belgianwaffle

Archives for June 2008

Help, they’ve got us surrounded!


Posted in: Belgium, Ireland

A couple of weeks ago Mr. Waffle got stuck behind a group of fishermen protesting about the price of oil.  It took him an hour and a half to get into work.  When he got in, he sent me this email:

From: Mr. Waffle
Sent: 04 June 2008 10:56
To: His loving spouse

Subject: FW: Demonstration, Wednesday 4 June, rue de la x – avoid the area
Importance: High

Note the useful timing of this message.

______________________________________________
From:   The Secretary who sneers at everyone

Sent:   Wednesday, June 04, 2008 9:39 AM
To:     Everyone

Subject:   Demonstration, Wednesday 4 June, rue de la x  – avoid the area
Importance:     High

Demonstration, Wednesday 4 June, rue de la X

The Belgian police have warned us of a potentially large demonstration by fishermen tomorrow morning. They are expected to gather around 10am.  Major delays and traffic disruption are anticipated. Staff are advised to avoid the area unless absolutely necessary.

This isn’t strictly relevant as it wasn’t really a blockade but last weekend we went to this must-see before you leave Belgium attraction and it was almost impossible to get in. “Fortress mini-Europe” said my witty husband. Jon Bon Jovi was playing nearby and all the car parking places appeared to have been reserved for him and his fans in tents.  You had to admire their perseverance as they sat there at 9.30 in the morning.   One assumes that Jon was still in bed.  And not in a tent either.

Then, this Wednesday, Brussels was fenced in by tractors.  There were half a dozen blocking traffic on my way into work. There were hardly any cars in the city and it was very pleasant for me on my bicycle.  I spoke to one of the farmers and he told me that he was up at 4.00 this morning to drive his tractor to Brussels.  The Belgian police wouldn’t let them drive on the motorway so it was a long old trek.  I assume that he has to drive back as well [though perhaps he could strike a deal with the hauliers who were blocking traffic on the city’s main traffic artery].   I asked, with what I hope was endearing faux naïveté (note to self, does this work, if you’re nearly 40?), what they were protesting about and he said the price of fuel.   I pointed out, very bravely I thought, after all he had been up since well before dawn, that food prices have soared recently which was surely compensating him for this loss but he was having none of it.  I am not entirely sure what he and his colleagues are hoping to achieve.  Though I gather that the Commission has folded and given something to the fishermen (I suppose that having rampaging fishermen outside your door focuses the mind of the average fonctionnaire), so, who knows, maybe they’ll get something too?  Though, as the Princess pointed out to me, they were inconveniencing everyone and what did they expect her to do for them?

Finally, today and yesterday traffic was held up to allow the 27 European heads of state and government and their courtiers and acolytes to whiz in from the airport with their police motorcycle outriders.

There will be much less of this in Dublin.  I understand that there traffic never moves regardless of whether there is a demonstration or not.

Pasta


Posted in: Twins, Youngest Child

Michael loves pasta.  His diet largely consists of pasta and pesto.  My first mouthful of pesto only passed my lips when I was 19 years old and spent a summer as an au pair in Naples.  I do wonder whether, if I’d paid a little more attention to the whole picking basil from the garden of their country house and sticking it in the blender with pine nuts and so on, I might have been Ireland’s answer to Nigella.  I digress.   So intrinsic is pasta and pesto to the modern Irish child’s diet that when I went to Perugia a couple of weeks ago, it was to find that my cousin had brought pasta and pesto with her from Ireland to feed her children.  She was a little defensive about this decision but it’s hard not to sympathise.

Anyhow at the supermarket Michael, took a packet of pasta from the shelves and clutched it to his bosom until we got to the check-out whereupon he briefly handed it to the cashier and then reclaimed it and carried it tenderly to the car.  “Mummy,” he said to me hopefully “me eat pasta after my dinner?”

Random examples demonstrating that my husband knows everything


Posted in: Mr. Waffle

1. At the mini train extravaganza.

Me: What does BNSF stand for on the side of the train?
Him: Burlington North Santa Fe, I’d say [on later inspection, this was quite right].
Me: How do you know that?
Him: Good guess?

2. On the radio

Me: Who sings that?
Him: David Bowie.
Me: Oh yeah, talk about selling out, remember that perfume advertisement?
Him: Well, David Bowie is the man who turned his back catalogue into a financial instrument.
Me: What?
Him: Complex explanation.
Me: How did you know that?
Him: Everyone knows that.

3. At the supermarket one morning.

Him: Interesting, that lorry is from Slovenia but the drivers’ friends are obviously Romanian.

Me: Eh?

Him: Well, it has Slovenian number plates, see from Maribor which, as you know, is Slovenia’s second city.

Me: Eh…

Him: But in the window he has Romanian plates with his friends’ names on them.

Me: Ah right.

To be fair this last touches on two of his specialised subjects: geography and number plates.   But generally, my husband is good on facts. When we have dinner at his parents’ house and a question comes up, everyone swivels towards him which I find mildly amusing. In my parents’ house (the home of the patriarchy as Mr. Waffle wistfully refers to it from his equal opportunities outpost), everyone swivels to my father. Though my father really does know everything.

What is it they say about women marrying men like their fathers?

Trilingual


Posted in: Belgium, Ireland, Princess

The Princess is terrified of going to her Irish language school in September.  She is excited about moving to Ireland, being closer to her relatives and having a house with a garden but the prospect of school is hanging over her like a dark cloud.  Any conversation about moving to Ireland ends with her in tears saying she can’t speak any Irish.

We have begun introducing her to the odd Irish word, though, unfortunately, this isn’t fooling her into thinking that she has an excellent command of the language.   I think that it will be easier for her to pick up Irish because she already speaks two languages but I’m not the one who will have to face a classroom of strangers and interact with them in a foreign language.   When not in the company of her parents, the Princess is, I think, a great conformist and she is concerned that she won’t be able to follow the teacher’s instructions.  However, she can now say “ciúnas!” with great authority.  I have emphasised that this will stand her in good stead as my memory of primary school is that this was the command most used by teachers and the one that they were most anxious to see obeyed.

I assume that it is progress of a sort that this morning she uttered her first trilingual sentence: Can I have a cáca milis in my boîte à tartines, please?

Interesting times ahead, I daresay.

Confusion


Posted in: Family

I sent my mother a belated little parcel for mother’s day.  At the same time, I sent my friend D a present for her new baby and her three year old daughter.  This is why my mother telephoned me and said “thank you for the miniature stove with doors that open and close”.  I hope that little A likes the Villeroy and Boch bonbonnière that is winging its way to her.

A Practical Arrangement


Posted in: Twins, Youngest Child

Michael completed his toilet training some time ago with almost no accidents.  So much for boys being bad at this.  This process has given me some unexpected insights.  It’s actually relatively hard for boys to aim with any accuracy but I am amazed how much easier it is for small boys to wee in public without wetting their clothes than it is for small girls.  I suppose I knew in theory but I never really expected to know in practice in quite so much detail.

A friend (mother of two daughters) tells me how she had a little boy to stay and after he had been to the bathroom, it was soaked.  He had stood at the toilet but every time he heard a noise outside the bathroom he had twirled around to see what it was and sprayed liberally as he turned.

Too much information?