The power of Switches

After my first shower it was time to do the dishes for the first time. During our first day we had used up the plates that were kindly provided by our landlord so I went into the kitchen to inspect the sink.
There were two taps: One was labelled “Hot” and the other one “Cold”: I slowly opened the hot tap a bit and waited for a while. I did not want to burn myself seeing as the “Hot” marker seemed to scream: this is really hot and you better not try holding your hands under this tap.
I carefully touched the water a bit and then immediately pulled my hand back. The water was ice cold.
Surely they must have labelled the taps wrong I thought, so I carefully opened the other tap, which also had ice-cold water.
This was bizarre. I let both taps run for a while, but the water did not start to heat up.
Finally it dawned on me that there must be a switch for the hot water. So far I have found a lot of those switches. Every socket seemed to have a switch, the stove had a switch and even the heating in the sitting room had two switches, so I was on the right track now.
What more is there to tell, I found the water boiler in the hot press and switched it on. After a good half hour I actually had screaming hot water and the ice-cold water from the other tab. Interesting, another new experience. We had already learned a lot about our new flat. Not only did it look quite different with fitted carpets, flowery sofas and a lot more stuff and a lot less storage space, but it also worked a whole lot different. We now had to master a whole army of switches that were conveniently hidden in all kinds of places.
I will leave out the incident when I stood in the hot shower and then nothing more happened, absolutely nothing, no water, no nothing. Anyway I called our landlord describing the problem and he came by…guess what…he found a secret switch that could be turned back on and that was it!

Irish Showers

I did not expect too much from Irish showers, especially after living in Finland for such a long time.
One really has to give it to the Finns; they know how to build efficient showers. The water pressure is always the same wherever you happen to shower. Huge water towers provide plenty of water so everyone can indulge in long, warm showers with the perfect water pressure for as long as they like. Water isn't really in short supply; after all the country is covered with lakes and it does rain a lot during the very short summers.

Remembering the good old days I carefully stepped into our shower for the first time. My friends had congratulated me earlier that our flat that was supplied with an electric power shower. They only threw in a word of warning that it might make an awful lot of noise, which would be a small price to pay, after all, I could take a hot shower whenever I wanted to.
I had eagerly nodded at my friends, but did not quite get what they meant. Why should I not have been able to take a hot shower whenever I wanted? Who would hold me back?
In the shower I started off by inspecting the chunky box that was hanging on the wall of my shower. There was a round dial for power and another one to adjust the heat. At the bottom of the box was a “Start / Stop“ button. Apprehensively I pressed the “Start / Stop” button and a few drops of water started to fall from the shower-head paired with an incredibly loud sound that reminded me of an air plane having a bad case of diarrhoea. I watched the drops for a while and then took a look at the power dial. It was on full power!
I stared in turns at the dial and the showerhead and then adjusted the showerhead so that all the drops would come out at least in one big stream. The water now came out in the middle of the showerhead and had slightly more power, but I still needed to turn up the water temperature to very hot, so I would at least feel a burning sensation where the hot water hit my body.
Quite a strange feeling really; part of my body was covered in goose bumps (it was cold in the bathroom since we had not yet found all the right switches to switch on the bathroom heating) and the other part of my body was stinging from the hot water.
Its not too bad really, after a while I am sure I will get used to these showers, and for sure there are a lot of things worse then freezing in your shower and it might always happen that we do find the right switch for the bathroom heater).
Come to think of it I cannot name a single one at the moment.

Irish Banks

Irish banks are holier than the government. To get a current account one has to produce twice as many papers as when applying for the PPS number and then you better be very very patient.
A good few weeks after handing in your application you might receive a phone call with your account details.
What does that help you?
Nothing at first, because now you need to start waiting for your ATM card.

If you try ringing your bank to enquire after the whereabouts of your card, you will always get the same answer.
“It will take 3-5 working days.”
That’s nice and might have you worried at some point during your 6 – 8 weeks wait.
If you have then finally received the valuable and much expected ATM card you might be tempted to ask for a Laser card or even a credit card.
Let me tell you one thing though. Be patient, just because you were successful once does not mean you will be again.