<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML xmlns:o = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" xmlns:st1 = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"><HEAD> <META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"> <META content="MSHTML 6.00.6000.16945" name=GENERATOR></HEAD> <BODY id=role_body style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; COLOR: #000000; FONT-FAMILY: Arial" bottomMargin=7 leftMargin=7 topMargin=7 rightMargin=7> Hello,   Yesterday but a week ago I had the happy chance to learn to know several members of APG. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Well, here in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Germany</st1:place></st1:country-region> we know nearly nothing about Who-do-you-think-you-are? There was something similar last year in German TV but I didn’t pay attention to it. Someone told me about it  but … well, you know …<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Last November APG told about the event in late February 2011, so I decided to attend. Twas a good chance to learn to know some fellow members in person. And it’s a shorter way to <st1:country-region w:st="on">England</st1:country-region> than to <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">America</st1:place></st1:country-region> anyway. So I organized the trip, got three Q-jump-tickets to have faster access to the show, bought a ticket to and fro through Ryanair, booked a hotel in London – Kensington within 15 minutes walk distance to Olympia where the show took place. Thursday night I rode to <st1:PlaceName w:st="on">Frankfurt-Hahn</st1:PlaceName> <st1:PlaceType w:st="on">Airport</st1:PlaceType> in the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:PlaceName w:st="on">Hunsrueck</st1:PlaceName> <st1:PlaceType w:st="on">Mountains</st1:PlaceType></st1:place>, stayed in a nearby hotel and took the 6.20-a.m.-flight to London-Standsted. That was funny. The wind blew the same direction as we flew, so we took off at 6.20 and landed 6.10 – always local time. Thus we landed ten minutes before we started. I really liked the idea. At eight o’clock I had reached downtown <st1:City w:st="on">London</st1:City> and took a cab to my hotel – wow, 13 Pound <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Sterling</st1:place></st1:City> for a taxi ride but I was bone-tired and anxious to get there. Three days later I paid two pounds for the same route but using the subway :-)<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> I parked my suitcase in the hotel, got all I needed and went to the event hall. I didn’t know what I had to expect. I presented my ticket and was among the first visitors that Friday morning. Q-Jump-ticket includes three tickets for workshops and my first was … well, actually I can’t remember. I know I attended at least three lectures that day – one was at 1 p.m. – Mark Herber talked about War Memorials Online at Stand 825 “The Genealogist”. He produced various memorials from all over <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Britain</st1:place></st1:country-region>, explained how they got there and what information could be gathered from it. Some were real monuments on public places but others were found on more or less remote sites like schools or even plants. When I sat down, there were two ladies sitting right near me and I asked one of them in case I felt asleep not to disturb me. Should I snore, please, push me with your ellbow. She recognized my alien accent and asked where I came from. I guess I was the only German to attend the show. I produced a booklet I had put together about the relation between my hometown St. Wendel and <st1:country-region w:st="on">England</st1:country-region> - The Great-Great-Great-Great-Grandmother of The Prince of Wales - Relations between my hometown St. Wendel, Germany, and England - and gave here a copy (they had been planned for selling but no occasion arised to really sell it so I donated about 15 of them and took the rest back home). Hope she liked it. I didn’t fell asleep during Mark Herber’s lecture but I started feeling the lack of sleep from last night. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> When I first entered the hall, I made my way to Stand 519- the APG stand where I introduced myself to Paul Blake, Laura Prescott and Kathleen Hinckley. Then I strolled through the hall realizing that these would become three very long days (plus an additional one for <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">London</st1:place></st1:City> itself) before I could go home. And I guessed they would get extremely boring. There was nearly nothing of real interest for me. All stands dealed with information about <st1:country-region w:st="on">England</st1:country-region> – and there was no real genealogical connection between my research in German to that in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">England</st1:place></st1:country-region>. That’s what I guessed after the first walk through the hall. I forget that quickly after I had talked to several people at several stands. Like Ian Hook at Stand 615 “Leger Holidays” (they provided military memorial trips to <st1:country-region w:st="on">France</st1:country-region> and <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Belgium</st1:place></st1:country-region>). I gave him a booklet whose second half is about a crash of a British bomber in my hometown in September 1941. Very exciting talk – he is curator of the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:PlaceName w:st="on">Essex</st1:PlaceName> <st1:PlaceName w:st="on">Regiment</st1:PlaceName> <st1:PlaceType w:st="on">Museum</st1:PlaceType></st1:place>, and he told me that some units of the Essex Regt were controllers during the 1935-Plebiscite in the Saar Region. Very interesting. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> I visited APG stand then and now and met other people like Craig Scott from North Carolina, Carol Bannister from Nottinghamshire and Rob van Drie from the Netherlands – uuh, it was such a pleasure to meet someone who spoke German. My English is not too bad but in school and later I learned something like Oxford English and during my research I have been in contact to lots of English speaking people but most of them American. You know Oscar Wilde’s Canterville Ghost where an American family buys a British castle. When the family enters the ghost watches them. And he tells about the mother she was good looking and spoke but absolutely no English. Well, I got very much acquainted to American English and much later I learned that the Brits’ English is much different in terms and pronounciation and has nearly nothing to do with Oxford English as well. I really had hard times during those three days in <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">London</st1:place></st1:City> to get acquainted with the language – not to talk about the traffic system and the currency. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> In the afternoon I urgently needed a coffee and bought a cappucino. Once that pretty somehow red-haired girl behind the desk understood my order, I ordered some piece of cake and paid 5.50 Pounds Sterling which is about 6.40 Euros = 8.50 US Dollars – for a piece of cake and a bigger cup of coffee. Incredible. The coffee was great but nevertheless … <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> I sat on the floor with a wall in my back and several other people near me – a men to my left and a middle-aged British lady to my right. We sipped coffee and listened to someone lecturing about DNA stuff. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> I attended two more shows that day – one was “Hiring a professional genealogist at home and abroad” with Laura Prescott who reminded me of our code of ethics. Well, I had read and signed it before I entered APG but had I really thought about it? Ofcourse I follow that code – had I been a member or not. Like the ten comandments – they are basic rules for a functioning society. That lecture was great and I really reflected about the code. As I did the next days when talking to visitors of the APG stand when “I was on duty”. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> The last lecture for the day was “Ideas for research before 1600” with Helen Good. Helen is a tremendous sight – a historian with very much passion for her subjects. When I first saw her waiting for the visitors to come along I had thought “oh, my goodness” but once she started to talk and showing examples I was faszinated. She talked about sources from 16th Century – id est 1500 plus. I was surprised to be able to read most of the documents she presented – the numbers were the same we in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Germany</st1:place></st1:country-region> had in that time. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> On Sunday I talked to her about it and produced a sample of another script in our catholic church in St. Wendel and she got fascinated about some letters she had never seen before. During her talk she presented a book called “Reading Tudor and Stuart Handwriting” by L. Munby, <st1:place w:st="on">S. Hobbs</st1:place> and A. Crosby, published 2002 by the “British Association for Local History” (www.balh.co.uk). It’s great and a very useful help for those who deal with that period of time in presenting letters and numbers in original with explanations attached.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> I didn’t know what to do that night so I went back to the hotel, bought some food and coke in a nearby supermarked and went up to my room. I had no watch with me and my portable showed our time in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Germany</st1:place></st1:country-region>. But there was a telephone in the room and it showed the time. So I went to bed at ten and at once fell asleep. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> I woke up next morning at 8 a.m. (telephone time), got up and went down for breakfast half an hour later – to find the breakfast room closed. Hm, they were to open at half past 8, now it was past nine. It was then when I realised that my telefone time was wrong – the difference was 1 hour and 40 minutes. I hasn’t been 8 when I woke up but 6.20. And it had not been ten when I went to sleep the night before but 8.20 p.m. Well, now I knew it. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> I went back to <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Olympia</st1:place></st1:City> hall and saw the long line of visitors alongside the hall and around the corner. I produced my Q-Jump-ticket for Saturday and quickly got in. I said “good morning” at the APG stand and went upstairs to attend Audrey Collins’ “Using the National Archives, onsite and online”. Audrey had had some problems with <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">London</st1:place></st1:City>’s traffic and the fought a hard battle with the computer and the beamer. The beamer shut off several times but Audrey was an experienced lecturer with cool temper. When one “slide” was to cut off once more, she told the audience to memorize this slide before it would cut off. And when it was gone she said: “Hope you did as I told you and memorize it!” we – the audience and I – loved her coolness. Finally the problem was solved and she showed us fascinating possibilities on the website of National Archives of <st1:country-region w:st="on">Great Britain</st1:country-region> (or just <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">England</st1:country-region></st1:place>?). <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> I was scheduled for the stand at 11 but got lost in a talk to some visitors upstairs and came late. First I stood in the back and listened to Marie Foden and how she made it before I dared to talk to a visitor. He asked me something and I really didn’t understand anything. I asked him to repeat and he used akronyms I never even heard off. I asked someone from the APG stand crew for help which was quickly provided. That accent really killed me. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Two hours later I walked around, talked to the Military Stand members (Royal Air Force) and the War Graves Commission folks and forget to visit Howard Brenbrook’s “What’s in a name?” At about 4 p.m. I quit and made it back to the hotel to prepare for the evening. At about six I was back and met Paul Blake at the entrance to the Pizza Restaurant right near Olympia Hall. APG had invited its members for a reception at the Restaurant with wine and drinks. Laura made the reception and asked everyone to introduce himself with name and country. The Brits had the majority with several people from <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Ireland</st1:place></st1:country-region>. After I’d spoken, I got a little mad about myself. While everyone told his country in English, I should have mentioned it “Deutschland” instead of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Germany</st1:place></st1:country-region>. A little bit of Patriotism – well, I didn’t. Laura’s reception was great and she thanked all those who had made this meeting possible, among them Eileen M O Duill from <st1:country-region w:st="on">Ireland</st1:country-region> who had organized the Stand in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:City w:st="on">Olympia</st1:City></st1:place>. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> We sat down and ordered our pizzas and the waiters produced some confusion when they brought the pizzas along and called them other names than on the menu. I had ordered a Caesar salad and it was very good. The wine bottles emptied and new were opened and we talked together and it was really a fine chance to talk to people whom you knew from the lists but never talked personally. Now some of us had a face behind the email adress. Later – after most of us had left – I talked to Maggie Loughran and Geoff Swinfield about several things I did not understand. They knew the event very well. When the restaurant closed at 11 p.m. I accompanied Audrey Collins and another lady who stayed at the Hilton and went back to the hotel. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <o:p>Roland Geiger</o:p> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>----------------- Roland Geiger Historical and Genalogical Research Alsfassener Strasse 17 66606 St. Wendel Germany phone ++49-6851-3166 email rolgeiger@aol.com <A href="http://www.hfrg.de/">www.hfrg.de</A> => APG - Association of Professional Genealogists => ASF - Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Saarlaendische Familienforschung Researchs in => genealogy => local history => transcriptions (f.e. old German into modern) => guided tours through St. Wendel (day and night) and St. Wendel County, Saarland, Germany </DIV></BODY></HTML>