The Lederman Kitchen

April 2nd marked 1 year of living in Dublin for us.  So much has happened in this last year, it's been a tough year, and a great year, and most definitely a year we will remember.   St Stephen's Green, Dublin Admittedly, living in Ireland was not been as easy of a transition as I expected.  But, I had formed expectations for living here before I had ever even stepped foot in the country.  I thought, how different could it be?  We were moving to a European capital city where the native language was English.  Turns out, it can be very different. Ha'Penny Bridge in Dublin It was a big decision to start with.  It meant a lot for Brian and I.  Besides the material things like leaving behind all our beautiful wedding gifts we had received only a few months earlier, we were leaving a strong network of friends and family. We left our dog (don’t worry, he is living with family), we left our Nephews when they were not yet 1 & 3....

I've been working in Ireland for exactly 4 months on Thursday.  These 4 months have flown by and I'm soaking up every minute I can. Working here has been an incredible experience, and I'm so lucky to enjoy my company, co-workers and job. Here is a glimpse of what my days are like. We change seats about once a month, so I now sit by 5 different colleagues  The photo above is where I (used to) sit.  My seat was the open one in the middle.  To my left was Antoine, from France.  Across from him, Mohamed, from Egypt.  Then Letizia from Italy, Saoirse from Ireland and Caroline from Sweden.  It's incredible.  My boss is Dutch and his boss Canadian. My colleagues are from all over Europe and even beyond.  I'm constantly impressed with the number of languages some of them speak and am insanely jealous that probably half of my team speaks at least 2 languages well enough to do business in them. Speaking only English is easily the most e...

I wrote before, in the post We're All Speaking English Here , about how we have a difficult time understanding some people and how we find it almost impossible to pronounce some cities, names, and words (all of which have Irish language roots).  Well, these things still are difficult, but we are getting better everyday. This post is about Irish slang.  In Ireland, there are a lot of similarities to the words, phrases and sayings British use, but some slang is just Irish. Below are a few of the common Irish slang terms we hear all the time here. Grand Pronounced: grand Used in a sentence: "That's grand", "I'm grand", "He is grand", "It's grand", "They're grand" - you get it - everything is grand over here Meaning: good Thoughts: I like it, occasionally someone will say it 5 times in one sentence, which makes me laugh, but I like it. Your Man Pronounced: yer man Used in a sentence: "Di...

It's true.  In Ireland, English is spoken.  It sounded so easy before we moved over here but turns out, there is still a language barrier.  There have been many time where Brian and I just don't have a clue what someone said.   Look at the address Brian wrote down below.  He needed to send in a form to set up his work payroll, and had to make a call to get the address.  After speaking with the first person and asking him to repeat himself a few too many times, Brian gave up and tried to find the address online.  When his Googling failed, he decided to call back and this time asked the second person to spell out every word in the address.  His Attempt: The Leery - Rathmines, Tax District Landhot Read - Dublin 5 Actual Address: Dunlaoghaire Rathdown Revenue District Lansdown House - Dublin 4 We'll know if he got it right if he gets a paycheck next month, let's hope so! It's not just understanding people when they are speaking, but r...