Ireland

Weather 

Due to a complete failure of imagination, I am always appalled by the Irish weather.  No one could have been more surprised than I was when on the morning after leaving sultry France, the Princess was running up and down the misty deck of the ferry, splashing through puddles in her sandles.

When we went to the beach the other day I was, however, prepared and the children were warmly wrapped up and had their rain coats on.  I realised that they will need to become hardier: all the Irish children were in t-shirts and shorts.  Mostly they had retired indoors by the time the torrential rain started.

Festivals

We went to the local horse show on Monday (not an exclusive event).  It was supported by a field of ancillary stalls and children’s entertainments.  In Belgium, it was always easy to tell our blonde milky white children from others on the boucy castle.  Here it is proving more challenging.  If only we had spent more time in Uccle than elsewhere we would have had more practice.

To our surprise and delight, there was a waffle stall.  The waffles cost 5 euros each.  And  they weren’t very nice.  We were outraged.  The standard rate for a reasonably acceptable waffle across all Belgian waffle vans is 1.50 (perhaps evidence of price fixing which the local competition authorities could investigate).  It is true what they say about the cost of living here.

Sporting Life

On Saturday morning the boys and their Grandfather watched Australia play New Zealand on the television.  They have not been exposed to rugby before. “They play a football, they all dirty!” exclaimed Daniel in surprise.  My brother came to visit later in the afternoon and, having seen the boys tripping about delightedly in my high heels was anxious to indoctrinate them with the basics of rugby.  I am not sure how much progress he made; when he left, Daniel was still trying to hit the ball with a tennis racquet.

Other Children

Escaping the rain on our return from the beach the children and I ended up in a cafe (Mr. Waffle was getting the car taxed – the glamour).  The Princess got chatting to a little girl.  They bonded and jumped in the small back garden.  The boys joined them.  They were very loud.  The punters got restive.  The little girl’s parents and I brought them in.  I decided to head out in the driving rain.  The little girl’s mother wondered could I get a lift from someone.  I explained that my husband was tied up with the Revenue (something I could have phrased differently, perhaps).  She offered us a lift.  I refused, grateful but polite.  10 minutes later we were drenched and only, alas, a little further along due to the indifference of small children to heavy rain and their deep interest in pausing to smell the flowers. The little girl’s father pulled up beside us in his Saab 9-3 (which, as his daughter had explained to us earlier was a clean car because they had taken Daddy’s instead of Mummy’s) and insisted that we all hop, dripping, on to his leather upholstery and dropped us to the door.  See, it is  true about Irish people being friendly; we have to be to survive the weather. 

We went to a barbecue on Sunday.  There was a little girl called Clodagh (very common Irish name, the gh is silent). “No,” said the Princess “there is no such name, it must be Claudia”.  Meanwhile the boys had agreed that the young man called Matthew must be Matteo and spoke firmly but kindly to the other 2 year olds in French (their experience of children in groups has been that French is the appropriate language, no longer).  Incidentally, my sister-in-law is a very talented painter and one of her nudes was hanging on the wall.  Daniel examined it critically and declared, “That lady has no nappy”. 

On Friday morning, I said goodbye to an old friend who married another old friend.  They moved from London to a house a short walk from ours seven months ago.  Rejoice.  Now we’re leaving.  Alas.
On Friday night, I said goodbye to my friend down the road.  We met because we kept seeing each other pushing twin buggies : she has a five year old son and two year old twin girls.  She is Canadian though her mother is English.   I think her mother felt that it was fate that we should be friends so made a point of chatting to me every time she came to Brussels.  Her mother was right.

On Sunday, we said goodbye to our ex-upstairs neighbour who now lives in a very large and beautiful art nouveau house around the corner from the old friends in which he kindly let our children play chasing.  His own six month old was safely in Prague with her mother which makes the invitation to us all the more virtuous.  Imagine bringing children into your life when your own are not there.

We were promptly back at our house at 11.30 to sell our car to a nice Indian family.  There two girls (6 and 6 months) were exquisitely behaved and at least two of my children ran into the room naked (it’s hot, I let them play with running water in the sink, lethal combination) before I hustled them out (Princess’s interesting excuse: you said that you didn’t want me running around half naked in front of the people who were going to buy the car so I took off all my clothes).

Down to the end of the road, to play in the paddling pool in a school friend’s back garden.  Screaming, excitement.  Buns too.

Upstairs to tea in current neighbours’ flat.  I feel mildly depressed every time I see their flat because it is so beautifully decorated and immaculately tidy but otherwise identical to ours.  Despite their perfect flat they are immensely child friendly and our children adore them.  How much do I love Italians, let me count the ways?  She is an academic and off for the Summer; she took the Princess for two hours this morning while I negotiated with the bank and went to get back our documents from the Indian family.  Turns out that they didn’t want our car after all (associated with too much nudity?).  Mild bitterness.  Would anybody like a peugeot 306sw, only 72,000 kms?  Just asking.

Tomorrow, we leave for France, where we are staying in a  nice chateau to break the journey (6 hours total journey time but we are puny).  On Wednesday evening we will sleep on the ferry and on Thursday morning we will find ourselves in Ireland where I fully expect it to be raining.