To Think this is a Bit Insensitive/Odd/Random

[LadyClarissaArseQuack]

We have German exchange students via my dd's school. The itinery is as follows:
Day1-2 at home with the host family
Day3 Coventry Cathedral
Day4 Iron Gorge museum
Day5 Alton Towers.

From my experience of visiting Germany (near Dusseldorf) the exchange student is likely to be familiar with the war having flattened things and post war reconstruction, so I wouldn't worry about that being insensitive. I went on a school trip to Iron Bridge as a teenager and found it incredibly dull, but it is probably a lot cheaper to go to than London. And as a teenager, visiting the Midlands without a trip to Alton Towers is like going on a French exchange to Paris and not going to Disney Land (I am still a bit bitter about that one as it was a truly shit week. I don't think that going to see Buckingham Palace gives any more sense of how we live than any of the other trips as most of us don't live in a palace. The cultural exchange bit comes from her spending time with you as a family.

Why am I so sniffy about the Coventry town centre ? It's fine if you have a quid to spare with all the pound shops
Walk down a cellar stairs and you can go down the Dog and Trumpet (Whoof and Poof) and score.
I spent most of my teenage years stoned in that pub.
I wouldn't say it was bad; but I wouldn't say it was good either.
I remember the tender years when I was completely stoned out of my brain in the cathedral ruins; whilst on the graduate programme for rate rebates for Coventry City Council.

My experience of Coventry is that it is a dump. But the Cathedral is meant to be nice and I haven't been there. I agree that a trip to Coventry town centre would be a bit disappointing if you have travelled from Germany. They need to get a balance between expensive trips and ones which are not actually worth doing.

I was on an exchange to Germany once when I was 16.

I mostly remember sneaking out of the haus at midnight with Sabine to go to a dope-smokin party in the woods with the local boys.

My kinda gal, Sabine.

Not even close in the culturally insensitive stakes - the boy's school in my town took their exchange group to Duxford Imperial War museum on the 50th anniversary of Battle of Britain day!

It's a long time since I taught in Germany but they certainly used to be very keen on Vergangenheitsbewaeltigung (coming to terms with the past) so a visit to Coventry doesn't strike me as that odd. As a veteran of many exchange visits at school and also having been on the teacher side of it the main thing that happens when they visit any town is all kids make a beeline for McDonalds thereby irritating the tits off harrassed teachers who had to faithfully promise families their kids wouldn't eat any beef in the UK.

geek pie my memory is:

Being fed lentils bacon despite clearly communicating I was vegetarian, going to a cool cafe/bar and smoking, snogging a floppy haired French boy and buying a Naf Naf shirt

I think enough ti 0me has passed for this to not be insensitive

"Alton Towers is in Stoke on Trent."

It's an outrage I tell you!