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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1973-09-26, Page 2wEDNEsDAY, SEPTEMBER 26, 1973 Sugar and Spice -Sirving Brussels ' and the surrounding community published each Wednesday afternoon at Brussels, Ontario • by McLean Bros. Publishers, Limited. Evelyn, Kennedy .1' Editor Tom Haley - Advertising Member Canadian Commu,nity Newspper Association and Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association. Subscriptions (In advance) Canada $9.00 a year, Qthers $5.00 a year, Single CopieS IO'cents each. Second class mail Registration No. 0562. TelephOne 887-6641. Fall Fairs The best time of the year for many of us is now at hand . . .Fall Fair time. Nothing quite matches the allure of an agricultural society fair in the small towns of Ontario. School children are excited about parading to the fair class by class with a teacher at their head on Thursday afternoon. The more mercenary little dears are hoping to be about 75¢ richer when they collect their prize money for things, grown or cooked with only a very little help from mother or father. Exhibitors of grain and live- stock show off their best and pick up tips from each other. Fresh baked bread, banana layer cake and cherry pie on display in the round house makes spectators drool, In- terest in who is the best cook and who does the most careful and/or creative needlework is high. There is a happy, relaxed at-, mosphere at the Fall Fair which comes from working hard with your friends and neighbours, winning prizes when you deserve them and taking time off to enjoy an after- noon at the fair. For farmers the harvest is pretty well over.Towns- people with the excuse of keeping up with this year's agricultural advances and of taking a last break before settling down to the fall routine can also legitimately attend the fair. -Every year there are scoffers and sceptics who say that the Fall Fair is dying, that few people are 'interested anymore in the small agricultural community, its compe- titions and exhibitors. But the continued success of the area Fall Fairs disproves this theory. If anything, interest in things agri- cultural and things homemade iS increasing as people reject plastic, expensive material things and overly commercial professional types of entertainment. We predict, in fact, that small community-run Fall Fairs will thrive as people reject centralized govern- ment and institutions and hang on to .the local, personalized ones which are valuable to them. Whether you are a kid who looks forward to the midway, a farmer who Wants to see what other people are exhibiting, someone who likes to relive the good old days by seeing the horse teams and the homemade handiwork or a city slicker who wants to enjoy old fashiOned friend- liness and fun . you'll like the Fall Pair. Come to Brussels next Wednesday and Thursday, Oct. 3 and 4. by Bill Smiley One last column about impresSions of England,- and if you're already sick of them, turn to the classified ads. Cost. A holiday in England used to be relatively inexpensive, what with lower wages and food costs. Not no' more. Costs have soared all over Europe and Britain is no exception. • You can still have a cheap holiday there, if you want to squeeze everypence, just as you can in Canada. But that's no fun, on holidays, . In the lovely old town of Chester, we paid about $15 for a room without 'bath. But breakfast was included. Good seats in LOndon theatres cost from $8 to $10. Meals in a posh restaurant are about the same prides as' in Canada - \pre-' posteroUs. Best place to eat is in the pubs, where, at reasonable cost, yOU Can get a hunk of frenCh bread and good cheese, or a plate of ,bangers (sausage), a slide of veal and ham pie, or a hOt steak and kidney. pie. Ice. If. you are accustomed to ice in your drinks in hot Weather, either forget it, or be prepared to fight for it. Order a dry martini and sit back Waiting for something ice-cold and up, lifting. What you'll get 18 a glass of lukewarm VerrtiOUth„ a, concoction desig- ned to send you screaming into the arms of the local We arrived iri Edinhtirgh, hot, tired and dusty after a seven-hour train ride. struggled with luggage i cab and got to our hotel robin, after riding up in the littleSt elevator it the world (No More than four persons or 600 pounds), I was intrigued by the thought of what *Mild happen if four 200-pounders got On. Anyway, when the porter arrived With our bags, we were stretched out, dying for a sold citiuk, I asked hiM to' bring s Otte ice. Oh, yes, ice, Ten minutes later he returned, toting a huge silver tray,,, bedecked witli sparkling' white napkin The piece de resistance rested in the' centre Of the tray wine goblet with four tiny ice elibea, in it, We roared, He was Wildered, We'd' -ordered. lee,. hadn't WOI brdight dOtitteSy. Canadians and Americans are friendly sods, on the whole, but our manners are riot always eitastly oolishedi We Were struck by thd courtesy And ,f'riendli'ness Of the trita. At' but stook ibt example, there le' no elbow-punching of old ladies, no sly kicks on the ankles, no every-man-for- himself attitude. There is a politeness, which, though pained at times, is very evident. There's an old tradition, fostered by movies and novels, that the English are extremely reticent, to the point of stuffi- ness, on trains. They're supposed to retire behind their papers, indicating each others preSence ,by no more than the occasional 'grunt or dirty look. Why, it's just the opposite. They'll go On and on and on, explaining• things, being kindly and helpful until, sometimes when you're eithauSted and don't feel like gabbing, you wish the old, grumpy stereo- type were true. Only once did I have a slight ttnpleaSant- neSs, arid it was my faUlt. We were cat- ching a train, and were late, Sweating under the luggage, .and With our carriage what looked like a qUarter of a mile away, I looked wildly around for a perter. The only One I could see was helping an elderly crippled lady out Of a Wheel Chair, to get on the train, I dropped my bags, gave the porter a hand at helping her up, then slung my luggage into the wheelchair and went beetling down the platform pushing it. We arrived, and I Started. to Unload- my luggage from the wheelchair, to put it on the train. A rather stern railway Official looked at my wife,: who'd been galloping along behind me, looked back, down the'. platform and Spoke, NO, have to go in the baggage Van." I didn't knOW why, as it hadn't happened before, but with two minutes to go I didn't care. We pi& the bags in the van, and he started to feld the 'Wheelchair and put it it, I Said, '"Oh, no, that belongs here." He turned purple, Rs had been looking over my shoulder fee the inValicii probably' expecting an old SOW on a StretCher, It was the Wheel,' Chair that had- to go into the baggage van, not the bags: lie had been completely baffled by this example of Canadian eutetptissi WAS embarrassed by his: error, arid therefore grew a bit bladk iti the countenanCe. APOlogiZedi with a very sincere arid offered to run the •Chair back down the: platform, but he gritted something about' the train leantig and auothst,p04§d five' I didn't quite oitolit butwhiohdotinitely Contained the wordi Eibloody.°$'