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Today, we're in the small town of Hastings.
Hastings is in the southeast of England on the southeast coast.
It's well known for its history and its historical importance.
So let's go and take a look around Hastings.
Let's go, okay.
So we are in the Hastings town center.
As you can see, It's a pretty regular town center for a seaside town in the UK.
Nothing too unusual about it.
Costa Coffee over there.
Over here we have a busker.
Take a look at this busker over here.
So she is playing guitar, she's playing songs.
This is what we call a busker okay, and if you want, you can go and you can put some coins into her case.
Over there she's busking for a bit of money.
I don't have any coins with me today.
Who does, honestly?
Nobody.
So let's go.
It's a Sunday morning here in Hastings today.
So a lot of people are out and they are just kind of here for a morning stroll out with their families.
So here we have a kind of souvenir shop. for tourists.
Locals don't come here.
Locals do not come here, but it's for tourists.
Let's take a look and see what we've got.
So we have some fridge magnets and on the fridge magnet we have a seagull.
A seagull is a good symbol for Hastings, because these annoying little things are everywhere in Hastings, okay.
I hate these seagulls.
I hate them.
They're greedy, greedy seagulls and they will steal your chips and your ice cream.
So it's a good symbol for hastings on this fridge magnet.
So you can stick this fridge magnet on your fridge.
Okay, that's what a fridge magnet is.
We have some more fridge magnets, strangely of london.
Don't know why we have london fridge magnets and hastings, but we do and obviously we have a selection of sunglasses here that you can buy.
Um, what else we got?
We got some mops down here.
Why do we have mops at a tourist souvenir store?
Don't ask me, I have no clue.
But for some reason we have some mops here.
What else have we got?
Some brooms over here.
So it looks like they also sell brooms.
They sell bins right here.
So lots of stuff for the house, I guess.
Mops, bins, and some brooms.
Not really what you would expect to see at a souvenir shop, but hey, I don't know.
So here we have some images from the Bayeux Tapestry, the famous Bayeux Tapestry.
It shows parts of the Battle of Hastings that happened in 1066.
So I believe these boats show William of Normandy arriving in the south of england.
On these boats here we have some cavalry and that's because when william of normandy fought against the english in the battle of hastings they came on cavalry or horses.
We could say
So yeah, we have some soldiers riding on top of horses.
This is in battle.
We call this cavalry.
And finally, i think look, i'm not a historian okay, i don't know everything, but i think that these are the normans on the cavalry over on this left side, and i think that on the right, these are the anglo-saxons or the english on this side.
Listen, I'm not a historian.
I don't know everything, but I think that's what's going on here.
Anyway, let's keep going.
So this is Iceland.
This is like one of the more budget friendly supermarkets.
If you want to go somewhere a little bit cheaper, a little bit more budget friendly, Iceland is definitely the place for you.
The reason it's called Iceland is because there are a lot of cheap frozen foods in there.
So, yeah, it's perfect if you're just trying to, you know, find something a bit cheaper, basically.
If you want something expensive, go to Waitrose, okay?
But not Iceland.
Let's go like.
That thing with hastings is you have not a sand beach, but you have a pebble beach.
Okay, this is a pebble and you know the whole beach is filled with pebbles.
I prefer sand beaches personally, but in hastings we've got a pebble beach.
Let's see how far i can throw this thing.
Not bad.
Kind of hurt my shoulder a little bit.
I was never good at this.
I was never good at skimming stones.
So this sign here, you get a 50 pound penalty charge.
What for?
Well, it says no unauthorized parking.
So if you're going to park in this area, you need authorization.
You need authorization, no unauthorized parking.
If you bark park here unauthorized then you will have to pay a penalty charge of 50 pounds.
So if you come to hastings, do not park your car here unauthorized.
So this pier behind me, this used to be a really nice pier.
There used to be lots of stuff that you could do on the pier.
It was a nice place.
Unfortunately, in 2010, two arsonists burnt down this pier, so this pier was burnt down in about 2010.
I think it was two young kids, two teenagers, set the pier on fire and the fire spread throughout the pier.
So two arsonists burned down the pier and now it's.
You know, it's not the same as it was, but You can see, nowadays there are people who are on it now so you can go on the pier, but it's not the same.
It's not the same as it was before.
So over here, as you can see, there's another busker.
He's playing on his acoustic guitar.
Hello.
How are you doing?
Looks like he's just tuning his guitar at the moment, so he's not ready to play yet.
He's just tuning his guitar.
And again, if you have any spare coins, if you have coins, you can put them in the guitar case And you can yeah, just give a bit of money to any busker that you see on the streets.
And this is John McCloud here.
So what kind of music do you play, John?
It's going to be like folky reworkings of everything from disco to punk to Britpop to yeah, just different sort of cover versions and arrangements.
Nice.
And do you come busking here often?
Do you go to other places?
No, I'm usually Brighton based, but I felt like a change of scenery.
So yeah, I thought I'd try pastings today.
Nice.
And do you usually get a lot of money when you come and busk?
Uh, in the summer, sunny weather yeah, it's a bit.
There was already someone in the town center when i got here today, so this is my second choice, so probably not as much as i would have hoped today, but we'll see.
Yeah, we saw that other busker in the in the town center.
Good, Got to break me.
So we are here in Bottle Alley, and you may be wondering, well, why is it called Bottle Alley?
Well, if you look at the walls over here, you can see there are lots of shards of broken bottles.
See here here here, lots of shards of broken bottles.
Here we have mostly green shards of beer bottles, I think, and here we have kind of more red, red shards of bottle all over the wall and you can see it goes all the way long way filled with bottle shots.
So that's why it's called bottle alley.
As you can see, the weather is actually really, really good today.
It's usually i complain about the weather in my videos.
Today i'm not able to complain about the weather, because how can i?
I mean it's actually good.
I mean, take a look, If you're going to go to a seaside town, this is the kind of weather that you want, right?
And you know, for me it's also not too hot.
British people don't like really hot weather.
You know we can't handle we can't handle super hot weather.
So this this is perfect weather.
So i would like to complain about the weather, because i am a british guy and that is what we do.
Unfortunately, i can't complain, So I will have to find something else to complain about today.
I'll find something.
Let's go and find something to complain about.
Let's go.
So we have finally reached the Hastings Old Town and we're going to go and explore a little bit around the Old Town.
There's quite a lot of unique pubs around here.
It's a good place for a night out, actually.
Let's go and take a look around the Hastings Old Town and see what we can find.
Let's go.
So here we have a selection of more fridge magnets.
Seems to be a lot of those around here.
Here we have lots of football emblems.
I don't know if you're a football fan, but here is Chelsea Football Club.
Man City.
Newcastle United, Man United, over here Liverpool, and so yeah, West Ham.
All the football emblems.
All the football emblems.
What's the word?
I teach pronunciation for a living?
Okay, all the football emblems over here of the premiership, in the premiership.
If you're a football fan, you will know over here we have some rude words on these.
Uh, here we have.
Uh, Beware of the grumpy old git.
Grumpy old git is an old man who is always grumpy, always in a bad mood, always complaining.
This sign says warning.
Retired person on the premises, in the house or in the building.
Retired person on the premises knows everything and has plenty of time to tell it.
So we're talking about a retired person, usually an old person, who does not work anymore, who likes to tell people about everything.
Someone who's a bit of a know-it-all, right?
A retired person who's a bit of a know-it-all, really.
We have an Italian pizza restaurant over on the left over here.
A nice bookshop over here.
So yeah, this is the kind of thing that you get around here in the Hastings Old Town.
It's kind of unique, interesting places.
Here we have a Thai cafe.
It's a bookshop slash Thai cafe.
Pretty cool idea, actually.
I would like to go in there, but we're not gonna go in there right now.
Now, in this restaurant, you can get a Sunday roast.
If you have never had a Sunday roast before, you need to try one, because it's goddamn delicious, I can tell you.
And the reason they're selling a Sunday roast right now is because it's Sunday.
So if you ever come to England and you're here on a Sunday, go and get a Sunday roast, because you'll love it, I promise.
You will love it.
So on the left we have another coffee shop.
Looks pretty good, honestly.
You can get paninis, wraps, bagels.
Very tempting, I must say.
I love these.
Let's go and get a pint.
Cheers.
Pay by card?
Thanks.
Cheers Cheers, thanks.
So got myself a pint.
Got some good head on this pint, just the perfect amount of head.
So the person who poured the pint did a good job.
This is called the Spitfire.
It's a beer called the Spitfire and this is named after the plane that was used in World War II for the British Army Spitfire plane.
Let's try a taste.
That's good actually.
It's a good beer.
Let me tell you a bit about why the town of Hastings is important in terms of history.
In the year of 1066, there was a big battle here.
It's called the Battle of Hastings.
Let me try and tell you the story of what happened at this time.
When the King of England, Edward the Confessor, He died without an heir. he did not have an heir.
Because he didn't have any heirs, any male sons.
There was nobody else who was going to be next in line for the throne.
From here.
There were three different people who thought they had a claim to the throne of the King of England.
There was Harold Godwinson of England, There was William of Normandy, who was in France, and there was also Harold Hardrada, who was a Viking ruler from the east, from Norway.
Harold Godwinson knew that the island was going to be attacked from the south, from William of Normandy.
So he marched, all his men, down south, getting ready for William of Normandy to attack from the south of England.
They were waiting there for weeks and weeks, and nobody came.
Nobody came.
And then suddenly they got word that Harold Hardrada, one of the Vikings, was attacking from the north.
So Harold Godwinson had to march his army really quickly all the way to the north of England really fast, and they fought against Howard Hardrada and they won.
They defeated him in battle.
They had won a great victory and everybody was very happy.
Everybody was overjoyed.
And then they got a shock, because word came to them that actually William of Normandy had finally decided to invade from the south.
So it was an absolute disaster for Harold Godwinson's army.
The army had just finished a battle. a big battle against the Scandinavian Vikings.
So Harold Gobinson had to march his army down south really quickly to fight William of Normandy.
The army was tired and it was very kind of a disaster for them.
They fought against William of Normandy.
It was a big fight and the battle happened around here.
It didn't happen in Hastings, but it happened slightly north, in a small town which today is known as Battle.
And there was a big battle here.
But in the end they say, legend says that Harold Godwinson took an arrow to the eye.
They say he died from an arrow to the eye.
William of Normandy came through and they won the battle.
And that has had a lot of effects until today.
We have a lot of French words in the English language like cow and pork.
Lots of words that come from French, from old French are now in the English language.
So it was a pivotal moment of British history.
So as you can see, a lot of people are out.
It's Sunday, the weather's good, so people are sort of enjoying the good weather and Old Town is the place to be in Hastings if you want.
You know somewhere to go to be with your family or your friends so yeah, this is the place to come.
Over there you've got a fish and chips place.
Obviously, if you want good fish and chips, this is the perfect place to come, because we are right next to the sea, so you get fish which is fresh from the sea.
Fish is really good here.
Something else you'll find here in Hastings is that it's quite a popular place for students to come and visit from lot of European countries.
You will see a lot of German groups of German students, French students, usually when they're 14 15.
Obviously it's a very, quite a popular tourist destination with people all over the world coming here for really just because of the Battle of Hastings.
That's the main reason people come here, But it's also pretty nice town.
So we're heading up West Hill right now.
As you can see, the steps are pretty steep.
It's quite a steep journey up to the top of West Hill.
So I'm a little bit out of breath because it's quite steep.
So thank you for watching this video of me wandering around Hastings in the south east of England and taking a look.
If you do like this kind of video where we wander around regular English towns, be sure to subscribe here on YouTube.
But also check out more on englishspongecom, because we have a lot more videos like this where you can learn English with the comprehensible input method.
If you would prefer to stay here on YouTube, check out this video where I wander around the town of Basingstoke.
Thanks for watching guys and I'll see you in the next one.
