Author: mattbolch

Visit to Tübingen Worth the Travel Hassles

Delights await those who are up to the challenges.

To say the trip Declan and I made to Manchester was part of a whirlwind tour is a vast understatement, because Tübingen, Germany, was our next stop. It’s been a university town since 1477, and Eberhard Karls University is one of the oldest universities in central Europe. Roughly one-third of its 90,000 residents are students, with most housed amid picturesque ancient buildings along cobbled streets embedded in the hills.

Marilynn was invited to give a paper at an Irish Studies conference at the university, so it was a no-brainer to add this stop to our itinerary. She flew directly to Frankfurt and took a mostly direct train there, but Declan and I weren’t so lucky.

We couldn’t find cheap flights into Frankfurt or Stuttgart from Manchester, so we flew on Ryanair to Cologne. The day started with a 4:35 a.m. wakeup call and a 7 a.m. flight, followed by at least four train transfers and most of the day. You must really want to get to Tübingen from Cologne.

The silver lining is that the train traveled along the Rhine River Valley, with stunning mountain views and literally dozens of castles — both current and ruins — dotting the hilltop scenery. The arduous journey was worth it to see this quaint city, which grew up on both sides of the Neckar River from the 12th century.

Top sites include St. George’s Collegiate Church (Stiftskirche), built in the 15th century and a central feature of Tübingen’s skyline. The church was one of the first to convert from Catholicism to Martin Luther’s Protestantism, and the structure retains many features usually associated with the Catholic Church. If history isn’t your thing, stop in for the stained-glass windows.

One unexpected delight was the City Museum of Tübingen exhibit devoted to early film silhouette artist and director Lotte Reiniger. When you were a kid, you may have gone to a puppet show with moving shapes behind a backlit white screen. That’s silhouette artistry, and Reiniger was best known for her ambitious film “The Adventures of Prince Achmed” in the 1920s. We visited the museum to escape the rain, but we’re glad we went.

Walking the hilly streets of Tübingen and seeing the sights were the best parts of our adventure. The city escaped Allied bombing during World War II, so the city doesn’t have that discordant architecture from the ‘60s spoiling the view of the buildings that are hundreds of years old. Colorful side-by-side Bavarian-style timbered houses and quaint shops line the streets, delighting the senses.

On the day we visited, a morning street market sprang up in front of the historic City Hall that featured local meats and cheeses, fruits and vegetables (including white asparagus), and other delights. Even a brief but torrid downpour could not stop market day, as people ducked under awnings or donned their rain jackets.

The river that flows through town at various points provides a great diversion. We particularly enjoyed watching eight baby ducks slalom through a set of rapids under mama duck’s watchful eyes, moving back and forth over the obstacles to reach the quiet pool at the bottom. Yes, it took 10 hours of travel time to reach Tubingen, but the views more than made up for the hassle.

Market day in front of historic Tubingen City Hall.
Leaving the courtyard at Tübingen Castle
Declan makes a friend

Declan’s Perfect Day Out in 8 Numbers

And Matt’s not-so-high highlights

For just about as long as Declan’s been an Arsenal fan, he’s also been a fan of the England Men’s National Team. And from the moment Marilynn fixed the dates for our trip, Declan was on the web to see what games we could attend.

The England vs. North Macedonia match we saw on Monday was a qualifier for Euro 2024, a continental competition played every four years. In other words, a big deal to name the top national team in Europe. So here is my report from the day, with Declan’s highlights and my not-so-high highlights.

3 — Number of goals scored by Bukayo Saka, Declan’s favorite Arsenal player, for his first-ever hat trick. The game was 7-0 in favor of the good guys. Saka is England-born of Nigerian parents, and Bukayo means “adds to happiness” in the Yoruba language. Saka absolutely adds to our happiness when he’s on the pitch.

10.07 — Number of miles I walked that day, according to my Fitbit. We were up at the ass-crack of dawn to make the flight to Manchester, followed by walking to the off-airport hotel, back to the airport to catch tram/train to central Manchester (where we visited the National Football Museum and Classic Football Shirts and also saw North Macedonia fans making merry outside a local pub), tram back to our hotel, tram to within 1 mile of the football ground, walking to the ground, then repeating the last two steps in reverse to return to our hotel by 11 or so.

70,708 — Attendance at Old Trafford, the historic home of Manchester United that seats 74,310. Less than 4,000 under a sellout is a great turnout for a summer game for a team that already had clenched the top spot in the division.

20,125 — My estimation of the number of vuvuzelas we heard during the match. In case you don’t know, the sound these instruments make is annoying as hell, which after the 2010 World Cup led to bans at many international football events. They’re also banned at many Premier League stadiums, but apparently not at Old Trafford. It wasn’t so much the sound; it was that a group of kids (Lord, I hope they were just kids) right above us kept (badly) using their vuvuzelas to play the nine-note tune that exhorts the crowd to shout “Let’s Go!” Fun side note: in England matches, it’s not “let’s go,” but “England!” Second fun side note: If one cannot remember how to spell vuvuzela, just look up “annoying horn, World Cup,” and it comes up instantly.

£101.50 — The price of our two tickets, including fees, which I thought was extremely reasonable for a national match. Compared to major league American sports, European football is much less expensive.

£15.50 — The price I paid for a ham and cheese toastie (toasted sandwich) at the Clayton Hotel, Manchester Airport, where we stayed. While I do know that prices are higher at hotel restaurants, one expects meat and such on said sandwich. There weren’t more than two sad slices of ham on this toastie, which didn’t cover 60% of the bread. Waving a toastie in the air and thinking about hogs does not make ham magically appear between the bread slices. I did get that charge taken off the bill, but the audacity to charge so much for so little still galls.

1 — Declan’s rank for our day in Manchester among our first 10 days. We knew it would be a highlight of the trip, and it didn’t disappoint.

1 — Despite the long day, the 10 miles of walking, the 4-plus hours of public transport, and the bad food, I’ll have to agree. Making lifetime memories with your son far outweighs the inconvenience and sore legs that ambitious jaunts require — although I would like to have told those 20,125 fans where they should insert those vuvuzelas!

Beware the Seagulls as New Irish Adventure Begins

I didn’t realize that seagulls sound like children being tortured until this trip to Ireland. Not that I’ve tortured children or anything, but seagulls produce sounds that make my skin crawl.

I guess one doesn’t notice the seagulls much by the seaside or along the boardwalk amid the sounds of waves and crowds, but on the streets of Dublin, the caterwauling (or should I say, child-erwauling?) is unmistakable. That, and the dive bombing toward you, around you, in front of you and everywhere in between. Declan was sure he was going to get hit in the head as one headed straight toward him or that he’d get hit by an aerial, um, semi-solid projectile as they passed overhead.

Seagulls! Damn seagulls!

Many are large enough that I can easily see a plucked seagull atop the grill, beer can rammed into its cavity, the makings for beer can seagull. Yum!

Yes, we’re back in our adopted second home, this time for a month. We spent our first full day in Dublin so Marilynn could get her reader’s credentials for research in the National Library and National Archives. She’s researching Brian Friel’s 1975 play “Volunteers,” which I’m looking forward to reading. We’ll return to Dublin late in the month for the last two weeks of our stay.

We then took a train to Limerick to catch a preview of the great new play “Freefalling,” a fascinating true story written and performed by Georgina Miller. I’ll spare you the details, but Miller spends most of the 90-minute play strapped into an aerial harness, which illustrates beautifully the highs and lows of her life. It’s directed by our friend Lynne Parker, artistic director of Rough Magic in Dublin. The play will be featured at the Cork Midsummer Festival.

We’re currently in Belfast, catching up with friends for a few days. Our flat is somewhat off the beaten path, but still close enough to the action. Declan and I will be in Manchester on Monday for an England Men’s National Team football match versus North Macedonia. We’ll join Marilynn in Germany on Tuesday. She’s giving a keynote at an Irish studies conference, and we’ll spent a few days after it in Germany, with a brief side trip to France.

Drag Queens a Family Tradition in Europe

Who doesn’t like a guy in drag?

Who doesn’t love a drag queen? Republicans, apparently, judging by the number of bills filed in red states seeking to ban drag performances, prohibit children from attending them, or classify them as adult-oriented businesses. Really? You’re going to cancel Ru Paul and Mrs. Doubtfire?

In Europe, going to a pantomime (more familiarly, a panto) is a cherished Christmas and New Year’s tradition, much like going to church on Christmas Eve or trying not to blast your fingers off while celebrating the new year.

A panto is a fractured fairy tale that’s hosted by a dame, generally a guy in a dress. Cross-dressing usually features prominently, as do music, bad jokes, double-entendres, triple-entendres (thruple-entendre, anyone??) and much hilarity. And fart jokes. Definitely fart jokes.

I had never heard of a panto until we started going to Europe regularly during the fall months, but it’s become a tradition for our whole family. Shortly after we arrived in Belfast in January 2017, I bought us tickets for the Belfast panto at the Grand Opera House, which that year was “Cinderella.” Even a few weeks after the new year, tickets were nearly sold out. For our performance, the audience was composed mainly of schoolchildren.

Let me put that in italics: The audience was composed mainly of schoolchildren.

They were young. They were in their school uniforms. They were laughing hysterically. They weren’t being groomed.

The Belfast dame is May McFettridge, who’s been hosting the holiday panto at the Opera House since 1990, save for the pandemic year. She also works tirelessly for UK charities that support disadvantaged children, so much so that she was awarded a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) for her charity work and had an audience with Queen Elizabeth in 2007 at Buckingham Palace.

The Grand Opera House lobby features busts of two people: the architect of the building – and May McFettridge, who was given her own bust during her 25th panto in 2014. John Lineham, who formerly was a car mechanic, has a wife and two daughters.

Let me put that in italics: John Lineham has a wife and two daughters.

He became an accidental drag queen when a relative who was hosting a radio show asked Lineham to phone in to liven it up. He pretended to be a Belfast housewife, the show was a huge success, and May McFettridge was born.

The Grand Opera House closed (fortuitously, as it turns out) after the 2019 panto for a year-long refurbishment. The venue was supposed to open in time for the 2020 panto, but Covid intervened and delayed the reopening. In March 2022, Prince Charles was on hand for it, sharing a few quips with May.

In Shakespeare’s time, men assumed both male and female roles. That tradition lives on today in the modern panto. Nothing to see here but entertainment for the whole family.

Belfast Badassery!

Enthusiastic audiences greet author and new book

Marilynn Richtarik’s talks in Belfast were the academic equivalent of a sold-out arena hosting a semi-famous rock band — albeit without cellphone flashlights aloft or the pungent smell of marijuana.

Audiences that require more than the fingers on two hands to count are considered good by scholarly standards, so it was quite refreshing to host 70 people Tuesday at Queen’s University Belfast’s Institute of Irish Studies (including 40+ online viewers) and about 40 on Thursday at the Linen Hall Library across from Belfast City Hall. The audiences were enthusiastic, and discussion after the presentations was lively.

Just like touring with that semi-famous rock band, celebrity sightings were also common. David Park’s novel “The Truth Commissioner” and Michael Longley’s poem “Ceasefire” both feature in Marilynn’s book. Park was on hand, as was Michael’s wife, Edna Longley, herself an accomplished scholar.

Anne Devlin and Rosemary Jenkinson, both playwrights and short story writers, attended the Thursday event, as did a journalist from Shared Future News and more than a dozen people from a cross-community initiative in north Belfast that strives to bridge the sectarian divide. That group asked particularly probing questions about how the Good Friday Agreement changed (or, rather, did not change) the lives of common folks in Northern Ireland, especially disaffected young men.

It was fantastic to see so many friends at both events and to make new ones along the way. We also are grateful to people at the Queen’s Institute of Irish Studies and the Linen Hall for making the necessary arrangements, and to No Alibis Bookstore in Belfast for selling copies of Marilynn’s book at both events.

Finally, while I wish I had come up with the headline for this post, that honor belongs to Dana Miller, a former grad student of Marilynn’s who tuned in while covering the SXSW Music Festival in Austin. She wrote, “What a brilliant talk you have given, and it is such a joy to watch you talk about your incredible work.”

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Have Knowledge, Will Travel

Care for a few facts? Will you buy me lunch?

An academic book tour is much like the education system during colonial times. Then, itinerant educators traveled from village to village, trading their skills for a night or two in a barn, a bunch of carrots for the stew pot or the occasional piece of meat.

This is only a book tour because Marilynn wills it so. There is no budget from the publisher, so she called and wrote academics, booksellers, and friends to arrange five readings and public events in Ireland, north and south. This is in addition to the people she asked to review the book, the work she did creating a hit list of academic and general interest publications for the publisher, writing blogs and articles about the work, doing a radio interview for a Dublin book program, and — oh yeah — staying on top of the two classes she’s teaching this spring.

In return for those five readings and public events, we have accommodation in Belfast for two nights, Dublin for two nights, and Galway for one night. We’re staying with a friend outside Belfast both weekends and a friend near Galway for a night. There are still a couple of days unaccounted for, so we’re going to see what the weather’s like and where we’d like to visit.

Oh, the Places We’ve Stayed!

We promoted Marilynn’s Stewart Parker biography for three years of book tours during the Thanksgiving holiday 2012-2014. Declan was in elementary school, so we took him out a week early and jaunted for two whole weeks, visiting Ireland and England the first year, England the Scotland the second, and England and Wales in 2014.

Her pay included some lodging, a few rail or bus tickets, and many meals out following a lecture. Fortunately, Marilynn doesn’t do it for the pay but, rather, for exposure for the book and the chance for us to travel to interesting places:

  • When I said I’d never been to Wales, she arranged a visit to Aberystwyth, the westernmost point of Britain. We stayed in a terrific grand hotel that overlooked the sea and the town’s boardwalk. During dinner, a Welsh professor taught Declan a dozen or two words, which he promptly wrote down on a napkin (and still has).
  • The previous year, we stayed in college lodgings in Durham Castle, an 11th century building that’s a UNESCO World Heritage site and also serves as a student dorm for Durham University. We ate breakfast at the high table in the dining hall, which served as inspiration for the Hogwarts great hall in the Harry Potter films. I should also point out that the bathroom for our room was up about 20 uneven concrete steps to an unheated chamber that in November felt like it was two degrees above absolute zero.
  • We’ve also stayed in the dean’s quarters at Hertford College, Oxford. Oxford University is comprised of 44 colleges, and Hertford was founded in 1284, which makes Marilynn’s Jesus College a relative newcomer. The Welsh college, which she attended as a Rhodes Scholar, was founded in 1571.
  • And though we remember nothing about our room at the Radisson Blu in Galway, we all still fondly remember the breakfast bar, which was the largest and most elaborate we had ever seen before — or since.

It certainly beat a few carrots and a soup bone.

(delayed) Planes, (wrong) Trains, (hired coaches), and Snow!

Getting to Belfast this time proved to be an adventure.

Maybe it’s the post-pandemic travel period. Perhaps it’s the lack of a working cellphone. But definitely it’s bad luck as Marilynn and I set off on our Ireland adventure on Thursday and Friday.

The plan was to fly into Dublin, take an express bus to Belfast, then a train to Helen’s Bay along the coast, where our great friend Eileen would pick us up in time to hit the bank by 4 p.m. to straighten out our UK account. But nothing went according to plan.

The Delta flight out of Hartsfield Thursday evening was 45 minutes late because of bad weather delaying connections, then the plane sat on the tarmac in Dublin because we were behind another plane that had lost hydraulic steering and needed a tow. What’s the Irish equivalent of Bubba the (airplane) tow truck driver? Padraic?

Looking out the window as the plane approached Dublin, all one could see was snow. As many times and as many different times of year I’ve visited Ireland, I’ve never seen more than a smattering of snow. What should have been a patchwork of green fields, with more green hues than the human mind can contemplate, was, instead, a uniform white, punctuated by stone fences that separated one field from the next.

Every Step Is Another Adventure

In a positive post-COVID sign, passing through immigration and customs was a breeze, taking under five minutes. Collect the bags, hop on the next Aircoach to central Belfast, and let the adventure begin, right? Well, no. Most coaches require advance purchase these days, and the weather delays out of Dublin meant that people who paid for earlier busses were catching later ones.

Note to self: Get a UK SIM card ahead of time. We had a UK phone for years, but with the long delay between trips, I knew the SIM would no longer be valid and the phone likely was outmoded. But it sure would have come in handy to keep our friend Eileen informed about our delays.

We felt fortunate to get a bus to Belfast. Marilynn did some fast talking to the bus driver, and I could see his lips moving as he counted the empty spaces on the bus. So again, we’re good, right?

After arriving in Belfast and a quick pit stop, we purchased our tickets for Helen’s Bay, went to the correct platform and got on the train. We were home free … or so we thought. Come to find out, there were two trains on the same platform, and we got on one headed in the opposite direction.

The train’s wayfinding signs were out of order, so we didn’t discover our error until after several stops. A nice conductor told us to get off at Antrim, cross over the tracks and take the 17:14 train back into Belfast. But that train was delayed by 25 minutes, then 30, then 33, 35, and finally 39 minutes. There was WiFi on the trains, so I could keep Eileen apprised, but there was no WiFi in the Antrim station.

Finally, at 18:56, we alighted at Helen’s Bay where our friend was waiting for us. Twenty hours after our journey started, Marilynn and I were finally back where we belonged.

Farewell, Dr. Himebaugh

I trust that every person reading this has that one person, that business mentor, that guiding light you always can depend upon for counsel and support. For me, that was Glenn Himebaugh, my journalism professor at Middle Tennessee State University. However, he didn’t know it at the time.

Nearly three decades after college, I did reconnect with Dr. Himebaugh and his wife, Ellen, visiting them in Murfreesboro and taking them to dinner when I was in town for meetings. To honor the man who meant so much for me, I founded an endowed scholarship for him in 2010, which started helping students a few years later.

While his passing last month at the age of 86 certainly saddened me, that sadness was tempered by the knowledge there remained no unfinished business between us. He knew exactly the influence he had had on my nearly 40-year career as a working journalist.

You don’t have to start a scholarship to honor the mentors in your life, but you do owe it to yourself (and your mentor) to make your feelings known.

Influence Well Beyond the Classroom

Like many people attending state university, I was first generation and worked the entirety of my college career — often full time. Consequently, I didn’t make those deep connections that I envy my wife for making during her undergraduate studies.

But during my journalism career, I often recalled my time on campus and the intensive and real-world training I’d received at MTSU. Dr. Himebaugh formed the core of my learning experience, teaching three of the foundational journalism classes, including feature writing and copyediting. He undoubtedly was the heart of the Mass Comm program, which he co-founded in 1971 and served for 40 years — the last 10 as professor emeritus. He taught those small, writing-intensive classes where students are slowly, lesson after lesson, paper after paper, molded into budding journalists and writers with bright prospects.

I remember his wry sense of humor and the washes of red ink he left on about every article I ever turned in. He was responsible for getting me involved in the campus chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, accompanying us to conventions in Mississippi and Atlanta, where an obviously inebriated Ted Turner delivered an incoherent keynote address. He also was indirectly responsible for one of my favorite personal stories, about how Mrs. Sarah Cannon (better known as country comedienne Minnie Pearl) insulted me in the backyard of the governor’s mansion in Nashville. But that’s a story for another day!

The Right Answer to a Big Question

After consulting the university foundation on the particulars of scholarship-founding, I invited the Himebaughs to lunch at a local Italian restaurant to ask his permission. I compare the experience to asking Marilynn to marry me, a joyful but stressful occasion filled with tears (mine) and much trepidation (also mine).

Somewhere through the main course, I brought up the subject, my voice breaking and a single tear falling from my left eye. When I popped the question to Dr. Himebaugh, he said, without hesitation, “As long as it’s not a memorial scholarship!”

Although Dr. Himebaugh is now in the newsroom in the sky, his legacy lives on in the thousands of students he taught over a long and distinguished career. It lives on in his scholarship that continues to grow and help fund the dreams of future journalists. But, per his wishes, the scholarship will never be “memorial.”

To support future generations of journalists, please consider a donation to the Dr. Glenn Himebaugh Scholarship at MTSU.

Want to Find Networking Success at a Conference? Pay Attention!

The man stood in front of his booth, scanning the crowd for the next person to engage in conversation. There weren’t many people around at this time during the conference as most people were in breakout sessions. Nonetheless, his stance and demeanor were those of someone who wanted to engage.

I will talk to anyone who seems willing to talk to me, so I approached him. He shook my hand firmly and looked me straight in the eye. I did the same.

I mentioned that most people manning booths were either talking among themselves or fully engaged in their devices, oblivious to the potential business opportunities passing them by. He agreed, adding that his father had been a furniture salesman and taught him the basics of working a conference.

What a coincidence, I replied. My father was a salesman, too. I spent many happy times accompanying him to a twice-yearly exhibition at the Tennessee State Fairgrounds. I would watch him interact with current and prospective customers, always ready with a firm handshake and a bit of banter.

My father would leave me in charge of the booth when he needed the restroom or when he got lunch for us both. I would greet customers as best I could, quickly mentioning that my dad would be back soon. (Total aside: the brownies that were part of the lunch at this conference were the best I’ve eaten. No wonder I kept going with my father to this event.)

You don’t need to be a salesman’s kid to understand the basics of salesmanship. The first rule is: Always be ready to engage.

Get in it to win it

The second rule is: Stay the hell off your phone. I have no idea how much money companies paid for booths at this conference for nearly 1,500, but I’m sure it wasn’t pocket change. Regardless, I saw many booth attendants doing things other than engage prospects and customers. Most were engrossed with their phones or laptops. Others were talking among themselves, rather hunting for the next prospect.

Attendees weren’t much better. The venue for this event has plenty of areas for impromptu meetings, but I saw dozens of people talking on or fiddling with their phones or using their laptops. I’m sure many of these people had legitimate business reasons to be otherwise engaged, but my guess is that it was less than half.

So if you’re too engrossed with your phone to engage with other people, what are you doing at a conference? I paid several hundred dollars to attend, and I made the most of it.

Third rule: Meeting people isn’t a volume proposition, nor is it all about what you’re selling or looking to accomplish.

The initial meeting is about finding a business connection. I bonded with one man because we are fans of the same English soccer team, but he’s not a prospect. A woman I met has her national office just a few miles from my home. She’s not a prospect, either, but I plan on visiting her at work soon because we hit it off. A meeting may be about how I can help someone, which I’m happy to do if I’m able.

The man I met who was ready to engage? Turns out, he definitely is a prospect. But that meeting never would have happened if we both hadn’t been willing to engage.

Think about that the next time you whip out your phone at a networking event or a conference.