Latvia and other nonsense, it's a little frightening to think a guy in your class in Manchester, Seattle or just a 34 year old colleague at work could pass away in his bed. Will kind of shake you up a little.

To the side are some pictures of Amit from our trip to the camp in Dovenest at the beginning of the quarter.

The Search for the O'Neil's

Apologies for the slow posts. I've broken the cardinal rule in blogging - deliver fresh content. Early market research shows I've lost as much as 67% of my viewership (dropping 2 of my faithful 3 readers...)

Now, we jump in the "way back" machine and head back in Ireland, where Pauline, Lisa, Dan and Andy have just left on a 8:30 train out of Galway. To where, you ask? Well, where everyone goes when they visit Ireland - the town of Roscommon.

Now if you know where Roscommon is, well you just know too much about Ireland. Ireland is about 5 hours across by train and Roscommon county is smack in the middle. We were trekking into this forgotten territory to find the ancient ancestors of Dan O'Neill, who's great grandfather moved to the U.S. in the 1880's and in a fit of wild creativity, changed the family name from O'Neil to O'Neill. I'm always up for a good geneological scavenger hunt, so this little adventure was something I had been looking forward to.

The actual city of Roscommon can't have more residents than about, I don't know, maybe 6, so when I say we headed all over town tracking down leads it wasn't exactly an exhaustive exercise. We started at a giant Catholic church which dates back to the 1800's and has all the baptismal records going back through the history of Roscommon. And chances are mighty high that if your name was O'Neil and you lived in Central Ireland, a Catholic Church was a pretty focalpoint of your childhood.

Unfortunately, the priest was out doing mass or something else non-conducive to geneology tracking, so we wandered into the bustling city center. Along the way we passed Mr. Doyal O'Donelll (nope - not making that up), who used to be the head of the town council. We asked the lovely Mr. O'Donnell if he knew any O'Neil's, and he gave us a wonderful rundown of every citizen of Roscommon in the last 40 years, but amazingly, said he knew no O'Neils. He knew of McNeills - they have a store down the street - but then he followed up with, "I knew an O'Neill, but she married a (something else) and they all died off. But you should talk to John Kerrigan of Henry Street. He's the town historian."

We weren't quite ready to invade a man's house, so we headed to the local pub to ask some locals. The bartender was insanely helpful, saying, 'I know some MacNeil's - they have a store down the street. But you should ask John Kerrigan of Henry Street. He knows everyone."

Next we hit the town library to see if there were any old newspaper archives of the O'Neils. But sadly, there were none. (I was tempted to look up the McNeills to find out when they opened the store everyone raves about, but I forgot to.) The librarian was very helpful, and started her sentence, "You know who you should talk to..." and I interrupted, "John Kerrigan of Henry Street?" and she answered, "Um, no. I'd go to the church down the street and ask the priest." Then she looked at me with disdain and disgust for interrupting her and I realized I would never be welcome as a full-time resident of Roscommon.

Dan headed back to the church, so I headed to Henry Street just out of curiosity. I was half-expecting to see an old guy in a rocking chair telling stories of Roscommon to a bunch of 8 year olds while drinking Irish Whisky on the rocks (the guy, not the kids - just pardon the dangling modifier). But alas, I walked up and down Henry Street a few times without ever catching the elusive Mr. Kerrigan, and there were far too many doors to knock on each one. Plus, I didn't really have a better line of introduction than, "Um, I'm a crazy American with no Irish Heritage, but I just had to meet this Mr. Kerrigan fellow." Which would have been fine in itself but doesn't really lead to much follow up conversation of import. So I headed back to meet Dan.

So, long story short - The priest was done with his real job and able to track down the birth records of quite a few O'Neils, and Dan can now hand off the data to his little brother, who will follow up the quest in the spring. Hopefully, then they will meet a real live O'Neil that has some blood relation to their great grandfather who left long ago. And that, my friends, was our daytrip to Roscommon, and off to Dublin we went.

My Meeting with Manchester City F.C.

It suddenly dawns on me that I forgot to talk about one of the more interesting appointments I was able to set up here in the UK.

One afternoon in a fit of pure folly, I tracked down the email address of a Marketing Exec of the Manchester City Football Club. To my extreme surprise and joy, Mr. H actually responded, saying he would love to meet with a North American MBA Student, and if I would be so kind as to provide a critical analysis of his Web site.

So last week, this American from Seattle headed over to SportCity Stadium to tell an Englishman how he could better market Football to Mancunians.

Some quick context: Manchester City is kind of like the Chicago White Sox (if you exclude the World Series this year). They are "Manchester's team" but play 2nd fiddle to the uber-popular Manchester United, much the same way the White Sox fall behind the Cubs. They have a shiny new stadium built in 2002 that increased capacity from 35,000 to 48,000.

When the stadium held 35,000 people, they sold out every match. Now attendance has risen to 42,000 per game, but that still leaves about 6,000 empty seats when they aren't playing Man Utd, Chelsea, Liverpool or Arsenal. So a couple of things struck me as odd - and it's probably just the difference between English and American marketing tactics.

First, I relayed a personal anecdote about having trouble finding the time of a game one night when I was trying to watch it on TV, so I asked where they advertise. I was surprised to hear a response of, "Well, we don't need to advertise, since everyone knows when the games are." Maybe that's fair. I know the Seahawks play on Sundays and someone will tell me what time, so maybe that's applicable. Except, oh yeah, Man City plays EPL games between Thursday and Monday, depending on when Sky Sports wants to televise the games. And the Carling Cup matches are on Tuesday or Wednesday every 3 weeks or so. So you pretty much need to hook a palm pilot up to the web site to keep track of when the games are. But it shows the attitude of marketing football in England, "Everyone knows when the games are, so why do we need to bother?"

One very cool system they have instituted is the "City Card." This is not (as I assumed) a credit card. If you are a Man City supporter, you buy this card for a pound or so. You give them all of your personal data (email, Mobile SMS, etc...) and attach a credit card to the account, so when you buy tickets, they just tell the database where your seats are. So you don't actually ever receive printed tickets anymore. You simply run your card through the scanner at the gate. They set this system up 3 years ago and are able to track all the demographics and buying behaviors of their fans over 20+ home games a year.

Now, I want you to read that last sentence again and do a personality test.

If you felt a tingle down your spine, and your brain suddenly converted into an abacus calculating, "42,000 x 20 = 840,000 fans per year x 3 years = 2.5 million customer records..." then you my friend are a marketer.

2.5 million customer records! Some of you are now falling over yourselves trying to find a whiteboard to release the geyser of ideas of what you would do if you had a database that not only tracks when your customers like to go to games, but where they like to sit, how much they'll spend and how to contact them via SMS if there are empty seats for a game that fits these parameters. I can feel the energy from here as your hands quiver with excitement of ideas of how to segment the data. And now I'm going to tell you what Man City does with this data.

Nothing.

They're "looking into it and doing a little number crunching at this time."

I know, it's as if someone just shot your dog, isn't it? It's like putting the Mona Lisa at the end of a 100 ft hallway without any lights. You know it's there, but you just can't appreciate it.

After I regained my composure and picked up all the furnitutre I had thrown at Mr. H, we talked about some other ticket pricing schemes. The EPL is not unlike American Sports, in that they've priced themselves right out of the family market. For obvious reasons, they've controlled the hooligan aspect of the game, while simultaneously raising ticket prices into the executive class to match the free spending clubs of Chelsea, Arsenal et all. So, now you have a stadium full of corporate types, some lifelong fans who can't afford to keep their tickets and growing unrest from those who say the games don't have the same excitement. In a nutshell, it's now the NBA.

And so incredulously I listened to Mr. H lament about not really having a way to segment his fan base and send them unique, nearly personalized offers that would help solve this problem. (Thankfully, the team was at home, so the club doctor was able to surgically repair my tongue when I had bitten all the way through it.)

Final thought that will amuse you. I assumed that there was no instant replay screen because of an EPL regulation. But in fact, when they spent their $100 million on the new stadium, they couldn't get a sponsor for a video screen and decided the additional $1 million was too much. So in a sport with 1-2 goals a game total, you have no replays in the stadium, but 42 seperate camera angles if you watch it in a bar.

Anyway, interesting differences between UK and American Marketing. It will be interesting to see what the Glazer family does over at Man United.

Galway, I hardly knew ye

A continuing theme through these posts (other than the fact that they are entirely too long and in horrific need of both a spell check and an editor) is that there just simply isn't enough time to see everything. And you really need the perfect combination of travellers to get everything you can out of a town.

And so it is that after two days in Galway, I left feeling like I needed more time in Western Ireland. This weekend's collection of Manchester Biz School exports consisted of myself, Pauline the sensitive French girl, Lisa the sarcastic Canadian and Dan the world's nicest American. And while we are all quite lovely people, we never seemed to get all the wheels on the ground at the same time. So, my report is somewhat incomplete. But that also means I'm coming back with a big group, so save your money now.

Some quick facts on Galway - it's the second fastest growing city in Europe (can you name the first - answer will be listed below) with a population increase from 25,000 to 80,000 in 15 years. Some people say this is because the Irish transportation infrastructure is so bad that people come to visit and can't get back, but others attribute it to a growing university population.

Galway's other claim is that it's basically the gateway to all of the small cities in Western Ireland. And there really are a lot of neat things to see. Unfortunately, the aforementioned transportation system makes it pretty difficult to move around.

Everything you need to see in Galway proper is in about a 6-10 block town square, but that does have a lot to see, including lots of traditional Irish pubs and a surprising amount of International joints. One odd rule seems to be that pubs stop serving food at 9:00, so if you have a late lunch and thus want a late dinner, you are stuck in the 18-20 Euro zone of fancy restaurants.

For me, the highlight of Galway's is a bar on the other side of the river called Monroe's. If you have ever been in an American version of an Irish bar, well this is the place they ripped the design off of. It comes complete with 3 old Irish guys on stage playing a string-like thing, a drum-like thing and a horn-like thing and belting out traditional music and an occasional Bob Dylan song (don't ask me - I just report what I see). I had decided to leave my travel buddies behind towards the end of our last night here, in order to make a mad dash through the places we hadn't been, but I ended up getting stuck on a bar stool in this place because it was so cool. It was so perfectly Galwayian (yes I just made that word up) that the only thing NOT Irish about it were the lost American guy and 2 Swiss girls. I'll add that the second coolest place to relax here is called "The Crane." Here, 8-10 musicians take over a section of the bar and just jam together on Irish horns, guitars, etc... As a crowd, our jobis just to sit and listen, so it has a nice laid back feel.

(Answer to above question - Warsaw.)

Even if you decide not to spend a single minute in a Galway pub, you are just a tour bus away from just about the loveliest coastline and small Irish villages you can imagine. We only made it as far as the Cliffs of Moher, and I fear there's no way the pictures of the tour cannot do the countryside justice.

So after Thursday and Friday nights in Galway, we were off to find Dan's long lost ancestors in a little Irish village called Roscommon, along with 2 nights in Dublin. Stories to come...

Latvia Day 2 - Your Mala? No, My Mala.

Holy shite time in class flies by. Here I am back in Manchester, finally nestled all snug in my bed, when the weekend's upon me and to Ireland I head. So let's finish off the Latvian stories.

When we left our heroes, they were having lunch and sightseeing on their first day in Riga. I think the pictures tell the sightseeing stories. And, I don't think anyone is really that interested in hearing stories about Halloween Friday night in an Eastern European town, submarine nightclubs, bars named after the Latvian word for "breasts", a club scene that doesn't *start* until 1am and ends at 6, what apparently turns out to be a world renown prostitution market and dance clubs packed from A to Z filled with the most unblelievable looking women you have ever seen. As a mature audience, I think you agree that those stories get old, so let's just zip ahead to the next day.

So at about 1:00pm we rubbed the sleep and sin from our eyes and embarked on a simple project of finding a restaurant where we could "have lunch by the sea."

Our comical tour guide Eugene said he knew of such a place and so we followed him - not to the sea actually - but to a train station. Apparently there was another town by the sea in which there may be more restaurants, because God knows how hard it is to contain oneself to a single lunch. So, off we went on our little adventure to Jurmala (your-mala).

I jest, but I was actually pleased we were going on this little journey. I mean, with Gene at the helm we were most certainly assured of getting lost. Plus, if there’s anything more exciting that getting off a plane in a foreign land, I think getting on a train in a foreign land may be it. Jurmala is kind of the Latvian equivalent of the Jersey Shore, about 30 minutes by train and nestled nicely into the Baltic Sea. We wandered down a long boardwalk type path that in the summer is probably teeming with Latvian tourists on holiday. Bars, Cafes, Restaurants, Shops – all the things you’d see in a classic American Beach Town like Cape Cod. Of course, Cape Codians know that autumn and winter are no time to be walking down a boardwalk, and Latvians are no dumber, so many of these places were closed. It was now 4:00pm and Vittorio's 24 hour long dream of “lunch by the sea,” made more difficult by the 1:00pm wake up and the fact nothing seemed to be open, looked bleaker and bleaker. The beach was gorgeous, though bloody cold, and we played around down there a while. If there’s anything good about a cold beach, it’s that frozen sand is much easier to walk on.

We had just about lost all hope for "lunch by the sea" when a little Lebanese place appeared out of nowhere. It was warm, inviting and friendly. There were plenty of couches facing the picture windows and we chose one right out front where we could concentrate on nature and less on the people cuddling and making out on other sofa. And so we indulged ourselves with overpriced Italian wine, expensive piroshkys and a giant apple hookah. We sat inside this beachside cafe watching the sun set over the Baltic sea and felling generally content about everything life had to offer. And when the sun had departed and the wine and beer had been drunk, we smiled fondly at our little personal play pen in Jurmala, basked in a happy glow. Such is life that if 1 year ago you had asked me to name 100,000 places that I would spend Oct 29, 2005 watching a sunset, Al Thome Restaurant and Bar in Jurmala, Latvia probably would have been behind JJ's Pig shop in Little Rock, Arkansas. But that's the real beauty isn't it? Who knows what's behind each door so just keep your eyes open and play along.

Yeccccchhhhhh, enough melancholy and sap already.

Let's just say at some point time marches on and we said goodbye to Al Thome and made our way back out into the dark and cold where we coaught a train back to Riga. And like I said, no one is interested in more stories of hot blondes, booze and dance clubs, so we can leave it at that.

And, since these entries strecthed pretty long, and Sunday was really no more than a day of more exploring, picture taking and general merriement, we will leave Riga behind simply with recommendations to spend a summer holiday visiting the country, along with Estonia and Lithuania.

Now, off to Galway and Dublin. Back Monday. Have a good weekend.