Primeval

Foothills of Ben Nevis, Scotland

Sunny day, warm enough not to be cold, not a soul around. We hiked through a series of mountain biking trails and managed forest before we wandered off the beaten path.

I am Dorothy.

We're back from an excellent holiday (vacation). And whilst I download photos and sort through memories to share with you, I thought I'd respond to a few requests about what life is like here for me in Britain...

For the most part, life here is pretty normal and I am at home. I do regular things, and don't even notice that I live outside of the States. Sometimes though, I glance about and notice something that just isn't right, but not necessarily wrong, for example, this image from my desk. If you take a look at it (and you can point and click on it to make it bigger), you'll notice that there are elements of my life that are just not part of yours.

Here is what you're looking at, umm, with some British spellings:

- First off, there's our chequebook. A little longer than my American one (both in spelling and measurement) and linked to an internet-only bank with customer service based outside of Glasgow.

- My Fulbourn Garden Society membership card good until the Annual Flower Show in the summer, where we'll see a summer cornucopia that could be described using every adjective.

- My British First Aid Course certificate. Alastair and I became certified last January, and although we learned the mechanics of resuscitation, we were encouraged to do the most important act in a moment of crisis: to offer a cup of tea. Apparently, even the thought of a cuppa will return any Brit from the brink of death.

- Next up is an invoice from the Cambridge Organic Food Company which delivers our vegetable box, which we hopefully will not need with this summer when our garden will be in full swing.

- A birthday card for a friend.

- The flowered paper is a gift certficate to Boden's, the equivalent to Banana Republic or J. Crew.

- Alastair and I do not have deadlines with the IRS at this point, we are only beholden to Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs.

- Botisham Brasserie menu is our local curry take-away. This is our closest take home option as well as ethnic food, if I don't count British pub food and fish & chips (isn't that ethnic?).

- Finally, The Mill is the green booklet which serves as our entertaining monthly village magazine, which includes regular columns from our green grocer about his recent avian sightings, the local vicar, a village expat moved to London, and sometimes even entries from lil'me.

So, when looking at this image, I can feel pretty British. But at other times, I'm far from it. For example, recently, Gordon Brown, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and a likely suspect when it comes to who will replace Tony Blair, has been expressing his views of what it means to be British. Yesterday was particularly interesting as he spoke of Britishness and his interest to add yet another element to the increasingly complicated process of obtaining British citizenship, something I'm in the process of doing. Brown believes that community service would be an excellent way for immigrants (hmm, that would be me) to develop a better sense of this country. This is in addition to the required ability to speak English (his idea, too) and pass a citizenship exam. Having done a load of volunteering, I have quite a few opinions on this, but that will just have be another post.

At other times, I'm home but in a foreign land and it is glaring at me, like last night at the grocery store where I passed Weight Watcher's new slogan: Top Up Your Gorgeousness. Now, perhaps Britain has obtained world domination and you, too, have this slogan ... but I'll bet you don't. This phrase is the epitome of Britishness. (Maybe Gordon Brown should join Weight Watchers.) Top Up is a very popular phrase used primarily for refilling a cellular phone pay-as-you-go card but now one can top up anything. And, Gorgeous, well, if you've spent any time in Britain you will know it is a wonderful exclamation and quite a popular adjective.

So, I guess I'm not in Kansas anymore.

Children of the Second World War

Back in February, I took advantage of the former church centre premises and held an exhibit of some work done by the local primary school in partnership with our village nursing home. I had done some mask work with both communities last year and was invited to a small party showing of the work at the nursing home. Apparently, this year's school curricula are examining the Second World War and with some funding from the national Heritage Lottery fund, the local city government, and the Cambridge Film Consortium, a local dramatic group got together a group of students to interview home residents who were children of the WWII. The results were shown at the party. The results were so evocative that I asked if I could show it in the then vacant space on the main street in town. Working with the local history society and the coordinators of the project, we came up with a strong exhibit of resident quotes and student interpretations, along with some visual aids in the form of artefacts such as rations cards, gas masks, flags, and music.

For the following five days, I hosted the public exhibit, which means that I know every word of the ten minute loop of film footage including songs, classroom exercises and interviews. I think I dreamt about eating a potato sandwich one night, which was Elsie's 14 year old memory: 'You've never lived until you've eaten a potato sandwich'. And, poor Alastair's grew quite tired of hearing me hum a tune sung by a very special home resident who's 102 this August. (By the way, did you know that every British citizen who lives to 100 receives a telegram from the Queen herself?)

I think we have all heard the memories of our parents or grandparents as they experienced blackouts and food shortages in the States. I certainly remember my grandmother talking about them. What I didn't know until moving here was that Britain suffered severe shortages due for primarily to its geography. It's deeply woven into the nation's memory. Frugality, which can be the bane of my existence at times, has reared its head on a number of occasions be it with food, books, even broken things. I wonder how much of that is a reflex of muscle memory born in survival, just like the reflex to avoid flame.

As an island, Britain had fewer land resources to rely upon than we did in the States. This was complicated even more by the supply ships not making it through to British ports. As a result of the depression and these shortages, health was poor and the Ministry of Food issued
daily milk ration to children in schools and heavily purported the benefits of cod liver oil, rosehip syrup and concentrated orange juice, which by the way isn't available in the stores here like it is in the States today. Several of the visitors to the exhibit shared memories of collecting rose hips here in East Anglia to sell to the government as a way to help their family's income and support of the nation's war efforts

Other memories were from the children who were evacuated from London to protect them from bombings. These children were sent by train or bus to rural areas where they were housed until it was safe to return, sometimes being evacuated twice. One woman told of six children to a bed, three at the top and three at the bottom.

Women were tasked not only to work in factories but to work on the farm, as the men who weren't fighting in the war were volunteering for Local Defence Volunteer Corps (Dad's army), the women house evacuated children, and made do with the weekly rations and creative exchanges of clothing, preserves, and any foodstuffs grown or raised.

A adult weekly ration consisted of something like:

Butter: 50g (2oz)	Bacon and ham: 100g (4oz)	Margarine: 100g (4oz)
Sugar: 225g (8oz ).	Meat: To the value of 1s.2d (one shilling and sixpence per week. That is about 6p today)	Milk: 3 pints(1800ml) occasionally dropping to 2 pints (1200ml).
Cheese: 2oz (50g)	Eggs: 1 fresh egg a week.	Tea: 50g (2oz).
Jam: 450g (1lb) every two months.	Dried eggs 1 packet every four weeks.	Sweets: 350g(12oz) every four weeks

But, there were no guarantees that the stores had all this available at once. At some point, it was encouraged to return stale bread to the butcher so pigs could eat it. Clothing was also rationed and a motto of 'Make do and mend.' is well known. The clothing factories and employees were employed for munitions.

Meanwhile, something mentioned often was that there was a sense of hope that this would pass. This rang true for me as I put two and two together: On V Day, now known as VE Day (Victory in Europe) to distinguish it from VJ (...Japan) Day, street parties brought everyone out to share whatever might have been stashed away for a celebration, for example tins of fruit. If people didn't think they were going to make it, why save something special for the future?

One of the most moving parts of the exhibit was a point brought to my attention by a woman who was an infant in the war. She had no real memories of the war only the years following. She noted that the generation who were children or teenagers in the war will soon be unable to remind us of this time, that it will be lost to the history books and that this would be a great loss for Britain and the world.

Fish, Fresh Fish!

Thank goodness, our postperson cycles right to our door or I think she would curse our very house for all of the times she has to balance a package in her front basket. Deliveries are a treat here, whether from far afield or just up the road. It's a wonderful way to feel like it's Christmas anytime of year. Usually, for me, expecting a delivery is exciting and well worth whatever tedious schedule of waiting that prefaces it. Not long ago, however I earned my delivery. It was grueling! A grey day without any indication of what time it is, I worked at home staying close to the door so as to not miss the knock, knock, knock of 11 kilograms (24.25 pounds) of fresh and smoked fish. That's right, fish!

I ordered via the internet from lands a wee bit North: a 3.1kg fresh salmon, 3kg of smoked haddock, 3 kg of kippers and the odd bag of fresh haddock bits for delivery on the date of my choosing, which was quickly x'd out of existence knowing that I would have to wait around for it.

The goal for all of this fish was to prepare and freeze all of it for future consumption and avoid the dreaded fishmonger at our local supermarket. When I say 'all of it', that's exactly what I mean: no waste. What's the point when I have control, right?

The salmon arrived bright-eyed and without a hint of fishiness. With the kitchen prepared the night before and our knives freshly sharpened by 'You know who'. (You can confirm this by checking for hair on the back of his hand.) After a diligent descaling akin to a good aerobic workout at the gym, I think I managed to get fish scales everywhere including the ceiling, but that's half the fun, right? After descaling, I made six steaks and filleted the rest making 12 good-sized fillets with skins on, each will be happily cooked in its own juices and laced with shallots, capers and lemon juice, which everyone who's visited us will be familiar. After the steaks and fillets, I was left with a back bone, head and tail which were dropped into the soup pot to make 3 litres of concentrated fish stock. Afterwards, the meat off the bones was refrigerated to spoil Squeak silly. Phew!

After that, the rest of the fish was removed from the iced boxes, wrapped into individual serving sizes and put in our deep freeze for the future. Breakfasts of smoked kipper, kedgeree and fish pie come to mind post haste.

What do you see?

Those are Alastair's bicycle tracks on his way to work last week.

Yes, it snowed. I feel like I'm back in the club again, since we haven't seen snow in... well, forever. It didn't last until noon, with only traces of evidence left the next morning. It was nice though.

We all did different things to adapt to this strange weather. Squeak decided sleeping on the down duvet just wasn't enough, and pinched my fleece too. We helped her nestle in ... just a bit.

I took a moment to wander the back garden, wondering when I would see these sights again. Remember this is very rare for me these days. It can be pretty darn cold here, the kind that forces me to wear a fleece vest under a fleece jacket and it still goes right through me. Mind you, I still smirk at my wee brother who always seems to be in negative 10 with a wind chill that would freeze polar bears. (Both of us need to learn not to leave our gym bags in the car overnight.)