Making New Friends in a Faraway Place

On Saturday we had plans to meet a couple from the US. My mom’s cousin’s cousin and her husband live just outside of Cork, Ireland in a little town called Ballincollig. We were invited to their home for a nice home-cooked dinner. But first we had other sites to see!

The bridge over the River Shannon in
Limerick.

Our first stop was King John’s Castle in Limerick, Ireland. It is the same King John from the Robin Hood movies! We learned a lot about his “reign” and about the town of Limerick. It’s a very cute town and as we were taking the castle tour, we heard the church bells ring at noon from across the River Shannon. The bells didn’t just toll the hour, they also played a lovely song! I got a video of it because it was so cool!

We ate lunch in the car along the way toward Cork because it was a long drive on the crazy Ireland streets. We got into Ballincollig a couple hours early so we walked the town. Most of the small towns in Ireland are exactly the same and this was no exception. Very cute with lots of store fronts that drip character. The one thing about this town that we hadn’t seen before was a shopping mall. We went in to explore and discovered that in Ireland, they have grocery stores inside their shopping malls!

I’d like to take a moment to share some of the funny things we’ve discovered about grocery shopping in Europe. You almost can’t find peanut butter… apparently it’s a very American thing, but Nutella is everywhere. They’re called “ice lollies” not popsicles. Half and half is non-existent here, they all use milk in their tea or coffee (yuck). What we call “raw sugar” they call “brown sugar”. Orange marmalade is a BIG thing here and it’s pretty delicious. The Irish people put sweet corn in everything! We got some pasta salads (like a macaroni salad) at the deli counter and it had pasta, a mayonnaise sauce, poppyseeds, red onions, sweet corn and pineapple in it. They also put sweet corn on their pizzas... very strange, but pretty good. The checkers all sit at the checkout counters and most people bring their own shopping bags, so if you don’t have one, you have to ask for one.

When it was time, we went to the designated gas station to meet Keith so he could lead us to their hard-to-find house. I was glad for that because we seriously wouldn’t have found it otherwise. When we got there, we were treated to an amazing view of the countryside surrounding their home. Keith’s wife, Linda and their daughter, Regina greeted us at the door and welcomed us into their home. It was nice to spend an evening laughing about the funny differences we’ve all experienced in the Irish culture.

New friends!

They served us a wonderful seafood dinner and an equally amazing berry cobbler dessert. We all laughed at the way the Irish package their ice cream too! It was such a nice visit and we felt like we’d always been friends by the time we left.

Funny rectangular shaped ice cream.

We had quite a drive “home”, but we made it in good time and in once piece. (Irish drivers seem even more crazy at night!)