Good Intro to the Traditional Sounds of South-Eastern Europe

Advantages: great selection, good variety
Disadvantages: somehow mistitled, mostly traditional stuff

...Rough Guide, best known for their budget travel guides, has been steadily expanding in other areas, and has been responsible for quite a few musical "guides" over the years. This 1998 album, marketed as "Rough Guide to the Music of Eastern Europe", does pretty much exactly what is says on the package: provides quite a wide ranging overview of folk and (occasionally) folk-inspired music of Eastern Europe. This is an album that pretty much started my liking for "world music" coming from my part of the world, and despite its age it remains a good compilation which really does showcase the variety of what's on offer quite well. One thing that this "Rough Guide" album needs is perhaps a better definition of what is considered Eastern Europe: this is a surprisingly woolly category (I always remember somebody commenting than Poland...

magdadh 13.07.2009 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Rough Guide To The Music Of Eastern Europe, The - Various Artists

First Great Eastern or Worst Great Eastern

Advantages: Good announcements
Disadvantages: Generally packed trains

...All of my life I have lived a train ride away from London. Working from the age of 16, I have spent the best part of 9 years travelling to and from the City to get to work. Fortunately for me I learnt to drive when I was 17, and for some time was able to avoid the Connex-controlled route from my old town of Welling to London Bridge. However, moving to Chelmsford saw me take a job in the centre of town ? literally a 10 minute drive from home. Talk about bliss! No more hour-long traffic jams, or waiting in all weather for the train to pull in late again. What could possibly go wrong? I shouldn?t have asked, because within six months a company takeover saw me transferred to a London based office, and with some trepidation I started to catch the train to work again. After several years of being subjected to Connex South Eastern...

SeasonTicketless 19.05.2003 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of First Great Eastern

Eastern Promises-A brilliant crime thriller

Advantages: Brilliantly written.Good performances
Disadvantages: Genre has its limitated appeal

...Eastern Promises is a crime thriller directed by Daviid Cronenberg and stars Naomi Watts,Viggo Mortensen,Vincent Cassel and Armin Mueller-Stahl in principal roles. The film starts with a pregnant young girl asking for help in a pharmacy who soon dies after giving birth to a daughter.Anna(played by Naomi Watts),a midwife at the hospital keeps the diary she found with the patient where she finds a card of a restaurant and decides to go visit that place to know more about the young girl who died. As it turns out, the restaurant is run by a family of underworld don(which she is completely unaware of),who actually molested/raped the young girl who died earlier.Since Anna can't read the language of the diary,Semyon(the don himself who only appears to be a very respectable family man) offers his help to translate the diary for her. By...

aadnan613 12.11.2009 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Eastern Promises (Blu-ray)

Mediocre Eastern

Advantages: frequent services
Disadvantages: dirty and no seats at peak times

...I always thought that when you buy a train ticket that you were purchasing a seat on a train. First Great Eastern obviously think differently. First Great Eastern run train services between London, Southend, Ipswich, Harwich and Clacton plus a couple of smaller branch lines. First Great Eastern itself was formed with privatisation in the late 1990’s as part is the First Bus group of companies. This review mainly concentrates on services between Chelmsford and Liverpool Street as this is the route that I have daily experience of. However having used other services on an infrequent basis and discussed their services with friends who use First Great Eastern services from other destinations I think this review does give a fairly accurate pictures of their services as a whole. In general terms the facilities at Chelmsford...

PaulBed 16.05.2003 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of First Great Eastern

TomTom Western Europe, let Jane take the strain.

Advantages: Stress free travelling, comprehensive, clear instructions, cheap
Disadvantages: Some very minor glitches in confusing bends with turns

...I recently reviewed the TomTom one, which we bought with the Western Europe maps, and I have been waiting to put Jane (our name, after the voice) through her paces in rural France. As with all TomTom maps, easy to see, easy to use, easy to understand, and easy to update. Absolutely fantastic, I have no idea how we ever coped without her/it. From getting off the ferry, the map/navigation was spot on, good clear instructions, in plenty of time, and the first time I have ever got through Paris without a hitch. To give you an idea of how good, we bought a local map of where we were going on the Limousin/Perigord borders, that did not have the town we were staying in (I call it a town loosely) as it was so small, no problem for TomTom, straight there, which was welcome after 7 hours of driving. We spent two weeks in the area...

paulhanton 19.08.2007 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of TomTom Map of Western Europe Maps

Tom Tom ONE XL Europe

Advantages: Large Screen, easy to follow, clear display
Disadvantages: battery life

...The Tom Tom ONE XL Europe is one of the easiest car navigation devices to use. It is mostly self explainatry but if you are unsure how to use it, the manual is very specific and very easy to understand. In my opinion the actual software that is installed on it is excellent. When driving, it is easy to follow all of the instruction that are being said by the automated voice. The one concern with this product is the very short battery life and sometimes, when it has been previously been connected to the computer to install updates, the system gets stuck and freezes. It has to be reset for it to function properly again and then it takes up to ten minutes!! There are many options that you can choose when planning your route so you drive the route that is most suitable for you. Other than the one disadvantage, it is a very good car navigation...

Ike120 28.03.2009 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of TomTom ONE XL Europe

TomTom Europe 22

Advantages: It's a TomTom. Easy to use. Does what it's made to do. Good value.
Disadvantages: None.

...I recently purchased the new TomTom Europe 22 from Halfords. I was originally going to buy the V3 of the TomTom Europe as the price is genuinley lower than the new one is. I'll get to that now. I actually, did, buy the V3 model first. When I did and went to set it up in the car I noticed the windscreen suction piece wasn't in the box and to top that, the actual sat nav seemed 2nd hand. Scratches - deep scratches - all over the sat nav. So I boxed it all back up and went back into Halfords. Served by the same person - baring in mind, it's the assistant manager. I told her the situation and that I wasn't pleased. She said, "I must of forgotten to tell you the sat nav I sold you was originally a display model". Which I don't believe as I doubt a display model would have scratches all over it as it's stuck behind glass. She explained to me...

Greeny1980G 08.04.2009 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of TomTom ONE V4 Europe

Probably the best airline in Eastern Europe

Advantages: Very good business class, good meals and service
Disadvantages: few east-west connections

...CSA Czech Airlines offer a cheap and high quality alternative for flights to Eastern Europe, both for business and holidays. Czech Airlines clearly set a mark by offering the cheapest Business tickets to anywhere in Eastern Europe and the Balkans. Business tickets from the UK to destinations like Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria and the likes come at around 400 to 500 Pounds (return). Western airlines like BA, Lufthansa, Swissair etc. - and even the Polish LOT - charge 700 and 1000 Pounds for the same routes. If you expect a no frills product at this price, you will be surprised at the high quality of Czech Airlines' servicee, particularly in Business Class. As one of very few carriers in Europe, Czech Airlines offer wide Business seats in a two abreast configuration on each side. Even "quality leaders" like Swissair can't beat this...

From_The_Continent 17.02.2001 (23.02.2001) · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Czech Airlines

The Birds of Europe - Lars Jonson

Advantages: Fantastic Drawings, Very Detailed Information On Every Species
Disadvantages: Quite Expensive

...I have had an interest in Wildlife for as long as I can remember and in particular I have always had a passion for Birds. My Garden is full of Bird feeding devices and I have spent many enjoyable hours at my window watching the Birds feeding there. Any serious Birdwatcher will possess a Field Guide and over the years, since my early teens I have always used the Collin's Guide to the Birds of Britain and Europe. A couple of years ago I decided that it was time that I updated my reference guide for something a little bit more modern. The book I chose was the Birds of Europe by Lars Jonson. Lars Jonson is a very well known name in the world of Ornithology. Born in Sweden Lars Jonson is best known as a Bird Artist and has won many prestigious awards. He had an exhibit at the National Museum of Natural History in Stockholm when he was...

micksheff 15.01.2007 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Birds of Europe - Lars Jonson

Better than Let's Go by far

Advantages: Uptodate, clear, concise, well written
Disadvantages:

...Trying to write a good travel guide to Eastern Europe in one volume is a gargantuan task. Before travelling to Eastern Europe I bought the Lonely Planet Guide and the Let's Go guides. There was of course some overlap, but each guide had different countries in it. The Lonely Planet guide was less preachy, better written and altogether a better buy, even fitting better into my backpack. The content was very accurate, the town and city maps generally clearly than Let's Go, and although it has to bee selective, there was a better selection of place in the Lonely Planet Guide. Even its choice of countries was better, as it was rational and didn't go for the completist approach i.e. tourist coldspots like Belarus was left out. Definitely one to pack in your backpack....

Morgenhund 29.07.2000 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Lonely Planet Eastern Europe - Lonely Planet