Cooker, Hob, Chips, Crisps, Roasties and Tea

Some observations.

This week, for your edification and further tutelage, I offer some of my observations, now that we have been “on Island” for almost four weeks (which makes us practically experts, having that San Juan County Redd blood that does not inhibit our opinions of our opinions, etc.).

• It rains a lot
• The countryside is beautiful and green (see previous)
• The roads are extremely narrow
• Drivers are extremely friendly
• Northern Ireland is not to be used interchangeably with Ireland – two different countries
• There is no way you could ever drive at the speed limit on most roads in Northern Ireland
• People are extremely polite
• Potato chips are called crisps
• Some crisps are meat flavored (I am not making this up – there are beef, chicken, and bacon flavored crisps, as well as shrimp – there is also balsamic vinegar, malt vinegar, cheese and onion, and extra salty)
• French fries are called chips and you can eat them with ketchup, mustard, BBQ sauce, mayo, salad crème, chili, malt vinegar or, if you must, plain
• If you ask for salt on your chips, you get more salt than you’ve had in the last year
• Chips (if you are confused, I am talking about fries) are often served with pizza
• We go grocery shopping about every 3 days (or more often if we want to eat food with our meals)
• Fresh food in the grocery stores does not have preservatives added, so everything expires within a few days of when it is placed on the shelf for sale
• The selection of cheese is awesome!
• Store-bought bread is good
• We were told they did not have good peanut butter but that is a lie to keep you from visiting – On my first try, I found peanut butter that Jason would eat (Jason and I share a high standard for peanut butter)
• I just read that a study here indicated people who eat pickle and cheese sandwiches are more likely to be intelligent
• Dinner is called tea
• Potatoes are served at tea
• Multiple variations of potatoes are served at the same tea – for example, mashed with roasted, mashed with boiled or roasted with boiled
• Roasted potatoes are called roasties
• Mashed potatoes with scallions are called champ
• I am called Elder
• There is no concept of a city block. I am simply told, “We don’t have ‘em.”
• Dish towels are called tea towels – they are used but not eaten
• Ovens are cookers and stove tops are hobs
• No one we have met has a long or difficult to spell or pronounce last name, like ours
• Everything costs more
• The single largest expense we have in a month is diesel for the car
• You cannot cash a check that someone else has written to you (you can deposit it, but you cannot cash it for currency)
• Bank deposits are made by sticking your cash and checks into a machine where the coins and bills are counted and the checks are electronically scanned and printed on your receipt for credit at a later date (after a bank employee looks at the check and decides whether or not it is legit)
• Credit and debit cards are not swiped; instead the cards have an electronic chip imbedded in the card and is used with a PIN code. Therefore you insert the card into a reader and enter your PIN, then pull the card out. We have actually had to show a cashier how to swipe our US card before we got all sophisticated and obtained a chip & pin card from our local Northern Ireland bank.
• Hot salsa is not
• Mild salsa is
• Traffic lights turn yellow to warn you they are about to turn green
• Not nearly as many cyclists as I had imagined
• No cyclists my age; they are all young men
• No women cyclists (Since my fist draft of this post, I did actually see a lady riding a bicycle)
• No way would I ever ride here – I would be endangering my entire body and my life
• Washers do
• Dryers don’t
• Iron-free shirts must be ironed because dryers don’t (dry – they don’t iron either)
• The Church is the same here as anywhere we have been
• We are having a great time
• Our YSA activities usually crank up around 9 and go like ninety until midnight
• Our YSA had never had an oatmeal cookie until my companion made them (the cookies, not the YSA) but we could not tell if they liked them
• Our YSA had never had rice crispy treats until my companion made them (the treats, not the YSA) and we could tell they loved them
• We are older than we used to be and we feel even older than that
• We have a new granddaughter who was born on 11.11.11 at 1:00 pm – Her dad, Joel, says they ran out of ones or they would have waited 11 minutes
• No one is Belfast seems to have ever heard of Blanding – what’s up with that?
• My companion and I have good craic (look it up in Wikipedia)

CFNI (Cheerio from Northern Ireland)

Elder Blickenstaff

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To start off the week Elder Blick went to register for Surgery. No it's not like it sounds. That's their term for registering for a doctor. Good to do that so if one is ever needed, you're all registered and ready to go with one of your choosing.

We both went to a bishops training meeting. Our stake president wanted us to meet all the bishops in the stake and what better time to do it than at bishops training! Needless to say, I felt a wee bit out numbered! The next night we both went back to the stake center to a stake council meeting. Elder Blick has been called to serve on the high council over the YSA and the Newtownabbey Ward.

We wandered around Belfast City Hall. A very beautiful old building!

Met a Northern Irish Gentleman on one of our walks. He was 82 years old. We said 'Hello' to each other, he commented about the sunshine and then a bit about himself. He was delightful. He gave us a couple of religious pamphlets (and here WE are the missionaries!) We talked for about an hour. He bore his testimony about how there is someone greater that us (and he would point up) that is in control of things. We talked for a good hour. Such a sweet man. I ran to our car when we got back to the parking lot and grabbed a Book of Mormon. We bore our testimonies about it. We explained that it is another testament of Jesus Christ, where it came from and about Joseph Smith . . . We wrote down our names and phone number on the inside of the book and gave to him, challenging him to read it. It was such a neat experience, I was so touched by his sweet spirit. He's a widower and my heart goes out to him. I just wanted to bring him home with us.

I went out with the sister missionaries two days In a row this week. The first day rained and rained and rained. We got drenched! We got stood up. We went to a members house and practiced the lesson on the Restoration on her. She gave us hot chocolate for which we were ever so grateful!!! The next day was cold, but sunny. After confirming an appointment with another YSA investigator we were again stood up. We did speak with this young mans grandfather. He was SO incredibly hard to understand! Holy makeral! Luckily the sisters could understand him, and so was I the longer I was around him to get the gist of what he was saying.

The highlight of this week is that Joel and April had their little girl, Abigail Joanne on 11/11/11 at 1:00. (Joel said they ran out of 1's!!!) 7 pounds 3 ounces. Everything went well for both mother and baby, for which we are so grateful! She's a cutie! Thank goodness for email!

We went to the Newtownabbey ( pronounced Newton Abbey) Ward. We were asked to bear our testimonies. There were only 37 people in Sacrament Meeting, 8 in Relief Society, and that included the teacher! They are small in numbers but so strong in spirit! You can imagine how often your turn would come around for speaking in church, or doing anything in the ward for that matter. Needless to say, the bishop did ask us to speak in December.

It's tradition here at the center for the YSA's to have the senior missionary couple get up and talk about themselves in a 'Getting to Know You' Fireside, so that's what we did last night. They enjoyed hearing that I had broken my arm two weeks before we got married ( so that means I was married with a cast on my right arm.) That I dated two of Elder Blick's cousins before I met him and said, "I give up! I must be suppose to marry into this family!" And that I kept from laughing out loud when I was introduced to him because the guy that was doing the introducing pronounced 'Blickenstaff' even funnier than the name actually is, and now it's been my name too for the last 35 years! The Rice Krispie Treats we brought were a big hit.

Your Irish slang lesson for the week . . .

sweets - candy
boot - trunk of car
da - dad/father
dummy - pacifier
holliers - holidays/vacations

. . . And thus ends another week on the Emerald Isle.

Love to all,

Sister Blickenstaff