Count the errors in this London Telegraph story about Boston
By Ron Newman - Thu, 11/29/2007 - 6:01pm.
Jacqueline Feather of the London Daily Telegraph says she moved to Boston seven years ago, so how can she get so many facts wrong in such a short article?
Quote:
You can expect the snow to start around Thanksgiving (the end of November) and the snow will stay on the ground until the middle of April.
Not any winter I can remember. It may snow in November but that will quickly melt. It may snow in April but only after earlier snow has melted. Only in rare years does snow continuously cover the ground all winter.
Quote:
There are INS (Immigration and Naturalization) offices in Boston
except that they've been called ICE (Immigration & Customs Enforcement) for several years now.
Quote:
To obtain a driving licence you will need to visit the DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles)
except it's actually called the Registry of Motor Vehicles (RMV)
Quote:
check the ' MCAS' (Mass. Comprehensive Achievement Score)
actually it stands for Mass. Comprehensive Assessment System
Quote:
Sainsbury's own one of the larger supermarket chains, Shaw's, and the other alternatives are Market Basket and Donellans.
Donellans? What's that? The major competitor she somehow left out is Stop & Shop. Roche Bros. and Johnnie's Foodmaster might be worth a mention too.
Quote:
Most other shopping is done in the Malls.
I guess she's never visited Downtown Crossing, Boylston Street, Newbury Street, or Harvard Square.
Quote:
It is worth bearing in mind that if you live anywhere near the New Hampshire border the sales tax is 0%.
Only if you actually cross the border!
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Donelan's
Ah! The writer is a real-estate broker living in Acton or Concord, I'm guessing.
Westford, actually
Her name is uncommon enough that a quick search in BigYellow turned up her contact information.
That explains the New Hampshire shopping, Donelans (store on Rt. 119 in Littleton) and Market Basket (Westford, near 495), snow on the ground comments (ski area in Westford), and overall lack of clue about Boston.
Wonder how she'd feel
if I moved to Maidstone or Canterbury and then tried to write an expat expert column about London?
That area gets snow much more easily than in Boston
The whole outer-495 area gets so much more snow. I grew up out there and moving to Somerville was a bit of a shock, there's not NEARLY as much snow here!
More, not more frequent
I lived in Littleton for two years and we got the same snowstorms that everybody else did. We occasionally got snow when there was rain in Cambridge (where I was working), but that was about it. It was often colder out there, but not snowier as many storms in this area are fed of coastal moisture.
nitpicker
Hmm... since we're nitpicking here, the snow on the ground in Westford isn't due to the ski area, Nashoba. Nashoba makes quite a bit of its own fake snow for their small ski hill - it doesn't accumulate in other parts of the town. Wrong, sorry!
Her perceptions, not mine
Given Ms. Feather's level of attention to detail, she may not have noticed that Nashoba was cranking the stuff out of giant squirt guns from Thanksgiving to springtime ...
Don't miss the comments section
"try googling MCAS ! but I'm not sure if this applies to Nusery schools"
Boston has several venues
I suppose if you can say that Boston has a Donelan's then you can also claim it has Football (American) and Football (Soccer). Gillette Stadium is about as far away from Boston as a lot of the Donelan's.
Sainsbury's still owns Shaw's?
I thought Albertson's/Osco bought out Shaw's. I noticed their logos now appear on Shaw's bags. Or does Sainsbury's own Albertson's?
Two sales ago
If the Wikipedia page for Shaw's is accurate, not only did Albertson's buy Shaw's from Sainsbury, but then Supervalu bought it from Albertson's. So, one more strike against this writer.
She also left out Whole
She also left out Whole Foods and the fact that the MCAS isn't the only predictor of school quality.
Whole Foods
I won't hold that one against her since she did say "there are a number of organic supermarkets as well"
Well, she left out Roche Bros!
And Store 24!
And Hanneford!
And Hanneford!
I think she should be given a break
Its true, there are many characterizations in her article that any Bostionian would find odd. However, she's writing for an audience in the UK for whom "Boston" may as well be a region, as she describes it. I was just happy that she didn't start off the article with Boston is a city on the east coast of the United States near New York. Although people in the UK are, generally speaking, familiar with US geography, some are not, and outside of the UK many are not. I have had countless experiences where I have to explain to people in Europe where Boston is in relation to either New York or Washington. So anyway, I didn't think her treatment of "Boston" as a region was so bad.
It's not that she lives outside Boston
but rather that she got so many easy-to-verify facts wrong, like the sales tax.
(Full disclosure: I don't live in Boston, either. I live in Somerville.)
Close To
I have found that the degree to which things are close to one another on different continents can be misunderstood. Boston is close to New York kind of like the way Manchester is close to London, or Munich is close to Prague.
Bad writing, not so much bad facts
Her facts may have been squishy, but weren't completely wrong. Who among us hasn't exagerated the weather at times? It's part of the New England mystique. And does it matter that she said DMV rather than RMV, or missed the words behind the MCAS accronym? Not really, particularly when you consider that DMV and RMV are essentially the same term, both serving the same function. It is much like being bothered by "the state of Massachussetts" in place of "Commonwealth." Technically, it is mistake, but practically, it doesn't matter.
The flaw in the article is that she is clearly not a professional writer, and I would like to think there is at least one British expat in the Boston area who can writed more effectively (and who can check the facts).
judgemental appliances
if you don't enjoy the heat make sure you have a home with air conditioning, but you can manage without, with the judicial use of fans.
Because of all that hot air from the legislative bodies? Judicious use of a dictionary might be in order.