Ahhhh 😊

[semireg@nrw.social]

@jon I've been catching up on "Jet Lag: The Game" in the last days and I'm impressed by the very different nature of the main challenge posed to the players in France vs in Germany:
Germany: Missing a crucial connection because of a 30 minute delay of the hourly train.
France: "No trains from here in the next 3 hours, and then the TGV onwards is fully booked. No apologies"

[phrawzty@hachyderm.io]

@tal
Malta also still speaks English :)
@tml

[tal@mastodon.social]

@tml

The only part of train traveling that I like is the announcements! The vocal delivery just sparks joy for some reason. (I work in railways, so train-brain gets no rest)

Only done a little work traveling in Germany with a dozen excursions to Netherlands, and it was a long time ago. At first I didn't like having English "baby fed" to me. But I ended up appreciating it when I was late for the last train home one night, it was a gift to be really sure I had the right train.

[pkyo@kind.social]

@jon

Silly announcements 😖☹️🫩

The endlessly patronising announcements on the UK are so irritating to me.

For a while, the warning about scarfs and hats getting blown off by passing trains made me wonder: "DO THESE PEOPLE HAVE NOTHING BETTER TO DO?!?"

[jon@gruene.social]

@PKYo uk is also terrible at that.

[jon@gruene.social]

@semireg yes. That sums it up.

[lionelb@expressional.social]

@jon

No incessant adverts for the British Transport Police.

[jon@gruene.social]

@lionelb Right.

[paavi@mastodontti.fi]

@jon I've got only one thing that I unconditionally dislike about this class of trainsets: the seats.

[jon@gruene.social]

@paavi eh? The seats are great! Among the most comfy.

[paavi@mastodontti.fi]

@jon If you have the right mindset it often is pleasant enough and you'll eventually get where you need to get to.

[paavi@mastodontti.fi]

@jon Compared to RENFE, which is "sorry you missed your connection, next train tomorrow"

[paavi@mastodontti.fi]

@jon I might be wrong, but aren't the seats the usual ICE4 type? I've got opinions about those, but then again I am shorter than the average Central-European with slighlty short legs compared to my back and I have angle preferences when it comes to the nearly horizontal part of the seat my bottom and thighs are supposed to rest on. :)

[jon@gruene.social]

@paavi No. The seats are different. I get your critique of the ICE4 ones.

[paavi@mastodontti.fi]

@jon Ooh, that's nice to have confirmed. Thank you! ...and sorry for my ignorance.

[semireg@nrw.social]

@jon To illustrate it perhaps even more poignantely:
While in France, the players sit around for hours in rural towns or even in Paris because there is no option for them to get away.
Whlie in Germany, they sit around in trains that should be moving but are held up somewhere on the line.
😃

[erebion@chaos.social]

@tal @tml Just imagine how hard that can be for tourists from countries that don't speak German/French/Dutch.

Brussels has a lot of EU and other organisations, therefore English for Belgian trains makes sense. More so than in many other countries in Europe.

[tml@mementomori.social]

@tal Have you had the opportunity to enjoy Trenitalia (machine) announcements? Very repetitive, very verbose and tedious, fairly odd English pronunciation. (One would think that when recording announcements, they would find a professional native English speaker.) You might feel forced to adjust your enthusiasm...

"tap tap mode"
"easy and convenient"
long harangue about some law including its number and date that mercifully is only in Italian
etc.

[tml@mementomori.social]

@erebion @tal How hard *what* can be? Understanding what essentially is an ad on the outside of a train?

[stefanlindbohm@mastodon.social]

@jon And the value for money with DB tickets can be incredible. I’m working on our integration right now and testing cases like Gothenburg to Swiss/Austrian ski resorts that can come in at under 100€ door to door.

Plus if you miss a train there’s always another option available. 15-60 min delay to destination might be common, but multi-hour delays rare. Compare this to many other countries where a small problem will often end up making you 3 hours late.