So, the busy weekends continue with a visit to Newcastle last Saturday. This one is organised by the Overseas Students Association, with the subsidised coach ticket costing GBP4. I was with three other students, all doing Linguistics, presumably one reason they went for the trip is to experience the Newcastle accent. A staff manning the Information Centre at the railway station had a strong accent that sounded not far from Scottish, but we don't know if that is the Newcastle accent.
The weather was wet and cold, the start of a cold spell to hit the eastern UK that has continued since. We didn't visit many places because it was just a day trip, and the coach journey already ate up 2 hours per way. But rather than bore you to death with the description of the places we visited, I'll leave it to you to look at the photos that I took.One noteworthy incident though. Unknowingly, we took our lunch at a Chinese restaurant that was just opposite the Newcastle United football stadium. We happened to leave the restaurant 10 minutes before the start of that Saturday's game, and bumped right into the fans streaming into the stadium. The passion of the fans were evident. Despite the rain, they were singing loudly, shouting cheers and ignoring the traffic, and it was quite intimidating to watch them. And there were so many of them streaming incessantly up the street that we wonder where they came from. Singapore has tried to build up grassroot support for the S League, but I really don't think we will ever get to this stage. It is just not in our culture to be so fanatic over a football team.
Picture showing Newcastle United's fans streaming into the stadium, which is the structure in the background behind the Chinese arch.
No comments:
Post a Comment