SANDINO SOCCER UPSET AS BRIDGWATER INTERNATIONAL SINK WITHOUT TRACE

Bridgwater International Cup losing Senior team

Every year Bridgwater International enters a team or two for the Bristol-Nicaragua twinning festival the 'Sandino cup', which pits international(ish) football teams against one another in a sunny playing field in the grounds of Ashton Court. This year we entered two teams Bridgwater international and Bridgwater International Juniors (who were marginally younger).

The bad news started when it became apparent that self-declared 'star player' Councillor Smedley pronounced himself temporarily unfit and within several minutes was asleep on the touchlines.

Dicky

Enter the Dicky

More bad news followed as traffic chaos on the M5 delayed the arrival of the junior team and master of all trades jack of none 'Dicky Weaving' , who was meant to be playing for the seniors.

Never mind. Time and Sandino waits for no one in particular and so off they went. 3 Slovaks and 2 Brits kicked off and within 14 minutes had lost 5.1 to Dynamo Henleaze. Meanwhile on the adjoining pitch, the Juniors still hadn't turned up so their first game against St.Werburghs Hotspurs was lost by default. 

is

And so it went on, until finally Dicky and the 7th cavalry arrived. Bridgwater Juniors clinched a sensational 1.0 victory over Real Madras and Bridgwater Seniors held the mighty Arno's Vale Academicals to a 1.1 draw.

But then it all turned to shit and they all lost the rest of their games finishing bottom of their respective groups, now with the prospect of playing each other in the supplementary competition for losers the Shit TrayTrophy. 

Sadly it wasn't to be. The Juniors went down several nil to the Easton Cowboys and the Seniors went down at least 3.0 to Red Star Bedminster.

Man of the match, Steve 'no goals' Miles

rubbish

On the positive side, much money was raised for Nicaragua, chimichangas were eaten and enchiladas donned as inappropriate headgear, whilst on the negative side one Bridgwater player was banned - although we're not sure whether this was for hitting someone or for not hitting one particularly rubbish referee.

STOP PRESS;- SENSATIONAL 'MATCH FIXING SCANDAL' INVESTIGATED.

Shortly after the tournament finished with  the surprise and frankly pathetic defeat of both Bridgwater teams, for who the organisers had to invent a new category of 'more than last' , revelations as to the role played by two apparently innocent and apparently female 'supporters' of the Bridgwater side present on the day. After extensive investigations by our team of experts and his mate Dave, it was shockingly revealed late last night in a kebab shop that the two nominally innocent 'groupies' were in fact multi billionaire Russian oligarchs working for the neo Stalinist Red Star Bedminster team who are currently in the pockets of top Putinista bathroom fittings magnate and UKIP donor, Frodo Tokalotashajt. 

former KGB 'match fixing' operatives at work

Laszlo and Dennis Grunszch, pictured left , told our reporter "Ok, so we paid Mr Dicky to throw the game, it's no secret now, but he knows we are holding his favourite toupee, the keys to his treasured Sinclair C5 and his poodle Trevor in a remote location in Vladivostok-so what would you do in his position? Ey? Big boy?" 

Answers on a postcard.

HUNGARIANS DROP IN ON A SUN-DRENCHED LA CIOTAT

Hungarian, Hungarian, French, Hungarian, French, Hungarian, British

Most Somerset towns are twinned with French  partner towns in nearby Normandy. Just pop across the channel and you're there. Not Bridgwater though. Oh no, we're twinned with a town in the South of France. Having said that, La Ciotat is just as easy, if not easier , to get to as any Norman twinning and , in fact, far more rewarding. While you're packing your car , driving to a Channel port, booking a ferry and driving off the other side, you can be popping up to Bristol airport, flying over to Marseilles or Nice and within 4-5 hours you'll be as much in La Ciotat as you would have been in Caen, Rouen or Bayeux. And it's sunnier.

La Ciotat was Bridgwater's first twinning. 1957 in fact. In recent years we've taken footballers and choir singers over there with the help of their Council and it's long established 'jumelage' committee. Lately, we've been trying to push the idea of 'triangulation', whereby Bridgwater has several twin towns, and our twin towns also have several twin towns, so why not introduce them all to each other. It can only be good for tourism, international friendship and economic development.

'a pretty balanced delegation'

Eszther on the Quayside in La Ciotat

So that's why in May 2013 we took across a group of people from Hungary. Zsolt Nemeth, a local councillor from Sarvar, his daughter Eszther, 'teacher of the year' Beata Kovacs,  from the Sebestien Tinodi High school and her daughter the lawyer Orsolya, seemed like a pretty balanced delegation.

Flying in to Nice from Vienna, it was less than 2 hours down the sunny coastal autoroute past Cannes and St Tropez to La Ciotat where gorgeous weather reigned supreme. The best hotel for us these days is the Croix De Malte, a delightful family run place that holds up to 70 people and a stones throw from the seafront in the centre of the town.  

'internationalisme'

Croix de Malte does great meals and we invited some friends from the local Partie Socialiste

Jean Louis and Zsolt share a toast

to join us to discuss current affairs and internationalism. And of course to make new friendships. Jean Louis LeSavre has been to Bridgwater many times and first came here in the early days of the twinning. "I don't speak English" he insisted. And then continued to speak near perfect English for the next 3 days.  Said Zenafi , known as 'the Capitaine' apparently because he owned a boat slightly bigger than himself, is the Chairman of the PS in La Ciotat and Laurent Karouby, a special needs teacher, the director of Communications, made up the host delegation who looked after us so well for our stay.

On Monday morning  we had a tour of the 'Route des Cretes', a spectacular cliff top road between La Ciotat and Cassis - temporarily closed due to the potentially incendiary nature of the flammable sagebrush  and high winds (le mistral was just dying down). But our buddies knew a different route and so we came at it from the Cassis direction first. From atop the cliffs - some of the highest in Europe, you can see azure seas as far as the eye can squint and tranquil bays either side of the massif.

Making Education links

Seeking out further helpful links we visited the newly established FRENGS language school, run by  Anglophiles Sebastien Lombardo and Gregory , who had met in Bournemouth and although not natives of La Ciotat, had moved there to set up their school. They helped us out for the afternoon with a guided tour of the city. They were particularly interested in our plans to take Media students to la Ciotat. After all, the first ever moving images were filmed in the town - the Lumiere brothers 'train entering a station' was filmed at la Ciotat station. Sebastian informed us of his own connection to the momentous event - "The railway lines came from St Etienne - and so do I!".

Their student Joelly was keen to practice her English on us and whisked away the Nemeths for a drive around the bay to Bandol and St Cyr Sur Mer, giving them a personalised tour.

'Keeping up Civic appearances'

Afterwards, it was time to meet some 'civics'. So it was off to the Town Hall where head of

Patzlaff and LeSavre-strong supporters of 'le Jumelage'

International Links Guy Patzlaff was waiting for us . He was very happy to welcome groups from any nation, and pointed Mr Nemeth in the direction of the Marseilles Chamber of Commerce in order to develop some of his ideas for business co-operation  between France and Hungary. With the involvement of our friends from Frengs, plus Mr LeSavre and Mr Patzlaff we had a general discussion about future link projects between our communities.

And so it was time for some Moules.  You can't visit France without trying some moules-frites. Mussels and chips. Yum yum i say.  Though maybe twice in a day is a bad plan. 

Vive les Moules-Frites

Zsolt & Said , while Francois Hollande looks on

On our last day we were invited by our PS friends for a little drink in their office to celebrate Europe , multi-culturalisme , le jumelage and to discuss the challenges ahead for us all. In Hungary they have neo-Nazis in uniform holding anti Jewish demonstrations openly on the streets of Budapest and in Britain we have the Europhobic neanderthals of UKIP  seeking to bring back smoke-filled pubs, put gay people back in closets and make sure migrant workers feel unwelcome, wreaking havoc in the polling booths and web forums. So any message that suggests that might be a slight step backward has to be a good thing. So we all drank to that.

Our informal visit had been a success, we had made some new contacts, spread a little international co-operation, contributed to the local economy and hadn't got drenched by the unseasonal rain. Until the last day in Nice...

BRIDGWATER COLLEGE FILM AND MEDIA STUDENTS VISIT HUNGARY

Welcome to Hungary

It was only a year or so back that we started to develop links with Hungary. This came about through a meeting with Hungarian councillor and turkey magnate   Nemeth Zsolt from the town of Sarvar at the Uherske Hradiste wine festival. He introduced us to school teacher Kovacs Beata  from the Tinodi Sebestian High school and thereafter the links simply flowed.

Well, Kovacs Beata is like saying Smedley Brian, but the Hungarians seem to like  things that way round, so this year I got Media teachers  Hughes Vanessa ,Woods Laura and De Francesca Mino to take College Bridgwater over there with 33 eager students.

Flying from Gatwick to Budapest the students were met off the plane at Ferihegy (Ferenc Liszt) airport by Ferenc the bus driver   and his bus (probably also called Ferenc). And Smedley Brian.

meltwater

It wasn't as cold as we thought it might have been and the snow generally hung in ploughed up patches on the edges of fields, which were equally dotted with vast limpid pools of meltwater. 

Heroes Square in Budapest

Staying at the Benczur hotel -in a great location just off the main Andrassy thoroughfare, we were able  to have a night wander around the nearby city park and Heroes square, past the ridiculously inappropriate 'Museum of Agriculture' - a converted castle, and back before midnight surrounded by steaming lakes of vapour that showed you;re never too far from a thermal spa in Hungary.

Next day the students from Sarvar travelled up to Budapest to join us. Todays highlights included a visit to the MTV studios - that's Hungarian as in Magyar TV -not the music channel of world renown and a skyline tour of the Buda hills on the Presidential palace side of the Danube.

chicken

Lunch time and shopping in the town centre Vaci street area allowed the staff to sample the delights of Hungarian  chicken and honey salads while the students headed for the magic that is KFC.

Hungarian Parliament across the Danube

The afternoon saw us visiting the Hungarian Parliament - a magnificent building right on the banks of the river, but which now costs money to visit. It didn't just a few months back. I opted to sit this one out quietly in a roadside cafe, where I was entertained by the delightful spectacle of 3 French girls screaming constantly at the Hungarian waitress that she'd robbed them while the poor girl/possible robber attempted to go about her business serving people. This lasted about half an hour whereafter the French decided to give up and promised to be back tomorrow.

An evening meal at the hotel was followed by a night on the town. Hungarian students Balint, Istvan and Berci were with them at all times in case of major incidents such as inadvertently ordering a mixed sauna instead of a KFC bargain bucket.

 Trabant

Donald Campbell aims to set a new land speed record

Morning rolled round and we rolled off. Along came Ferenc in the Ferencmobile  and within 30 minutes we were at Memento Park, the place where the anti-communists took all the communist statues and put em in an anti-communist statue museum and charged all the people a dollar and a half just to see'em. Well, you don't always know what you've got till it's gone. However, in this case it had been over 20 years since the collapse of Communism and none of the Hungarian students really knew much about why the statue museum was there in the first place. So Mino and Vanessa demonstrated 'the good old days' by trying to fit into a Trabant.

Next stop was the Korda Film studios. Lots of famous Hungarian film people of course. Bela Lugosi to name just one. So the film students had a guided tour around the film sets and afterwards mingled with the throngs of extras, of whom there were none, in the studio canteen. And ate chicken.

The Hungarians sing in Hungarian

Across the vast icy puddly snow drifty wastes of Hungary the bus trundled for a couple of hours before arriving in Sarvar - the delightful little town with it's quaint middle European houses, charming folk customs and the castle where Elizabeth Bathory who went on to murder 300 peasant girls  lived.

chicken

That evening we had a party at the Tinodi Sebestian school which involved singing Hungarian songs and being treated to several promotional films of Hungary, Sarvar and wellness spas. Who'd have thought the Hungarians had invented the biro, the rubik cube and the detachable chicken! The highlight of the evening was a fiendish quiz set by Hungarian students which would have gained the winners in any other country a Mensa award or an entrance exam to a top University. The winners on this occasion attained the top award of 'large cream cake'. Which would have probably satisfied Leonardo Da Vinci and put him off his inventing at an early age. If only achievement was properly rewarded!

The sunny village of Cak

The next day the HungoAnglo students headed off by Ferencbus to the nearby town of Szombathely where they interviewed the editor of the local newspaper 'Vas Nepe', who complained about the dumbing down of the newspaper industry and the pressures on budgets and the increase of unemployment. And gave them several hundred small cheesecakes for better contemplation.

palinka

After dinner at a local school, they headed into the Austrian borderlands and the small village of Cak - famous for it's ancient wine cottages and modern wines and palinka (brandy) - an especially interesting strain produced by Mr Nemeth which featured a portrait of his charming daughter Eszther on each bottle.  An evening meal in Cak sponsored by Mr Nemeth was followed by an evening break in central Szombathely and then back to Sarvar.

The final day saw the group headed off to Vienna -just 2 hours away on the same Danube. Guided by the sprightly Gabor, the group visited the Schonbrunn palace and the ancient city centre before heading off to Vienna airport  and back to Gatwick.

2013 PROGRAMME KICKS OFF WITH A MULTI-NATIONAL PEACE KEEPING MISSION TO KINGS LYNN

Bridgwater International's 2013 season has kicked off with our participation in a Multi-National EU funded Educational project with the West Anglia College of King's Lynn and students of three countries - Spain, Italy and the Czech Republic.

When Czech teacher Honza Muzik signed his students up for the project he came to us straight away to help with the logistics and specifically the London leg of the trip. 24 students from Barcelona Spain, Pescara  Italy and Ceske Budejovice Czech Republic  all landed  at different parts of the capital at different times so it was our job to co-ordinate the search and recovery mission that scooped them all up and deposited them in a single place.

Muddy

That turned out to be Rotherhithe. More specifically the YHA Thameside youth hostel on the banks of the muddy river with it's splendid views of Wapping. 

Two days in London saw the group check out all the usual sites, taking advantage of the cheap group  tube prices, ranging from Canary Wharf to Buckingham Palace to Covent Garden and the British Museum plus an all you can eat for £5.50 at Mr Wu's in Chinatown. Although there was a bit of a difference of opinion now and then. The Czechs and Spanish headed off to Camden Market while the Italians seemed set on  Primark on  Oxford Street.

Snowy

After a full English breakfast we took them out into the snowy wilderness and off to Kings Lynn. Interesting little working class town the same size as Bridgwater it might be, but the Fenlands definitely don't have the charm of the Somerset levels and 'flat' would be over-descriptive of how flat it was. It was 'bloody flat'. Still, if you like 'flat' that's the place for you. 

Rainy

The project thereafter involved the multi-national task force that we'd parachuted into the town spreading out, mixing in, hunkering down and other inappropriate military terms , but basically getting to know the place .

 And at that point we left them to it. Whereupon it started raining.

SNOEZELEN,SNOWDON AND SEDGEMOOR

Not the three least well known of the seven dwarfs, but a mildly convoluted way of linking together the themes of our final project of 2012. 

For the third year running now, our partners from the Akropolis Family Centre in Uherske Hradiste have sent us a small group of women eager to learn about their counterparts over here in the UK , and this year we split the project with some lovely people in Worcester. 

Lovely

Snoozyland

Why Worcester? As George III said. Oh no, that was 'Bugger Bognor'. But in this case it was because in Worcester they have a major Snoezelen project , and that's something the Czechs wanted to learn about. So 6 of the group went up there. Now Snoezelen (pronounced SNOOZYLAND)(ish) is a Dutch idea which involves creating a controlled multisensory environment as a therapy for people with autism or developmental disabilities . So for 10 of the 14 days , Jane Roberts and her team of Snoezelanders sourced up a Worcester programme for them. Meanwhile, we took 4 of them down to Bridgwater. Then for the 2 weekends we put everyone together and decided to go to...well, Wales seemed about right. 

"Look out there's a marathon coming.."

 Lovely

Arriving late evening to Bristol airport and spending the first night in Cheddar, the whole group came with us to Bath and then to Cardiff where they spent the next night. The next morning it was the Cardiff Marathon. That should be good, I thought. I'll just cross this road. Ah, here come's the marathon now. I'll just let them pass. So there's the first lesson. If you see a marathon coming, cross the road quickly. 18,000 runners later I managed to cross the road. Up the Welsh valleys to Cyfarthfa Castle we had some Welsh cakes waiting for us and then it was off to Worcester to drop half the group at the Snoozy centre. The others came with us to Bridgwater and stayed with Kate, Inglis, Delilah and a variety of cats ,dogs and chickens at a relatively town centre location. 

Cllr Slocombe shows them a thing or two

Lovely

 During their stay in Sedgemoor we took them around a variety of Family Centres, pre school and nursery buildings and gave them a taste of how, where and whether social services actually works for us. At Sydenham Family centre they participated in a Parent led drop in session and at Victoria they discussed with the Homestart project about what help could be provided for young families. Out in the sticks they visited the Stowey Bears pre school centre and the Little Vikings Nursery in Watchet. Back in Bridgwater they took in the College nursery, nattered with the knit and knatter group at Hamp Holy Trinity Church and again with the elderly ladies at the sheltered housing project at Homecastle House. But it wasn't all fun. They also met Cllr Gill Slocombe the Chair of Sedgemoor District Council and her vice chair Cllr Peter Downing who explained to them why Cllr Smedley was a good for nothing anarchist who ought to be shot. They were of course joking. 

Lovely

a bit wierd...

Weekend 2 we picked up the Worcester people again and took everyone to North Wales. (Hence Snowdon). Staying at Betws Y Coed for a couple of nights they toured the Isle of Anglesey and Snowdonia scaling the worlds 387th highest mountain (by railway) and then visited the friendly Welsh market town of Caernarvon where a friendly Welsh local demanded we shut our minibus door in an empty car park to let other people park. On our way back to Worcester we stopped in at Shrewsbury, where our chum Jo Cox lives. Jo was on the original wagon train to Czechoslovakia back in 1992 and only 3 years ago took some Salopian youth workers with us to meet the Akropolitanians in UH and so was pleased to show this lot around her town. Especially good was the Boiler Room , on Hills lane-the towns first Steam Punk cafe. Well worth checking out. 

Lovely

 But it wasn't all high flying jetsetting. One night the group went to Nether Stowey and took part in a Czech evening eating goulash and watching the O'Byrne families Czech holiday videos. Another night it was Czech-English Quiz night - which everyone lost as the questions were so stupid. On a different occaision we took them to the Green Olive-as part of our 'support west quay businesses' agenda. And who could forget the jazz night at the Bridgwater Arts Centre..well, certainly no-one who ever heard the resident trombonist attempt to play the melody from 'Girl From Ipanema' in the style of George Chisholm. 

Lovely

Lovely beach...

 The highlight of the Bridgwater groups sojourn was the visit to 'People Can' in Taunton, where they had a talk from the wonderful Elaine Di Campo and her team about the tremendous work they do in the community and spent time in the offices meeting some of the workers that provide floating support, advice and counselling for people who's lives aren't working out and need that bit of extra backup. Suitably inspired they declared Elaine the loveliest person they'd met - which was up against some tough competition. And that included Nigel, who took them to Beer (the fishing village) and Simon (who guided them to the top of Snowdon) (by sitting in the same train). 

Two weeks later they were gone. Bags filled to bursting point having contributed to the local economy and minds filled with ideas , inspiration and idiocy. And who can decide what's what deserves a European grant. 

Elaine and the gang at People Can

UNE BONNE WEEKEND AVEC LE GANG IN BRIDGWATER SUR MER

Bridgwater choristers establish  a beach-head

No-one quite knows why Bridgwater is twinned with the elegant Mediteranean yachting resort of La Ciotat-but thanks to whoever did that 55 years ago. Last year we kick started the link with a joint Anglo-Czech football invasion -successfully losing every game, and this year we took a multitude of choirs from the Bridgwater area to link up with a choir from La Ciotat.

The result was another well earned credit for Yvette Staellens and her globetrotting 'Voice of the People' team based at the Bridgwater Arts Centre. Each year they come with us to a different country, imprint Bridgwater culture with a dainty slipper mark on the hearts of all they meet , make a few friends and leave with a song on their lips. Even at 5am in the morning. And in this case, even when they were circling Bristol airport unable to land due to bad weather and having to be diverted to Cardiff.

Lovely

The French choir Citharista take the etage

This year 54 people joined the trip. The lovely Yvette runs several lovely choirs dotted around the region but this time she was joined by the talented and mildly gorgeous Claire Anstee  and her own  team of world music beatniks from the sticks,  making an incredible collection of natural voice talent on one stage. Add to this the tremendously professional 'Citharista' choir from La Ciotat -prominently featuring town councillor Jean-Marie Vandamme- especially adept at ad hoc doo-wop scat singing and you couldn't move for music!

Flying from early morning rainy Bristol to early morning Nice - slightly skimming feet above the waterline as we landed-and driving through  sunny Provence past St Tropez, Cannes and the rest of the Cote D'Azur it actually felt like you were somewhere in the region of Highbridge but with slightly more sun, sand, seafood and baguettes. 

Perfect

Councillors trying to convince the French to come to Bridgwater

La Ciotat is a perfect tourist destination from which it's hard to get the inhabitants to leave. So on this occaision we took along some books about Somerset and, for good measure, the rest of Britain, as gifts to show them what we had to offer. It didn't have too much affect. But what did was when they met up with those Bridgwater ambassadors of the Voice of the People choir who, after a couple of days singing and partying together almost convinced the French to pay a return visit to Bridgwater next summer...so well done there!! Reality comes at a price.

In French they take their Jumelage seriously. (That's twinning by the way). And when they heard that a Bridgwater choir was coming to visit them they booked the Spectacular 17th century Notre Dame church which overlooked the harbour for them to perform in. The perfect acoustics were caught on video and the youtube clips included below.

Blessing

Claire and Yvette square up

The range of the Choirs material spanned the globe with songs from the Baka people of Equatorial Africa  through Australian aborigine lullaby's by way of a song from Bridgwater's Czech twin town Uherske Hradiste , a Hawaiian Earth blessing , a 16th century English madrigal to the topical Moon River .

Top of the hit parade this evening was a spontaneous blues soul duet performed by Yvette and Claire , delivered with such feeling that you almost imagined they were going to punch each others lights out.

The packed audience cried out for an encore. Fortunately Yvette had forgotten to include one song in the set list and so they did that one.

Stunning

La Ciotat- a bit like Bridgwater

But even more singing continued into the early hours as both Bridgwater and La Ciotat choirs adjourned to a council function room for a Camembeart and Pastis frenzy  while singing each other into the ground. Not to be outdone by Yvette and Claires stunning performance, the French choir leader Carine Verdu suddenly burst into an unprovoked version of some Aria from Carmen with a degree of sensuality and gusto that one senior councillor almost choked on his fromage du chevre.

La Ciotat council had made a big effort . Deputy Mayor Patzlaff had constantly worn his Bridgwater tie for the entire year past , refusing to remove it in case he met anyone from the twin town. Tonight he was in luck!! Sadly he didn't speak any English. Madame Leonardelli, the president of the Jumelage committee had a bit more, and Virginie Giaccone, the International links officer a bit more still. But still they thought they better roll out their friend Thomas-who did his best. On the other hand the Choirs brought with them numerous members whose schoolgirl French led to an evening of uncompleted sentences , cheerfully resolved by another glug of wine , hand gestures, or in the case of the Dutch chorister, entire re-enactments of classic scenes from history in order to make her understood. But that's the joy of twinning-trying to communicate rather than give up and build walls.

Calanques

Plumetting the depths

Once the singing was over (if that's ever likely) the travellers sampled the merry joys of La Ciotat. Having 'done' most of the harbourside restaurants, bought up the waterfront market and witnessed the startling site of elderly women dressed in that Medieval way tying each other up with ribbons and then trying to dance, the only direction was seawards. Almost everyone chose to visit the nearby Calanques (interesting Jurassic headlands) by boat. And got incredibly wet. Even the experienced seafaring Cllr Tucker hadn't experienced anything like it , even on the mountainous waves of Cape Horn. Singing while drowning I mean.

On the final night the group had a party at Croix De Malte hotel where 3 of the singers formed an impromptu version of the Beverly Sisters  to sing their thanks to Yvette - who responded in song - which caught on - until half the room were ad-libbing lines thanking each other.

Pleasant

Singing it like it is

The only way such a pleasant weekend could finish was something going wrong. An unexpected visit to yet another country. The perfectly timed flight from Nice reached Bristol, hit English weather and the plane had to land in Wales. The group -amongst 4 other plane loads of travellers - had to be bussed back to Bristol in 12 specially hired coaches. The Bridgwater group chose the driver that reversed into an airport lamp-post.

VOICE OF THE PEOPLE'S LA CIOTAT VIDEO JUKEBOX