The Last Straw/Frank McNally: I used to think that the extrovert Irish and the stiff-upper-lipped English were just tourism clichés, with little basis in reality.
But after three days of the culture clash that is the Cheltenham Festival, I've changed my mind. The Irish who travel to Cheltenham are almost without exception talkative and easily moved to song (often with terrible results). By contrast, even here in the west country, the English are paralysed with reserve.
There was a poignant moment in what is laughingly called the press room on Wednesday. I was sitting on the floor under a television set beside a draughty door with my decrepit laptop, taking advantage of one of the two available plug sockets (the other belonged to a fridge, and it had been reserved months in advance by experienced racing journalists). The Coral Cup was showing on the monitor over my head, and a crowd of gatecrashers had gathered to watch while enjoying the press room's one undoubted advantage - a bar without a queue.
It became evident that a couple of the English viewers had backed a horse called Emotional Moment. "C'mon Emotional!" they cheered, politely at first, but with growing urgency. And as the race neared its finish, and the spectators grew more excited, I found myself looking up at them and hoping that, for their sake, Emotional would win, just for once. But the moment passed (the finishing post, in fourth place) and English reserve was restored soon afterwards.
There is a broader clash of cultures here too. This was most striking if, like me and many race-goers, you stayed in Stratford-on-Avon and commuted. Every morning, you left behind a world dominated by Shakespeare's English, and emerged into one where they spoke another language entirely. Just as earthy, and occasionally as poetic, but a language populated by "maiden hurdlers", "smart geldings", and "leery ould buggers". Not to mention "leppers": Cheltenham is probably the world's biggest lepper colony. Above all, festival week Cheltenham is a place where you can have a "good touch" on a "game mare", without getting arrested.
I felt sorry for our Shakespeare-speaking bus driver the first morning when, as we snaked across the Cotswolds in a traffic jam, he attempted to divert passengers with tour-guide patter. "Over there," he would say, "you can see the Malvern Hills, where the composer Elgar lived". This information was greeted with stony silence from the bus. Unless Elgar was running in the Champion Hurdle, and the driver had information about his chances, nobody wanted to know.
Of course, the widest cultural divide in Cheltenham is between those who have good information and those who don't. Information is rampant during festival week, but most of it is imcomplete, misleading, or untrue. Or it was true last week, before the ground dried up. Up-to-date intelligence from the horse's mouth (or at least from his stable) is hard currency, and before it reaches you, it's usually well worn, so the odds have tumbled to the point where they're too skinny (as they say in Cheltenham) to be worth the risk.
I thought it was an oxymoron (as they say in Stratford) when I saw that the meeting's opening race was sponsored by a "wealth management" company. What cretin, I wondered smugly, would heed the financial advice of a company that sponsors horse-racing and, indirectly, encourages gambling. But then the race was won by a roaring-hot favourite, the first in a lengthy series of results that made Government bonds look risky in comparison, and left bookmakers needing advice on poverty management.
Meanwhile, I was reduced as usual to searching for interesting coincidences as grounds for backing a horse. And I thought I'd found one on the second day when our bus hit a bump in the road outside the hotel, leaving the front fender hanging off and delaying us by three-quarters of an hour while a replacement vehicle was called. It was immediately obvious that someone somewhere was telling me to bet on the festival "Bumper", a race being run that very afternoon. But nowhere in the field could I find a horse with a name related to bus travel, or public transport generally, or road hazards. So I kept my hand in my pocket and watched as yet another swelteringly-hot favourite romped, as they say in Cheltenham, home.
I went home myself on Thursday, not exactly romping, and no wealthier from the week the bookies got cleaned out. But the festival was an interesting experience, with lots of emotional moments. And my big consolation is that that at least I didn't back any of them.