St. John’s, Newfoundland: The Weather, the Newfoundlanders and The Big “Lean In”

After leaving our shorts and tee shirts behind in New Jersey, Mary, Bob and I flew via Toronto, to St. John’s, the capital of Newfoundland. We knew that it would be much colder here and were armed with sweaters, gloves and hats (At least those of us with Type A personalities).  While inside the airport, we called an Uber, opened the airport door (No electronic doors here—this airport is no JFK) and as the cold wind smacked the three of us in our faces, we all yelled at the same time, “OH MY GOD!” We jumped into the Uber as fast as was possible for three middle aged people, and met our first friendly Newfoundlander, who happened to be from the Sudan.  Before he even put on his seatbelt, Bob asked him how he got to Newfoundland from Sudan and he said, “Well, I first came to Toronto,” which hardly cleared up that question for us. As the wind whipped around our car, we then asked if this was normal weather for this time of year and he said—much to our chagrin—that this was really good weather for this time of year. I immediately questioned the adequacy of the number of sweaters I had packed. Today, we visited Cape Spear, the eastern-most point in North America.  It was freezing and the wind was blowing like crazy and Bob turned to me and said, “What, was Antartica fully booked?!” 

As we drove to our Air BnB, I noticed two things: 1. Even though it is June, none of the pools had yet to be filled; and 2. Tulips and daffodils were currently in bloom. Having briefly experienced the frigid temperature here, I was surprised that they didn’t wait and bloom in August. 

Today, we went on a van tour of St. John’s and the surrounding area. Unfortunately, the tour did not come with closed-caption. It is true that English is the primary language in Newfoundland, but that doesn’t mean  that it sounds anything like the English we speak in Jersey. For example, our guide told us that we were going to “Petty Herber” (Harbor) and that his fishing buddy was very “smert” (smart). Last night, Mary, Bob and I walked to a local convenience store for a few items.  People are so friendly here and the woman behind the counter began to tell us a lengthy story, about watching her nephew…at least I think. I thought if I just leaned in I would better understand what the heck she was talking about. I was sadly mistaken and I could only hope that everything was ok while she was babysitting, because when we were ready to leave, I just wasn’t sure. 

In between our babysitting conversation, I noticed that the store appeared not to have half & half, a staple for Bob and Mary’s morning coffee. I asked my new friend whether or not there was any half & half. She had a long explanation—in between her babysitting story—of how there had been a big run on half-&-half that week. She then stopped and said that she was going to call her boss  after a brief exchange of which I could understand none of, she said that her boss was going to solve our problem. She then asked for our address. Bob’s “go to” assumption was that the Newfoundlanders’ niceness was just a ploy, and that they were going to try to kill us. That was not the case.  It turns out that the employer told her that he would be happy to get us a pint of half & half and deliver it to our house….which he did. Today, we were standing on the corner trying to figure out how best to get back to our house and a Newfoundlander leaned in, excused himself and tried to help us.  What a place!

Tomorrow, we leave the capital and head out to see puffins and whales…we hope.