There is (hasn’t there been always!) something immensely satisfying about being right.
Driving in Spain is a frightening experience. Driving in Spain is bad.
On the roads you are accompanied by racing ‘aces’ who exist in the blinkered comfort of their vehicles, oblivious to other road users who may as well not exist as these self-styled driving ‘experts’ weave in and out of streams of traffic.
In a circus the antics of ALL motorcyclists might be amusing and amazing: “See the death defying carving up of fast moving traffic! Thrill to the adrenalin pumping experience of sensing a blur of machine weaving around you as you travel at speed! Gasp as you pass twisted metal illuminated in the flash of blue lights!” But on the road these drivers are barely believable as they death wish their way along, treating cars as if they were the merest wisps of gossamer which will spin away in their slip streams!
Spanish pedestrians have a truly humbling faith in the absolute truth of their own invulnerable immortality as they blithely stride out onto poorly lighted, vehicle obstructed crossings. If they can see you: they are safe – this seems to be their road sense!
For someone from Britain, where God knows we have our driving faults, the driving in Spain is a revelation of awfulness. Inconsiderate, rude and suicidal are adjectives that I would apply to the more reasonable drivers, the rest are just plain murderous.
And now I have the proof to back up my own empirical research from driving on the slaughterways of Spain. Forbes.com http://www.forbes.com/2007/12/10/drivers-europe-dangerous-forbeslife-cx_ll_1210driving.html has completed a list of twenty eight nations in Europe and listed them in order from the worst drivers to the best based on the number of deaths per million in each country.
The worst countries are dominated by Eastern Europe and the new Baltic states where new money, consumerism and cars are ahead of infrastructure and concern for safety. But in the list Spain is listed as the 13th worst and good old Britain as the 23rd. We must be doing something right at last!
Most galling for the Spanish is that the French are listed as the 19th worst country and yet all Spaniards know that French drivers are worse than they are! It is wonderful how refreshing statistics can be.
Barcelona has imposed a zone in which the highest legal speed for cars has been cut to 80klm an hour. It has been said that Barcelona has greater air pollution than the centre of London! Something is therefore being done. From the first of January 2008 the new speed limits will be enforced (they are already in operation) and fines will be levied on those miscreants speeding. I will be interested to see how this new speed limit is administered because Catalan Traffic Police are an unobtrusive lot (except when pouncing on youthful late night drivers in carefully orchestrated ambushes near night spots!) and they will have to be much more visible if this new limit is to be obeyed.
Toni is still in Terrassa. This morning was his uncle’s funeral (he died yesterday) and he was on his way to his aunt’s house. If I understood Toni properly, the speed with which the funeral has been arranged is staggering.
I continue to work my way through the verbiage of National Curriculum speak to find out what I ought to be talking about in the interview tomorrow for the job in Sitges. It is a soul stunting experience reading descriptions of intentions rather than getting to grips with the actual substance of lessons. After reading screen after screen of words, words, words you begin to wonder what English is all about. I must have looked at scores of screens of information, apparently specifically designed for teachers and not one of them has had the name of an author (except of books of educational philosophy or pedagogy) or the title of an imaginative book or a poem or play. I probably have not pressed the right buttons to get to the good stuff where I can be enthused rather than depressed by what I am reading.
I will soldier on and hope that I find just a few nuggets of something I recognize as English before I have to go into the interview only clutching desiccated phrases of the educators of educators.
Driving in Spain is a frightening experience. Driving in Spain is bad.
On the roads you are accompanied by racing ‘aces’ who exist in the blinkered comfort of their vehicles, oblivious to other road users who may as well not exist as these self-styled driving ‘experts’ weave in and out of streams of traffic.
In a circus the antics of ALL motorcyclists might be amusing and amazing: “See the death defying carving up of fast moving traffic! Thrill to the adrenalin pumping experience of sensing a blur of machine weaving around you as you travel at speed! Gasp as you pass twisted metal illuminated in the flash of blue lights!” But on the road these drivers are barely believable as they death wish their way along, treating cars as if they were the merest wisps of gossamer which will spin away in their slip streams!
Spanish pedestrians have a truly humbling faith in the absolute truth of their own invulnerable immortality as they blithely stride out onto poorly lighted, vehicle obstructed crossings. If they can see you: they are safe – this seems to be their road sense!
For someone from Britain, where God knows we have our driving faults, the driving in Spain is a revelation of awfulness. Inconsiderate, rude and suicidal are adjectives that I would apply to the more reasonable drivers, the rest are just plain murderous.
And now I have the proof to back up my own empirical research from driving on the slaughterways of Spain. Forbes.com http://www.forbes.com/2007/12/10/drivers-europe-dangerous-forbeslife-cx_ll_1210driving.html has completed a list of twenty eight nations in Europe and listed them in order from the worst drivers to the best based on the number of deaths per million in each country.
The worst countries are dominated by Eastern Europe and the new Baltic states where new money, consumerism and cars are ahead of infrastructure and concern for safety. But in the list Spain is listed as the 13th worst and good old Britain as the 23rd. We must be doing something right at last!
Most galling for the Spanish is that the French are listed as the 19th worst country and yet all Spaniards know that French drivers are worse than they are! It is wonderful how refreshing statistics can be.
Barcelona has imposed a zone in which the highest legal speed for cars has been cut to 80klm an hour. It has been said that Barcelona has greater air pollution than the centre of London! Something is therefore being done. From the first of January 2008 the new speed limits will be enforced (they are already in operation) and fines will be levied on those miscreants speeding. I will be interested to see how this new speed limit is administered because Catalan Traffic Police are an unobtrusive lot (except when pouncing on youthful late night drivers in carefully orchestrated ambushes near night spots!) and they will have to be much more visible if this new limit is to be obeyed.
Toni is still in Terrassa. This morning was his uncle’s funeral (he died yesterday) and he was on his way to his aunt’s house. If I understood Toni properly, the speed with which the funeral has been arranged is staggering.
I continue to work my way through the verbiage of National Curriculum speak to find out what I ought to be talking about in the interview tomorrow for the job in Sitges. It is a soul stunting experience reading descriptions of intentions rather than getting to grips with the actual substance of lessons. After reading screen after screen of words, words, words you begin to wonder what English is all about. I must have looked at scores of screens of information, apparently specifically designed for teachers and not one of them has had the name of an author (except of books of educational philosophy or pedagogy) or the title of an imaginative book or a poem or play. I probably have not pressed the right buttons to get to the good stuff where I can be enthused rather than depressed by what I am reading.
I will soldier on and hope that I find just a few nuggets of something I recognize as English before I have to go into the interview only clutching desiccated phrases of the educators of educators.
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