(very nearly entitled A Post especially for Anonymous of Sarajevo)
Given our total overexcitement of being able to watch most of the 20 20 Cricket series last month, you can imagine the excitement in the Brits In Bosnia household when it was discovered that not only can we watch the Ashes (the England vs. Australia cricket for the non-Brits amongst you), we can even watch it live.
No, Eurosport has not suddenly decided to broadcast it (for some bizarre reason 5 x 5 days of cricket was not top of their list to show in Bosnia). It turns out that you can watch the games live, online, for a small fee, if you live somewhere where the English Cricket Board hasn't sold the rights of the games to. So, to the fellow Brits in Bosnia, if you want to watch the matches or their highlights, ECBTv is where to go.
We will be watching far more of the cricket here than we would be able to in the UK, given that we refuse to pay Sky for the priviledge. The summer working schedule has just been thrown out of the window.
Showing posts with label tv. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tv. Show all posts
Thursday, 2 July 2009
Wednesday, 3 June 2009
The really important things to bring back from home
I'm still unpacking. It takes forever and is one of my least favourite activities. But, as I try and create some form of order in the chaos it has struck me that what I have actually bought home from the UK is nothing like what I expected to bring home. Utterly food obsessed, I thought my bags would be stuffed full of things like marmite, mango chutney, popadoms, pine nuts, chocolate hobnobs and PG Tips and all those other things that we can't get hold of out here.
But when push came to shove, and I realised that we didn't have enough space to bring back everything that I thought we would it was the important stuff that stayed in.
- marmite and teabags. Obviously. But these were really the only foodstuffs that made the cull.
- childrens suncream. Althought the weather here is currently dreadful and we can only look at the English summer going on and weep, it will get hot here. Last year we couldn't find any childrens suncream that wasn't very thick and gloopy so I bought some back.
- new clothes. The clothes in Bosnia are surprisingly expensive, especially children's ones. It is far cheaper to buy them in the UK and bring them back, particularly when the second hand shops around my parents house are so great . I may have also snuck a few new clothes for me in when Dave wasn't looking.
- Calpol and Calprufen. We have enough to sink a small battleship. You can get similar in Bosnia, but I feel it is safer to stick with what I know. I know how many times I can give it to them, how much, that it is safe to alternate the two and that if it doesn't bring their temperatures down that we need to go to the doctors. When their temperatures soar, I don't want to be worrying that I haven't quite got it right on the medicinal front.
- a few English language books.
- a few box set DVDs. We really don't watch the local TV that often. We have no idea what is on, or when it will be on. So, we prefer to watch an episode of a show that we know we like, although what we will do when we finish The Sopranos I have no idea.
- many many many childrens DVDs. I can't take the childrens tv here, Cartoon Network is dreadful and even Adam says that the cartoons aren't very good. This way CBeebies still works its magic and I can take comfort in the fact that it is vaguely educational.
So alas, no room for the mango chutney. I'm still not sure if leaving it behind was a mistake.
But when push came to shove, and I realised that we didn't have enough space to bring back everything that I thought we would it was the important stuff that stayed in.
- marmite and teabags. Obviously. But these were really the only foodstuffs that made the cull.
- childrens suncream. Althought the weather here is currently dreadful and we can only look at the English summer going on and weep, it will get hot here. Last year we couldn't find any childrens suncream that wasn't very thick and gloopy so I bought some back.
- new clothes. The clothes in Bosnia are surprisingly expensive, especially children's ones. It is far cheaper to buy them in the UK and bring them back, particularly when the second hand shops around my parents house are so great . I may have also snuck a few new clothes for me in when Dave wasn't looking.
- Calpol and Calprufen. We have enough to sink a small battleship. You can get similar in Bosnia, but I feel it is safer to stick with what I know. I know how many times I can give it to them, how much, that it is safe to alternate the two and that if it doesn't bring their temperatures down that we need to go to the doctors. When their temperatures soar, I don't want to be worrying that I haven't quite got it right on the medicinal front.
- a few English language books.
- a few box set DVDs. We really don't watch the local TV that often. We have no idea what is on, or when it will be on. So, we prefer to watch an episode of a show that we know we like, although what we will do when we finish The Sopranos I have no idea.
- many many many childrens DVDs. I can't take the childrens tv here, Cartoon Network is dreadful and even Adam says that the cartoons aren't very good. This way CBeebies still works its magic and I can take comfort in the fact that it is vaguely educational.
So alas, no room for the mango chutney. I'm still not sure if leaving it behind was a mistake.
Wednesday, 11 March 2009
Come on you Blues!
One of the great things about being English is that wherever you go in the world, you can always find an interest in the English Premier Football league. Here, this means that I can still watch Chelsea on TV and even have people to dissect the match with afterwards. So last night I was glued to Juventus vs. Chelsea even though my understanding of the commentary was, at best, patchy. Then I could chat about the brilliance of Didier Drogba to my football loving friend who was also watching the game.
D, not a football fan at the best of times, refused to watch. He was listening to England's attempt to beat the West Indies in cricket and was refusing to talk to anyone at all.
D, not a football fan at the best of times, refused to watch. He was listening to England's attempt to beat the West Indies in cricket and was refusing to talk to anyone at all.
Tuesday, 10 March 2009
Different lives
One of the things I like about living in Bosnia is the way in which life seems that much, um, closer. There is no hiding from the fact that sometimes life isn't very nice. From the Roma kids begging at traffic lights, to the amputees sitting outside of the supermarket in subzero temperatures, to the very visible levels of poverty there is plenty of evidence that life can be very very hard.
Adam is curious about all of this. He regularly asks questions along the lines of why is that boy is begging? why does that man not have a leg? why are people cutting down the trees in the park? why can't that boy buy a new toy scooter? why doesn't that girl have a Daddy? Why does that dog not have a home? We discuss all his questions and I try to explain in language that he understands that not everyone is as lucky as we are, sometimes these not very nice things do happen. He does think about all these conversations and I'm often surprised when a few days later he returns to the topic to talk about it a bit more. I try to be open and honest about everything and have been amazed by his ability to process what we are talking about. He is genuinely interested in what is going on around him and has a young child's natural curiosity to take on board all these different things.
Having watched all this, I have been following with a degree of interest the furore surrounding the appointment of a disabled presenter for the BBC's childrens channel, CBeebies. Some adults have complained that she gives their children nightmares and are preventing their children from watching the channel when she is presenting (see more here about this story). As you might imagine, a whole lot of people have had something to say about this. On the whole people support the presenter and rightly add that children need to be exposed to difference in order to counter future prejudice and discrimination. But I would add that further to that, children are interested in the world and to ban them from seeing something that makes that world a more diverse, and therefore interesting, place seems to me to be a real shame.
Adam is curious about all of this. He regularly asks questions along the lines of why is that boy is begging? why does that man not have a leg? why are people cutting down the trees in the park? why can't that boy buy a new toy scooter? why doesn't that girl have a Daddy? Why does that dog not have a home? We discuss all his questions and I try to explain in language that he understands that not everyone is as lucky as we are, sometimes these not very nice things do happen. He does think about all these conversations and I'm often surprised when a few days later he returns to the topic to talk about it a bit more. I try to be open and honest about everything and have been amazed by his ability to process what we are talking about. He is genuinely interested in what is going on around him and has a young child's natural curiosity to take on board all these different things.
Having watched all this, I have been following with a degree of interest the furore surrounding the appointment of a disabled presenter for the BBC's childrens channel, CBeebies. Some adults have complained that she gives their children nightmares and are preventing their children from watching the channel when she is presenting (see more here about this story). As you might imagine, a whole lot of people have had something to say about this. On the whole people support the presenter and rightly add that children need to be exposed to difference in order to counter future prejudice and discrimination. But I would add that further to that, children are interested in the world and to ban them from seeing something that makes that world a more diverse, and therefore interesting, place seems to me to be a real shame.
Friday, 6 March 2009
The TV1000 game
When we were thinking about coming out here we amassed a vast collection of DVDs that we could watch in the evening, thinking that we would be unable to watch much TV here. Turns out we were wrong. Not only can we get pretty much any film and TV series here on DVD for a fraction of the price (and I mean a tiny tiny fraction) but most of the films shown here are in English with subtitles so we can watch them anyway.
We also have Cable TV which has a number of English speaking channels. There is the Discovery Channel, National Geographic and some other ones that I don't know what they are. To get our news fix we can sometimes catch the English language Al Jezera news channel and we did once manage to get Sky News. Otherwise newswise we are left with CNN which raises my blood pressure nightly and I have to resist throwing things at the TV, particularly at the weather reporters who take annoying to a whole new level.
There are a few film channels too: Turner Classic Movies, TV1000 and a few others all show decent films. We've had a Robert de Niro season, a Britflicks moment, Thrillers weekend, Moulin Rouge and other musicals.
We have no idea where to get a schedule for what is going to be shown on these channels, so it is a bit hit and miss whether we actually work out what is on and when. We do know that TV 1000 will always start a new film at 10pm, so a new, unmissable game has developed. Whatever else we are doing at the time, D and I congregate in front of the TV to name that film as the opening credits roll. We are helped in our mission that TV1000 does like to show the same films a lot, so before the studio name has faded from the screen we have already guessed 'Robocop!' 'Die Hard!' 'Die Hard 2!' ' Terminator' and bizarrely 'The Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover!'
We also have Cable TV which has a number of English speaking channels. There is the Discovery Channel, National Geographic and some other ones that I don't know what they are. To get our news fix we can sometimes catch the English language Al Jezera news channel and we did once manage to get Sky News. Otherwise newswise we are left with CNN which raises my blood pressure nightly and I have to resist throwing things at the TV, particularly at the weather reporters who take annoying to a whole new level.
There are a few film channels too: Turner Classic Movies, TV1000 and a few others all show decent films. We've had a Robert de Niro season, a Britflicks moment, Thrillers weekend, Moulin Rouge and other musicals.
We have no idea where to get a schedule for what is going to be shown on these channels, so it is a bit hit and miss whether we actually work out what is on and when. We do know that TV 1000 will always start a new film at 10pm, so a new, unmissable game has developed. Whatever else we are doing at the time, D and I congregate in front of the TV to name that film as the opening credits roll. We are helped in our mission that TV1000 does like to show the same films a lot, so before the studio name has faded from the screen we have already guessed 'Robocop!' 'Die Hard!' 'Die Hard 2!' ' Terminator' and bizarrely 'The Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover!'
Wednesday, 11 February 2009
La la LA laaaaa... la la la la la la
On finding out that we are British, a lot of Bosnians have greeted us with "That's so cool - I LOVE British comedy!" For quite a while we weren't sure what British comedy they meant. Were they talking Mr. Bean (or, heaven help us, Benny Hill) type of British comedy? Is it something more along the lines of Monty Python and Fawlty Towers? Or more modern - maybe The Office? Black Books? Peep Show?
It wasn't until we really got to the bottom of why it is that people always ask us if we have ever been to Peckham that the penny dropped. One of the top Bosnian shows is Only Fools and Horses. Rodney and Del Boy are complete stars here. We couldn't understand it.
The show was on last night so we watched it (instantly transported back to our childhoods and Thatchers Britain). But we did see why the Bosnians like it. The tower blocks of Peckham are not too far removed from the tower blocks of Tuzla where many people live. The apartments are small and whole families live together. The Bosnians, stifled for years with overbearing authority, tend to operate just on the other side of the law, finding a good deal is a national pastime. Trotters Trading is very similar to the businesses that many people have here, or at least many people can understand the thinking behind it. I hadn't thought of it before but Peckham and Tuzla are not too different at all.
It wasn't until we really got to the bottom of why it is that people always ask us if we have ever been to Peckham that the penny dropped. One of the top Bosnian shows is Only Fools and Horses. Rodney and Del Boy are complete stars here. We couldn't understand it.
The show was on last night so we watched it (instantly transported back to our childhoods and Thatchers Britain). But we did see why the Bosnians like it. The tower blocks of Peckham are not too far removed from the tower blocks of Tuzla where many people live. The apartments are small and whole families live together. The Bosnians, stifled for years with overbearing authority, tend to operate just on the other side of the law, finding a good deal is a national pastime. Trotters Trading is very similar to the businesses that many people have here, or at least many people can understand the thinking behind it. I hadn't thought of it before but Peckham and Tuzla are not too different at all.
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