Manchester is "heaving"

As promised, I’m going to starting each new post with things I like about England (until I run out). Today – the way certain things are phrased:

[On the phone] You’re not here today, are you
That’s an astute observation
Oh aye, I’m sharp, me

[eg] She was so happy with her present
Oh bless

[eg] I don’t like cheese
Do you not?

And “it’s going off!” translates in English to “it’s heaving” (hence the title of this post)

I have been gearing up to blog about our trip through the south west with photos and the full travelogue. But that’s still coming - in the meantime I had to describe the scene in Manchester today.

As soon as I got off the train this morning I realised something was up (oh aye, I’m sharp me). That’s going to tell you that I still haven’t really been following the football. For today the UEFA cup final is being held in Manchester between the Glasgow Rangers and Zenit St Petersburg.

Now, I still haven’t got my head all the way round all the different competitions (eg I know that Manchester United is playing Chelsea next Wednesday in Moscow in the Champions League final – go figure). What I do know is that there are 100,000 Scots currently roaming the streets in full footy regalia (and aren’t I happy that today I wore the blue jacket?)! I haven’t been able to quite make out the chants but I’ve since had them explained and I don’t think I’ll repeat any here. The basic theme is anti IRA, anti Pope.

You see, the Rangers are the protestant football team of Glasgow. Phil the doorman gave me a lecture this morning the Battle of Boyne, James I, William of Orange etc after I asked why a whole lot of clearly scottish lads were wondering around town draped in a union jack emblazoned with a lovely picture of Queen Liz.

Some of the highlights so far:

• There are masses of plane spotters out at the airport being delighted by dozens of antique Russian aircraft coming in
• A public golf course was opened up for the fans to camp on
• The pubs opened at 10am this morning and have been doing a brisk trade (not unexpected)
• Some of the more enterprising local buskers are sporting rangers’ scarves
• Both cops and horses are in riot gear (which for the horses means plastic visors)
• One guy said he’d paid £7k for 7 tickets
• The air on this clear crisp late spring day is filled with marijuana
• Apparently there was a 7 mile hold up on the motorway this morning
• I can hear the crowd from the 5th floor of my office tucked away in a back street
• There was a Carlsberg TANKER spied in the streets this morning and I'm sure not the only one
• Sainsburys cleared their shelves of all bottled alcohol - cans and plastic wine containers only
• As I write there is a series of 3 a side matches taking place in Castlefield near the canals
• A massive game of "keepsies upsies" was going on in the square this morning (where you have to keep the ball off the ground)
• The Russians apparently have their own screen but with only about 10,000 of them, I imagine they'll be swamped.

This is one of the local pubs.

So tonight I’m going to stick around for a while, at least unless it looks like the rangers are going down!