Travel with medicine - how do you keep it cool?

Mini ice pack the size of drinking glass. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

A hotel in France had no fridge in the room, but the receptionist who also ran the bar offered to put my pills in the bar fridge. I declined, because I ran the risk of forgetting or finding the fridge was locked and the person with the key was on an errand, just when we were in a hurry to leave next morning. However, the car was so cold overnight, that we were able to leave the pills in the car which was safely locked away in an underground garage.

Insulated Lunch Box 

The latest comment I had on my appeal for suggestions on Face book was that you use an  insulated lunch box. This is what I do. I use a padded bag which is foldable so it is lightweight and can be compacted.

Cool Box

 Su Collins

Cool bag or see if it can be taken out of fridge for a period of time. 

If travelling by car all day, this works.

Add a Towel

Ron-Ethan Melamed

Keep it rolled up in a towel with an ice pack

Useful  

Websites https://www.amazon.co.uk/mini-ice-packs/s?k=mini+ice+packs Please share links to your favourite posts.

Tartan & Tartan Visit in Scotland

 

Prepare for a tartan theme wedding, waring your tartan to a wedding, or joining the celebrations on Tartan day or Tartan week. Look out your tartans or buy new ones, or prepare pictures for your website.

I have a tartan headscarf. The label says Lochcarron, Made in Scotland, 100% new wool. GORDON.

Colours

The Gordon scarf colours are black, green and yellow. You can confirm which colours by looking at the fringe.

When are tartan days and Scottish weeks? 

Days

Tartan day is held, celebrated, on April 6th in the USA, Canada and parts of Scotland. (It seems to me that New Year's Eve and every day are tartan days in Scotland!) It is also called National Tartan Day and International Tartan Day. Every state in the USA has its own tartan. There are also tartans Buddhists, for Christian clergy, Jews and Muslims.

Weeks

The Scottish Tartan day has been expanded to Scotland Week.

Other opportunities for buying and wearing tartans are at the Edinburgh Festival, which features street performances, comedy in rooms in pubs, sometimes booked through the ticket offices, or free with a donation box handed round, and ticketed theatre performances in theatres, featuring national groups from around the world.

The Lochcarron visitor centre

The Lochcarron visitor centre is south of Edinburgh, making it even nearer to England, and a possible stop if you are driving north. They have a shop, free parking, a picnic area and free refill of water bottles. You can learn about tartans and buy some.

In addition to clothes, you can buy fabric which you can make into your own clothes or cushions.

More Information from these useful websites

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tartan_Day

https://www.lochcarron.co.uk/

https://www.nms.ac.uk/tartantoday

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Learn Tamil, Bengali, Malayalam and Related Languages

 Tamil is spoken in Tamil Nadu in India. 

Tamil Nadu means Tamil country. The capital is Chennai, formerly called Madras..

Tamil is also spoken in Sri Lanka. 

Lanka means island. Sri means resplendent.

Sri Lanka previously was called Ceylon. You might still see Celonese tea. Twinings Tea company websites uses both words, 

Singapore

Tamil is additionally one of the four national languages of Singapore. Tamil is spoken in Little India, where you find shops and restaurants. Also in schools for those whose family language is Tamil.

Learning Tamil

I could not find Tamil in Duolingo. But I could find Hindi, and one of the Indian languages has learning English as an option.

Wikipedia has articles on the language and the countries and places mentioned. Wikivoyage has a phrasebook for each country.

Quora has interesting discussion on saying hello and goodbye in Tamil.

Wikivoyage has a phrasebook. They say that Tamil language is spoken by 74 million people. 

Tamil is closely related to Malayalam, and more distantly related to Kannada and Telugu. It is not related to the languages spoken in northern India, but like other Indian languages has been heavily influenced by Sanskrit.

What to see in Tamil Nadu

The capital city, Chennai, has beaches. 

Huge Hindu temples. The religion of the majority is Hindu.

What to see in Sri Lanka

The majority religion is Buddhist.

What to see in Singapore

Little India has small shops, and huge Mustafa's department store.

 Restaurants serve meat or vegetarian dishes, and Singapore's speciality, fish head curry, with white rice on green banana leaves. The banana Leaf Appollo is one of many South Indian restaurants, many of which are vegetarian.

Little India has a museum about Indian immigration to Singapore. very interesting and visitor friendly. For example, when I was there you could try on hats and take a selfie..

Useful Websites

https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Tamil_phrasebook

https://twinings.co.uk/collections/sri-lankan-tea

Wrong deliveries, broken deliveries, tax on deliveries

 In the good old days a smart person could mail home anyhing too heavy to pack. Nowadays the moral is, sender and recipient beware - of extra charges, taxes.

USA Postage and tax

A relative of mine in the USA visited their relative and accidentally left behind a coat and some clothes. The used clothes were posted from one state to another. In addition to the mailing cost, the recipient was charged sales tax.

Singapore to UK

We posted crockery and leftover kitchenware from where we were renting a service apartment in Singapore, back to our home in the UK. Most of the household stuff was bought in the UK and taken or sent out to Singapore. 

To our surprise, in addition to the huge cost  in Singapore, of mailing each of the three boxes, on each box we had to pay a large sum of money on import duty to the UK before the company would delivery our goods.

What is the moral? 

1 When packing to return, check all high cupboards by standing on a chair or ladder, and/or sweeping top cupboards and above cupboards with a broom. 

2 Mark the box as used or second hand goods. Customs and excise will assume you are shipping new goods bought from department stores. Even so, be prepared to pay tax on delivery. 

We had broken items delivered. So we had paid tax on the delivery of broken items!

3 Bubble wrap everything. Paper and tissue is not enough wrapping for crockery. Even socks and d, clothing is better than just paper. Your parcel could be dropped, or crushed. Layers of card or tin boxes, double layered, lined and filled with bubble wrap, offer extra protection. Now you know why your small item from Amazon arrives in a huge box inside a box like a Russian doll.

Useful Websites

https://www.openweb.com/share/2f8MHDrUys3y9yOXmWnSfklSVqG

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The Three Xhosa Clicks taught easy!

South Africa has several languages. English. Afrikaans, which is based on Dutch. Xhosa, the language of Nelson Mandela. Zulu.

I remember when I visited South Africa how impressed I was by people who could speak the native languages, and even speak or understand several of them. As for the click language - amazing! I was impressed that local could speak it, and that any multilingual foreigners could learn to speak the language, or even understand it.

When I started investigating the languages I started with Wikipedia. I was impressed to read that as many as 7 million people spoke Xhosa.  The number of African languages even in South Africa alone was daunting. 

However, at the end of the Wikipedia was a chart comparing several languages, showing the translation of the opening paragraph from the constitution. The English was on the left. I could see that with my knowledge of a few words of German, and the ability to follow the similar Dutch words, I could see that Afrikaans would be easy to pick up. 

The other piece of good news was the similarity of the native African languages. Zulu and Xhosa had several words which were almost identical. Another group of three languages were either similar to the first two, or similar to each other. If you knew one language from home and a second from school. You need only study two more to know 8 languages!.

I learned the clicks from this video. first above. Learn easy it says. I would say learn easily, but never mind, I agree that he made the learning easy. Only three sounds. For three letters. C x and q. Sounding like a horse clopping, tut tutting, and so on.

Their other video taught me the word shap.

I started looking at languages to fulfil my dream of being a polyglot (meaning a speaker of multiple languages) by starting a club for Polyglots.

 Click Languages

Practise xhosa sounds with a man

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dw_hBNyi_9c

Some history and world view from a lady

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dw_hBNyi_9c

Perfect Anniversary dinner at Villa Bianca in Hampstead

Two storey Villa Bianca Restaurant in Hampstead. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Location, Location

Hampstead is a lovely area. Lively. But the hotel is a few steps down a quiet side street.

. It is in a wuite side street just off the lively main street of Hampstead on the hill.

 The name of the restaurant means white house

Seating Area - Up or Down?

The last time we visited was two years ago when we sat downstairs in the window by the door. I think upstairs suited us better.

This time, in April 2024, we had a table for seven upstairs at Villa Bianca for an anniversary dinner. We were beside the grand (samll grand - that sounds like an oxymoron)) piano upstairs. I thought the music would be too loud for conversation but we managed okay.

Upstairs also has the advantage that the toilets are only steps away. 

Drinks & Service

We started with the house Champagne. The male and female servers were smiling and helpful and a delight. Our Portuguese but multilingual waiter was charming.

The menu has a range of prices from the mushrooms on toast which was huge, three pieces, enough for two people and a piece to take home.. I was saving myself for the main course and dessert. 

Food

My main course was chicken. We swapped around. The others were happy with their liver and fish.

The dessert was chocolate pudding, oozing. I would say everything was above average. Nt Michelin standard but very satisfying. Faultless.

All in all an excellent evening.

Anniversary

My husband said he had told them it was our anniversary. They did not do anything but I had my own paper plate with the word Joyeux Anniversaire and we ordered Champagne, and our guests brought cards and gifts so we did not notice not having the word happy anniversary on a plate.

I think that restaurants seeing you order Champagne might ask if you are celebrating and if so do something special.

Our three year old got up to change places and collided with a waiter and she burst into tears. The manager found her some complimentary breadsticks which instantly distracted and consoled her. My husband said, we got freebies, we have no complaints.

Prices

If you ordered lobster or different drinks and Champagnes you could have a much larger bill if you are looking to spend more and are seeking more. But we were happy with things which suited our budget and have happy memories.

Useful Website

https://villabiancagroup.com/villa-bianca/

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THE ALPHABET EXPLAINED: The origin of every letter