Comments | rjshook: Blame the French

rjshook

Blame the French

Oct 04, 2005 18:32

On Monday at 15h30 I get a call from my boss. I'm on site in Ireland. I'm told to get to a site in Kent, England ASAP. I make travel arrangements and I get a flight out of Shannon at to Gatwick that about 5 hours later. I get to site early this morning to find out that the problem had be solved over the phone late last night, either while I was in ( Read more... )

Comments 9

crazykittylady October 4 2005, 18:02:23 UTC

Am I going to be the only one to point out that it's currently Octobre?

rjshook October 5 2005, 12:04:47 UTC

Oops I meant to write September and/or October as strike month. August is vacation time. I remember my friend straight out of university had 6 weeks annual vacation.

(The comment has been removed)

rjshook October 5 2005, 12:06:26 UTC

"manifs"? I thought a strike was "greve".

hockeykris October 4 2005, 18:43:30 UTC

My brother lived in England for six months, so he often traveled to the continent on the weekends. On almost every trip out of the UK, he ran into one problem or another that could always be traced back to and then blamed on the French. He found that they were a satisfactory place to assign blame, although no resolution ever came out of any of his troubles.

inulro October 4 2005, 20:12:37 UTC

You do not want to drive from Cork to Galway if you don't really have to.

When we were in France two years ago, half the country was due to go on strike the day we were due to sail back. (It was May). Fortunately my French was good enough to understand the news broadcasts the day before. We allowed loads of extra time in case there was traffic jams etc but there were even fewer people on the roads between Chartres and Dieppe than there had been on the way down and ended up in Dieppe very early indeed. Our hoverspeed (English company) was on time.

Work were surprised when we showed up the following day as there'd been news reports about how all of France had ground to a halt. By "all of France" I think they meant Paris and the port at Calais.

rjshook October 5 2005, 12:10:40 UTC

The first time I came to Ireland I was flying from around Leads. The best option I found was to fly to Cork. That 200km to Galway took me over 3 hours I think. It was a real shock to the system after being in Italy. Shannon is not too bad a drive from Galway. I just did it and was able to average a lousy 70km/h. The roads in this country blow my mind.

inulro October 5 2005, 18:37:20 UTC

You have to remember that until *very* recently, Ireland was the third world. Some of the infrastructure hasn't caught up.

cemetary_gates October 6 2005, 15:51:34 UTC

your travels sound really interesting! I wouldn't mind hearing more (that is why i'd like to add your jounral to my "friends" list) if you didn't mind... My name's Amberle and i stumbled apon your journal when i added schools to my info (QEP)!!

have a good day!

rjshook October 7 2005, 09:06:50 UTC

Thanks - welcome!