Bits and bobs

Some anecdotes and observations that aren't quite interesting enough to be blog topics all by themselves...

• On June 16th Steve wore shorts for the first time this year. After three months of virtually the same weather week after week ("temps in the 50s, chance of rain"), we finally got some warmth. The temperature has reached 70 several times in the past two weeks and everyone is rushing outside to soak up every drop of sunshine. Not that we're complaining; we well remember the last winter in Ohio...

• While the Irish love to complain about the weather, the climate does have its advantages. One of them is the lush beauty of the countryside and gardens. Sandy really misses the flowers we used to have in our yard, and this spring we visited the garden of a woman from church who was hosting a fund-raiser for Ireland's version of Samaritan's Purse. I think the visit scratched Sandy's flower itch for a while.

• Every time we meet someone new they ask us where in the States we are from. They seem to be able to tell within our first few words that we are Americans. They often ask if we're from Florida, since that's the one place all Irish seem to have visited. If they have been to the States, they will proceed to tell us all about their visit and how much they loved it. Sandy and I wonder what our accents sound like to them. We've discussed how certain accents sound more pleasant to our ears than others (e.g., English, Irish, and French versus German, Dutch and Russian). We wonder if the Irish think of our accent as nice or harsh. For some reason we suspect the latter. But they do seem to be quite fond of us Yanks.

• I (Steve) was getting my hair cut recently and the female stylist asked me where I was from. I said from the U.S. and she said, "Yeah, but where?" I said, "Cleveland Ohio. Do you know where that is?" She said, "Nah, boot I've hayrd of it." Made me smile.

• We've been getting a kick out of some of the signs we see. Here's one we particularly liked. It was at the end of a 4 mile hike. I mean, shouldn't every fish and chips shop have one?

• Here's another sign. It highlights a particular problem we have encountered in our neighborhood park. Personally, I think all dog poop signs are better in verse.

• Lastly, regarding the title of this post. We mentioned previously that "bobs and bits" was an Irish saying we really like. In talking about it, we realized we weren't sure if bobs came before bits, or the other way around. So we were in an elevator at a department store a few nights ago with a store saleswoman. And as the doors closed Sandy asked her, "Is it 'bobs and bits', or 'bits and bobs'?" The young woman giggled at us and said, "Bits and bobs, DAYfinitely." I guess that settles that. 

A locked door, a key, and the beautiful Irish countryside

A few weeks ago our daughter Heather and son-in-law Toby came to visit, and we took our first cross-Ireland trip. We headed to the west coast and saw the Cliffs of Moher, the city of Galway, and an area called the Connemara. We drove winding, narrow country roads, dodged sheep, saw beautiful vistas, mountains, lakes, castles, ancient ruins and everything green, green, green. Sandy drove the car while Steve navigated, an arrangement we have mutually agreed is best for our marriage. Actually she has become quite a good driver over here, and she handled the twisty, tight, stone-wall-lined country roads with grace and courage. 

Here are some of the highlights:

The Cliffs of Moher.

Heather and Toby.

Traffic jam.

Kylemore Abbey.

Doolough pass.

Our next album cover.

More Doolough Pass.

Narnia?


We arrived back home to our apartment on Friday evening, the first night of a three day holiday weekend (Monday was to be a public "Bank Holiday"; something the Irish celebrate fairly regularly). As Sandy bent to unlock the door, she suddenly stood up wide-eyed and said,"Oh my gosh, she locked the other lock! We're locked out!!!"

An explanation is in order. Our apartment door has two locks. One is opened with this key:

And one is opened with this key:

The building is around 150 years old and we think that the brass key is nearly that old. We had decided not to use the brass keys because they were so clunky to carry around. And so in our wisdom had safely stored them away inside our apartment. Unfortunately, while we were on vacation our landlord, the owner of the apartment, had come over to let some maintenance man into the apartment and proceeded to lock up the apartment when she was done. So now it is Friday night, the beginning of the holiday weekend, we are locked out and our landlord lives about two hours away.

We managed to find one neighbor home who had the phone number of the apartment management company. We called thinking of course they would have an extra set of keys.  But of course, they informed us only the landlord has the brass key. We called a locksmith who informed us that such locks could only be opened by drilling them out. We couldn't quite see doing that to a historical building. So we called our landlord hoping against hope they hadn't left for a vacation themselves. They answered, and were appropriately aghast and apologetic (and probably a little incredulous that we stupid Americans weren't using the brass lock). But the question was, how do we get the brass key from their home to ours, late on a Friday night, with them living so far away? Well it turns out there is a tour bus that runs from their town to Dublin, and they happen to know the bus driver. And that's how we found ourselves a couple of hours later trudging two miles into the center of Dublin, to stand in front of a hotel in an area we didn't know, and wait for a big white tour bus, carrying a man, who was carrying our brass key. And who, without exchanging a word, based only on eye contact, a smile, and Sandy mouthing the word "key", tossed us an envelope from the top step of the bus. Brilliant!

Only in Ireland.

Speaking Irish

We've been struck by the beauty of the Irish language, which Americans, including us before we arrived, incorrectly call "Gaelic." From what we can tell, Gaelic is mainly spoken in Scotland, and the native language here is simply called "Irish." In Dublin all signs are written in both English and Irish, and Irish is taught as a second language in the schools. There is a national movement to preserve it, and in some parts of the west and north it is spoken as the primary language.

Where we notice it most is in names, both of people and places. What makes it difficult is that phonetically it bears no relation to English. So looking at an Irish word gives you little sense of how to actually pronounce it. Here are the names of some people we have met, and one town. See if you can guess the correct pronunciation of each (answers at the bottom):

1. Orlaith
2. Eoin
3. Aoife
4. Diarmaid
5. Dun Laoghaire




On a different subject, we know there is a very small minority of you who like it when friends call you over and say, "Hey, take a look at my vacation photos!" For the rest, you can skip this part. In any case, we got to spend a few days in Switzerland in the Lake Geneva area recently. Here are a few shots.

Looking across Lake Geneva at the French Alps.

Sandy in the tasting room at the Nestle chocolate factory in Broc.

Stacks of cheese at a factory in Gruyere.

Flowers lining the promenade along Lake Geneva in Lausanne.

The promenade in Montreux.

An interesting item for sale in a market in Lausanne.

Vineyards above Lake Geneva near the village of Lutry.

And the requisite selfie, outside the Olympic Museum in Lausanne.

Cheers for now!




[Answers: 1. Orla, 2. Owen, 3. Ee-fa, 4. Dear-med, 5. Dun-Leary]

Walking and driving in Dublin

Dubliners walk fast. I mean FAST. They walk like they are going somewhere, not just out for a stroll. When I am walking to work, people fly past me like I'm a toddler. Men, women, old, young, they zoom by on both sides of me. Even when I think I am walking briskly I get left in the dust. And it's not just commuters. When Sandy and I are out on an evening or weekend, other couples routinely zip by. In fact, we've noticed that whenever we see a couple or group of people up ahead that we are gaining on, when we eventually catch and pass them inevitably they are speaking a language other then English. 

Dubliners also don't wait for the green light when crossing a road on foot. They look for an opening in the traffic and dash across. When we first arrived we couldn't get used to this. It was hard enough to get a handle on what direction traffic was coming from. With driving on the left cars make turns from very (to us) unusual and unpredictable directions. We approached each intersection with barely disguised terror. We would stop at the curb, look in at least eight different directions - left, right, forward, back, up (no helicopters landing...whew), down, sideways, and kitty corner - then look again, then take a deep breath and stride purposefully into the street. Only to turn and race back to the curb when a car, horn blaring, came roaring from an impossible angle. What the...where did THAT come from??? Sandy would get so nervous I had to grab her hand and yell "Now!" as we would dash. And half the time I was STILL wrong. Thankfully we are finally getting the hang of it. Especially since we are now learning to

Drive. As I mentioned in a previous post we have bought a car. A tiny, feeble Toyota hatchback called an Auris (otherwise known as a Corolla). It is the slowest car I have ever owned. But it is small, and that's what counts. The roads here are narrow to begin with, and, because there is such a shortage of parking spaces, seemingly every road allows parallel parking on both sides. This means the usable driving space is narrowed even further. On some streets there is not room for two cars going in opposite directions to pass each other. This creates some interesting moments as you try to discern whether the other guy is going to pull to the side and let you go, or if he's just going to keep coming. And we're having to learn some new traffic signals, such as intersections where there are two or three sets of lights side by side, and some turn red while others show a green arrow, and you have to figure out which one pertains to you. Sandy nearly got rear-ended on her first drive in our car in such a scenario. Neither of us had any idea whether she was supposed to stop or keep going. Fortunately all we got was a honk and a glare.

And we are having to learn some new road signs. This is one that really stumped us:

We couldn't figure out what it meant. And then as we drove a little further, sure enough electronic ambient music suddenly started playing on our car radio and these finger-like objects came in through the windows and started massaging our shoulders. It was awesome!

OK, maybe that didn't happen. And maybe it was referring to speed bumps that just slowed traffic down a bit. But you have to admit my idea is pretty cool.

Glendalough

One of reasons we bought a car was so that we could see the Irish countryside. Today we made our first excursion outside of Dublin, to Glendalough, one of the most famous monastic ruins in Ireland. Glendalough (glen-da-lock) was a monastic settlement established in the 6th century by St. Kevin. Here are some photos.

Glendalough sits among the Wicklow mountains, offering some great hikes. We did a short one today, with plans for many more. This is definitely one of the places we will be taking visitors.

And I don't want to be alarmist or anything, but we noticed these growing on a tree limb. I'm almost positive I saw something like this in a science fiction movie. Can anyone tell me what these are???

Adventures in car insurance (a Classic Expat Tale)

So we decide to buy a car; a small used one, something we can explore the countryside with, and it follows the normal process…research, decide what car you want, visit the car dealer, test drive, negotiate, make a deal. All we need to do before driving the car off the lot is obtain car insurance and get the money to the dealer. Shake hands, thanks, see you soon. Simple, right? Hah. Here is my diary of the days that followed:


Day 1: Contact insurance carrier recommended by co-worker. Email exchange; set up call for next day and give agent my office phone number. This is going to be a piece of cake.

Day 2: Morning…no call. Afternoon: See on phone display that I missed a call. Only then realize I haven’t set up my phone answering system yet. My mistake. Email agent, suggest call next day.

Day 3: Email from agent, asking if I have "requested proof of driving experience" from my previous insurer. Email exchange ensues; what exactly are you asking for? Answer: You need to request a "No Claims Bonus Certificate." OK, I say; must be something insurance companies know about. I email my previous insurer; they reply they can get prior claims information, but have no idea what a "No Claims Bonus Certificate" is.

That evening, we process a wire transfer to move funds for the car from U.S. bank to Irish bank, something we have done successfully twice before.

Day 5-6: Weekend

Day 7: Receive five years of claim data from my U.S. insurer; forward to my Dublin agent. Agent calls: Not what she was looking for; needs additional data. Email U.S. agent with request.

That evening, discover the bank wire transfer failed. Hmmmm. Decide we made a mistake, and resubmit.

Day 8: Receive email with data answering every question the Dublin agent asked, forward to agent. Receive email reply with still new questions. Email U.S. agent, who emails revised letter; forward to Dublin agent who doesn’t understand the letter; get yet another version of the letter from the U.S.; forward to Dublin agent.

Day 9: Dublin agent thanks me for all the information; I think, yahoo!, it's over!; then she says now she must call the U.S. agent to verify everything. I think, you have to do what? I provide the phone number, but with a five hour time difference I see problems ahead.

Day 10: Notified by U.S. agent that no contact has yet been made. I send email to the Dublin agent offering to help arrange call; receive "Out of office until Monday" reply. I slowly begin to tear my hair out.

That evening, discover that the second attempt at a bank transfer has failed. I tear more hair out.

Day 11: Make calls to each bank; no immediate success in solving the problem.

Day 12-13: Weekend

Day 14: Send emails to both insurance agents; no apparent progress made.

One glimmer of hope appears regarding the bank transfer, however. Potential problem discovered; turns out the banks use different terminology for the same thing; U.S. bank form asks for "Account Number"; Irish bank wants the "IBAN", which is an entirely different thing. Seems about par for the course. I make a third attempt at a transfer, and pray.

Day 15: Hallelujah! The two agents actually connect by phone, and, surprise!, Dublin needs yet more new information.

That evening, the bank transfer worked! There is great rejoicing.

Day 16: Oops, something is still missing. One more piece of data required that has not to this point ever been requested. How is this possible? I start to doubt if I will ever drive a car in Ireland.

Day 17: All the data is in! Forms emailed to me for signature. The agent calls to go over everything. We walk through the documents one by one, additional questions, check, check, and then she says: "And the car is registered under Sandra, right?" And I say no, actually it is under both our names. Silence. 

"Well", she says, "In that case we need a little more information…"

Day 18: I have gathered the new data, signed the forms, scanned them and emailed them to the agent. She calls me, everything is in place, I pay my deposit with a debit card (everything is debit and direct wire here), and it is over! I’m insured!!! I email the car dealer who has been waiting patiently for almost three weeks…I’m finally done! I’ll transfer the funds for the car and be down this afternoon to pick it up. Great, he says. I log in to my Irish bank account, open up the wire transfer page, complete the first page...check...the second...check...open the third, and see these words:

"You require a Card Reader to use this Service."

And it all comes back to me. Three months ago, opening the bank account, learning about the processes and requirements for banking in Ireland, and the bank representative talking about the card reader – a mechanical device you have to use for doing certain transactions, something to enhance security. You can’t just type your account number into an online form, you need to physically put your card in the reader and obtain a unique password. Something we were supposed to order when we arrived in country. Something we didn't do. And now the website is telling me I can order one and receive it in the mail in a week. And an image comes to mind; it looks like this:

But then the Lord brings something else to mind, a favorite verse from Romans, chapter 8:

"I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us." 

And I'm reminded that my so-called problems are not REALLY problems. And I take a deep breath, and I call my Irish bank, and it turns out that way back when we were opening the account, at the same time they were telling us about the card reader, they also had us sign up for the ability to do phone call wire transfers. You'll probably never need this, they said, but it might be nice to have just in case. And the woman on the phone asks if I would like to do one? And I say, bless you my child.

And on the 18th day, a car is purchased.

Adventures in pub food

I'm not sure whether to be concerned about this or not, but I've noticed something about the pub food here. We were at a pub a couple weeks ago, sitting in the middle of a group of energetic women screaming and hollering while watching a women's rugby match on the big screen, and I ordered lasagne. Seems like a pretty basic item, right? When the order came, this is what I saw:

Notice anything odd? Yes, that's a side of French fries ("chips") and cole slaw with my lasagne and garlic bread.

OK, I can deal with that. Fries are good with most things, after all. But then, last Friday night, we were at a different pub, one we're thinking of making "our" pub, the kind where they know your name, and I ordered enchiladas. I hadn't had any Mexican food in Ireland yet and it sounded pretty good. When the order came, it looked like this:

Notice anything familiar? That's right, French fries under my enchilada!

Is this something to worry about? I'm not sure. But don't you think there is at least a possibility that this is a conspiracy to make me gain back the weight I have shed from all the walking I'm doing? Makes you wonder. Stay tuned.