Saesneg y frenhines

An example of a Cornish language sign.

Many of our American friends probably realise that not all Brits sound like the queen. What you may not realise though is that the UK has seven non-English indigenous spoken living languages, the BBC supports television channels devoted to two of those languages and that one of these seven even is an official language in part of the UK.

Apart from English, Welsh is the most widely spoken of these indigenous languages and shares official language status with English in Wales. Many over here treat Wales almost as a fictitious place that you might somehow wander into, like you would Narnia, but it's a real place with a real language, with real people speaking it. (It's probably the second most spoken language in the UK, but we'll have to see what the newest census figures show when they're released this week, Punjabi, could pass it up.) Welsh has a type of sing-song quality to it, and just looks ridiculous on signs. The BBC produces Welsh language content for S4C, an independent publicly broadcast station in the country.

The BBC also produces content for the Scottish Gaelic television channel BBC Alba. This puzzles me a bit since Scottish Gaelic, out of the seven indigenous languages is spoken by the second least amount of people. To me, Scottish Gaelic sounds exactly like a language you'd imagine Scots to speak, if they didn't speak English. (Although to hear some of them, you might think that they don't speak English.)

Out of the seven indigenous languages in the UK, four (Welsh, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Cornish) stem from the Celtic language. Two are mixed languages spoken mostly by gypsies (yes that's a politically correct term over here) and one is very closely related to English and is considered by some to not be a language, but rather a dialect of English.

You Say Goodbye, I Say 'Allo 'Allo

Erica and I don't watch much TV. One of the main reasons for this is the TV Tax that I wrote about almost three years ago. We still watch some shows after the fact via DVDs or Iplayer. (Hulu is blocked over here dontcha know?) I've started watching a classic Britcom called 'Allo 'Allo. Set in occupied France during WWII this comedy is from the creators of 'Are You Being Served' and bears a slight resemblance to 'Fawlty Towers' in that it is centered around a cafe owner who has a wife whom he tries to forget about interacting regularly with foreigners. One of the most enjoyable features of the show for me is the fact that while the audience hears all the characters speaking English, the characters interact as if they are speaking different languages. The French and Germans understand each other as it is assumed that they are speaking the same language (probably German (in reality English with exaggerated accents)). When two British airmen are stuck in the village and the Resistance tries to sneak them out, they are unable to comprehend the 'language' being spoken. The only person who knows 'English' and can communicate with them is Michelle, the leader of the resistance who when speaking to them uses an exaggerated posh accent (how all us Americans expect Brits to sound (except obviously the lower classes who all sound like Dick Van Dyke)). The show relies on a lot of verbal gags and innuendo, but is a welcome companion for late evenings while Erica does her freelance work.

Some of the other programs I've enjoyed while over here.

Downton Abbey--The first series (as the Brits call seasons) was certainly the best, but two and three are a nice distraction. It'll be interesting to see how far they can stretch it out.

Fawlty Towers--John Cleese at his finest. (Yep I said it) You also have the loveable Manuel and they only made twelve episodes so it never feels like it jumped the shark.

Top Gear--I find that if I watch too much of it, it can feel very forced. Some of the stuff they do is fun to watch, especially on Youtube. 'Star In A Reasonably Priced Car' (Take celebrities, give them a cheap car and have them race around a track (A real one that's shaped like this and not one like this NASCAR fans.))

Extras--Probably the program I've most enjoyed. It's a Ricky Gervais creation where he plays an out of luck actor who gets work as an extra on movies. Always hoping to somehow get a speaking part, he bumps shoulders with stars such as Ben Stiller, Patrick Stewart, Kate Winslett and Daniel Radcliffe who play themselves with exaggerated or inverted personae. The Daniel Radcliffe episode was my personal favourite. 

Friends--I know it's an American show. Brits love it though. For almost the first three years we were here you could basically turn on the TV at anytime of the day and some channel would be showing an old episode. When Erica was pregnant with Clive we worked our way through the complete set of episodes.

Dr. Who--...Dr. Who I feel just demands too much energy. You have to buy into the whole experience. You can't just watch one episode because if you do it just doesn't make sense. I want to want to like Dr. Who, so perhaps someday, but for now I'll just leave the good doctor for all his other fanatics.

And did those feet in ancient time...? Nope

And did those feet in ancient time

Walk upon England’s mountains green?

And was the Holy Lamb of God

On England’s pleasant pastures seen?

And did the countenance divine

Shine forth upon our clouded hills?

And was Jerusalem builded here

Among these dark satanic mills?

Bring me my bow of burning gold!

Bring me my arrows of desire!

Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!

Bring me my chariot of fire!

I will not cease from mental fight,

Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,

Till we have built Jerusalem

In England’s green and pleasant land.

And Did Those Feet in Ancient time is a poem by William Blake that was set to music by Hubert Parry. Jerusalem (as it is commonly called) is a patriotic song that has almost reached the level of God Save the Queen (King) as England's national anthem. In fact many English prefer it to GStQ. It seems to me that one of the reasons for this preference is that Jerusalem excludes those other parts of Great Britian that the English aren't so fond of (see: Scotland, N. Ireland, Wales, etc)

I find the song itself to be a fantastically mesmorising tune, full of gravitas. But then there's the unfortunate inclusion of the words to the song.

Blake's words were inspired by the apocraphyl story that Jesus, accompanied by Joseph of Arimathia (his uncle as the story goes) visited England in the years between the story of Jesus visiting the temple at the age of twelve and then starting his ministry at the age of thirty. This story, like the stories of Jesus visiting the Buddha and Jesus visiting the Native Americans (ala Mormanism) are complete rubbish, but it seems to be one of those things that people like to believe and towns like Glastonbury have taken advantage for tourism and religous purposes.

So in short, 'was Jerusalem builded here'? Nope. But if you have different lyrics to fit this powerful tune I'm all ears.

QE II

Queen Elizabeth II celebrated her Diamond Jubilee (60 years on the throne dontcha know?) with an extra long weekend.

It was a pretty big deal. She's only the second English monarch to reign for 60+ years. Her great-great-grandmum Victoria reigned for 63 years and 7 months.

In honour of the Queen I have composed a song to the tune of 'God Save the Queen' or 'My Country Tis of Thee' whichever you prefer.


God save the good queen Liz.
She's the best in the biz.
God save the queen.

She's reigned for a long time.
I'll celebrate with rhyme.
Now, I've run out of lines.
God save the queen!

Proto-ordination

The short story is that we came to England so that Erica could pursue her master's degree and we could have an adventure. Mixed in with that though was a thought that perhaps God was calling us to the British Isles long term so that we might live for the sake of the salvation of those living in the UK.

This idea first presented itself while we were still considering coming to the UK, before Erica and I were even married. Erica is much more adventurous than I am, and I was still struggling with the idea of living cross culturally. I spoke to Peter (a British professor at Moody, who along with his wife Kelli did our pre-marital counseling) and he encouraged me to really consider England as his opinion was that the state of the church was pretty dire, and that I might fit into English culture well. (Peter, you might not remember this conversation, but I thank you for it.)

As I mentioned I was not anticipating living cross culturally. I had imagined spending the rest of my life within 50 miles of where I was born, and my biggest criterion for living cross culturally was that they spoke English (or kind of spoke English) Erica was enthused to study abroad however, and Peter's opinion stuck in my head so we decided to come over, she would study and that I would look for a ministry job.

No jobs opened up for me in the area of Erica's school, so we decided we should just settle down, allow Erica to study, and that I would get a 'real' job. Along with this, we had to find a church home. Our original default church was a CoE church, and they had a great heart, but sadly not a great mind. They tended to be heavy on emotion and Erica and I never really felt that we fit in well. It remained our default church as we church-hopped (In theory I hate the practice of church-hopping, and our general philosophy is to attend the church nearest to us, but for reasons that require a long-winded explanation we didn't do that). We visited United Reformed churches (a mix of Presbyterian and Congregationalist theology), free churches, a multi-national church plant, and smaller CoE congregations, and for a variety of reasons none of them worked out. We had just about resigned ourselves to the fact that we'd stay at our default church because it was the strongest of the weak, and because we had invested a reasonable amount of time in it, when I suggested that we make one last church visit, All Saints', Loose. On one occasion at a smaller CoE church we heard a guest preacher who was one of the clergy at All Saints' and I had been impressed with his sermon. Erica told me it was the last church we were going to try (at this point we were six months into our stay), and if it was a dud we'd stick with our default church.

Now that we've been at All Saints' for almost two years, am leading a home group, and on the PCC (Parochial Church Council--akin to elders? congregational board?) I'll spare you the details, but we were blown away by the care of the church and it's vision for reaching the area. It's not a perfect church, but the parts I don't care for are personal preferences and not theological issues, so we serve alongside those whom we love.

At this point though I still didn't feel very Anglican or committed to the CoE, but I was intrigued by it. I had never been a part of the 'established' church, (In fact my view of the established church was that they were nearly always the bad guys) and the idea of the corporate worship service being reinforced by a liturgy had been growing on me since graduating from Moody. I also started to realize that at least at All Saints', not-yet Christians would just show up to a service, especially christenings (infant baptisms), weddings, and funerals. It was like it was in their blood.

I'm not sure when this fascination started turning into commitment, but I am pretty sure what sealed it for me was reading Jonathan Fletcher's pamphlet, Why the Church of England? published by Reform There's a fair bit where Reform and I differ in general, but Fletcher's piece really spoke to me. Take a minute to read it, it's only about a page long. His three reasons for sticking with the CoE in it's present state are, 'because of the clear doctrinal basis on which it was founded', ie. The 39 Articles, and the Book of Common Prayer, 'it's glorious liturgy', the BCP and it's emphasis worship being 'intelligible, congregational, biblical, and edifying', and lastly 'historically the CoE has great strategic influence, ie It's the best boat to fish from. As I said before people will regularly wander into their local CoE (because of the building's beauty, because they want to have a child christened, because it is where their parents were married--somewhere within them the CoE is still a part of them) while they will not walk into another church because it might be 'happy clappy', or cultish, or worse yet, foreign.

After reading Fletcher we decided that at least while we were able to live in England, we would commit to being a part of the CoE. Initially that meant being at All Saints', Loose, but what would it mean when our time at All Saints' was finished?

One possibility; ordination

Day 2

The Alliance Review 17 December 2011

According to the internet, Mark Twain once said, “If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you're mis-informed.” In the case of my hometown, I would add, if you read the Alliance Review you are mal-informed. Being mal-informed is like being malnourished. In the instance of malnourishment food is entering your body, it just isn't the food that you need to live a healthy life. I would argue that a glove shaped (really a glove? more like a deformed chicken foot) is not the kind of information one needs to live a healthy life. Mr. Beach didn't grow it himself, he just found it "in a bag of spuds". And note the small print in the bottom right hand corner. It isn't a submitted photo. A Review photographer actually took time to specifically photograph Mr. Beach and his "unusually shaped potato"!

Granted, the picture occurs on page B8, amongst some local information such as the weekly school menus; and while not a strong candidate for a Pulitzer; it is edited well. It is nowhere near the prize for dumbest headline in the Review. A few years back there was a photo of some local senior citizens doing Christmas crafts. The headline?  "Alzheimer patients create Christmas memories". 

An Infographic

I (Zac) love information. I especially love when information is presented visually. They even have a term for this nowadays; infographics.

The above infographic shows how the various parts of the islands we currently live on relate to each other. The bluish (I hope) circles represent legal definitions and the other colour represent geographical definitions.

Enjoy.

Black Friday

We just got home from having a Thanksgiving meal with our small group from church. It is an afternoon where we can relax, fellowship, and and take part in one of the best holidays that the United States has to offer. It is fun to watch our British friends resist the temptation to make roast potatoes and to instead mash them, to see two of our friends pulling on opposite sides of a wishbone, or watch our priest-in-charge try pumpkin pie for the first time.

Both years I have given an abridged version of the history of thanksgiving and we go around the table and share things that we are thankful for. All around it is a fun day; especially this year having homemade mulled cider.

The question I dread though is this, 'What is Black Friday?'

You see they don't have anything like it over here and the concept is foreign to them. There is not one high holy day of consumerism where people worship under the guise of preparing for one of Christianity's holiest days. It just doesn't happen. So they are shocked when I explain to them that stores/shops open at midnight and that you have to be one of the first people in the store or else you won't get the $2 toaster (that is regularly priced at $29.99). They are gobsmacked to hear that people camp outside stores for days in order to get the latest video game system or the ticklish new toy, and they don't know what to make of people pushing, shoving, and using pepper spray!?!?! to get a good deal.

My opinion of Black Friday has changed since being in England. I used to think of it as a slightly pathetic but harmless way to spend the day after Thanksgiving. I now find it to be one of the most embarrassing parts of the culture that I come from. As one of my English friends today commented, many of the people that go out are acting as strongly religious people, committed to their belief that bargain prices are worth their time and energy.

I know it is not the only 'religion' that runs amok in U.S. culture (God and I are still chatting about my fascination with professional sports) but it is one that saddens me, especially when I have to explain it to outsiders who are celebrating a day that at it's core encourages gratefulness.

Just One of Those Things

Erica and I have been in the UK for over two years, have adjusted to/accepted most of the cultural differences and yet I am always surprised by how much it bothers me.

The zippers over here are backwards.

Here's what I mean.

When I buy a jacket or hoodie, I put it on and as I go to zip it up the pull of the zipper is in my left hand rather than the right.

This really threw me off at first when I would be out browsing at a shop such as H&M (where I am never quite sure what are men's clothes and what are women's).

While I now understand that it is backwards to what I am used to; it is always strange when I put on a jacket for the first time and I routinely use my right hand to grab for the pull even on a jacket that I have owned for over a year.

As opposed to other left-handed peculiarities this is one that is not limited to the UK. While we were in Ukraine last year we met up with one of the missionaries who was there in Kiev. He was wearing a nice custom made track jacket with the name of the football team that he coached on it. I jokingly asked him if it had an 'American' zipper or a 'European' zipper. He made clear that it had a 'normal' zipper and that the rest of teams jackets all had the American style as well.

I guess in the changing of cultures there are some things that you just can't let go of.



In other news, yesterday I met up with a DDO named Clive. Details to follow shortly.

British Summer Time

Summer Time in Britain started today. Granted seven of the last eight days have been mostly sunny, but with a predicted average temperature this week of 52F and rain forecasted you can hardly call it summer.

Fortunately for summer's sake, British Summer Time is to the UK what Daylight Savings Time is to most of the U.S.

All in all, I think it is just a bit of deceptive advertising.

Brit Bars Vol. 2

One of the great things about the UK is that these are available from the first of the year until a month after Easter. Another great thing about the UK, is the Cadbury Twisted which is available all year round. The Twisted is the classic Cadbury Egg fashioned into a twisted Twix bar shape. Very nice for those times of the year where one is missing the gooey goodness of the egg.
A surprise sweet that I am really enjoying are Starbursts. The fact that everyone in the UK uses real sugar instead of HFCS as a sweetener makes these moderately enjoyable candies extraordinary over here. The downside however is that one of the original fruit flavours over here is Blackcurrant. which tastes extraordinarily like a raisin. No good.
The last candy bar that I love is a Cadbury Double Decker. Named after London's famous bi-level buses. This treat is best described as a combination of two of my favorite American sweets. A Three Musketeers bar and a Crunch bar. It is a bit thicker than your normal candy bar and is a thing of beauty.
Though, since we all know about British dentists and their handiwork, I'll try to lay off the sweet stuff.

It's Like The Internet In Newspaper Form or Oh my-I-O

My (Zac's) local paper back in Ohio has a section entitled "Readers Tell Us". Readers Tell Us is an editorial that allows folks to call the newspaper on the phone and leave a thirty second anonymous message with whatever they have on their mind. This can range from thanking a good Samaritan for returning their keys at the mall, to asking for help in getting rid of earwigs, to (as most often occurs) complaining about the government. It is probably this feature of the paper that keeps it profitable as many only read the paper for it. As Garrison Keillor once said, "A good newspaper is never nearly good enough but a lousy newspaper is a joy forever." So without any further ado, a few swatches from the Alliance Review.

"Dry eyes. Does anyone have any solutions for dry eyes? It would be really appreciated."

"All right people of Alliance, here's your challenge; on July 4 between 1 a.m. and 3 a.m., somebody set fire to a building in Alliance. Look around your house. Who wasn't home with you last Sunday at that time? Who came home smelling of smoke and fire and was a little bit dirty? Whoever that person is in your family needs to be turned in. Stand up for what's right. Stand up and do what you need to do--turn this person in."

"Black and white need to stand together against illegals becoming citizens. We are going to become the minorities. Spanish and Muslim populations are growing very, very fast."

"This week we need to pray to open the eyes of those who would destroy this country as our founding fathers envisioned."

Zed is for...

I was under the impression that zed was only to be used in France, Quebec, and language confused parts of Canada.
The first trouble came when we called a company over here looking for car insurance. While we often outsource our customer service lines to various Asian countries, England outsources theirs to...the Scots.
The exchange between Erica and the Scottish gentleman on the other end had gone smoothly until it came to getting our names down.
"And what is your husbands name?"
"Zachary, Zee-A-C-H-A-R-Y"
"Sorry, what was that again?"
"Z-A-C-H-A-R-Y"
"Um...okay, we'll put that in the post shortly"

Upon receiving our newly purchased insurance we discovered the confusion. The policy had been made out to Erica and Vachary Neubauer. Ah, Zed is bigger than we thought...

I was reminded of this confusion today at work when I had to take inventory of the letters that we iron onto the back of England football (read soccer) jerseys. "We have six Zeds? What is the plural of Zed?" Between my five co-workers who were standing there they could not decide.

For a fun look at Zees, Zeds, izzards, and uzzards, take a look here.

Life's Certainties: Death & (TV) Taxes

Erica and I have been married for a little over two years, and during that time we have not owned a (working) TV. Many people advised us before we got married to not have a TV for our first year of marriage thus forcing us to interact more with each other. We followed this advice and were so pleased with the outcome that after year one we were in no big rush to go out and get a TV. As we considered moving to the UK though we both considered the possiblity that we would get one once we got over here. Erica for BBC's period pieces, I for some football, and both of us for some quality Britcoms. (Remember, they created the office.)

Here's what we discovered upon arriving in the UK. The British government imposes a TV licencing tax//fee of £145.50/$216ish (only £48/$78ish if your TV is black and white) per year on each household that uses a TV to watch content as it is shown live. (Taxes for basic items? Didn't something happen in Boston Harbor because of that idea?) The proceeds from this fee go to funding three channels, BBC 1, 2, and 3. While the BBC is very much akin to PBS in the states, with the amount of funding they receive it is able to run three different channels and create such critically acclaimed period pieces as Pride and Prejudice.

Watching DVDs only is permitted as is watching a TV show on your computer after it has been initially shown, but watching live TV on your computer is not. If you are found to be watching TV illegally you can be brought to court and fined up to £1000.

Got that?

My first question was, how do they figure out if you are acting illegally in this regard? The answer...

TV Police

The UK government has a national registry of addresses that have paid the licencing fee allowing them to keep track. But it goes further. They have officers who can detect if you have a TV!

From the official TV licencing website:
Enforcement officers may use a hand-held detection device to measure both the direction and the strength of a TV signal. This makes it easy for us to locate TV receiving equipment in even the hardest-to-reach places. (i.e. hiding it in your attic) We also have a fleet of detector vans that can detect the use of TV receiving equipment at specifically targeted addresses within 20 seconds.

How exactly does all this fancy equipment work? Nobody really knows. Many have conjured, quite accurately I am now thinking, that these claims are a hoax to scare people into buying the licence.
http://www.bbctvlicence.com/Detector%20vans.htm

The detector van watch website and others are all part of an amusing anti-BBC campaign online.

All of this craziness makes not having a TV something to enjoy once again.

Introductions

As Erica and I meet people a peculiar pattern emerges. It used to be odd, but now it's just plain weird. After they find out we're Americans the conversation looks like this, almost to the word;

Brit: So where in the States (never the U.S. or America, always "the States") are you from.

Us: Erica is from California, Zac is from Ohio.

Brit: A long pause. (Occasionally I intersperse "One of the small ones in the middle")

Brit: ...so where in California are you from? (Obviously having no clue where Ohio is)

Erica: Napa

Brit: Where?

Erica: The Napa Valley

(Often times) Brit: Oh! Napa Valley (emphasis on valley). How do you like the weather here? (Obviously we hate it since California is 70 degrees and sunny all the time, especially since the entire state is right on the beach)

Us: We don't mind it. It's actually similar to Napa's weather.

Brit: (Look of incredulity; obviously they aren't actually from California)

We do like British people, and meeting them.

Our Loose Neighbors

So a nearby town has an unfortunate, but very humorous name; Loose. This presents numerous possibilities that fortunately the town embraces. Examples:

Loose Bowls Club (Bowls being a lawn sport similar to bocce)
Loose Women's Society
All Saints' Loose (The Parish Church)
and my personal favorite; Loose Baptist Church (As opposed to those rather strict Baptist churches)

The British Two-Step

You know how when you are approaching a person who is walking towards you sometimes there is that awkward moment when you both head the same direction trying to get out of the way? Over here it happens exponentially more. I think I realized why. My instinct is to go right, their instinct is to go left: I've had this go on for four or five tries. I blame them driving on the wrong side of the road.

What To Look Forward To

My O so very observant sister pointed out that a blog not blogged is likely not to be read. Our current internet situation is poor. We have a pay as you go mobile connection, but live in a dip that seems to avoid contact with the outside world (especially via wi-fi signals). When we do have a good connection we tend to use it for things we really have to do. Thus the blog has been left to rot thus far.
What you can look forward to though from this blog is an update of how the Neubauers are doing job wise, school wise, ministry wise, etc. We'll have plenty of pictures. Like from our trip to Bruges this weekend, and other goodies, such as my search for the best fish n' chips in the UK, and my systematic experimentation of British candy bars. We'll also throw in odds and ends, like driving on the "wrong" side of the road, and other cultural peculiarities.
Hope you'll stay in touch.
Zac & Erica