"He is better dressed than Mo but I don't know about his personality," said Mary McGuigan after meeting the new Northern Secretary, who went walkabout in Belfast city centre yesterday.
Peter Mandelson wasn't finding it quite so easy to mingle with shoppers as his predecessor, but he was trying. "Have you been waiting long?" he asked a woman pensioner standing at a bus stop.
Everybody knew Mo on her first walkabout. She had told jokes and hugged and kissed all around her. Her successor didn't favour the "touchy-feely" approach. He refused to kiss a baby in a pram. "Hello, Mr Mandelson," he said to anyone he greeted in case they didn't recognise him.
Many didn't. "Is he some sort of business executive?" asked Charlie Little. Mo had taken bites out of apples and cream buns. Mr Mandelson took a cheese-and-onion crisp from west Belfast schoolgirl, Seainin Keenan. "His breath will be stinking all day," said Seainin.
Mr Mandelson focused on children and pensioners. "What is your best subject?" he asked schoolboy Stuart Campbell.
"French and maths," said Stuart.
"What is your favourite sport?" asked Mr Mandelson
"Rugby," said Stuart.
"You're very diverse," said Mr Mandelson.
"I didn't even know who he was but I know now," Stuart said afterwards.
"Are you happy?" Mr Mandelson asked a pupil from Victoria College. She was, but a group of other schoolgirls weren't. "Bring back Mo!" they shouted.
East Belfast pensioner William Maguire wished the Northern Secretary "every happiness and success". Mr Maguire was confident the peace process would succeed. Mr Mandelson said he admired a strong faith.
"So long as it's not socialism," muttered a journalist.
"Have you been standing there long?" Mr Mandelson asked at another bus queue.
"It was a good first day," he told a shopper who asked him how he was finding his new job. "We have to be optimistic."
"How do you think you will get on with Mr Paisley?" a man shouted.
"Perfectly well," said Mr Mandelson.
Olive Simpson said the Northern Secretary was "very pleasant". "I don't like him," said Alberta Livingstone. "Didn't he cause enough trouble in England? Now they are hiding him here until he is acceptable again in London."
"I hope you haven't had to wait too long," he told a group of women pensioners at another bus queue. "I've been in so many meetings all day. I needed a breath of fresh air and I wanted to meet the people."
"Mr Mandelson was very polite," said Colette Seaward. "But I liked Mo."