Monday 18 June 2012

Barmy Army Goes Cultural in Ukraine

You couldn't really make this up: but someone having done so, it certainly sets the mind racing.

Yes, on its rest days the Barmy Army pays a cultural visit to ... Chernobyl

'Tourists have to sign lengthy disclaimer forms and guides who show them around the area are only permitted to work for two weeks at a time before having to leave the area. Trips on the days England are not playing are booked solid with supporters keen to explore one of the most notorious tourist destinations in the world ... “England fans have perhaps got an unfair reputation because of the past and people think we just get drunk when we go to matches overseas. But there are thousands of football supporters who take a real interest in the countries they visit".'

Well indeed.  It keeps them off the streets and, truth be told, what you might pick up at Chernobyl could be a sight less problematic than from some of the dodgier venues in downtown Kiev.  I am told that during the Beijing Olympics, tourists were taken on tours of reeking open-cast neodymium mines; and when South Africa hosted the World Cup they offered evening pedestrian excursions to Soweto that proved very popular.

Question is - what shall we offer our own international guests when July comes around ?  The Shale Gas Earthquakes of Blackpool ?  The Victorian Sewers of old Soho ?

Suggestions ?

ND 

6 comments:

Tourist trapper said...

Tower Hamlets, Luton and Bradford.

Most of them will then feel right at home.

Bill Quango MP said...

Kit them out with steel toecaps,hard hats, high viz vests, thick gloves, ear defenders,heavy jackets and a 50 pages health and safety checklist.
Make them pack a red cross bag of bio hazard masks, plasters, bandages, bite treatment, tetanus vial, Surgical gloves and antiseptic spray plus Incident and Injury booklet.

That should get the tourists expecting a very dangerous day out.

Then take them to a city farm, explaining along the way about UK Health and safety regulations.

Jim said...

The Barmy Army is a cricket thing isn't it, or have the football fans nicked the name as well?

Nick Drew said...

TT - I have a feeling some of those destinations are already booked (what will be the increase in UK population consequent upon the festivities ? whole teams from some nations, no doubt)

BQ - yes, they will be thrilled by the whole British experience: when in Rome & all that

DTP - we are quite broad-minded on this blog but I feel you may have fetched up in the wrong thread ?

Jim - yes I thought that but I have encountered some of the footie fans having (mis)appropriated the term

hovis said...

The badlands of Peckham in the south and Tottenham in the North could perhaps be our own version of a shanty town tour. We could even offer a come back in five years and see how much it has declined to satisfy the ultra prurient

Jan said...

One of those streets of Victorian terraces where the houses are all boarded up followed by a tour of a depressing council estate....maybe the visitors will wonder why such reasonable housing is either not used at all or often abused with abandoned cars/washing machines etc strewn about.