belgianwaffle

Ireland

Status Update


Posted in: Family, Ireland, Work

Pros

We have our health.

As of last Wednesday we are no longer commuting hours to the city centre from the delightful but distant suburb where my parents-in-law kindly had us stay for 6 weeks (that would be four weeks longer than any of us thought it would be).  On the way in there is a level crossing and for many years it has featured in traffic reports as a Dublin landmark and I always thought it was a poor and unremarkable landmark.  That was before I realised that every commuter from South County Dublin spent an hour morning and evening crawling past it.  Also I spent a number of hours before a scrolling sign on a hotel telling me that bookings were now “been” taken for Christmas.  These things grate.  Especially if you have to listen to Charlie and Lola on endless repeat while chugging along.  Does anyone else thing that Lola needs something done about her adenoids?

The children all like school.  Our worries about the Princess going to school in Irish were completely unnecessary.  She is picking it up extraordinarily quickly.  It is quite amazing to watch.  Also, the structured, assigned seat, looking at the blackboard schooling we favour in Ireland seems to really suit her and she is happy. The boys have settled well into Montessori school and we love their teacher.  They also seem fond of her.

Cons

Our house is tiny.  We have far too much furniture and quite a lot of it is still in storage.  Despite 6 weeks and 20,000 euros worth of work, it looks worse than it did before we started. For this, I blame Eamon the electrician who left the place looking like Swiss cheese.
No internet (this comes from an internet cafe), no telephone.

I started work today.  I am not particularly enthusiastic about this job but it will pay some of the bills.  My reception this morning has not made me more enthusiastic.

My bicycle was stolen over the weekend.

Disapproving musings


Posted in: Dublin

There was an article in the paper recently on free range kids, something I’ve seen knocking around the internet over the past couple of months (am I the last person to notice how many things in the papers seem to be stale versions of what has been on the internet for ages?).  It was a Dublin version of what everyone has been saying – our children have no freedom because we’re too scared to let them take any risks.

Since our return to Ireland, we have been struck by the suicidal behaviour of Irish pedestrians who throw themselves across the road whenever they get a chance.  This is particularly noteworthy as in the 5 years since we last lived in this country, everyone has acquired an enormous American SUV.  And we do not have American roads and infrastructure and these cars are ludicrously enormous on our small streets.  (These two paragraphs are connected, bear with me).  The other morning, Mr. Waffle passed a private boys secondary school near his parents’ house and he saw a fleet of these vehicles dropping off their precious passengers to school.  He said it looked absurdly like an army of mercenaries had decided to take over South County Dublin and were rolling up to the school to make it their headquarters: “The revolution storts* here”.

*This is not a typo, there is a nasty Dublin accent where the “a” sound is substituted by an “o”, I live in fear of my children picking it up but given where we will be living, they are much more likely to pick up a different nasty Dublin accent. It’s hard to know whether to be glad or sorry.

Sic Transit


Posted in: Cork, Ireland

When I sat my matric, there was a space on the front page for candidates to insert place of birth.

The invigilator, knowing his audience, said to his group of Cork students: “When they say place of birth, they mean Cork, they’re not interested in the competition between the Bons and the Ville.”

Since I had had my pen poised to inform the university authorities that I was born in the Bons Secours maternity hospital, his warning came just in time.

Maternity services in Cork are now being concentrated in one centre. Coming back from the park this evening, my brother, the boys and I saw the Erinville being knocked down. It’s just as well that they’ve abolished the matric too.

What recession?


Posted in: Ireland

The builder cleaning out our new house has found a number of items which he feels are perfectly good, including a CD player. He does not want them.  None of the other builders want them.  We don’t want them.  It seems a shame that they should go on the skip.  When I told my father-in-law this and expressed the hope that someone might perhaps take these items from the skip, he mused that it was hard to know whether it was more embarrassing to be caught putting something into your neighbour’s skip or taking something out of it.  Good point.

The costs of our modest renovation continue to skyrocket unexpectedly (unexpectedly to me, anyway; doubtless providing a welcome boost to the Irish economy).  Our furniture arrived from Brussels today and it has been stacked up to the ceiling and out to the walls in the (only) ground floor room.  We should have got rid of more things before we left Brussels.  Understandably, the painter and the electrician (rewiring the house) say they cannot work in these circumstances.  The man installing the kitchen is game to give it a try but a kitchen without electricity is ultimately unsatisfactory.  The plumber is unaffected.  Tomorrow we will find a warehouse to store our furniture until these tasks are complete and a man with a van to move it.  Shortly we will have spent all our savings on renovation and moving (and removing) and when (if) we manage to actually get in to our house (now impossible due to packing crates), we will have to live on air or paint fumes whichever is the more nourishing.  Also, our builder has gone on holidays and there is still a wall to be demolished and a ceiling to be fixed.  Poor Daniel keeps asking when he can go home (something everyone involved would like to know).  We were hoping to be in by August 25 as the Princess starts school on August 27 but there is now every likelihood that we will still be holed up with the unfortunate parents-in-law on that date.

And it’s still raining.

North Side/South Side


Posted in: Cork, Dublin, Ireland

Cork has a north/south divide but it is as nothing to the chasm in Dublin. The river Liffey separates the largely affluent south from the largely less affluent north. My husband’s family are from one of the most prosperous southside suburbs. We will be living in the north inner city. A 30 minute drive (off-peak), the river and a whole world separate these locations. May I share some sample conversations? Of course I may, it’s my blog.

Relative (you know who you are): You must join the [local] library, it’s wonderful for the children.

Me: But it’s miles away [for me].

Her: Of course [smiling encouragingly] they must have libraries on the Northside too.

I took myself off to the house of my new friend from the cafe along with herself and Daniel. She was charming and delightful but disappointed that we would be living so far away.

Me: It’s not that far, really.

Her: Mmm.

Me: Honestly, we move back to Dublin and it’s like the Northside is further away than Brussels.

Her: Of course, in many ways, psychologically, it is.

This weekend we are very Southside as I have taken the children to Cork while Mr. Waffle wraps things up in Brussels. Maybe he will be able to sell the car (hollow laugh).
I heard the Princess explain earnestly to her brothers: “Now we are in Dublin, Ireland but we are going to take the train to another country, Cork.” Clever girl.

The train ride was rendered less hideous by the charm of the teenager opposite who shared crisps and buttons with my offspring. She was travelling with her mother and several siblings. Her mother was a large lady with an IRA tattoo (and, people, I don’t think that this is an individual retirement account), so it just goes to show – you should never, never get a tattoo.

Culture Shock


Posted in: Belgium, Family, 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”.Â