Reply to: work permits up 45%

[hyperD]

Somehow the words "plenty of carnage" and "great fun" and "pleasurable driving" just don't seem to go together.

Had a conversation with a Canadian guy here the other morning, mentioned that a few times I'd seem people drive down the pavement in a residential area because they didn't want to wait in traffic, reply (in a very nonchalant manner): "yeah, I've seen that as well".

Sometimes it's reasuring to know how normal it is.

When I travelled around Europe with my wife in the Tuscan, I met a Canadian guy in Romania who had been travelling around Croatia in a Land Rover with the mandatory jerry cans strapped on it. He said that he'd seen plenty of pile-ups and "carnage" that looked like something out of a war.

What he described to us was fairly grim to be honest.

One thing we liked in the TVR was to power around the convoy of slow eastern european lorries to make some progress. What was more distressing was seeing the overladen skodas trying to tailgate our every manoeuvre and often overshooting our duck-in positions.

I even saw 4 guys leaning out of a window of a trabant taking photographs of our car with their mobiles while overtaking us on a twisty blind road.

Despite the carnage, when you have a free road it's wonderful to floor it and enjoy the view with the roof down. It's great to outpace a 911 on the autobahn. And an audi that had been going slow around the twisties - beautiful overtake maneouvre on the apex and powered past...

Driving around the Swiss border and the mountain roads were breath-taking. Flooring it in the tunnels and have people moving out of the way as you just unleash 380bhp was very grin-inducing!

It's more annoying to go up to 175mph with the roof down and still accelerate only to find the wife has woken up and told you to slow down....

Not so good when you're doing < 10mph in Romania because the national roads are so badly made that you have to keep pulling over to let 20 cars pass you.

[Joe Black]

Travelling by car in Europe is great fun. The main noticable difference is that lane dicipline seems to be better in Europe than here...Plenty of carnage but overall still far more pleasurable driving.

Somehow the words "plenty of carnage" and "great fun" and "pleasurable driving" just don't seem to go together.

Had a conversation with a Canadian guy here the other morning, mentioned that a few times I'd seem people drive down the pavement in a residential area because they didn't want to wait in traffic, reply (in a very nonchalant manner): "yeah, I've seen that as well".

Sometimes it's reasuring to know how normal it is.

[cityboy]

Totally agree with you on lane discipline and the right hand \ middle lane hoggers.

I would like to see 'em all horsewhipped, but that maybe because I have a hangover because I was on the lash last nights all paid in Forints.

[hyperD]

Yes, one of the things that strikes me most about everyday life in E Europe is the lack of traffic on the roads. Lack of jams, anyway. It seems to me that I remember this from my now distant youth.

Most areas in Europe appear to have better roads and less traffic than the UK SE. I'm amazed that I can cycle a couple of miles to the shops and back quicker than I can by car now. Everywhere you go there are more and more traffic lights and tailbacks. I actually get this feeling of dread everytime I have to travel by car here which I never used to get.

Travelling by car in Europe is great fun. The main noticable difference is that lane dicipline seems to be better in Europe than here. As soon as you arrive back in Dover, you really notice the right hand lane hogging that appears to be solely a British disease.

Driving standards are pretty much the same - awful. Moreso in eastern europe where you have the dangerous scene of locals with limited experience driving new faster "western" cars mixing it with locals in trabants and skodas. Plenty of carnage but overall still far more pleasurable driving.

To be honest, I fecking hate driving here and might sell the TVR and just get taxis everywhere.

[Euro-commuter]

shoot off east to the inlaws for cheap beer, local food, no traffic ...

Yes, one of the things that strikes me most about everyday life in E Europe is the lack of traffic on the roads. Lack of jams, anyway. It seems to me that I remember this from my now distant youth.

[hyperD]

Hungary has problems with hiding its growing inflation, unlike the UK which has hidden it quite well. Ferenc Gyurcsany is a self proclaimed "friend" of President bliar which is a worrying sign...

Yes, I was there in the heady transition days in the early 90s when you could dine as a king with hard currency once arriving at Ferihegy 1 and off to the Kempinski for £40/night.

Now wife and I shoot off east to the inlaws for cheap beer, local food, no traffic and keeping our fingers crossed that Nyíregyháza military airport opens for commercial traffic...got married there...

Plenty of commercial properties available for SIPPS... but I never said that ol' monocular brown...

[Joe Black]

Forints, yep remember them. Just thought they had switched, or maybe they're still on the to-do list.

Was there a few times years ago in the still Soviet era, East Germans queuing to change their maximum allowed 5 DDR marks per day, while me and then girlfriend rented an architects loft apartment for £5 per night and could buy bottles of Champanski and a whole chicken for 50p.

Nice.

[hyperD]

1800 Ft action? I thought they'd be taking Euro-action these days?

I'll get me coat...

Sadly sir, if you frequent the ho's, erm sorry, local women, you'll find everything in HU is in Forints as is all transactions in the former soviet controlled state (don't mention the EU binding inflation limits, I might have mentioned it but I think I got away with it) and as such, it remains stuckfast with much complicated 000s in its currency.

Euro = dodo.

[Joe Black]

1800 Ft action? I thought they'd be taking Euro-action these days?

I'll get me coat...

[hyperD]

another fiver will get you a 'ho.

alledgedly.

'Tis true. If you drive out on the main route from Budapest towards Miskolc and Debrecen you'll see loads of dusky cigány slappers ready for some 1800 Ft action.

[The Lone Gunman]

How can I get in on this fiver thing? in Budapest thats 4 beers

You just have to finesse or out a suitable piece of info and claim your fiver. It is only a virtual fiver mind.

[cityboy]

nearly beer time!!!!!!

[freakydancer]

How can I get in on this fiver thing? in Budapest thats 4 beers

another fiver will get you a 'ho.

alledgedly.

[cityboy]

How can I get in on this fiver thing? in Budapest thats 4 beers

[n5gooner]

n5gooner is at IBM and I claim my £5

Milan.

wrong!!! so I claim it back!!