Most people think I live life in the slow lane at home but every year I am surprised at how much slower everything is here and it takes time to learn patience if your food takes a while to arrive (waiting for your why why is obviously an exception...) or in a queue in a shop. People wander about and get in your way. So I am trying to go with the flow more. This did fail me miserably though with the usual tech issues that appear each trip. The iffy wiffy in the hotel was resolved easily enough by them finally installing an extra router near my room. At least in the mornings and afternoons so far it's been good enough for a decent slingbox signal so I am happy in the anticipation of watching the Downton Abbey Christmas episode as well as having been able to catch up with the Apprentice, Gogglebox, the Supervet and the other highly cultural programmes which are my viewing choices! This time it was Apple letting me down. They seem to be catching Windows up for annoying bugs! I updated the iPad mini to ios9 just before I left. That managed to mess up any wifi signal. It also messed up Overdrive which is what I use to download and read my library books. And now there are documents on my iPad Air that I can't open unless I upgrade Pages, Numbers etc. But I can't do that unless I upgrade the iPad Air to ios9 and I can't do that because then I wouldn't be able to get library books on that either. So now I have to read library books on the bigger iPad Air, not on the mini.... One of these days technology will work seamlessly.... And whilst I hate Sevenoaks District Council with a passion, Kent County Council at least are redeeming themselves with their Library Services trying to resolve the Overdrive issue.
The other thing that is now odd here are carrier bags. I have obviously finally learned at home to manage without so it's really strange here to be given one with everything you buy, but the people in the shops are obviously quite used to taking them back! Not surprising really with the high number of Europeans here. The tourist mix here continues to evolve. Still lots of Northern Europeans, still very few Brits and Aussies. For some reason a number of Turkish restaurants have opened up. Russian is still on a few menus but it being increasing replaced with Mandarin Chinese. Perhaps a new measure of the Global economy! But the Chinese tourists continue to get a really bad press here with their apparent lack of understanding of local cultural norms and hygiene. Mind you the Russians, male and female, aren't much better parading down the road a long way from a beach in very brief and revealing swimwear.
The weather here has been its usual up and down self, from days where it's been so hot even I'm complaining to the last 36 hours where it has rained - as in tropical downpour - virtually non stop. It plays havoc with any planned walking schedule, even when it clears up it can come back so fast you really can get caught out. The rain dropped the temperature so much that it was time for the long sleeved t shirt... But the heavy rain does clear the air and this morning on my walk - like Deryn's doggie walk series, although the doggies aren't cute little Bertie but rather more scary feral temple dogs - the air looked nice and clear.
But going back to life in the slow lane, there's a guy wandering about here who is the spitting image of Tom Hanks in his Castaway role. Bent almost double with a long grey beard he seems to be scavenging anything he can, taking his time it seems to examine every square inch he sees. Perhaps I better take care I don't slow down quite that much...
