The Girl with the Goalden Boot

Sunday, June 05, 2005

 

"The problem is, I spent three years in speech therapy trying to cover this God-awful Boston accent! And after forty-five minutes with Max, I'm right back at the chowder house serving scraw to those jerks from Harvard!" - Lisa Miller, in the NewsRadio episode Boston.

Boston is one of those cities that I know a lot about, but haven't actually been to before. I did an assignment on Boston, in geography class in year 10. I was originally going to study Chicago, because Lucy (one of my classmates) had chosen Boston, but she ended up changing her mind, so I was back to my most favourite city of 1999.

Boston is the capital city of Massachusetts, and is the largest city in New England. It is also New England's leading business, financial, government and transportation centre. Boston's public transport system is the oldest in the US. The average temperature ranges from -1ºC in the winter, to 22ºC in the summer. Immigrants flock to the Boston area, where the Irish, eastern European Jews, Italians, Portugese, African Americans, Hispanics, West Indians, and most recently, Asians have made their homes and their mark. Boston is the birthplace of education in the US, and I'm sure you've all heard of Harvard and MIT. Both are in Cambridge, which is across the Charles River from the CBD. Boston is the home to many firsts, including the first post office, public library, sewing machine, first university to open all departments to women (Boston University), first word spoken by telephone, first computer (at MIT), and the first Davis Cup tennis match.

The Boston Massacre in 1770 was the killing in a street clash of several colonists by a squad of British soldiers. Speechmakers invented the name "Boston Massacre" and used it to rally the colonists against British policies. The massacre was one of the events that led to the Revolutionary War in America.

The Boston Tea Party was a raid by American colonists on 3 British ships in Boston Harbour in 1773. Colonists disguised as Indians emptied 340 chests of tea into the harbour to avoid payment of a British tax on tea. The British response helped unify the colonists and brought them closer to movement for American independence.

Walk the "Freedom Trail", which traces the landmarks which shaped Boston's history. Some of these places include Faneuil Hall, the Boston Massacre site, site of Benjamin Franklin's birth, Paul Revere's House, and the Old State House.

You may have seen some of the scenery and buildings of Boston, and may not have realised it. Movies such as Good Will Hunting, Fever Pitch and Love Story, and TV shows like Ally McBeal, The Practice and Cheers, are set in Boston.

Some other random facts - the Boston Red Sox won the most recent World Series, the New England Patriots won the most recent Superbowl, everywhere you look in Boston you'll see Dunkin' Donuts, the Democratic National Convention was held in Boston, President John F. Kennedy's hometown is Boston, residents use chairs, trash cans or whatever they can find to reserve parking spots when it snows...

And of course, Flora and her family immigrated to Boston when she was 4, and she lived there, until she graduated from Boston College, worked for a few years for a cable TV news channel, and returned to HK to become who you know as Flora today. Maura was born and raised in Boston's Hyde Park district as an Irish Catholic. She later went to New York University and subsequently LA to pursue her acting career. And now, Kit will be spending her hiatus from work in Boston.

Wicked cool.

Lola Nadal 8:47 PM