Oh, my paws and whiskers

I started out on that post about having seawater in my veins with the idea that every Englishman has that.  We are a seafaring nation, after all, and have been for centuries.  Britannia rules the waves and all that.  And all this started because I somehow got it into my head that there is nowhere in England more than 75 miles from the sea.  Not even right in the heart of England, which some claim is Leamington Spa, is one more than a hop, skip and a jump from salt water.  That was the premise; that was what I recalled reading or being told aeons ago when the world was young and I even younger.  I had intended mentioning this trivia in my seawater post but it somehow managed to get itself left out.  That often happens to me.  Anyway, I thought I really ought to check out the accuracy (or veracity - take your pick) of the statement so I Googled it.  That was when I found myself entering a parallel universe, a different world from the one I usually inhabit.  It was, I tell you, an Alice in Wonderland moment.  I was in an alien world, in more senses than one.  I had managed to enter a world I suppose I knew existed but one of which I had no real knowledge, far less experience.  It was the world inhabited by people wanting to become British citizens.

I imagine that every person born a British citizen who has reached the grand old age of 15 or 16 will have an opinion on this subject.  They will know what they consider to be the attributes needed by anybody wishing to join this select band.  And one doesn't need to have political leanings to the right of Gengis Khan to say that anybody becoming a British citizen should have some knowledge of how we got where we are, where we are now, and where we are heading.  And what better way to assess the applicant's knowledge than setting a test?

When I Googled the thing about nowhere in England being more than 75 miles from the sea, I clicked on a link which took me to a forum where potential test candidates were seeking information.  It seemed that the most common question was asking if it was necessary to read Chapter 1 of the Government-produced (I presume) book as all the questions in the tests are based on Chapters 2 - 6?  Seemingly, it is not necessary to read Chapters 1 and 7.

From there, I found my way to another site which sets sample test papers.  It was here I learned that the test comprises 24 multiple choice questions to be answered in 45 minutes.  It was in the first of those test papers that i found confirmation of the fact that nowhere in Britain (not just England) is more than 75 miles from the sea.  But I confess to some puzzlement, amazement even, at some of the questions asked.  Like the number of members of the Welsh Assembly -  40, 50, 60 or 80?  I hadn't the foggiest idea - and nor, I would suggest, would at least 90% of the population.  So why does an aspiring British citizen need to know?  Unless they intend living in Wales, of course.

And how about: "Where do you normally go first if you wish to buy a house in Scotland - solicitor, estate agent, building society, local bank?"  The cynic in me immediately asked, but who would want to buy a house in Scotland?  But more seriously, the vast majority of people in England would have answered "estate agent" - but not me, as I recalled reading somewhere sometime that, in Scotland as in France, solicitors sell houses.

But I didn't know the percentage of the population that lives in Scotland or the percentage of the population that is Jewish.  And this latter question seemed to me to have potential racial problems.  I attempted five different sets of questions and passed each test - just.  The pass mark is 75% and that is exactly what I scored in three of the tests.  Given how obtuse some of the questions were, I thought that satisfactory.  And no test had taken me more than three minutes - nowhere near the 45 minutes allowed.

So I decided to see what I could do with a driving theory test.  Sample test papers are available on a Government site.  I was horrified when I learned that I had scored only 46 out of 50, albeit with more than 46 minutes still left to me.  The pass mark was 43.  But they didn't tell me which of my answers were wrong.

I tried a US citizenship test and scored 80%

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I've rather taken to Haydn's Trumpet Concerto, especially the third movement, and that is what is playing as I type this.

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I wonder if they have seawater in their veins?  not a very recent picture, needless to say!