As an Essex boy and occasional cricket fan I read with interest a piece in the Observer which states that Ravi Bopara, who has had a short break from cricket for personal reasons, was due to play today "in Essex's local derby against the Netherlands."
Now I am pretty geographically inept, but Essex / the Netherlands / local derby? Did Holland invade Suffolk while I was having my bath?
insertponceyfre... | August 20, 2012 - 07:24
I am in Suffolk, and looking out of the window right now, I can't see anything remotely Dutch. Hope that helps!
FTSE100 | August 20, 2012 - 07:38
I live in Hollandaise on Sauce, which I think is between the Netherlands and Essex. People keep walking past my house, all going in the same direction, with cricket bats. They have built a bridge across the river Sauce with stumps. They gather on street corners and talk darkly of umpires, or possibly empires. I don't know what they're up to but I don't like it.
Terrence Oblong | August 20, 2012 - 18:43
Thanks for the reassurance insert, Suffolk is strange enough as it is without suddenly becoming dutch.
h jenkins | August 20, 2012 - 20:40
Well, Terrence, Holland is actually IN Essex.
The village of Great Holland is just to the west of Frinton and Holland-on-sea is between Clacton and Frinton.
It's to do with dutch engineers being brought over to drain some of the marshlands of East Anglia.
Helvigo Jenkins
Terrence Oblong | August 20, 2012 - 20:45
They obviously called it Great Holland so as not to confuse it with the other one.
I have never heard of Great Holland, and I have driven from Clacton to Frinton, I must have had my eyes closed at the time.