Britain's Largest Inland County

Did you know that Shropshire is Britain's largest inland county? No, you probably didn't. Why am I telling you? Well, the Horan clan - which for the moment consists of just me and Clare - are planning a camping trip to Much Wenlock in Shropshire. We plan to go next June with friends from Manchester. Clare is counting down to the day already.

European Day of Languages

Today is the European Day of Languages. As a budding philologist, I think it's a great idea.

I recently found out that there are 225 indigenous langauges in Europe. That's a staggering amount and this figure doesn't include langauges spoken by immigrants. That's still only 3% of all the languages spoken in the world. I imagine that a lot of the languages are very closely related and are more likely dialects of an official language, as is the case in Italy and France. However, there are host of langauges spoken in the Caucasus, but I wouldn't have considered this region as part of Europe, but I guess the Council of Europe do! I suppose why shouldn't it be? I'm sure I read somewhere that a small part of Kazakhstan is part of Europe.

I've heard of a few languages that many haven't: Sorbian (a Slavic language spoken in eastern Germany), Plattdeutsch (a variety of German similar to Dutch), Frisian (spoken on a group of islands off the northern coast of the Netherlands, and the closest living relative of English), and Galician (spoken in the northwest of Spain and a closley related to Portuguese). However, some others have come to my attention in recent months: Kashubian (a Slavic language spoken in northern Poland), and various Finno-Ugric languages, such Mari, Udmurt and Erzya. These are related to Finnish and Estonian and more distantly to Hungarian.

Most languages in Europe are Indo-European and are related to one another to a greater of lesser degree. They're even related to languages in Northern India, Pakistan, and even faraway Nepalese. The theory is that they are descended from a language (Proto-Indo-European) that existed about 6,000 years and was spread through conquest, migration and trade, and evolved into the myriad of languages we know today.

Language is generally, but not always, the basis for ethnic indenity, particularly in Europe. Yet if one actually looks more closely at them, we see that they aren't that much different. Of course, if a Pole and I were to try to converse in our native languages, we wouldn't get very far! However, we'd see that they have a common origin and that we're not that different. There's even a theory that there once existed one language and that all langauges, living and dead, are descended from it. This may or not be the case, but I'd like to think it's true and that we're not all that different, no what language we speak.

Anyway, I have digressed somewhat. This European Day of Languages has made me want to run out to the nearest Instituto Cervantes. Although, I'd love to learn something really obscure, like Euskera!

The Longest Name In European Football

Celtic's Dutch striker Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink has the longest name in European football. It derives from the 17th Century when two farming families in the Enschede area of Holland intermarried. Both the Vennegoor and Hesselink names carried equal social weight, and so - rather than choose between them - they chose to use both. 'Of' in Dutch actually translates to 'or'. I have to admit that it looks much better if the name were double-barrelled.

It must cost a small fortune to have his name put on the back of replica shirts, and he will probably escape a lot of bookings, as referees will not want to go to the bother of writing his name in their books!

Not That Close A Call

150 injured as Hungarians riot over PM's lies . I managed to get out of the country a whole two years, two months and one week before the riots. Also, I was only in Budapest for one day, spending the other two weeks in a commuter town called Gödöllő 30 km from the city. What a close shave!

Phew! Got Outta That One!

Thai military claims control after coup. Shit! I was only there last week!

Adventures In the Urban Jungle

The wife and I went camping on Friday night. She is an avid camper and had been pestering me to do it for ages. Beacuse of the wedding and other things, we hadn't a chance to go to the countryside this year, so she suggested somewhere a lot closer to home: our back garden. I was reluctant at first, but I soon relented.

I actually enjoyed it a lot more than I thought, although it was a little strange, as we don't have a large garden and I could hear cars, house alarms and other kinds of sounds that one wouldn't find in the countryside.

The Randomist

I'm going to see Ross Noble this Thursday at the Olympia. I saw him live in Manchester three or four years ago and have seen him on the tellybox several times. I think he's one of the funniest stand-up comedians around. Like the Big Yin, Noble goes off on tangents; however, he rarely goes back to where he started off. A lot of it is improvised and is complete bollocks, but I quite like surrealistic comedy, so I'm looking forward to it. The link I've added is a segment of a show he did for telly a couple of years ago. Meat hinges, eh? It had me in stitches.

Thailand Rocks!

After spending four days in Bangkok, we're on the beautiful island of Ko Samui. We'll be here until Wednesday. I'll wait until we get home to give a more detailed account of our honeymoon, but suffice to say: Thailand rocks!