Mullings An American Cyber Column By Rich Galen

US & Int'l Papers

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Chunnel

Wednesday June 28, 2006

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Enroute Paris, France
Under the English Channel

All right. This isn't being written entirely while (or, those of us who have been in Merrie Olde like to say, whilst) under the English Channel, but I am on the Eurostar train which, in fact goes though the Channel Tunnel.

While (or as those of us who have been in Merrie �)

Dear Mr. Mullings:

WE GET IT! Whilst! Whilst! Whilst! You were in London. We're very happy for you. Now, shut up and get on with it, already.
Signed,
The Princess Diana Society

I was going to write a column about George Bush, Tony Blair, Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schroeder. I'll wait until Friday for that.

Here's the deal on the whole Chunnel thing. First of all, no one calls it that any more. It's the Channel Tunnel. At least in English.

If you had read the piece this morning by Alan Katz in the International Herald Tribune before you went into the Channel Tunnel you would have read this: "Eurotunnel, which runs the railway tunnel linking Britain and France, rejected a Deutsche Bank debt reduction plan �"

I thought this was amusing. A joint effort to connect Britain and France was being financed by Germany.

You don't get it? Start watching the Discovery Military Channel (not Chunnel) and you'll see the humor.

It was somewhat less amusing when I remembered I was about to travel several tens of kilometers under some dozens of meters beneath the surface of the English Channel through a hole in the ground which is, not only effectively, bankrupt, but worse yet, is half owned by the French.

On the British side -

SIDEBAR

I'm never certain what to call England.
In fact, I have a problem being confident about the current politically correct version of a lot of things. I noted the change from Negro to Black. But the switch from Black to African-American snuck up on me.
I am still not certain how to refer to people whose ancestors were here before Columbus: American Indians or Native Americans. If I were one of them, I think (because "American" is an Italian derivative) I would demand to be known simply by the name of my tribe: Sioux, or Ojibwa, or the Band of South Floridian Casino Owners, or whatever.
So, I don't know whether to refer to the place which is the big island on the western end of the Chunnel as England, Great Britain, the United Kingdom, or the Place Where Saudi Princes Come to Play When They Think No One is Watching.

END SIDEBAR

On the British side, you take a taxi to Waterloo Station and go through immigration. French immigration. The Brits have a shorter memory than I do. If I were Tony Blair, I wouldn't let a French immigration officer within, say, 24 miles (which, according to Wikipedia.com is the distance you travel underwater) of the English-British-UK-TPWSPCTPWTTNOIW border.

The train is fine. If you are in First Class you are served wine or beer and a meal which, in my case included salmon.

I refer you to the Mullfoto from the other day which was of the label from a slab-o-salmon saying, "Fresh Color Added." I am, therefore, off salmon for a while - much less salmon served on a bankrupt train line co-owned by the Brits and the Frogs which the Hun are trying to bail out.

At a point early in the ride the engineer came on the loudspeaker and said something like "we will be entering the tunnel under the English Channel in ten minutes."

At least that's what I think he said. Being French, he spoke English with something of an accent. Forty-five seconds later we were plunged into darkness.

After some 20 minutes we came out of the Chunnel and into the French countryside which was indistinguishable from the English-British-UK-TPWSPCTPWTTNOIW countryside we had just left with the exception of a sign which you wouldn't see coming out of a BART, or a Washington Metro Orange Line tunnel.

The sign had an arrow pointing to the right saying: "Dunkirk."

It wasn't just another random countryside. We were rolling through history.

On the Secret Decoder Ring Page today: Links to the IHT piece, the Wikipedia Channel Tunnel entry, and the link to that Salmon mullfoto. Also, today's Mullfoto, which means a great deal to me; and a Catchy Caption of the Day.

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