by I’ve got my TV tuned to BBC news, with the war now centred on Lviv in the west after the Kremlin said they’d concentrate on the Donbas region having been pushed back by the Ukrainians. Since the first morning of the war, none of this has made any sense at all. Joe Biden has just made a speech, saying at the end that “for God’s sake this man cannot remain in power”. Whenever I see Biden speak about the Ukraine war, I wonder what the orange turd might have come out with.
Today I had my maths lesson in Dumbrăvița – he did well on a practice exam paper – and then when I got home I had a last-minute cancellation, meaning I just one had English lesson before stepping on the tennis court. I played two sets, both with the woman who struggles a bit with her footwork, so I had to run a bit, which was no bad thing. It was a lovely early evening for tennis, and it’s been a great week of weather all round. Blue skies every day.
Yesterday I called my aunt, and this time she answered. I remembered to add “Auntie” before her name. She was much better than she can be. In the past she’s seemed unaware of anything beyond her four walls. She’ll say the weather is bad, I’ll then mention that it’s fine and sunny where I am, and then she’ll almost seem put out by my mentioning other weather. Incorrect weather, as she sees it. I got none of that yesterday. We spent most of the ten minutes or so discussing the war. She still did her usual trick of ending the “conversation” when I still had things I wanted to say.
My aunt would get on well with the eight-year-old girl in Germany whom I teach on Skype. Yesterday’s lesson with her was especially hard because her father was with her the whole time. I made what I thought were fairly strong noises to say that I’d prefer it if he’d damn well go away, but he paid no notice. Half-way through the hour-long lesson her mind wandered. She must be tired, I said to her father. No, she’s just bored, he said. There might not be a whole lot I can do about that. Her English has got noticeably better in the time I’ve taught her. I think that’s down to YouTube more than me; her accent is very American.
Wednesday saw the return of Zoli, my first-ever student here, way back in November 2016. I hadn’t seen him since the very start of the pandemic in Romania, two years ago, when I joined him on a trip to the mountains. As we drove there, he told me that the hut had been closed because of the virus and we’d have to sneak in, and I got angry at him for not telling me before. Though it was beautiful up there in the snow, I was aware that a tsunami of disease and death was about to hit us. I thought I might never see him again, so it was a great pleasure to receive a text from him to say that he wanted to restart lessons. Wednesday’s meeting was hardly a lesson: it was a chat followed by a game of Bananagrams.
I’ve ordered a Samsung phone to replace my iPhone 5½ (as I call it) which I got as a present almost five years ago. My present phone doesn’t charge unless I place a heavy book on it, and then its battery runs down almost visibly (actually visibly if I’m making a video call, say), so I end up not using it much. It’s a low-end Samsung, called an A13 (it cost about NZ$300 or £150) but it seems to do everything I could ever want and much more. What it won’t do, however, is FaceTime, so I’ll have to switch to Skype or WhatsApp or something for keeping in touch with my parents. FaceTime has been so convenient.
Amid all the news of the war, they’ve been showing the PR disaster that is P&O, the once-proud British shipping company. P&O stood for (and presumably still does stand for) Peninsular and Oriental, a name that conjures up the world’s great trade routes and general intrepidness. Now it’s Dubai-owned (ugh), and the name makes me think of an outfit that lays off 800 of its staff on Zoom without giving any notice, and now has a ship that is deemed unseaworthy.
And finally, back to tennis. Ashleigh Barty has decided to retire from tennis at the age of just 25, at the pinnacle of the game. After winning Wimbledon and then her home grand slam in Melbourne, she probably thought, just what else can I achieve, and why not play cricket or golf or any of the other sports I’m ridiculously talented in. Tennis will miss her, though; I remember not long ago hearing some commentators suggesting that she might be too nice to ever be a champion. In other news, the no-tie-break final set, which has produced extraordinary drama over the last half-century, is no more. The movers and shakers of the tennis world thought we’d all be better off without that suspense, and now all four grand slams will be (quote) enhanced by a first-to-ten tie-break at 6-all in the final set, as the Australian Open has employed since 2019. I’m always wary of that marketing-speak word enhance. The new system has been billed as a one-year trial, but you don’t usually trial something in the biggest events on the calendar. It’s possible that, say, Wimbledon reverts to what they used before, but in all likelihood this will be a permanent change. Well, until someone else comes along and decides to shorten things even further.
