QI (2003–…): Season 20, Episode 11 - Trundling - full transcript

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Good evening...

...and welcome to QI,

where, tonight, we're trundling
along on trains, trams and tractors

to territories beginning with T.

Let's meet my fellow travellers...

An intrepid adventurer,
Cariad Lloyd.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

A fearless circumnavigator,
Jamie MacDonald.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Thank you very much.

BALDLY going where no man
has gone before,



Tom Allen.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

And still putting his trainers on,
it's Alan Davies!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Right, time to come
and blow your horns. Tom goes...

SHIP'S HORN HONKS

I do beg your pardon.

Quite butch. Very butch, wasn't it?

Well, all the nice boys like
a sailor.

Cariad goes...

NOVELTY HORN PLAYS MELODY

And Jamie goes...

BAGPIPES DRONE

BAGPIPES PLAY: Scotland The Brave



I was just coping
with being in London.

And Alan goes...

MUSIC: Horny '98 by Mousse T
vs Hot 'n' Juicy

I think that's great.

That's my funeral song, actually.
I want that played at my funeral.

It might surprise you that I like
a big horn, so...

...I have decided this week
to have one as well.

HORN PLAYS LA CUCARACHA

Isn't that great?
Right, question one...

Can you tell me everything you know
about the Tour de France?

Yes, Cariad.

Yellow jerseys. That's everything
I know about the Tour de France.

Jamie, there's a picture of a man
in a yellow jersey,

so that's...
She's just said what she knows.

I think I probably get it out now
that I can't see

in case everyone thinks you're being
really patronising.

I knew that before the picture.
Did you?

I have actually been suffered by
my late father

to be forced to watch
the Tour de France.

He was, like, a triathlete
and was training for an Iron man

and was very into watching other men

do the thing that he liked doing
at the weekend.

Tom?

I've tried a lot of things,
but I've never tried "athlon".

Oh!
RAUCOUS LAUGHTER

I read Lance Armstrong's
book and, from that book,

which is really, really interesting,

I found out all about the
Tour de France

and it being a cycling race
around France,

but I'm suspicious of you
and your question.

There might be another Tour
de France that we don't know.

Well, no. We are talking about
the Tour de France.

They had a stage in Essex.

Around Epping Forest.

AUDIENCE CHEERS

Forest! They're cheering for the
forest.

I've never had a cheer before! No.

The message has slipped through
the net.

The interesting thing about
Lance Armstrong is that,

in the list of Tour winners,

the most common name is...?

Lance?

No, the answer is...

JAMIE: Jeff. Jeff! I like that.

The answer's nobody,

because after the revelation
of Lance Armstrong's doping,

seven successive races were declared
to be officially without a winner.

So the person who's most won
the Tour de France is nobody.

He was also married to Sheryl Crow

and I think that's really
interesting.

They were definitely an item.

I thought they were married.
They might have been.

When your predecessor
in that chair, Sandi... Yes.

...Mr Fry, was asked to appear
on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?,

he snubbed my advances
to be his partner... Oh!

...and he asked Nigel la Lawson.

Well, why wouldn't you? Yeah.

And then the question came up, "Who
is Lance Armstrong's girlfriend?”,

and I was sitting at home going,
"That'll be Sheryl Crow."

I know about Sheryl Crow.

I've had a crush on her since 1994.
Yes, beautiful.

She's stunning!

And they didn't get it,
and he went out on about 1,200 quid.

I laughed and laughed.

So does anybody
know how the Tour began?

Ready, steady, go.

I'm going to give you
an initial point.

I thought that was very, very good.

So, it began... It's not a tour,
though, is it? It's not a tour.

So, why is it called...?
It is a tour, in that they...

They're not stopping to go,
"Look, there's the Eiffel Tower.

"There's the Champs..." No.

They're not doing
any sort of touring. No.

Imagine going on
a bicycle tour of a city

and then everybody else is, like,
trying to elbow you out the way,

everybody's on drugs.
It's a nightmare!

But the interesting thing is,

it began as an argument
between two newspapers.

So, in 1894,
France was absolutely convulsed

by something called
the Dreyfus Affair.

Does anybody remember
the Dreyfus Affair?

The one where the guy was sent off
to an island in exile? Yes.

I do know that, yeah.
Yes, absolutely.

So, Alfred Dreyfus was
a Jewish army captain.

He was accused of spying

and it absolutely divided
French society.

There were those who thought
that he was a traitor

and those who thought
he was a victim of anti-Semitism,

and, weirdly,
it started the Tour de France.

So, there was a cycling magazine
called Le Velo,

which is The Bicycle,

and the editor, Pierre Giffard,
was very pro-Dreyfus.

That's him there.

And one of its major backers,
Albert de Dion,

he was actually arrested

for demonstrating against
Dreyfus's pardoning,

and De Dion pulled his advertising

and set about establishing
a rival newspaper called L'Auto -

The Car.

So, the new magazine was edited
by a man called Henri Desgrange,

and as a publicity stunt
for the new magazine -

bearing in mind this is a magazine
called The Car -

he decided to start
a gruelling 19-day bicycle race.

LAUGHTER

This was in 1903,
and it absolutely worked.

Le Velo folded as a publication
in the next year.

It's an incredible race.

You can see it goes
all around France.

I think we have a picture
of the very first winner.

There he is - Maurice Garin.

He looks absolutely knackered.
LAUGHTER

He's actually the one
in the polo neck.

Would you call that a polo neck,
not a roll neck, Sandi? Oh, sorry.

It's very difficult to know what
a polo neck is and a polo shirt.

Yes. I get very confused.
And nothing to do with polo.

It's got a hole in it.
Yeah. Yes, exactly.

Thank you, Jamie.
Thank you very much.

In 1910, they decided
to make the race even harder

than bicycling
all the way around France,

and the Tour went up into the
high mountains for the first time -

the 2,100m Col du Tourmalet,

which is down in the Pyrenees
in the south there.

Do they stop for luncheon?

Well, there was a writer
called Alphonse Steines,

and he wanted to do a recce to make
sure that it was safe to do this.

So, he got stuck in the snow.
He abandoned his car,

he fell into a ravine,
he nearly died of hypothermia,

was found by a search party at 3am,

and he sent a telegram back
to the editor that read,

"Tourmalet crossed. Very good road.
Perfectly passable.”

And that's the attitude we need!

Has anybody ever been on
a racing bicycle? I have not.

Oh, yeah. Yeah?
Have you never been on one?

Darling, have you seen
the height of them?

My wife and I did a triathlon.

I've been on a racing tandem
round the Chris Hoy Velodrome

and that... Oh, wow! I've never
shat myself so much in my life.

The guy said, "What you'll notice
about this bike is,

"there's no brakes."

"Oh!"

And we started going,

and you're going about 30mph
within about five seconds.

It was horrible!
Then the back wheel bounced and...

Well, that'll be
all the shit everywhere.

Does anybody know the name
of the first Briton

to win the Tour de France?

BAGPIPES PLAY

Yes?

Is it Bradley Wiggins?

KLAXON BLARES, GROANING

First klaxon of the evening.
It is not Bradley Wiggins.

Any more for any more?

I'm going to give you a clue.
It's a great feminist fact.

HORN HONKS
Yes?

Ooh! Is it Emmeline Pankhurst?

It was a woman
called Millie Robinson

who won the Women's Tour in 1955.

She was the first
British person to do so.

She was a van driver
from the Isle of Man,

in case you're curious. Oh, well,
that's cheating, isn't it? Yeah.

"Millie's up ahead, isn't she?"
Beep-beep!

FRENCH ACCENT:
"We cannot catch Millie!"

Do you think that's why
nobody took it seriously?

Cos it was an uneven race?
Well, yeah, in France,

if women did it
and then a British person won,

I imagine they were like,
"We're never doing this again."

Well, the event organiser
did not help.

He was called Jean Leulliot
and he wrote...

FRENCH ACCENT: .."I will never
organise this race again.

"Women are different from men.
They talk too much in the peloton.

"It's not normal. In addition,
once the racing is over,

"they do not rest as they should,

"but fatigue their legs
by going shopping.”

And then he went on to appear
in 'Allo 'Allo! Yeah, exactly.

OK, Alan, which of your skills
is also on view

on the Tour de France every year?

My skills? Your particular skills.

My particular skills. Yeah.

You have a pad and pen
in front of you.

What do you tend to draw in there?

Oh, a cock and balls.
Yeah, there you go.

LAUGHTER

Thank you, row two.

They just want,
"Ha-ha! Cock and balls!"

That's true for me -
Epping Forest, cock and balls.

Oh, you've given me a dud pen,
so I can't draw.

Look, it happens to all men.
It's not a big deal.

They have a small team
of effaceurs - erasers -

to camouflage phallic graffiti
along the route.

It is a long-standing tradition

that spectators paint the names of
their favourite riders on the track.

Unfortunately, it's 3,500 km,

so there's an awful lot
of unwanted graffiti,

so painters drive ahead
of the cyclists

and turn what they call "le sexe"
into butterflies and owls.

Giant faces. That's what I've been
trying to draw all these years.

I'm just not very good at owls.

All French butterflies have one eye.
Yes. It's weird.

Now we know what the ladies
were talking about in the peloton.

What I love is, they drive
two hours ahead of the race

and then they have to drive back

because people are behind
putting more penises...

So, the Tour de France has
a special team of workmen

whose job is to hide the tools.

What use is a tandem
in love or in war?

Is it...?

SHIP'S HORN HONKS

llYeS?ll

"Tom!" Whenever I walk into a room,
that's the sound.

"Tom!" That'll help me out
very much.

"Oh, there's Tom." Ah, yes. "Hello!"

Yes. We should all...
I just walked into the room.

SHIP'S HORN HONKS
"Nice to see you."

Hang on. I'm just going to do mine.
Let me see.

HORN PLAYS LA CUCARACHA

"It's Sandi - we've got a party.”

What use is a tandem in love
or, indeed, in war?

I imagine they're a great source
of arguments, aren't they,

a tandem, if you're on it
with a couple?

Jamie, you did a tandem.
Yeah, I mean, we did.

Once we got on the road, when we did
the tandem, me and my wife,

we wobbled a bit and she went,
"Shit! Shit! Stop, stop, stop!"

And I put my foot down and she went,
"Shit! Shit! Stop! Stop!"

Does not mean stop.

So, yeah, it can turn love into war.

It was actually used in war.

The Boer War was
the very first conflict

where tandems were commonly used.

The Royal Australian Cycle Corps
had a war cycle,

so it was a double tandem,
so two tandems bolted together.

This is actually a tricycle.

But it could be fitted with
a Maxim machine gun down the middle

and the wheels were adapted so it
could also go on the railway tracks.

And then it doubled
as an ambulance -

you could take the gun off
and put a stretcher on in place.

And they were also used
to generate electricity,

particularly in the First World War.

They used a static tandem bike
attached to a dynamo,

and then you could power,

for example, a radio station
might be a good thing.

But in the late 19th century,

these two-person bikes,
and cycling in general,

became incredibly popular
with young people.

Now, this one...
There they are, young people.

What we've got, Jamie,
is we've got a man and a woman

on a two-person tricycle,
which was known as a sociable,

followed by a woman
on a bicycle by herself

who looks very grumpy.
But there were opportunities

for young people to go on a tandem
and be followed by a chaperone,

so this was a chance
to do some flirtation,

if you like. It must be
quite difficult to be flirtatious

when you're going along in a tandem.

"There's another cock
on the ground.”

That's one way to get the girl,
isn't it?

There was actually
a Chaperone Cyclists' Association

formed in 1896 and used to supply -
I like this -

spinsters over 30 to accompany
young ladies on their bicycles.

What do you call a tandem
with three riders?

A tridem? Triandem?

What does "tandem" mean?
Anybody know?

Two. Two on a bike.

No, it just means the riders
are sitting one in front of another.

Oh! So, a tandem with three seats
is still a tandem. Tandem!

So, "tandem" comes from Latin

and it means length,
really, or at length.

There used to be a thing where
horses would be one behind the other

and they would have been in tandem.

So, there, we have a carriage
with one horse in front of the other.

That's tandem.

Tandem cycling was an Olympic event
from 1908 in London

until Munich in 1972.

I have to say, there were
some athletes who treated it

as a bit of a joke.
At Helsinki in 1952,

there were two Australian athletes

called Lionel Cox
and Russell Mockridge,

and they decided to compete,

despite never having ridden on
a tandem bike until the week before.

And they borrowed a bicycle
from the British team

and promptly won gold in the...

Wow!

...2,000m event.

If you want to take up
professional tandem cycling,

you'll have to get in line.

GROANING

What was the toughest obstacle
faced by the first train

to go all the way around the world?

Is it ticketing?

Cos it's technically both
a return and a single.

Actually, it was a guy -
a guy called George Francis Train.

He was an American entrepreneur.

In 1870,
he circumnavigated the world.

He is the person who inspired
Jules Verne to write Phileas Fogg.

And his name was
George Francis Train? Train, I know.

Yeah. What are the chances?
Yeah. It's a fantastic trip.

It took a long time, going round,
partly because he was arrested

and held in Lyon Bastille
for 13 days.

Did he give it a bad review
on TripAdvisor? Yes, terrible.

So, what kind of transport did
George Train introduce to Britain?

Introduced a mode of transport

to Britain that
we'd never seen before? Yeah.

Paragliding.

Funicular. Funicular! Did I get it?

I like just that word... No.

Sorry. Train ran Britain's
very first successful tram...

Oh, of course! ..system. Oh, tram!
How did he describe it?

"It's like a train..."

Yeah, little bit like a train.
"..but it goes on the road.”

"What do you call it?" "A...tram?"

So, his first tram
was in Birkenhead,

and what I love about this...

He was...
He obviously thought big, George.

He invited all of
the crowned heads of Europe

to come to Birkenhead
to help open the tram.

Unbelievably,
not one of them turned up. Aw!

I know. "Oh, no!
King of Spain hasn't turned up.”

"The Princess of Sweden said yes,
but I think it's a maybe."

He then set up a line from
Marble Arch to Bayswater in London.

Very popular,
except with wealthy residents

who had to cross the line
to get to Hyde Park.

They could not tolerate
these new vehicles

hogging a fixed section of the road

on rails sticking up above
the road surface

and proving an obstacle
to carriages.

It's also not very far, is it,
Marble Arch to Bayswater? I know.

"We're off! We're here."

He was arrested for -
and I love this -

breaking and injuring
the Uxbridge Road.

He's actually a wonderful character.
He's wonderfully eccentric.

He used to like to shake hands
with himself. What? He was...

"How are you doing?"
Is that a euphemism, Sandi?

It's a long journey,
a long time on his own.

"What are you doing in there?"
"I'm shaking hands with myself!

"Get out of my tram!"

"There's no such thing as a tram,
you dirty bastard!"

"I've just invented it!

"I'm going to Bayswater!"

"It's only up the road!"
"Leave me alone!

"I was nearly finished
until you came! Arrgh!"

Train was arrested again
in the United States.

He was described...
Quite rightly so! Yes!

He was declared a lunatic
for supporting Victoria...

It was because... Seems a bit harsh.

Well, he was a supporter of
the women's suffrage movement,

and there was a suffragist
called Victoria Woodhull,

who was the very first woman
to run for President back in 1872,

and he was arrested cos
he was a lunatic for supporting her.

But he wasn't in favour
of all women.

He was outraged by another woman
who's a sort of QI favourite,

which is Nellie Bly. Anybody know
anything about Nellie Bly?

Alan, can you remember anything
about Nellie Bly?

No, I can't remember. She...
In one ear and out the other.

Wasn't she an elephant?

She was a writer and,

as a stunt for the
New York World newspaper in 1889,

she went round the world in 72 days,

and Train responded immediately
by making two much quicker journeys

cos he couldn't bear it
that somebody else had done it,

he was no longer the guy.

There's a guy called James Holman.
He was an explorer, and in 1832,

he became the very first
blind person

to circumnavigate the globe.

He lost his sight in the Navy,
aged 25. So, he left,

he attended medical school,

and he spent
the next 40 years travelling.

I mean, it's a fantastic story.

He was imprisoned
in Siberia as a spy.

He had a river named after him
in Equatorial Guinea.

He published five volumes
of memoirs.

And I love this - he claimed he
could tell a person's social status

by the sound of their footsteps.

See, this is what they told him.
He had no idea where he went. No.

He sailed up and down
Loch Lomond for five years

while they put different spices
under his nose.

"That's you in China now." "Oh!

"I'll write a book about this.

"It's magic. Now I'm going
to become a doctor. Ah!"

What do you think happens
in a tram-driving competition?

BUZZER HONKS
Yes?

Somebody wins. Yeah. Yeah.

Not what I was expecting,
but that is correct, yeah.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Well done!

Yeah. So, there's
an annual competition called

the European Tramdriver
Championships.

You have to do, for example,
different disciplines -

stopping within 20cm of a cone
without hitting it... Ooh, tough!

...accelerating to exactly 30km/h
without a speedometer,

braking by eye
to get as close as possible

to a marked spot on the ground,
but my favourite, which is, I think,

the most crowd-friendly event,

tram tenpin bowling.

Drivers have to shunt
massive bowling balls

towards skittles to knock them down,

but without hitting the skittles
themselves with the tram.

Wow. I always feel like our trams
are a bit apologetic, aren't they?

They should have a louder horn,

considering they are going along
normal roads,

so you don't expect
to see a train there.

Now they just go...
FALLING TONE: .."Meh."

They're, like, a bit ashamed
they're not a bus or a Tube.

Yeah, they're like...
They're like, "Sorry. Sorry."

FALLING TONE: "Meh."

When trams were introduced
in the United States,

there was an anxiety that
passengers might be hit by a tram.

There was a suggestion
they should put a sofa

on the front of the tram to...

...to scoop people up
out of the way.

Very good idea.
I think it's a marvellous idea.

That's how someone died
in Coronation Street.

Who remembers? Someone really famous
got hit by a tram. Who was it?

Alan Bradley. No, it was...

Yeah. He was evil,
as Rita Fairclough's boyfriend.

Yes, Rita's boyfriend.
Thank you. Yes, yeah.

Got hit by a tram in Blackpool.
He deserved to die.

He did, and it was satisfying.
He was awful to Rita. Wasn't he?

JAMIE: She was with Mavis.
Oh, yeah, there was Mavis.

Oh, yeah. But wasn't there
a Coronation...? Oh, shut up!

I was also... I was going to say
about Judy Garland, as well.

Oh, now you're talking!

Oh, and she was
in Coronation Street.

She went out with, erm, Ken. Ken!
Everyone went out with Ken.

She was married to Ken
just before Deirdre.

No, erm, Judy Garland
sang about being...

She called it a trolley.

# Bang, bang, bang
went the trolley... #

Yeah, lovely.
# Ding, ding, ding goes the bell

# Bing, bing, bing
goes my heart biogs

# From the moment
I saw him, I fell. #

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

I love that song! But that song -
all that's happening is

she's just trying to pick up
some bloke on the tram.

Yeah, but she goes
to the end of the line and...

Yeah, well,
we've all done that, Sandi.

Sometimes,
I forget to buy a ticket.

Was she not just terrified
on the sofa at the front?

What I've read about that song
is she's just telling people...

Like, the whole tram, she's just
telling them all about this man,

and they're just like,
"Yeah, tell me more,"

which, if you do that on the Tube,
does not happen.

George Train travelled the world
in 80 days.

What a marvellous piece
of nominative determinism.

Why, if he'd been called

George Rail Replacement
Bus Service...

...he might never have made it.

Now, George Train travelled by tram,

but what kind of tractor
can't move anything

heavier than an ant?

Is it a tractor beam?

It is a tractor beam. No way!

But it can move
the Millennium Falcon.

Do you think it is just a matter
of science fiction?

The Millennium Falcon? No, not...

Since we mentioned the ant...
Can it move a Dec, as well?

GROANING

It can only move Ant, not Dec.

So, we are talking about
tractor beams,

so those are devices
that move objects

using a beam of energy.

Now, up until fairly recently,

they were confined to the realms
of science fiction,

but Professor Bruce Drink water
and his team at Bristol University

have made one.

It consists of hundreds of
tiny little loudspeakers.

They generate sounds
that are louder than a jet engine,

but they are too high-pitched

for the human ear
to be able to detect it.

And these sound waves,
they surround an object,

holding it in place, basically
in a sort of invisible cage.

An actual tractor beam?
Well, let's find out.

Please welcome
Professor Bruce Drink water.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Right, Bruce, tell me
what you are holding in your hand.

Well, this is the tractor beam.

I mean, it looks like a piece
of wood with a bit of wire on it.

Yes, it's a low-cost,
battery-powered version.

You can make it at home if you want.
Amazing.

So, you've got, in this box here,
little tiny polystyrene balls.

Yeah, polystyrene balls.

So, if you'd just pick one up
for us... Oh, right.

...and then just drop it down,
we can see it just drops, right?

And the idea is that
you're going to use the tractor beam

to make this hover in the air,
is that right?

It is indeed, yes.
OK. Is it on? It's not.

I'll switch it on. I mean, I can't
tell. I have absolutely no idea.

Can you hear it now? No.

Whoa-oh!

LAUGHTER

So, inside, there are lots and lots
of tiny little speakers.

Is that right? Exactly.
They're all outputting ultrasound,

so that's...
You can't hear it, hopefully.

What could hear it?
Bats, dogs and cats.

Right. So, the theory is that

you're going to pick up
one of these polystyrene balls

and make it hover in the air.
Exactly.

So, as you said,
there's a sound field in there

with a little quiet region
surrounded by a very loud region,

and so I'm going to try

to put the little object
in the quiet region.

You've just got to find
the exact spot for it.

There we go. Oh! AUDIENCE: Ooh!

That is extraordinary.

APPLAUSE

So, like a magic trick,
I want to know

there's no wires or anything
that I can't see.

Can you show me? Right.
Well, this is a wire loop.

Yeah. And, hopefully, we can...

whoa! Wow.

So, what...? Witch! Witch!
That is extraordinary.

So, what's holding it in place?

It's the sound itself making
a very, very careful pattern,

which is sort of a bit like...

Where the particle is,
it's like noise cancellation,

so there's no sound. And then,
around it, it's very loud.

So, we've sort of sculpted
a sound field around the particle.

So, I think of a tractor beam
as drawing it towards,

but it seems to be pushing it away.

It might look like
it's pushing it away,

but the real proof
of a tractor beam is

it's got to be able
to pull something,

and that will mean
that it beats gravity.

So, if I turn this over, hopefully,
you can see it's beating gravity.

And if I press
this button here... Yeah.

...it will pull the particle up.

No! AUDIENCE: Ooh!

Oops! Oh, there, it dropped.

LAUGHTER

APPLAUSE

So, what are the
practical extrapolations from this?

Could you make a giant one,
for example?

You could make a giant one
and that might be able

to replace robots,
you know, to make tiny things.

All your electronics
are getting smaller,

so you want tools
to be able to handle those.

You can also make
smaller versions of this

that can move really,
really small things,

like cells and micro particles...
OK. ..viruses, potentially.

So, you're looking at
something under a microscope

that you can't manipulate,

but you might be able to
with a tractor beam?

Yeah, exactly. So, at the moment,

using a microscope
is a one-way process -

you look at something, but you can't
really interact with it very easily.

But with sound waves, like this,
all shrunk down into the microscope,

you could. And you can move things,
prod things,

and you can even
assemble them together,

potentially to form
the starting point

for new tissue to grow,
like new muscles.

It's mind-blowing. How much
to make one of those for yourself?

This? The parts are about £100.

Wow! That's amazing.

We could club together
and make one of those. Yeah.

Professor Drink water!
Thank you, Bruce. Thank you.

CHEERING

Right, let's venture a little
further afield on our travels.

Where would you go to find
the most leaning tower in the world?

Go for it, Cariad. Pisa.

KLAXON BLARES

Not Pisa? Not Pisa, I'm guessing.

Do you know, years ago,
I was in Florence,

and I went to
the train information place

and I said, "I would like to get
the next train to Pisa, please."

And the man said,
"The next train is at 11.05."

I said, "But it's 12.05 now."
He went, "Ah, you missed it."

Is it the ones in...?
Is it Malaysia?

Is it those Petronas Towers?

Is it something like
there's something built in,

so if there's a cyclone, it'll bend
like a frickin' palm tree,

but you don't have to shit yourself
cos it'll spring right back up?

You're talking about a building
that was specifically built...

The most deliberately inclined
structure in the world

is the Montreal Tower.

It is 165m high
and it sits at a 45-degree angle.

Ah! Yeah. Anyone else feel like they
wanted to vomit when they saw that?

The thing about it is, in a way,
it's sort of cheating, isn't it?

Because it was deliberate.

I like the ones
that are supposed to be straight.

There's one in Shanghai
called the Huzhu Pagoda

that leans the most.
It's about seven degrees.

So, if you think off..

The Tower of Pisa is about
four degrees. This is seven.

It was built in 1709.

Tilted over - I like this -
when they set off some firecrackers

and it burnt down
its wooden supports.

Pisa isn't even
the most leaning tower in Europe.

That's the church tower
of Suurhusen in Germany...

GASPING
..which is at least five.

So, again...
Not as photogenic as Pisa.

No. That car in front of it

really doesn't set it off
in the same way.

So, Pisa's tower
originally leaned the other way.

Construction was started in 1173,

and after just five years
and three storeys,

it started tilting north.

What is that man doing?

It looks like
he's grabbing some boobs.

It's those things
where you take a photo

and it looks as though
you're holding the tower up.

Yes, but even I know
you don't grab a tower like that.

So, it started leaning straight away

because the ground they built it on
was too soft to hold the weight,

and they started putting
tapered blocks in

and they kept doing that
for 200 years

and it no longer tilted north.

It tilted south instead.

I've been up it.
It's only got a little railing.

There's nothing to protect you!

I thought there'd be
a bit more to it. Yeah.

And once you get near the top...

People surely would be falling,
but they don't fall out.

I mean, it is famous for leaning.
It is.

So, you think,
"You've had your warning."”

But you do find yourself going,

"This is really leaning over,
isn't it?"

You couldn't fall off
the top and go,

"Oh, I had no idea!"

"Who said this is dangerous?”

The late, great Barry Cryer -
I remember I said to him once,

"How did you know, when you were
writing for The Russ Abbot Show,

"that you'd got a great idea
for a piece of comedy?"

He said, "It was nine o'clock
on a Monday morning

"and we were sitting there
and somebody said,

" 'Russ Abbott opens a restaurant
in the Leaning Tower of Pisa

" 'and tries to serve
from the dessert trolley.' "

He said,
"9.10, we all went for a beer."

The Tower is now stabilised.

It was stabilised
in 2008 with cables

and 600 tonnes of lead counterweights
and so on.

They had a competition,
didn't they, for ideas? Mm.

And people submitted ideas
of a huge statue of a person...

Yes, holding it up. ..holding it up.

Surely, that person
would also start to lean.

Big Ben leans, too. Did you
know that? I didn't know that.

Strictly speaking,
called the Elizabeth Tower.

Due to subsidence,

engineers estimate it'll fall over
in about 1,000 years.

Oh! Yeah. That'll be exciting,
won't it, when that happens?

I wonder what time it'll be
when it happens.

It'll probably be a dong of the bell
that sends it over the edge.

Yeah, probably. Dong...!

For this one,
the clue is in the question, OK?

So, I need you to listen
very, very carefully.

What can be used
to deliver the post in Tonga?

The clue's in the question.
A delivery van? What CAN be used?

Yeah! A can!

Or a bee! What about a bee?
Could it be bees?

Can be? Can be?

Pretty good.

The answer is... Electricity?
A watt of electricity? It is...

The answer is a can.
I'm just going to stop you.

It's a can.

Anybody know anything about Tonga?

Where is it? What is it?
Anything at all?

It's in the Pacific. It's an island.

JAMIE: Loads of islands, isn't it?
Yeah, it's about 170 islands.

Yeah. It's a Polynesian monarchy.

So, for about 100 years,

the people in the
northernmost island of Niuafo'ou -

my apologies
if I don't get that right -

sent and received mail via tin cans
retrieved from the sea...

Wow. ..by swimming postman.

Niuafo'ou is a volcanic rim island,
so it lacks a natural harbour.

It doesn't have any beaches.
Impossible to dock a ship.

So, when the postal system began,
which was in 1882,

passing ships
used to throw overboard

buoyant biscuit tins, kerosene tins,
that sort of thing,

filled with letters,

and they'd put a flag on it
attached for visibility.

And the strongest swimmers
in the island would swim out

to retrieve the cans
and then use a long stick

to pass outgoing letters
up to the ship's deck.

Who are they from,
though, the letters?

They've never been anywhere.
"Who are these bloody letters from?

"Can you stop sending us these
letters? We don't know who you are.”

It's mostly tax demands. Yeah!

I'd have written to them
with some plans

for the building of a jetty.

To be fair,
they don't have it any more.

They now have an airfield.

That's quite tricky with that
circular runway they have. Yeah.

Just keep going round
and round and round.

Might be all right taking off, but
landing would be very difficult.

What do you think they did after
one postman was attacked by a shark?

They got two postmen.

Yeah, one to distract.
Yeah, one to, "He's that way!

"Quick, quick!"
They started using canoes.

What, they hadn't
thought of that before? I know!

They invented the post
before they invented boats.

There's some fascinating bits
of Tongan oral history.

So, in the 12th century, a piece
of wood was briefly named king.

So, there's a guy called
King Talatama

and he had died without any heirs,
and his brother -

I hope I'm going to say this right -
Talaiha'apepe

was the obvious next monarch,

but there was no precedent
for brothers inheriting the throne

and it was thought to be a bad omen

for the father-son bloodline
to be broken.

So, Talaiha'apepe
named a wooden block

as the previous king's son,

and, consequently,
the wooden block became the king.

The wooden block
was given a wife to marry,

and the wife and the wooden block
adopted the brother...

...and thus he became the next king.

They really took the idea
of the family tree to heart.

What begins with T and is
a rubbish place to go for a drink?

Toilet. Tonga.

Yeah, both Tonga and toilet.
Rubbish place to go for a drink.

The clue's in the question.

Rubbish place - the tip. Yes! Oh!

So, in 2019, there was a pop-up
cocktail bar called Gome Pit,

and it opened in
a Tokyo trash treatment centre,

called Musashino Clean Center.

So, you could sit there
and you could have nibbles

and have a drink and look through
at a giant mechanical claw.

Every now and then,
there'd be a body part.

GROANING AND LAUGHTER
In a film, there would be...

You'd be having a drink
and there'd be your Auntie Jean.

Don't you think that's, like,
quite good, in terms of

how much rubbish we use and
how much waste we're accumulating?

That's exactly the point of it.

And while you're contemplating
the end of the world,

you can have some nice sushi.
Why not? Have a Martini.

Ooh, I love a Martini wherever I am,
so the tip is as good as anywhere.

But imagine trying to get a mattress
out the back of your car pissed.

Did you know this?
15% of Tokyo Bay -

so that's about
250 square kilometres -

is reclaimed land. Yes, I knew that.

So, it was waste
from construction projects.

The project started in 1592.

It was dirt displaced from a moat

dug around the big castle -
Edo Castle. Oh, wow.

And then they carried on -

20th-century domestic waste -
to fill it up.

And, ironically, almost all of
Tokyo's waste-processing facilities

are built on land reclaimed
using domestic waste.

There's an artificial island
off Tokyo Bay

called Yumenoshima - Dream Island -

and it was built
using domestic waste.

I think they inserted it
between layers of clay

and, originally, they were going
to put an airport there,

but, eventually,
it just became landfill.

Looks a bit like Heathrow there.

It was the setting for the archery
and water polo events

in the 2020 Olympics, so it did
actually work out in the end.

Imagine trying to find your arrows
in there.

In Copenhagen,
we have a waste-to-energy plant

and it converts the town's rubbish
into heating and electrical power,

which is already fantastic,

but the outside is both
an artificial ski slope,

a hiking trail, and the world's
tallest artificial climbing wall.

It's known as CopenHill
or Amager Bakke,

and I have skied down
the waste processing... Whoa!

It's the weirdest thing
because you go up

and you can see,
through the glass thing,

all of the waste being processed.

And, meanwhile,
you've got your ski boots on,

and then you get to the top
and you come down on your skis.

It's absolutely amazing.

Any other skiers?
Any other skiers?

I've been skiing, yeah.
I went with school.

And then, at the end of it
we all got a certificate,

and I was the first one to go up
and get my certificate.

I didn't know that
the French might give you

a different greeting
when you get a certificate.

So, the lady skier went towards me
and I didn't really...

She was trying to give me a kiss
on both cheeks, a la European,

and so I kissed her on the lips
in front of my whole school.

Now, after all that travel,
it's time to get back to the hotel,

but not before a late-night stroll
down the unnerving alley

of general ignorance,
so fingers on buzzers, please.

Which country has
its bagpipe culture

protected by UNESCO's
Intangible Cultural Heritage List?

I'll give you a clue -
it begins with S.

BAGPIPES PLAY
Yes?

Had to. But I do think it's Spain.

Oh!

Well, why would you say Spain?

Because I met a Spanish person
and they bored me to shit about it.

"Bagpipes aren't originated
in your country.

"They're originated in our country.”
So, I think it's Spain.

I'm going to give you
two points for that.

They are, in fact,
played all over the world,

and have been for centuries,
but when I was looking for

the UNESCO Cultural Intangible,
it is bagpiping culture in Slovakia.

It was added to the list in 2015.

It's a fantastic list.
It was started in 2008.

It basically safeguards
cultural practices

and raises awareness about them.

And Slovakian bagpiping
has been very, very important

in the folk culture
from at least the 18th century,

and it was deemed
in need of safeguarding.

Milan Rusko, who's the secretary
of the Slovak Bagpipers Guild,

he says that Slovak bagpipes have
a very pleasant sound,

as opposed to the aggressive,
strong and noisy sound

of Scottish bagpipes.

What's wrong with that?
BAGPIPES PLAY

LAUGHTER

I don't know what he meant!

I'd like to introduce that
Slovakian to that Spaniard. Yeah!

They'll have a great time.

It's a fantastic list.
There's beer culture in Belgium.

You think, "Oh, no, fair enough."
I like this one -

practices and expressions
of joking relationships in Niger.

So, what it is -
there's two communities

and they don't always get on.

What they'll do is they'll find
a person in each community

to represent them, and then
they basically take the piss

out of each other
to stop everybody fighting.

I just think it's a great...

Isn't that a round
on RuPaul's Drag Race?

I was just about to say!

There's Mongolian coaxing ritual
for camels, which...

Come on! Come on!

Now, having gone through
all of those different

intangible cultural things,
can you name any of the items

on the UK's
Intangible Cultural Heritage List?

BUZZER HONKS
Yes, Cariad? Moaning.

Talking about the weather.

Maybe getting drunk
in a civic high street.

KLAXON BLARES
Oh!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Wow. So, our Irish neighbours
have three entries.

The French have 23.

The UK has zero.

Oh, no! Course we do!
Nothing worth preserving.

Oh! But people who think we should
say that the UK has been very good

at looking after its buildings,

but not good at
the intangible cultural stuff,

so things like - I don't know -
Morris dancing, cheese-rolling,

that kind of thing.
Do you know what? Bothered?

No, we don't have anything.

Where was Dracula prince of?

SHIP'S HORN HONKS

Transylvania. Yes!
KLAXON BLARES

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Yeah, baby!

No! No! The darkness!

KLAXON BLARES

So, the real-life Dracula
was Vlad Ill - Draculea.

He lived 1431-'76.

He was Vlad the Impaler, basically.
Oh! Oh! Yes.

So named because...

He liked to impale? He impaled?
..he loved impaling.

He was born in Transylvania,
but he was, in fact,

the prince of the
neighbouring province of Wallachia.

Doesn't have the same ring about it,
does it? No, it doesn't.

"Welcome to Wallachia."

They do Mexican street food,
don't they? Yeah, they do.

He impaled thousands of people
in his lifetime.

I went to a torture museum in Spain

and they had an impaling thing
and they could impale you.

So, it went up through your back
and out your shoulder and... Oh!

But you were alive.
Oh, that's horrid, isn't it? Yeah.

Did they also have bagpipes?

There is a supposed link
with Transylvania, Tom.

So, there's a castle. He definitely
didn't live there, Vlad I,

but they make
kind of a big deal out of it.

It's called Bran Castle,
but it's because Bram Stoker,

who wrote Dracula, he once saw
a drawing of Bran Castle in a book,

and that is what he based
the home of Dracula on.

The actual castle
that Vlad Ill lived in

is about 150 miles away
and is now a ruin.

You'd go, wouldn't you? You'd go,

maybe buy a key ring...
Absolutely. ..a fridge magnet,

maybe some olive sticks.

In 2021, so during the pandemic,

the castle offered itself up
as a site

for people to get free doses
of the COVID-19 vaccine.

IMITATES DRACULA: "Come in!

"I will vaccinate you!

"Haven't you pushed that in
a bit far?!"

The doctors wore fake fangs.

Oh! That's amazing!

And then, if you were vaccinated,
you got free access to their...

They have an exhibition
of medieval torture implements.

I mean, and why not?

And so, footsore but happy,
we reach our final destination -

the scores.

In equal last place with minus 17,

it's Tom and Alan!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Still in the taxi queue
at Terminal 5

with minus 13 is Jamie!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

And our traveller triumphant
with minus 2, it's Cariad!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Right, that's it
for this week's episode of QI.

I'm just going to see
if this is still working.

HORN PLAYS LA CUCARACHA

I'm just going to walk down
the street doing that.

HORN PLAYS LA CUCARACHA

Thanks to Jamie, Tom,
Cariad and Alan,

and I leave you with this
traveller's tale from Dennis Norden.

"I was given a parking ticket
and said to the policeman,

" 'What do I do with this?'
He said, 'Keep it.

" 'If you manage to collect
three of them, you get a bicycle." "

Goodnight.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE