The Simple Life - Belfast Style

I realized the other day, that I really haven't covered one of the most important parts of my YAV year. Before I came to Northern Ireland, I vowed to live in community with the people around me, and that meant taking on a simple lifestyle.

So, what does simple life entail, exactly, especially in the highly Westernized, U.K. culture? Don’t worry – Paris Hilton and Nichole Richie are not involved. There are, however, lots of ways that I have changed my consumer habits over the past five months in my stay here, and I think most of them are arguably for the better.

For one, I have noticed that I have become much more energy conscientious than I would have been at home. I turn off lights when I leave a room. I don't let the water run.

My energy usage has been cut down not only by my own initiative, but by the selection of appliances in my house. I do not have a dishwasher. I wash all of my dishes by hand, and conserve water by washing them in a tub. I do not have a tumble dryer. All my clothes air dry on a drying rack in the spare room of my house. This saves a good amount of electricity every month.

Another appliance that is missing from my home is a microwave. I am a natural popcorn fiend. Give me a bag and I transform into a vacuum cleaner. Elizabeth and I have discovered the art of popcorn on the hob. The great thing about making your own is that you can add the amount of butter and salt that you want to it, and garlic salt, I’ve discovered, is quite good too.

My heating is on a timer, and on average runs 7 hours in a day. It is set for the morning hours, before I awaken, and in the evening about the time when I arrive home from work (6.00-ish). Occasionally, if I am in my house for an afternoon, I will turn the heat on, especially on the colder days. I’ve found, though, that a hot water bottle, a cup of tea, and blankets can work wonders.

A habit that I've picked up during my stay in Belfast is recycling. One of the nice aspects about living in Belfast is that each home is provided with a recycling bin, and biweekly the bins are collected. I’ve noticed really, it’s a matter of accessibility. At home in Virginia, the nearest recycling center is several miles away from my home. I think this produces less of an incentive to actually make a habit of recycling. Something else that I’ve noticed is that I prefer to use shopping bags rather than using plastic grocery bags. I think we have at least five of these in our house, and they have drastically help to increase storage space by eliminating the plastic bags that can cover shelves.

Another change that I've had to make has to do with my hair, yes, my hair. I like to dye my hair. I tend to go for a dark cherry-cola color. This year, I have had to give up going to a salon to keep my color, and I've resorted to the boxed hair dye on ASDA (my grocery store) shelves. Elizabeth and I discovered that we both share this passion for hair color, and as a result, we have organized official hair-dying parties.

I suppose an advantage of living this type of lifestyle is that it has, in many ways, helped me to connect with lots of people in Ballybeen. On several occasions I have had some of the women that I have met in the programmes I work with over for a cup of tea, and vice versa. I have noticed that living in the area, and particularly in a home fit with the resources typically available to the surrounding community has allowed me to connect in unique ways. I think that the people of Ballybeen who come into my home are allowed to feel comfortable because they recognize that I am living as they do. Any possibility of intimidation is erased by the fact that I live as they do, and this has opened up new and exciting opportunities to learn more about them and relate to them.

One of the new people that I’ve gotten to know in Ballybeen is a Pakistani woman, named Mehrin who lives just around the corner from me on Bute Park. She brings her now seven-month-old daughter, Sabaoon (meaning “dawn”) to DFCI’s weekly moms and toddlers program, Sticky Fingers. I struck up a conversation with Mehrin about two months ago, when she first started coming to the program, and I discovered that like myself, she too was an English major. She completed her masters thesis on Charles Dickens at a university in Pakistan and had left the country to join her husband, a professional cricketer in the U.K. She has lived in Belfast for over three years now, but like myself, she knows what it is like to be away from home and being of a different culture in a new place.

She and I have found lots to talk about, and each Friday we share a cup of tea and a biscuit at one another’s homes. I continue to learn more and more about Pakistani culture with every visit that I make. Mehrin pulls out the photo albums and traditional dishes each time I visit. This past week Mehrin asked me to teach her how to make apple pie, and we spent the larger part of the afternoon peeling apples, laughing and joking, kneading dough, and watching Sabaoon play on the floor of my living room. Soon Mehrin will teach me how to make traditional Pakistani dishes…YUM!