Could you stay with Life in the UK?

As I mentioned in my last post, it's been nearly 5 years since we moved to the U.K. This means that we are now eligible for permanent residency. To get this, you need to pay a big heap of money (like a couple of thousand pounds) and you need to pass a 24 question test entitled, "Life in the UK". This is a variety of questions about Britain's history, demographics, holidays, politics and etc. It's only 24 questions, but there's about 200 questions you could be asked. We actually had to study to pass this, it wasn't simple. But neither was it particularly relevant or useful. Why do I need to know the biggest immigrant groups to the UK during the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s?

Most information I needed to know for the Life in the UK test will not be very useful for anything but the odd pub quiz, but some information would have been useful if they had provided it when we moved here. Then I could have known how things worked straightaway rather than spending five years figuring it out for myself! Five years on, they bother to tell me in the study material how council taxes work. Trust me, the council found us and made sure we understood (i.e. paid) long before this!! One would think they would equip new immigrants to the UK far better for integration by giving them all this information at the start of their move to the country, rather than after several years of establishment. Talk about missing the boat - weak immigration pun intended.

So if you are a British citizen and want to see if you truly deserve citizenship, try taking this little test here. Life in the UK Sample Test. Good luck with that. Let me know if I should call round to take back your passport tomorrow.

Off to School

Time has done its one-way linear trick of making 5 years pass since I started this blog. I now have a daughter old enough to go to school in Britain. This will probably bring about a whole new set of posts about how things are different. But it's a question as to whether things are different because of location or different because of the passage of time.

For example, when I was little, I walked by myself to and from school. As did everyone I know. Now no one here does this, certainly not for the first several years. They have some sort of adult escort with them until they are at least 8 or so. Possibly longer, depending on paranoia concern of the parent or the route the child needs to take to school. But this is no different to how it is in Canada either. I know my friends and relatives do the same for their children too.

Escorting your children to and from school is quite an interesting one for me already. Having walked the short path from our house to the school, I always felt that it would be relatively early when I would allow my daughter to walk to school on her own. However, that was before I saw how busy it is with cars at school drop-off time. The road we walk that goes past the school has no sidewalk on the part we take and there are loads of people driving past at that time. My daughter is sensible, but I don't know about the drivers. Late for school, late for work, kids fighting in the back, etc etc. One week has already made me postpone my plans for her walking herself by at least a year or two.

The other BIG difference for me is the uniform. When I went to school, you just wore your everyday clothes. But here, it's a uniform. There is a list of clothes that I had to buy over the summer and I spent around £130 on everything, and this wasn't buying the most expensive items either. One summer dress, part of the summer uniform which she can wear until the half-term break in October. After that it's the winter uniform which is either a grey skirt and blouse or grey pinafore (aka jumper dress in AmEng) and blouse. So a skirt and 2 pinafores. Plus then green tights and white socks, as necessary. Then also, they have to have specific clothes for gym class (aka PE). This is a bit silly to me, as for the amount kids sweat at this age, I really don't see a point of trying to get thirty 4/5 year old children changed out of uniforms, into gym clothes and back into uniform. I suppose it might save wear and tear on the uniform and be slightly less restrictive, but it seems like a big bother for little benefit. For this I had to get a shirt with the school crest on it and also shorts and "plimsoles". Plimsoles were a bit of a mystery to me. They were a word I was familiar enough from reading English books to know that they were a shoe, but I wasn't very sure what kind of shoe it was. In the end I had to ask another woman in the store who was school clothes shopping to help me know exactly what they were. And then there was the conundrum of whether they had to be black, or whether white was acceptable. And if white was acceptable, if the ones with the daisy embellishment on it that L. had fallen in love with would also pass muster.

This all was both amusing me by confusing me but also stressing me out slightly. You want to make sure your child fits in and feels accepted at the start of their school path. The last thing I wanted to do was to get the wrong thing and have my daughter upset because it wasn't the same as everyone else's or for the teacher to comment on it and me have to go and rush to buy the right thing. Not having at least the slight familiarity of how things work with a uniform and what the standards are, I had to use my common sense and place a few emergency calls to friends with little ones also starting to ask for advice. Fortunately my friends were quite helpful and in the end, my common sense got tired of me anguishing over a pair of £4 sneakers and said if they really wanted things to be so strict, they would have made the uniform list more detailed. So white plimsoles/sneakers with daisies is what I bought. And a crested cardigan. And crested fleece jacket. And 2 pairs of black shoes. And a water bottle. And I still have to buy the book bag. And the gym bag. And all the labels to put on all this kit so that there's a reasonable chance we'll finish the year with the same amount of stuff as we started.

This first week she went to school for half-days. Next week they will stay for lunch and then come home. The week after, it will be full-time, all-day. It's now the end of the first week and she's tired. She enjoyed it and both of us were excited on her first day, probably me even more than her. It's a bit sad, to see the end of this beginning. But we are long way from the beginning of the end; there is far more good to come.

Why so few updates

I'm sorry. Really, I am.

I haven't been updating this the way I should. One of the main reasons that I haven't been doing it is simply because all those funny British habits, products, customs and names no longer are so strange. We've been here long enough that most things are (or seem) normal now. A friend said, "Haha! Your assimilation is complete!" in a joking victorious tone. I responded that it just meant we would be harder to detect when our c'lonial attack was complete. Haha!

But some things about Great Britain still strike me as pretty funny. I just heard the name of where friends are going on holiday: Sandy Balls! Just when I recovered from that, she then told me that her mother lives in a place called Bushey! People living so close to somewhere named Maidenhead shouldn't laugh I suppose, but I did. Quite a bit.

Reverse Culture Shock - Let me charge you more.

Ah, the best laid plans of mice and moms. I thought I would have blogged more in the past few months. Well, let's try again, shall we?

We were in Australia for the holidays. Well, we left the UK on Christmas Eve (December 24) and arrived Boxing Day (December 26) in Sydney. We weren't delayed by the snow in the UK, we actually planned the trip that way. It was £100 cheaper per seat and it only postponed things by one day. Plus Santa managed to land on the wing of the plane and drop off a couple of presents for the kids while they were sleeping. Pretty good flying I thought.

But let me get back to my post. We had a great time in Australia, both Sydney and Perth, seeing family and friends. No floods or cyclones where we were, thankfully, just wonderfully warm and sunny weather.

Just a couple of things bothered me about Australia. Any time I had been to Australia before, there was never any tipping. This time, I saw plenty of change boxes at the tills of coffee shops and spaces left on your bill in restaurants for a tip. A friend said he figured this was still limited to just big cities, but I didn't really have a chance to check. I think it would be sad if Australia becomes a tipping country. I tip where it's normal to do so, but I wish it wasn't becoming normal to tip in Oz.

The other thing that really bothered me was having to pay a surcharge of 10-15% on Sundays and holidays in food establishments. Not everywhere did it, but it certainly wasn't a one off. Sure, they probably have to pay the staff more on those days - but do you know what? That shouldn't be my problem. Or at least, that shouldn't be my problem on those days, don't tell me your profit margin is so slim that on a holiday you are making a loss because of staff costs. As G pointed out, if you are open on holidays, you are probably getting more trade because not everywhere else is open, and your extra turnover should more than cover any extra costs. If I lived in Australia, I would make it a point to boycott anywhere that did that, and probably not just on Sundays, but permanent ban.

Anyways, just a short note for today. Now that I got that off my chest, I feel much better.

Halloween Hints for Beginners.

Halloween is starting to become bigger here in the UK and I thought I would share some ideas and tips for those who aren't used to doing anything for Halloween. I know the idea of Halloween started on this side of the Atlantic, but believe me, the other side in North America has truly expanded upon the concept.

1. Pumpkin. First, get yourself a pumpkin. Now is a good time to find one, about a week before Halloween. If you wait too close to the date, there are likely only badly-misshapen ones, too small ones or ones that have started to rot and have soft spots. You can get it even earlier as pumpkins store well. Keep it dry and cool and it should be no problem to last until October 31. Choose one that is big enough to get your hand into easily once you open it up for carving.

2. Carving. Carve your pumpkin! I love carving pumpkins and you can really be creative here. But, if you are new to it, it's best to stick to a basic pattern. Rather than write here how to carve a pumpkin into a jack o'lantern, I'll just link to a good article on pumpkin carving for beginners. Tips for carving: Don't try carving your pumpkin more than a couple of days before Halloween, as it will quickly spoil once it is cut. And get yourself a serrated blade to carve the pumpkin with, as it will make your carving MUCH simpler. Here's a complicated one that I did a couple of years ago. I put it here just to show off, please forgive me.

3. Costumes. The Brits seem to think that Halloween costumes need to be scary. I disagree. If we want to look at the tradition of Halloween and costumes to scare away spirits, I think it's just as good to confuse them by not being recognised because you are in costume, rather than scaring them. Especially for little kids, I think it's nicer not to necessarily have something covered in blood and guts and just something exciting for them to wear. Plus, it gives you a lot more room for creativity if you aren't limited to spiders, cats, witches and ghosts. But hey, if you have older kids who want to go for the knife through the head look, I say go for it.

This next point might out me as an old fuddy-duddy, but I think home-made costumes are waaaaaay cooler than store-bought outfits. Maybe it comes from when I was a kid, store costumes were either very expensive (ie, Mom and Dad wouldn't buy it) or really lame. By lame I mean they were a cheap plastic mask of a character and then a even cheaper plastic top similar to a garbage bag in material with more printing of the character.

See what I mean? Do you want your kids to be seen in the 2010's equivalent? No. Make your own costume. Sure, buy bits and pieces to put it together but don't just buy a costume. Last year my daughter wore a red dress and had a mask of Peppa Pig and she looked perfect. This year, she wants to be a hula girl, so it's a skirt made of grass or ribbons (which ever I organise) and a lei and a flower in her hair. Done. Honestly, please leave a comment and ask for an idea if you are stuck rather than buy a costume. I'll do my best to come up with something for you.

Tips for costumes: If you are planning on going trick or treating in the costume, try and make it big enough to fit over a jacket. Not much point putting lots of effort into your costume and then have it covered by your winter parka. Or at least wear enough layers under the costume that you can keep your jacket open in front for people to see it.

4. Trick or Treating. I like trick or treating. When I was a kid I loved going to people's houses and getting the candy, but I also loved showing off my costume and seeing people's reactions. Now I enjoy the kids coming to my door and seeing their costumes. I feel seeing their efforts at dressing up is more than fair reward for a couple of cheap sweets. I don't feel it's begging at all; they entertain me and I give them a sweet in return.

Tips for trick or treating: For anyone less than 13 or so, I would recommend going with an adult. Depending on age, the adult in question can either come up to the door with the child or hang around on the sidewalk, trying not to embarrass the child with their existence. We would usually go around with the other kids who lived near us. It makes life easier for the people you visit too, as they can get a bunch of kids at once rather than one or two every minute. Back in Canada I would go to any house that had its lights on. Here, I would recommend just going to the houses that have jack o'lanterns in their window or on their steps. Since Halloween still isn't done by everyone, there's no need to tick off people by pushing Halloween onto them. So if you are willing to hand out candy to the kids, see points 1 and 2 above!!

The littler the child, the earlier you can start going out. I think that 5:30pm should be the earliest you start, with between 6 and 7:30pm being the ideal time to go. 9pm should be the absolute latest you knock on anyone's door, so plan your strategy from there.

We used to use pillow cases for collecting the treats. Strong, yet light for carrying. Slightly classier than a Tesco bag too.

5. At the end of the evening. Once you are done trick or treating, have an adult go through the candy. There are plenty of urban legends about terrible things people have given out for Halloween, but I don't know of any documented cases. Still, it doesn't hurt to have a quick look over to make sure there aren't any items like a lollipop that has lost its wrapper or a box of raisins that has popped open, both collecting more dust and detritus than is prudent to eat. If you are accepting people for Halloween and you are done for the evening, let people know by putting the light out in your pumpkin, taking it out of the window and turning off your front light.

I hope these tips and ideas will help some of you out there enjoy Halloween here in Britain. Happy Halloween and spooky good time to all!

Red Tape at its Finest - The DVLA

I'm feeling a lot of anger towards the DVLA today. DVLA stands for Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency. They are the people who issue UK driver licenses. And they are useless.

I'm finally changing my Canadian license to a UK one. This should have been done a few years ago according to my insurance and they are a bit ticked off it wasn't done before. Ticked off enough to strike me off our car insurance policy until it's changed. So no driving for me until this is all done.

Okay, no big deal, just send in all my paperwork and my Canadian license and my passport. Within 15 working days, I should get my new license back. Of course, there will be the problem that the DVLA say that Canadian licenses don't specify if I can drive a manual transmission, so it will likely say that I'm only allowed to drive an automatic. Never mind the fact that Albertan licenses DO in fact have a classification for people who can only drive an automatic on them, that doesn't count according to the DVLA. I don't know what they want - to have sat with me when I did my test in a tiny manual hatchback that wintery afternoon of 1987? Of course neither of our cars is automatic, just like 84% of the cars on the road in the UK.

So I go and spend loads of money on sending all the documents special delivery and also enclose another prepaid special delivery envelope to get my passport back in (as they send that before the license is ready). This week there was a special delivery for me but I wasn't in to get it. I figured it was my passport but it had to wait until G was back from his business trip so he could chauffeur me over to the main post office in Maidenhead to pick it up.

I went to pick it up today and see that it wasn't just my passport, it was ALL of my documents. Apparently, I forgot to tick one box. The box that asks if I need corrective lenses to read a number plate (license plate) from 20.5 metres away. I left that blank for two reasons. One, on the form, it says if you already have a license, don't bother to fill that out. Their own form says to leave it blank! Two, if they had bothered to look at my Canadian license, they would see that I do have that classification requiring corrective lenses. But noooooooooo, that might mean they would also see that I'm not limited to the classification of driving only an automatic!

What really gets on my nerves, is they ask you for your phone number and email in case there are any "problems" with your paperwork. If this was not a case for contacting me, I don't know what would be?!?!

I am so steaming about this. So bloody blinkered and useless to be unable to contact me to ask me. Instead send it all the way back to me so I can once again pay loads of money to send it to you registered mail and be even longer without the ability to drive safely insured. Twats. Twatty twatty twattery to top all twattery.

End of Summer Update

I can't believe I haven't posted in 3 months. Twenty lashes with a wet noodle for that. Well, the World Cup came and went, with all 3 teams I was willing to cheer for going out. May, June and July saw absolutely gorgeous weather here in southern England, which makes me not exactly happy with the lousy cold and damp August, but more willing to forgive and forget it. We had a very nice "staycation" for a week here, with day trips to local activities. It was really nice actually, especially since anything longer than a 3 day weekend usually means we are travelling far and away. It was pleasant to not have to pack like we were off to invade Russia, with every piece of equipment under the sun and provisions to feed the invading (colonial, natch) army. Oh, and I should give you a pictorial update of the allotment, including my marvellous pumpkin. Soon, soon.

I should hopefully be posting more in the next month or so. It will be a bit of a departure from my usual Colonial-based posts. I plan to take part in the 6 Items or Less Experiment (part deux) when it gets started here in a couple of weeks. In fact, I'm so keen on this idea, I might not even wait until they officially start it, but as I have a couple of things to get done before the experiment starts, I may indeed wait. More on that in the coming days and weeks...

In the meantime, I will leave you with one passing question more related to regular subject of my blog - understanding cultural differences. This time pop culture.

Why is it one of my favourite UK shows, Dr. Who, only does 12 episodes a season, but all of my favourite US shows, House, Modern Family, Glee, do over 20? Actually, there have been lots of UK "shows" that did a total of 6 episodes. I would call that a long mini-series rather than an actual season run. One of the shows I liked, Sherlock, ran for all of 3 episodes!! You know when they are doing another run? Next year, for 3 more!
Grumble grumble, complain complain.

General Update

No big news today, just a quick note.

It seems I have missed one of the main events of the Cookham social calendar. Let's Rock the Moor is happening as I type this. I thought it was free in the afternoon, only costing in the evening. This was incorrect and you need tickets for the whole thing. By the time I realised this, they were sold out. It was starting to become embarrassing, with everyone I met asking me if I was going. So, no I didn't go.

The weather has been fantastic this week. Today saw the first use of the paddling pool this season and Mitchell's first ever go in it. I'm very pleased with my 6 pound pool; I didn't think it would last one summer, but this is the start of its third. Both Lena and Mitchell really enjoyed their splash around this afternoon, as you can hopefully tell from these pictures.

Now I have to leave you and get back to the football. Bayern Munich is in the final of the Champions League and I do have a soft spot for them in big games. 1860 is my team of choice for Munich, but you don't see much of them on the international circuit. Which reminds me, I have to decide who to cheer for in the World Cup. Australia, Germany or England?

Election Day

Today is the general election in the United Kingdom. It's the first time EVER that I have been living in a country and allowed to vote in the election, which actually made it a bit exciting for me. In case you are wondering, all Commonwealth citizens residing in the UK are allowed to vote. So both colonials in this house have voted.

I had just moved to Germany when the first election happened in Canada in which I was old enough to vote (the previous one I was 17). Since then, I've not lived in Canada and therefore even the times I voted, it didn't seem to make much impact. Living in Germany as a foreigner, I was not allowed to vote, which really cheesed me off. Taxation without representation! They kindly allowed me to use the roads and public transport and all those other things my taxes went to, but it still felt unfair. So today is quite a remarkable day for me in exercising my part in the democratic process.

I won't tell you who I voted for because part of the great stuff in this democracy is that I don't have to tell you. I will tell you that I found it extremely odd that waving my polling card was enough to ID me at the polling station. What if I had dropped it on the way and someone found it and decided to use it? What if someone had stolen it? Sure, it's only one vote, but it's MY vote and only I should be allowed to use it. Why don't I have to prove who I am?

I was excited as I went out this morning to vote, but it was also coming from other people. There definitely a slight feeling of excitement around. I'm not sure anything will change around here, we are in a pretty solid Conservative seating (hee hee, I'm glad I checked that link and didn't just guess at it, since there is also a Teresa May), but the Liberal Democrats have been gaining momentum so it could be interesting results. And just so he doesn't feel left out, the Labour candidate link too. Whatever the result here and overall in the UK, I am very happy I have finally had the chance to exercise my vote. You may consider it a right, but speaking from experience and from knowledge of the many undemocratic places on the planet, it's most certainly also a privilege. Go out and use it.

Taking Part

I have been thinking about the subject of this blog post for a few days now and it's rumbled around long enough that I felt the need to put it down on paper. Well, not paper, on electrons perhaps is more accurate. Please bear with me while I give you some background information.

When I first moved to Munich, I ended up joining a Bavarian oom-pah-pah band. I was a member of the Pullacher Blasmusik, the local wind band for the town of Pullach. It was such a fantastic experience, I could write for hours (and probably bore some of you to tears) about why I enjoyed it so much. I played with them for all 13 years I lived in Munich. They were the only group I actually cried saying goodbye to at the end of our stay in Germany.

The reason I mention this is because if I moved to Munich for the first time today, it would be highly unlikely that I would join them. When I first moved to Munich in 1993, I found the band by putting an ad in the local free ads paper, saying I was looking to join a band. Nowadays, every one would fire up their computers and do a search. And for Germany, English speakers searching the web will probably come across the extremely useful and informative website of Toytown Germany. I am still a member of the forums there and they are goldmine to anyone moving to Germany. Not just for information about the place, but as a friendly place to ask the questions you don't know who else to ask. Like why do Germans stare at me? Or is it strange that I saw a woman in her 70s having beer with her breakfast the other day? And it's a great way as a new expat to meet other expats. Lots of them plan organised events and in Munich, they have even formed the TT Orchestra and Singers.

So if I moved to Munich now, I would probably have joined the TT Orchestra, assuming they would have me. Why? Because they would have been easy to find. Because they would speak English and when I first moved to Germany I didn't speak any German. Because when I first moved, I only planned to stay a year, so an expat band would have been easy to get to know people and less intimidating than joining a German-speaking (or Bavarian speaking!) band. But I am so glad they weren't around and I didn't join them.

Now don't get me wrong please, especially my friends who are in the TT Orchestra. I think you guys are great for forming and you sound like you are really taking off and doing fantastic things. Things I would certainly have enjoyed. But I would have missed out on so many other things by not playing with a local band. I went to Ukraine and France on tours with Pullacher Blasmusik and Pullach representatives. Because of PuBla, as we affectionately called the band, I learnt not just German, but Bavarian. This is a dialect of German that other Germans might not be impressed that I know, but most Bavarians certainly were. Probably the majority of my German friends came via the band. Being in the band gave me a good advantage when I applied for a job offered by the Pullach local authority. I even got together with my husband by convincing him to come along and join the band.

I moved to and stayed in Germany to get to know the country and the language, and playing in an expat band would not have done much towards that goal. I lived in much of an expat bubble as it was, with most of my friends being other people from countries other than Germany. PuBla was my best and strongest connection to the country I actually lived in and I'm forever grateful for having made that connection.

I know not everyone is in a foreign country to be part of that foreign culture. But even if you are there purely for work or for family, I think your experience is improved by trying to take part in the local (no longer foreign) culture. You aren't still at home, so you should try somewhat to make where you are home. Who better to help you feel at home than the people who are from there to do it?

I'm not saying that where ever you are, you should "go native". Be yourself and be proud of where you come from. But also accept you are in a different place now and try and be proud of that place too. You chose to live there so you should enjoy there. You don't have to join a local band to do that, it could be a local sports team, an art group, volunteering at a retirement home, whatever. It could be simply hanging out at the local cafe and starting conversation with the people there. It doesn't matter what it is, just take part in the world around you. Trust me, it's good thing to do.

See the Light

I blogged a few months ago about how it's dark too early in the evening in the UK and also too bright early in the day. Finally, there is an organised group who agree with me and I am only too happy to lend my little blog space to shout their praises.

http://www.lighterlater.org/ is a campaign to push British time back one hour, throughout the year. Meaning going onto the equivalent of central European time for all intensive purposes. More people would use and enjoy an extra hour of light in the evenings than get use out of it in the mornings and the organisers (10:10UK) have calculated that nearly half a million tonnes of CO2 would be saved per year by all the lights that wouldn't need to be turned on so early in the evening. Plus, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (I will admit, I laughed at the name the first time too) says it will save 100 lives a year, mainly road accidents that occur in the gloomy evenings driving home from work.

I encourage everyone to sign up to try and get the UK to spring forward another hour. It hardly costs anything, would save money, lives and the planet. Is that a deal or what?

The Game

It's 2 weeks until the 2010 Winter Olympics start in Vancouver, Canada. Thanks to my friend Cristy for showing me this ad which really captures a bit of Canadiana. Even my Canadian friends who aren't sports fans will understand this ad.

For me, this really captures how I sometimes feel about hockey. Nowadays, living away from Canada, I don't get to watch much hockey. I did have a very exciting time a few years ago in 2006 when we went back to Canada for a visit. We were in Vancouver visiting my relatives out there and were supposed to be driving back to Edmonton on the day of the Stanley Cup final (that's the big trophy for winning the league, in case you don't know). The Edmonton Oilers were playing in the final, the first time in well over a decade they were there. Leaving on the day of the final was a problem for me. I was afraid we would be driving somewhere through the mountains, miles from anywhere with reception of the game and that I would miss the FINAL game. Have you ever seen Rainman? When Dustin Hoffman's character, Raymond is afraid he is going to miss Judge Wapner on TV? That was sort of my behaviour. So instead we stayed an extra day on the coast simply so I could see the game. They sadly lost, but I still was happier having seen it than not.

Hockey is the only sport where if the Oilers, my home town team, or Canada are playing, I actually truly care what the result is. I love soccer/football, I think it's a beautiful game and I enjoy watching it. But I don't have a team; G teases me that I cheer for the referee. Which is probably about accurate, I like watching a good game, I'm not interested in the result so much. Sure, I can and do pick a team to cheer for, but it's not like I feel cheering during hockey. Nor is it the same cheering. Hockey is the game that makes me shout at an inanimate TV screen. Hockey is the game that can make me jump up and down in a pub full of people, screaming and pumping my fist. Hockey is the only game where I feel if my team wins, I have won too.

So here's wishing all the Canadian teams good luck in the upcoming Olympics. Along with millions of other Canadians, we will be watching, waiting to be able to shout, "He shoots, he SCOOOOOOOOORES!!!!!!!!!!"

Michelin Star for The Royal Oak

I just noticed that The Royal Oak, Paley Street has received a Michelin Star in today's new Michelin guide. Congratulations to them, that is great news. I'm guessing the reviewer didn't eat there the same day I did, as I had a slightly different review of The Royal Oak, but it pleases me that it seems my experience there was very much a one-off. I'll be happy to go back at some point.

What's Gender got to do with it?

(singing the title of this post to a Tina Turner tune...)

Just a short little comment about some of the inherent sexism there is around raising children that I've noticed in the UK. It's all about Mummy. Some many groups for young children and adults to go to are called "Mums and Toddlers" or a variation of that, but not varying on the Mum or Mother bit. Yes, I would agree that mothers are still probably the majority of adults taking children to school, playgroups and classes, but it bugs me. If I was a dad, it would really bug me. There's currently an ad on TV for a margarine where the TV celebrity chef (who by the way, must have sold his soul to advertise for a margarine) tells us how "Mums can collect the tokens" to help with purchasing cooking equipment for schools. Why? Why just Mums? Are Dads considered too incompetent and scatter-brained to be able to collect margarine tokens? Are female parental units the only ones watching that TV ad? I think it's nuts that it gets away with that.

I've currently taken on a leadership position in a group that defines itself using the word Mum in the title. As it most definitely isn't just for mothers, high on my to-do list is to slowly bring about a change in the name. I will still be leaving out a great number of adult carers by changing the Mum to Parent, but at least I will feel we are on the way.

Some may think I'm being petty or silly, but words are powerful things. By naming something with the gender-specific title like "Moms and Tots" or "Dads and Lads", you passively ostracize half of the population, even if that wasn't your intention and even both parents are welcome. I think by using a more inclusive term, people are more likely to feel included. That certainly is my hope at least.

Spot the Canadian

Back in February, I blogged about snow in a mild climate. Well it has snowed again here in southern England and once again there is chaos on the roads. I will cut slightly more slack for yesterday, when it rained in the afternoon which slowly turned to snow as the temperature dropped. That, on top of the snow that has been around since Friday made for very slippery conditions. People in the nearby towns abandoned their cars and walked the couple of miles back home, rather than spending another several hours in stopped traffic. I've read accounts of people taking over an hour to move 200 metres down the road and four hours sitting at the bottom of a hill with plenty of others stuck in their cars for company.

Once again, I was one of only two people who cleaned off our sidewalk. It surprises me how ingrained it is into me to shovel off the snow, but it is. The only other person I saw removing the snow last week? A woman sweeping the snow away from the front of the pharmacy. She used to live in Germany, so once again the old connection pops up (read my other blog post if you don't know what I mean). As I'm the only house that has clean sidewalk, if you live in Cookham, it might be fairly easy today to spot the house where I live, hence spot the Canadian.

I know when I walk down a snowy street I find myself alternately thanking and cursing the owners of the house I was walking past, depending on whether they have bothered to clear their sidewalks. I'm not bothering to curse at anyone, but I am feeling slightly smug, thinking that people might be inwardly thanking me for my consideration of them. They may be thinking I'm a fool to have bothered, but I will continue to take pride in having a cleared sidewalk. As long as it remains a novelty of once or twice a year at least!

Dark and Light

There's several things that I don't understand about the UK, but the one that plagues me the most is why they insist on being in a different zone than most of the rest of Europe. Right now it's 4:30pm here and with the rain, it's horribly, horribly dark and depressing. If it was 5:30pm, like it is in France and Spain, due south of here, it might be almost tolerable. But no, being an hour later means the sun sets an hour earlier.

Actually, it's in summer that this bothers me the most. On June 21st, the longest day of the year, the sun rises in Dover at the excruciatingly early hour of 4:36am. In Calais, a mere 34 km to the south-east and for the purposes of my rant, close enough in longitude and latitude to be the same, it rises at 5:35. Does this seem fair? Birds and small children don't understand clocks, they understand the sun is up and therefore you (that is, ME) should be up as well. Nearly all of Great Britain is in longitude line with France and Spain, which both use Central European time. Why doesn't Great Britain? WHY? Why make such extraordinarily early sunrises in summer and early sunsets in the winter? It's hardly like this country gets moving at the crack of dawn.

Mission plan

We have a mission. We have the attack clones, now we have our mission. We've decided while we are here in Britain, to try and spend the holidays that take place in this country visiting the various British major island groups. So far we have been to the Isle of Wight and to the Inner Hebrides; specifically, the Isle of Mull. That takes care of two of them. What do we have left? Well, the Outer Hebrides obviously, the Shetland Islands, and the Orkney Islands in Scotland for a start. If we get through all of those, we can start to work on all the little "Firth" groups up there. The Isles of Scilly and the Islands of Furness in England. Anglesey in Wales and then the separate islands of the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands. Oh, a visit to Northern Ireland too. I think I've covered the major ones, because there are thousands of little islands around the British Isles. But if I've left something out, please let me know. I am after all, an uncivilzed colonial who doesn't know any better and I will need to add any missed ones to the list.

Why the mission? Because I think it's a good way to get to know the country we are living in. We might be here for just another few years, we might end up spending the rest of our days here, but either way, I wouldn't like it if at the end, I couldn't say I had seen a variety of places around the country. Our families live far away, so that will always slow us down from exploring locally, but local exploration does need to be done.

So if you have any great tips or ideas of when to visit any of these places, where to stay or the address of your great-aunt Bessie who would love to have cake and tea with us while we are visiting near her, let me know. The mission has started.

The 2nd Invasion Force

Sorry I was so quiet over the summer. It was a busy time, with lots of long-term visitors and also the birth of our next clone/colonial, Mitchell. He's a wonderful little guy and I will post some recent pictures in the next day or two, but I'm guessing most readers of this blog will have seen pictures of him already, hence my lack of urgency about this.

I have lots of ideas for new posts, so assuming I can find some time, you should see semi-regular updates from me. Today I'll just leave you with something that local readers of the blog might find interesting. The Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead (I do get a kick out of living somewhere "royal", even if no one issued me with a crown when I moved here) is hip and up-to-date with the latest technology. They have two Twitter feeds; one for events: http://twitter.com/rbwm_events and one for the borough: http://twitter.com/RBWM. I've just signed up to them, so their usefulness has yet to be proven. None the less, I think it's a great idea.

Even better than Twitter feeds though, is the Cookham page on Facebook. http://www.facebook.com/pages/Cookham/116477699826. It's of course not working for me right now, but it's probably a temporary Facebook glitch. This has been a good source of info about things in Cookham, along with the excellent website they already have and which you can find by following the link in the right column.

So with this short post I hope to be back to blogging. Hope to see you here again soon.

A Package to the Future

We are redoing the floors in our house, replacing the carpet with new floor boards. G and his dad found a few pages of newspaper under the boards in the living room dated May 31, 1974. It's from the Maidenhead Advertiser, the local once a week paper. The pages are quite interesting. Let me quote you one of the ads of a house for sale: 

"COOKHAM DEAN: This charming semi-detached cottage is situated on high ground ina semi rual area, overlooking orchards. Complete renovation has been carried out, including a new kitchen and a new bathroom. Two bedrooms, bathroom, lounge, dining room, modern fully fitted kitchen, ample space for a car, large gardens. Central heating. £15,000." Just so you know, a house described like that would now go for around £320,000 pounds today! 

The ads for help wanted are good too. They advertise specifically by gender if they want, even listing a different salary, depending on whether you are male or female. An audio typist (female) with Black & Decker would have earned £26.34 per week. Part-time help at Marks and Spencer earned 52 pence an hour. They did have the benefit of a 3-course lunch for only 5p at least, amongst other things.

We thought it was kind of nifty to find these things, so we decided to make up a time capsule to put under the floor before we lay the new boards. I was pretty keen and eager with this and if we had had more time or thought of it earlier, I would have gotten all high-tech with the container and found lots of fun stuff to put into it. But the boards can't wait and we didn't think of it earlier, so what we have will have to do. Here's the letter I put into it, minus some personal details:

"April 28, 2009

 Dear Finder,

 I am writing to you from the past. How far in your past I can’t say, but past it definitely is. We are laying new floorboards in our house (address) and after finding bits of the past under the old boards, thought it would be a fun idea to leave some more history for others to find. I don’t know if it will be us to find it in 4 years, or some total others to find it 40 years. I just hope you enjoy the information and things we’ve provided for you to get a glimpse into our lives and the world of 2009.

 We are a 3, soon to be 4 person family. My name is A. I’m 37 years old and was born in Canada. My husband’s name is G. He’s 30 and was born in Australia. We met and married in Munich Germany when we were both living there and moved to the UK in October 2006. Our daughter is Lena and she is 2 years old. We have another child due at the end of July and I feel a bit sad that I can’t include any information about him (we were told it’s a boy after having my 20 week ultrasound scan). But the floors can’t wait until then to be finished.

A bit about what is happening in the world today. The main story of today is the start of a scare about swine flu. Over 100 people in Mexico City have died so far and cases have been confirmed in the U.S.A., Canada, the U.K., Israel and New Zealand, among others. So far, no one outside of Mexico has died of the flu, but the World Health Organisation has raised its pandemic threat level from 3 (where it has been for ages due to possible risk of bird flu for the past few years) to 4. The max is 6, which is global pandemic. I’m not worried yet, but I did pick up a few extra groceries and disinfecting hand gel today, just in case. When people in places other than Mexico start to die, then I will start to worry. The really potentially scary thing about this flu is that people from ages 20-50 have been the ones who have died, not the very young or old. That’s the age group who died in the 1918 pandemic, so it’s something I will be paying attention to for the next week or so.

Our hobbies right now include gardening, cricket, music and cooking. We love living in Cookham, as we find it is a peaceful village, quite different from the hustle and bustle of London. We often go for walks along the river, or up the hill to the pub, The Jolly Farmer, where we enjoy a pint or two and then head home.

I’ve included an inventory list on another piece of paper to help you identify some of the things in this time capsule. Please try and contact us when you find this, we would love to hear from you. Here are our contact details at the moment.

email addresses: a@gmail.com, g@gmail.com, l@gmail.com (no, Lena doesn’t write emails at the young age of 2, but depending on when this capsule is found, she might be a better contact for the future)

website: http://cloneattack.blogspot.com

I hope that’s enough to find us. Enjoy this little slice of history and good luck with your lives and future."

Included with the letter was the inventory list, a current picture of the 3 of us, the grocery order list from Tescos that was delivered today, the first few pages of The Daily Mail and a central bit about St. George’s Day, just past. (We aren’t regular readers of The Daily Mail, which is generally considered to be fairly right in politics and conservative in beliefs. More they had the best freebie giveaway out of the papers on the weekend. It has some information on the swine flu and some current sports news.) A brochure for Rebellion Beer Co. Our local microbrewery just across the river in Marlow Bottom. Some pages again from the current issue of The Maidenhead Advertiser, including the news from the Cookhams, house prices and some help wanted ads. And finally some coins. Some Aussie and Canadian ones since we are, and some British and Euro coins. We figure there's a good chance one of the last two won't exist anymore at some time in the future, so it could be worth something. 

It all got put into a box that arrived today in the mail from Munich (thanks for returning the books Inessa, you are far more efficient than I ever will be), then wrapped it in plastic and tucked it under the boards. Tomorrow it will be nailed in and within the next few days, sealed off until an unknown time in the future. Here's a picture of it just before it got put under the old boards. 

I'm actually pretty excited about this, and hope that it is eventually found and that we are all still around for the future finders to locate us. I'm in a good place in my life right now and to get a reminder of it at some point in the future is something to look forward to. 

Buried Treasure!

Today was rather exciting, as we found buried treasure in my garden! My father-in-law was helping me dig over the allotment and he found an old coin. The date on the coin is 1735, which makes it really old in my colonial eyes. I cleaned it up a bit to have a better look at it and as much as we can tell, it's not a British coin. Here's a couple of pictures of both sides.
You can see the date at the bottom of the coin, 1735. Above it looks like three letters, Η Γ Α. Above that looks like it's less clear, but looks like a fancy A, with the middle cross bar extending past the angled sides, followed by possibly an F. 

This side is far more difficult to decipher. We think the bit to the left of the corrosion at the top might be a bird head and neck, with a wing on the right side of it. But it might not be, it might be a scroll, it might be anything. This picture is actually pretty good, you aren't missing anything in the photo that we can see in person. 

So if anyone out there has ideas of what this coin might be, or where to research it more, please leave a comment! 

EDIT: Through the power of the internet and my supergoogling friend, Babs, we have found that the coin is a Russian Denga. Not worth a fortune, but an interesting find. What is even more interesting is to ponder how it ended up in an allotment plot in Cookham???