I am under the English Channel on a train
in one of the wonders of the modern world:
the Channel Tunnel.
And it's easy to take the tunnel for granted these days:
you just buy a ticket, take your somewhat ridiculous leopard print suitcase--
it's not mine--
on board the train, and a couple of hours later you're in Paris.
And it's easy to forget just what a wonder this thing is,
and it's easy to forget that it was 200 years, nearly,
from the first proposal to put a train under the English Channel--
actually, it wasn't a train back then, it would've been horse drawn carrages
lit by oil lamps--
to this wonderful construction under the seabed itself.
And here is something you might not know:
those older schemes, those somewhat ridiculous Victorian schemes,
some of them actually started.
In 1881 exploratory tunnels were made about a mile out from the UK, and out from France.
There was a tunnel started,
but then the British press and politicians got cold feet,
and thought it might compromise our national security.
And in the 1970s the British government at the time was all for building a tunnel,
but then they got cold feet when the economy tanked.
But just imagine:
we might have had a Channel Tunnel a century earlier
if it hadn't been for Britain being worried about its sovereignty,
although given there was World War II and Hitler really could have invaded through it,
perhaps they were onto the right idea.
That is something you might not have known.
[Closed captions by MM. Translating these subtitles? Add your name here!]