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
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Review of Rough Guide To The Music Of Eastern Europe, The - Various Artists

connex southeastern

Advantages: Fast
Disadvantages: very expensive, not comfortable, not reliable

...tables provided encase you want to pass the time on your journey with a nice crossword, however these tend to either be broken, have chewing cum on them or 'mysterious' stains. So as you can see the features on offer aren't to good so feel free to look out of the window at the nice countryside, provided that is that you manage to get a window that isn't scratched and/or covered in graffiti. Coverage over the southeast The coverage over the south east is good but again isn't that good near by to me there are several towns that are not linked to the rail network, but like wise there are some other small towns that are connected. However every town and city in the region is covered by at least one station so it's a fair distribution of stations. People with disability Every Connex train as standard has a carriage...

Deal_lion 13.04.2007 · Read review
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Review of Connex South Eastern

DIRTY, DANGEROUS AND DECREPIT

Advantages: See review
Disadvantages: See review

...On a recent visit to Tunbridge Wells in Kent I had the misfortune to experience the “service” offered the regional railway operator Connex South Eastern. I’m not sure where they dreamed that name up – I think it’s supposed to signify rapid connections or something – I think the use of the word “con” is probably far more appropriate. In the course of a normal working week, I will probably spend between six and ten hours travelling by train. Due to the nature of my work, this involves travel right across the UK, so I have now experienced most of the major rail operators quite extensively. I have to hand it to Connex though – they are without a single shadow of a doubt the worst rail operator I have yet to experience. It would appear that most of Connex’s rolling stock is...

LostWitness 24.08.2001 · Read review
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Review of Connex South Eastern

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
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Review of First Great Eastern

The History of South Tyneside

Advantages: Free entry, interesting, easy access
Disadvantages: None

...I first went to this museum with my sister when I was about 8 or 9 years old. When looking for something to do on Monday, I asked my friend, Emma, if she wanted to go here with me since I haven?t been for ages. My older sister, Joanne, lives in South Shields so we met her and my niece (23 months) at the museum on Monday morning. I got slightly lost getting to South Shields as I took the wrong turn at a roundabout, but as it was my furthest venture in my car on my own (about 25 miles) I was still quite pleased I found it without too much hassle! On arriving at South Shields I met my sister and followed her into the town centre, as I don?t know my way around South Shields. (The museum is signposted though) The entry into the museum is free and although we just spent about an hour and a half there (my sister was going to Uni. ? and I...

bluejules 20.07.2007 · Read review
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Review of South Shields Museum

Connex make BR look good

Advantages: Vibration of old trains sends you to sleep. Delays mean extra sleep
Disadvantages: Boss yells at you for being late. Dog eats your dinner due to being late.

...In a recent and somewhat uncharacteristic fit of optimism, I decided to escape London for the fresh air of east Kent. Things looked good, I managed to stretch my wage to get a mortgage and my partner found a job she enjoys. Perhaps a little naively I thought that Connex South Eastern would be capable of ferrying me to work in London every day. At the very least I hoped that they would be able to reliably achieve a modicum of time keeping in this simple task, even if I plan to jump companies the minute the high-speed rail link from Ashford to London is completed. Alas, Connex have failed dismally. I have recently suffered regular extensive delays during the ‘rush hour’, a period of the day where Connex staff appear to be doing as little as possible. I have had the joy of trains 45 minutes late boarding in London...

gorrit 01.11.2001 · Read review
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Review of Connex South Eastern

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
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Review of First Great Eastern

South Devon Railway

Advantages: Nostalgic look back in time.Wonderful scenery, friendly Staff, Clean Trains.
Disadvantages: Short journey.

...We visited South Devon Railway for a day trip to Totnes on the steam train. Admission Prices: Return trip (single fares also available) Buckfastleigh - Totnes Littlehempston Adult £9.90 Senior Citizen £9.20 Child £5.90 (5 years - 14 years; under 5s FREE) Family £28.90 (two adults and two children) There is also FREE parking at Buckfastleigh for cars and coaches. We travelled from Totnes to Buckfastleigh to Totnes and it was just like going back in time. It was a thorougly enjoyable ride on a proper steam train. Taking in the wonderful scenery from Buckfastleigh to Totnes. We went in the summer and it was a fantastic journey beside the river Dart t. The trains are clean and comfortable, in my opinion much better than the trains of today. The children enjoyed the ride and the ability to get up and move...

livelylad 31.10.2009 · Read review
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Review of South Devon Railway Trust

Journey South

Advantages: Great voices, brothers are very easy on the eye!
Disadvantages: No original tracks

...This is the debut album from Andy and Cal also know as Journey South. Andy and Carl are brother who shot to fame on the X-Factor. They had been singing together for years and had spent all of their time touring the country playing small gigs and singing in pubs and clubs. All of their hard work paid off when they auditioned for the X-Factor and easily made it through to the live finals. Unfortunately the brothers did not win the show, much to my disapointment, but they did very well which lead to this album. There are 11 tracks on the CD which are:- The first time ever I saw your face Let it be Desperado The circle Nobody Knows I still haven't found what I'm looking for All of you Time after time It must have been love All that I am English Rose All 11 of the tracks are cover versions but they do sing them very well...

sewbizzie 24.09.2007 · Read review
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Review of Journey South's Album

A bad Connexion

Advantages: Generally OK during off-peak times, Not many first class cabins
Disadvantages: Frequently late or cancelled at peak times, Gets overcrowded, Infrequent service compared to underground

...'t generally a picnic to look at – a lot of them are heavily graphitised on the outside (don't they have security at their depots?!) and will be littered with various discarded newspapers, beer cans, sticky drink stains, food wrappers etc, especially in the evening. The trains don't provide tables, either solid ones or fold down ones, but this is just as well during rush hour as there is barely enough space for people let alone their various belongings. And on the Connex SouthEastern routes, the seats are arranged a bit strangely so that in one aisle three seats are facing opposite another three, and behind these are paired seats, and in the other aisle are two seats facing opposite another two, with again paired seats behind them. This means people end up squeezing past the three seaters. However, although the seats take up a lot of space...

chinnyli 24.09.2001 · Read review
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Review of Connex South Eastern