There is a growing debate across Europe about the usefulness of changing the time, adjusting the clocks by one hour, twice a year. At this time of year, we move the clocks back one hour and many people are grateful for the extra hour in bed. Of course, that hour has to be paid back in the Spring but we can cross that bridge when we come to it. Personally, I am undecided about the best way to manage this issue. Whatever we do, we will have dark mornings and dark evenings during the winter.
There is, however, one thing that I am sure of. People in different countries talk about the time in different ways so, when we want to talk about what time it is or what time to meet, we have to be careful. For example, in English, 11:30 would be called ‘half-past eleven,’ but in Germany, it would be ‘Halb Zwölf’ and in Spain, it would be ‘las once y media’. Therefore, if using English as a common language, it would always be better to say ’eleven thirty’ in order to avoid any international confusion.