As you already know as common knowledge or if you have read my blog (because it comes up a lot in my other entries) that it rains a lot in the United Kingdom. From what I understand this is one of the rainiest years in a while too. So knowing all of this I found it rather entertaining the other day when I walked through the aisles at Tesco Extra (the store for everything possible that you could ever want) and found there to be an entire row dedicated to sunscreen, bronzer and after sun. The bronzer makes since because it’s a common trend in the UK to have a slight orange glow induced by spray tan or tanning creams but the sunscreen and after sun was a total surprise to me.  I understand that yes you can get UV radiation in cloudy whether too, but even in the hottest brightest summers in Canada you don’t usually see entire rows devoted to sun protection products and that is in a country that actually sees the sun more than 12 hours a week. It really confused me until I talked to my roommate about it and he said it was because people in the UK really like to go on vacation to warm places. TADA! Of course! That made sense to me. There are very few weeks that I don’t think at least once about how much I would prefer to be in a warm bright dry place. Even coming back to Canada to find snow on the ground and a brisk wind seemed like heaven because there was sun. I needed sunglasses! Back to the main point, I now understand the point of the mass quantities of sunscreen but I guess the traveler in me is curious as to how many bottles of sunscreen are abandoned at airport security because their owners forgot to pack them in their checked bags or maybe I’m the only one that buys things like that at the destination because I am not confident enough in my packing organization.

Free Cash!

I don't have any stories about cash machines, I just think it's funny that so many of them say "Free Cash" instead of "Free Cash Withdrawals."
I feel like that could get confusing.....

Everything that I have Learned about Leeks

In the fall I went to my first rugby game in Wales with my North American friend Sam (I swear she isn't my only friend here). Because it is the national sport of Wales we weren't sure what to expect but we knew whatever we saw would be awesome. We were like kids in a candy store. Thanks to the wonderful ticket lady, we had prime seating,beside the athletes tunnel to the field. We arrived in time to hear the anthem and see the welsh goat all dressed up and then saw Samoas Manu Siva Tau war dance. We didn't think it could get any better, but then out of the corner of our eyes we spotted them. Magical creatures. They had white heads with beards and a tall grassy hat. They looked like gnomes that just came out of hiding. I learn new things about Wales on a daily bases but this creature was beyond my understanding. I got the courage to ask the man beside me what these were. I swear to you I did not believe him when he told me his answer... "those are supposed to be leeks" what?!!? I didn't want to look like a newbie so I left my questions to that but I couldn't wrap my head around the fact that people dressed up as leeks in this country to support their rugby team. People do crazy things when they are in love with sports. The rest of the games events weren't important (Wales lost, Samoa did their chant again, we saw some British Olympians and we made new friends).

Naturally the first  thing I did when I got home was Google "leeks and Wales." It turns out not many people care to do research on leeks and all the information I got was from wikipedia  and a health food site but  the following is everything you need to know about leeks....

Leeks are from the same family as onions and garlic. Very little is known about their nutritional benefits but they are believed to be similar to that of garlic and onions (go figure). They may or may not have immune supportive properties as well and be an anti-inflammatory and have cardiovascular support (again who knows how accurate this all is). People like them because they are a fairly durable plant that can grow in Wales all year round. They eat the stalk which has a mild onion taste.

Still didn't answer my initial question about why there was a connection between leeks and Wales......

But then I found this.... Apparently there is a legend that King Cadwaladr, a British king, had ordered his soldiers to wear leeks on their helmets in battle to identify themselves against the Saxons. I'm not sure if you would have guessed this or not but the battle took place in a leek field. This was such a common legend that even the great Shakespeare wrote about wearing  leeks  on the head as an ancient tradition in Henry V.

Quote from Henry V:
"Your majesty says very true: if your majesties is
remembered of it, the Welshmen did good service in a
garden where leeks did grow, wearing leeks in their
Monmouth caps; which, your majesty know, to this
hour is an honourable badge of the service; and I do
believe your majesty takes no scorn to wear the leek
upon Saint Tavy's day."


Thought this could be your fun fact of the day.....

 




















To get a better view I got the help of: http://www.welshsuperstore.co.uk/

 

 

No yellow pee!

 

I forget how commentaries work but since I have been in Wales I have noticed a few ‘gender and sport’ issues. First off, I thought when coming here I would fit right in because I used to play rugby and it is the national sport of Wales. Whenever we have conversations about sports and what sports we like or what sports we play I always bring up the fact that I used to play rugby and every single time, no matter who I talk to, they give me funny looks. Apparently Rugby is not a “girls sport” and some boldly follow that up with “don’t you have to be fat (or big) to play rugby?” (for the record some of the best players on my high school rugby team were the small mighty girls ) I always ask “what are girls’ sports?” confused because so many of my girl friends growing up played rugby like me. The responses differ but usually it is football (soccer) or netball; for the tough girls, field hockey. I don’t believe that everyone in Wales has this same opinion, just those that I have talked to thus far.

 Our Optometry society plays 3 sports; an all-girls Netball team, an all-boys football team and a co-ed badminton team. I have recently started playing  Netball which I am still not fully sure of the rules but from what I understand it’s kind of like basketball but you don’t dribble, only 2 of your teammates are allowed to shoot at the net, and there is no backboard to bounce off of. It’s been really fun to learn how to play and as our team gets better, our plays are faster and we start to create strategies. I have also learned that since it is a “girls sport” many of the players wear a skort (for those who didn't have one of these lovely pieces of clothing in their grade 2 closet it is a half skirt half shorts). Last week we had our first game and I was off the first half because I had never played netball so another teammate was teaching me the rules and we started talking about one of her friends’ netball teams. She had mentioned that there was a boy on this team and he was forced to wear a skort because his coach wanted everyone to be uniform. I am not sure how this player felt about wearing the skort (I asked but the girl didn’t know) but it seemed kind of extreme to me.

I have since taken it upon myself to break gender stereotypes in small ways, for example I made all my flatmates watch the x-women in the CIS championship. If anyone can show that rugby can be played well by females it’s those lovely ladies.

Now that you have read my rant, you have probably realized that it has nothing to do with yellow pee. That was my rugby teams cheer. You have to be hydrated out there on the field.

Ugly Christmas Sweater? No, A Christmas Treasure...

Ugly Christmas sweater parties are a big trend in Canada/ North America, and why not? Ugly Christmas sweaters are awesome! They are everyone's guilty pleasure! Its the one party theme that everyone dresses up for. Why? My  theory is because everyone wishes they could wear them all the time..... If this is true for you, then Christmas in Wales is the place for you! I have seen the transformation from September to Christmas season (there is very little in between, when September is over they start selling Christmas stuff). Christmas sweaters enter the stores beginning of December and are sold out within a week, and that's when the awesomeness begins... ugly Christmas sweaters everywhere- but here they are not ugly, they are beautiful and edgy and stylish. Big Reindeer, Snowmen, Penguins, Snowflakes; the whole lot of Christmas characters on display everywhere. And these are not jokes. People pay up to 40 pounds (64 Canadian Dollars at the moment) for some of these things that in Canada you find at Value village for $1.25.  I am wearing a reindeer right now (although mine did not cost nearly as much) as I type this in a Starbucks (the only coffee shop open until 8 on a Saturday) and I fit in. Way to go Wales for being awesome.

Caution: Confused Canadian Crossing the Street

Since I was a child, I was always taught to look both ways before crossing the street; I used to be one of the several "traffic guards" in elementary school ( we got to go to the movies at the end of term if we were crossing guards). I kind of think of myself as an expert in the "crossing the street" department- or so I thought....  Traffic here is scary.....In Heidelberg Ontario there was no traffic, so to start this one lets back up to my time in small town Nova Scotia. If you even LOOKED at the road, people would stop for you JUST IN CASE you decided that you wanted to walk across the street. I always thought that was funny but I loved the fact that pedestrians owned the town. You almost got to places faster by walking then by driving. Then I moved to to big town  Nova Scotia and drivers would stop for you but not always instantaneously, they were more likely to stop if you were at a cross-walk. Now I live in big city Wales and I have stepped back into my childhood self, waiting for my parents (my classmates) to tell me when it's safe to cross the street and I am not ashamed to ask for the help!
The cars here will not stop for you. If you are in the way they will honk and hope that makes you move fast enough  that they wont have to slow down. There are blinking crosswalks here but many of them take a long time to change and even when they do, unless you are standing right at the edge, drivers ignore the fact that its not their turn to go.
I went into lab the other day and on my way into the classroom and was making small chat with my lab instructor. This is how that conversation went:
"How was your weekend?"
"Boring I did a lot of work- how about you?"
"Not good actually, I got hit by a car."
What! The rest of the story was what you would expect of a story of a person on a bike being hit by a car, however the added extra was that the car driver didn't stop and yelled out the window with some profanity that it was not his fault (by the sounds of it, it was). I should mention at this point that my lab instructor was OK. His bike was not. Point of story; when visiting Cardiff walk with the locals until you catch on and always wear a helmet when biking. Lets just say I am happy to know I have a health plan and some patient classmates.

Being Brutally honest

If my uncle taught me anything (of significant importance) that stuck with me then it would be the lesson to be brutally honest. Usually put in the context that when someone is being ridiculous you call them out on it, but could be used for many other examples. I got together with my North American friend Sam the other day and I was telling her that I had started to write a blog and we started talking about what she found unusual and interesting and we both agreed that people from the UK are generally pretty blunt and brutally honest.
If you do something wrong, they will tell you; if they need to give you bad news they will not sugar coat it. It's not them being mean, it's them being honest.
Sam and I were exchanging stories of this when she came up with  a very surprising one. As far as I am aware Sam has been on two big trips involving train transportation and both times her trains have been delayed. The first time it was because the train before hers was stopped because someone was on the tracks. The second time they actually announced over the sound system that they had to stop because there was "a suicidal man on the tracks". It amazed us both because if this situation were to happen in North America it would be announced as "technical difficulties" and then we would wait wondering what possibly broke down and then "the technical difficulty is solved" and  you are on your way wondering if this technical difficulty is really solved or if your bus/train/plane is near the end of its life ready to be sent to Nigeria (that's where my vehicles go to die).
When talking to my Welsh and English friends they have all confirmed that this is not abnormal to hear, and most likely all think our "technical difficulties" doesn't make sense (which it doesn't). This way I feel like I am involved in everyones train gossip, maybe next time they will announce who's having a child or who got fired from their job and why. Who needs TV when you have a train.