COLLEGE GUILD
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TRAVEL, Unit 4
England
After sharing every detail of her trip with Dwayne, Molly told just about every one in Bar Harbor
about her trip to Fort Point. Although they enjoyed hearing about Brunswick, Bay Village and
Fort Point, (and especially hearing about them from Molly Toothaker who never went
anywhere!), they were a little puzzled. They understood why Molly wanted to learn about the
area where Dwayne went to college. But why did she spend all that time in those small
neighborhoods when she could have explored all that Boston and San Francisco have to offer.
Having bent the ears of all her Bar Harbor friends, Molly sat and looked out toward the Atlantic
Ocean; she felt so blessed, knowing how many in this country were shut away from such beauty.
She also congratulated herself again for actually getting onto an airplane and flying clear across
the country. As she looked out, she began to wonder what it was like on the other side of that
ocean. It didn't take long before she was saying to herself, "I flew across the country, so why
shouldn't I be able to fly across the ocean!?"
Next thing Dwayne knew, she was buying a ticket for London. "I'll be fine", she assured him.
"They do speak English there, you know."
When Molly went to a Visitors' Center in London, she found out that in no way is English the
only language spoken by the English. She was surprised to learn that in this capital city of 7
million residents, more than half of them were born elsewhere!
1. Did you grow up in the same town you were born in? What were the advantages and
disadvantages of this?
2. Name two advantages and two disadvantages to living in a different country from your
native country.
3. Which do you think is best – for children to be raised in one place, or for their families
to move on to a new state or country every few years? Explain.
4. What country would you choose to live in?
One place where people of many nationalities settled when they came to England is called Brick
Lane, a community where housing has not been too expensive. Brick Lane apparently got its
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name because it was where the bricks were made to rebuild the city after the great fire of 1666
when most of London burned down. Some of the most recent immigrants are from Bangladesh.
Even the street signs reflect the Bangladeshis' growing
presence in London.
In Brick Lane, the first thing that struck Molly
was the street lights. At the top of each tall
green metal pole is a metal ornament, like the
leaves of a flower -- the only place you will
see them in London. Their design is based on
an original one from Bangladesh. The city
council put them in to mark the fact that the
area has a large population of people from
that country.
5. Think of an item or symbol that represents home to you.
6. What item or symbol would represent what you want a home to be?
In 1971, India invaded East Pakistan, defeated the West Pakistani occupation forces and created
Bangladesh. In 1974, Pakistan agreed to recognize the independence of Bangladesh. It is one of
the poorest countries in the world, with summer floods and winter droughts. Most people in India
practice different religions from the Bangladeshi; wars have resulted from these differences.
7. How would you define homeland?
8. List 3 reason why some people choose to leave their homeland.
On Brick Lane, shops sell food, clothes, books and other goods from Bangladesh. In one small
block every building, 8 of them, is a Bangladeshi restaurant! There is a travel agent specializing
in tickets for Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca that all Muslims are supposed to make once in their
lives. [Islam is the major religion in Bangladesh.]
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9. How do you think it would feel to leave Bangladesh and come to London?
10. How would it feel to temporarily be back in Bangladesh for Hajj?
One Brick Lane building looks out of place here – "Elfes Stonemason". When Molly looked in
the window, she saw that most of gravestones have Hebrew script. Elfes is left over from the
time the Jews were the main immigrant group in Brick Lane, from the late 19th to the mid 20th
century. The other legacy of the Jews is the two 24 hour bagel bakeries, almost side by side.
(Molly was "forced" to buy a treat from both.) Like Bangladesh, Israel became a country after
years of violence. Now Palestine wants the same recognition.
11. How should the creation of a new country be decided?
12. Why are these conflicts so hard to resolve?
On Brick Lane, one large building has a very tall chimney on which is painted “Truman..” To an
Englishman that means beer. This is an old brewery, but has been converted to bars and shops
selling fashion items.
These are run like any store, but Molly was lucky to arrive in Brick Lane on market day. Crowds
of people and barriers blocked traffic. All along the lane, in the side streets and under the arches
of the overhead railway, were stalls selling fruit and vegetables, clothes, carpets, cleaning
products, tapes and videos, furniture, etc. In addition to stalls, there were quite a few poor folk
trying to sell items they had lying on the pavement.
13. Do you suppose these vendors have as much of a profit margin (income vs. expenses) as
the fashion stores? To get an idea, list the kinds of expenses for each, then estimate the
income for a week.
14. What would you guess Molly bought there?
Before Molly bought anything, she had to figure out their currency. The British have pence,
shillings and pounds vs. our pennies, quarters and dollars. Each British pound has 100 pence,
just like our dollar and cents, but one pound is worth around $1.90.
15. When Molly changes $50 into pounds, how many pounds does she have?
A bagel on Brick Lane costs 90 pence. At the market, she spends five pounds and 60 pence. She
buys 3 postcards at 40 pence each.
16. How much is that in pence and pounds?
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17. How much is that in dollars?
Distances are also measured differently in England; the unit they use is a meter versus a foot.
One meter = 3.25 feet. In the U.S., we are starting to use meters too, for instance in track and
swimming competition.
18. What would the advantages be for this country to switch to the metric system vs. using
inches, yards and miles?
Down to brass tacks
One group of people who have lived in the East End of London practically forever are
"Cockneys." They were London's city dwellers who used to run the street markets; sometimes
they got into trouble with guys from the country who came in to the markets. They also had the
reputation of getting into trouble with the law.
Although English is their native tongue, they nevertheless started their own language – some
people think it was to be able to fool customers in the markets. Regular English has adopted a
number of Cockney expressions, for example you might hear someone say, “Let’s get down to
brass tacks”. “Brass tacks” is Cockney for “facts”.
Here’s how it works: You pick words that rhyme with the words you want to say. If a Cockney
wants to say that his "wife is upstairs", it will come out, Me trouble and strife is up the apples
and pears". These are tricky, but you quiz fans might enjoy the next 3 questions.
19. What are you doing if you go to the Eiffel Tower with faith and hope for a Charles and
Dave and a Bob Squash? Translation at end of Unit
20. Try one of your own: write a sentence with 3 Cockney replacements for your words.
21. Draw a picture of what you just described (in case your College Guild "profs" can't
figure it out!)
From slang to literature…
What also had Molly interested in Brick Lane was learning that three extremely famous men
came from that part of London – Shakespeare, Dickens and Jack the Ripper. The first two were
authors, but what could they possibly have in common with the third? For one thing, Dickens'
whole family was sent to prison. On an historical scale, the fame of all three teach us about the
England of their day.
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William Shakespeare
It wasn’t easy writing plays in Shakespeare’s time. You didn’t have scenery or lighting, or
special effects – you had to do it all with words. Theaters were out of doors and performances
took place in the afternoon, because there weren’t any artificial lights. Most of the audience
stands in the area in front of the stage, while the rich folk sit up in balconies further back. The
actors did have costumes and props, but they had to come out onto a bare stage and persuade the
audience that they were in Rome, in a cathedral, in a palace, in Egypt, or even in the middle of
the ocean. Sometimes Shakespeare had somebody walk out onto the stage and tell people
where they were. He did this in Romeo and Juliet, for example, to introduce the play.
PROLOGUE
Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life;
Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
Do with their death bury their parents’ strife.
The fearful passage of their death-mark’d love,
And the continuance of their parents’ rage,
Which, but their children’s end, nought could remove,
Is now the two hours’ traffic of our stage;
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.
Shakespeare's kind of theater leaves more up to the actors and the director, and right now the
director is you! You are in complete charge of this scene and the play you will be directing is
The Tempest, (the one in the middle of the ocean).
22. How will you make ship and weather noises?
23. How do you persuade an audience in the middle of London in the middle of the
afternoon that they are about to experience a shipwreck?
24. Do you use a moderator to help you begin the story?
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25. If so, what will he say? (Yes, he – even the women's parts were played by men.) If not,
what are the opening lines of the first character to speak.
Charles Dickens
As a schoolgirl, Molly had read A Tale of Two Cities, David Copperfield and Dickens' other
novels of nineteenth century England. She was a fan of his books and thrilled to be able to find
out more about this writer.
It is an old truism that you write best what you know about. All his life, Dickens wrote about
the things that had happened to him as a child. Because he wrote so clearly and so well, people
listened. Romantic novels (where life always turns out happily) was the popular literature of the
day, so when someone revealed the truth about the lives of the poor, it was a rarity, and an eye
opener. Because of the writing of Charles Dickens, many of the laws that had allowed these
injustices were changed.
26. What would you write about your childhood?
27. Would you relate that time to your ending up in prison? Explain.
Dickens was the oldest boy in a large family. When he was just eleven, they moved to London.
In those days, you could be sent to prison if you owed somebody money—and that is what
happened to Dickens’ family. His father was sent to Debtor’s Prison and the entire family, except
for Charles, joined him there. Young Charles had to stay behind and work at a job he hated. For
the rest of his life, he never forgot being alone, hungry and abandoned in this huge city. When
the debt was finally paid off, his family came out of prison and Charles was allowed to go back
to school.
Dickens started publishing his work when he was just 20 years old. Almost overnight he became
as famous as the most popular actor or musician you could name. His writing was real; it was
funny; he told people stories about parts of the world they had never seen; and he made them
care about things they had never cared about before.
In England in the nineteenth century, poor people were put into institutions called work houses
which were very much like jails. They could not leave; they were poorly fed and housed and they
had to do very hard physical labor, even the children. In his novel, Oliver Twist, a boy decides
that any life is better than starving in a work house, and he runs off to London. There he meets a
bunch of kids who take him back to the place they're staying—with a man who trained them to
be pickpockets. The first thing the boys in Oliver Twist have to learn to steal is a handkerchief.
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28. What in the world is the point of stealing handkerchiefs?
29. In modern language, tell what you think happens to Oliver.
In the works of both Dickens and Shakespeare, Jews are often portrayed as the villain.
30. Why would this be?
Jack the Ripper
This serial killer seems to have a greater hold on the imagination of people than most any other
criminal figure. His crimes are more than a hundred years old, yet books are still being written,
speculating on his identity. For a time, it was even believed that he might be a member of the
British Royal Family. A great many innocent men have been accused of his crimes in the court
of public opinion.
His "legend" is certainly connected to the progress taking place in England at that time:
a) He was active at the time newspapers were gaining general circulation; a
sensationalized series of unsolved murders sold lots of papers.
b) This was the time when photography was popularized, so his crime scenes were
amongst the first that were photographed by the police.
c) This was the time when criminals could only be convicted if their crimes were directly
witnessed, or if they confessed. [There were a surprising number of provably false
confessions.]
d) Nowadays, Scotland Yard would be in charge, but back then it had no authority in the
City of London. The Metropolitan Police who were in charge were urged to offer a
reward but did not. "Jack the Ripper" was never found.
31. What has now changed to help find and convict criminals?
32. Where is the potential for error in these techniques?
33. Why do people make false confessions?
Prison in Great Britain today is much like prison in the United States. England does not have
capital punishment (though it is a subject intensely debated in the Parliament.) Jail in
Bangladesh is another story. There the police are a paramilitary force who seem to do pretty
much as they please. Their “extra-judicial killings” are virtually never prosecuted. Detention
without formal charges is permitted; rape of female inmates is common. There is a huge case
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backlog, so lengthy pre-trial imprisonment is the rule. Bangladesh has capital punishment. It is
one of five countries in the world that executes juvenile offenders.
Back to Maine
Just as she did in Boston and San Francisco, Molly had discovered a small, relatively unknown
part of a large city. The more she saw, the more she believed that every place on our globe lives
with and is changed by the influences of the others. But this interaction creates permanent rifts
and violence too. It was wonderful to walk down Brick Lane and see people from so many
cultures living together. But were they one community?
34. How much and what can a visitor learn about another country?
35. Write a poem about Brick Lane.
If Molly's friends were puzzled before, they couldn't understand why a woman who had just been
to London would spend so much time talking about Bangladesh!
translation for #19: "...go to the shower with soap for a shave and a wash."]
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