Praise for Postcards From Across the Pond
"Postcards from Across the Pond" is a true delight! Laugh out loud funny regardless of which side of the pond you call home; Mike Harling has a knack for finding both the humor and the charm in everyday fare. Bill Bryson move over, there's a new American expat in town with a keen sense of humor.
Jeff Yeager, author of "The Ultimate Cheapskate's
Road Map to True Riches", www.ultimatecheapskate.com
As a Gael who made the reverse trip from UK to USA, with a Brit mate, I savored the bubbling flavor of this Yankee reaction to Saxon country in the form of perky postcard-style epistles. This writer, having moved to his Brit wife's homeland, copes with everything from negative officialdom to personal reaction to a minatory spider, all with the same good cheer and venturesome spirit.
Eileen Swift, former syndicated travel writer for Newsday
A lovely, quixotic, affectionate attempt to bring together those "two nations divided by a common language." A must for travelers in both directions.
Gordon Astley, BBC Southern Counties Radio
Postcards From Across the Pond
by
Michael Harling
Second Edition published 2012 by:
Smashwords Edition v05
Postcards From Across the Pond
Copyright 2008 by Michael Harling
Smashwords Edition License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment and may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book, please purchase additional copies. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the work of this author.
Also by Michael Harling
More Postcards From Across the Pond
For Shonagh, who continues to make it all worthwhile.
Contents
The First, Last and a Little in Between
Americans Are Officious—You Can Bank On It
The Americanization of Britain
You've Lost That Loving Feeling
If It's Dydd Mawrth, It Must Be Wales
New York/New York City: Know the Difference
England, But Not as We Know It
How to Spend £117.23 ($188.74) on a Serving Bowl
Introduction
I came to England via Ireland, a circumstance that holds little significance now other than to explain how I ended up here and had no real consequences beyond confusing my friends from the States as to where I actually disappeared to. They figured it out eventually, and time has reduced this life-defining fact into a curious bit of trivia.
The truth is, I wasn't planning on going anywhere; I was quite happy where I was and looking forward to many years of uninterrupted monotony. All I wanted to do was spend a week or so walking in the Irish countryside. Six months later I was living in a different country; six years on, I'm still here.
You have to agree that changing careers, moving from one continent to another and getting married all in the same month is bound to bring about some collateral changes, but I really didn't expect it to be so radically different. It's England, after all; America's staging ground for sorting out European wars, they speak the same language, watch the same TV, read the same books—it shouldn't be much different than moving from New York to Arkansas (well, New York to Minnesota, perhaps).
The differences, however, were so plentiful and unexpected that I, like many others, couldn't resist droning on about them on my web site. If you do that long enough, eventually you end up with enough material for a book.
Many of these observations were chronicled some years ago and revisiting them brought on an ache of nostalgia for those early days, when discoveries waited around every corner and walking across the street for Fish and Chips was high adventure. Now, taking a train to Birmingham or driving to Newport is routine and I see so many McDonald's, Starbucks and episodes of "Friends" on the telly that I begin to wonder if England really is all that different from America after all.
And this is not merely due to the fact that time has jaded my perceptions; many of the things I write about in these pages have disappeared or changed, and not always for the better.
Our much-maligned storage heaters have been replaced with modern heaters, the British have, unaccountably, fallen in love with SUVs and other, over-sized modes of transport, air conditioning is becoming the norm and Marshmallow Fluff® and creamed corn are readily available at Tesco. It's enough to make me cry.
Still, every so often, I'll encounter a village with a name like "Cocking," or overhear a conversation about a Cheese Rolling competition, and the sudden realization of where I am brings back that sense of wonder, leaving me amazed and ever so grateful for being here.
Michael Harling
October 2008
Getting There
My great-grandfather, according to family legend, was deported from England. For all I know, this may be true; a story as splendid as this discourages scrutiny and can only diminish if mixed with mundane distractions such as facts. It's also largely irrelevant. Whether my ancestors jumped or were pushed, they left Blighty without a backward glance. No one, to my knowledge, had returned to the mother country and I, a second-generation Republican, wasn't about to break tradition, especially with a solid career, a spacious apartment in the suburbs and a comfortable future to look forward to in America. Emigration is for third worlders looking for a better life; Americans know there is no better life anywhere else and stay put.
I wasn't searching for anything more than a bit of sightseeing when I took my first trip abroad in August 2001. Yet six months later, I had quit my job, given up my apartment and was sitting on a transcontinental jet banking over the Sussex countryside for the final approach into Gatwick airport. The word "immigrant" never entered my mind—it has such a working class ring to it—but that's what I had become.
As the plane maneuvered toward the runway, the young woman in the seat next to me began siphoning off her rising excitement through conversation. She was an American student on her first trip abroad, planning to stay for an unspecified time and hoping to pick up a job as an au pair. I nodded, making sympathetic noises and kept silent concerning the legal logistics her plan would require. At the time, I knew the immigration code by rote, but appearing too knowledgeable on the subject might draw suspicion and I couldn't afford to tip my hand; she might be a spy for the Home Office.
In truth, I was on my way to marry the British woman I had met on the aforementioned trip and had visited only twice since. This would be my final crossing; after the plane touched down (preferably right-side up and on the runway) I had no intention of leaving the United Kingdom. Assuming, of course, they let me in.
The idea that being an American didn't automatically allow me to go wherever I pleased whenever it pleased me was still a novel and shocking concept. I had, after all, visited Mexico, Canada and several Caribbean Islands without benefit of a passport, so it came as something of a surprise when—on my introductory visit—the Irish immigration clerk refused to admit me.
Even then, I was savvy enough to understand I needed a passport to visit Europe. The young lady actually had it in her hand, but she was obviously not giving it the consideration it deserved. Surely she must have noticed it was an American passport. If so, why all the questions?
My decision to visit Ireland was based on a whim (England was too expensive and I didn't know any foreign languages) and the young lady holding my passport didn't seem to like that explanation one little bit.
"What are you plans?" she asked.
"I thought I'd just travel around and see the sights."
"Where are you staying?"
"Just anywhere. You do have hotels here, don't you?"
"I can't let you in if you don't have any concrete plans."
Her words didn't make me angry, or frustrated, simply confused.
"Why on earth not?"
She sighed, as if being forced to explain an obvious punch line to a particularly obtuse dinner partner. "You might be planning to stay here illegally." Was she joking? Americans don't sneak off to live as illegal aliens in Ireland; Irish people sneak into America to live as illegal aliens. "I'm sorry, but if you don't have any definite plans I can't let you in." She sounded like she meant it but, unlike an American Immigration Official, she sounded truly sorry. "Don't you have anything?"
Still confused but sensing the urgency, I grabbed for the only thing I had.
"For a couple of days, I'll be hiking with a group from England."
"Can you prove it?"
As the line of people behind me stretched further down the corridor, I pulled off my pack and began rooting through its contents. "I think I might have a brochure in here somewhere."
I never found the brochure, but I must have demonstrated to her satisfaction that the life of an illegal immigrant was an aspiration beyond my abilities because, with a final glance at the queue and a cursory "Welcome to Ireland," she stamped my passport and handed it back to me.
Subsequent visits found me better prepared, but my current trip was a bit more, how should I phrase this, delicate. At that time, coming into Britain to marry someone wasn't exactly illegal, but it was highly suspect. The odds of me being fingered for contriving a marriage of convenience just so I could enjoy the copious benefits of being a UK resident were admittedly low, but there remained the real chance I might be turned away by a cranky Immigration clerk who was still upset that they allowed Madonna in. And once turned away, getting back in could prove difficult indeed. Therefore, I had decided on the safer route: obfuscation.
My carry-on, as well as my suitcase, contained no photo albums, mementos or anything else that might suggest an intention of staying longer than two weeks. I had an appropriately dated return ticket and a camera around my neck. I didn't have to worry about pretending to act like a bumbling tourist—that part came naturally.
With the plane safely docked and unloading, I wished my hopeful companion good fortune and followed the herd through the terminal to immigration. (I've always wondered how the first guy knows where to go; if I de-planed first, I'd probably lead everyone into the parking garage.)
Having been through Immigration Control at Gatwick before, I knew enough to eschew the fast lanes reserved for European Union members and instead joined the shorter, but slower, procession under the "All Other Countries" sign. The crossing was, from a journalistic point of view, disappointingly smooth; I told the immigration clerk where I would be staying, showed my return ticket and entered my new home.
The journey, since that time, has been perplexing, frustrating, surprising and, above all, continually infused with humor, which was why I began chronicling my adventures in this strange but pleasant land. Even now, I am still making surprising discoveries (just this morning I found out British children refer to "Chicken Little" of falling sky fame as "Chicken Licken," which, to my American ears, sounds vaguely pornographic) and continue to be grateful that I have not yet had to seek employment as an au pair.
Fun With Firearms
I grew up in rural America, and that means one thing (well, okay, two): cow tipping, and guns.
Firearms are as American as a Post Office massacre and, where I grew up, chambering a round was as natural a part of life as sneaking bottles of beer out of the back of my sister's boyfriend's pickup truck while she gave him a hand-job in the cab. I learned to shoot when I was nine and rarely encountered anyone who didn't own a gun. It was, therefore, expected that I would acquire my own guns as I grew up, providing my sister's boyfriend didn't shoot me first.
Because of this upbringing, as well as several peripheral yet not unimportant activities, I found myself, some years later, living in suburban America with a wife, three infant children, a loaded pistol in the night table and a burglar creeping up the stairs.
Well, that's what it sounded like, anyway. My erstwhile wife and I were reading in bed late one night when we both detected the sound of furtive footsteps on the stairway. We barely had time to exchange startled looks before the noise sounded again and convinced us there was someone in the house.
While I freely admit to being a devout coward, sometimes a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do, and so, with a mildly trembling heart, I slipped out of bed, grabbed the pistol, scooped up the sleeping cat and went to confront the intruder.
Looking back, I suppose the sight of a naked man holding a revolver in one hand and a bewildered feline in the other might have been enough to convince any would-be burglar to vacate the premises voluntarily, especially if the man said something enigmatic and Eastwood-esque, such as "I've got a cat here, mister, and I'm not afraid to use it."
Instead, desiring to keep the element of surprise firmly in my corner, I tiptoed to the edge of the doorway and flung the startled cat into the abyss, the theory being that a yowling, hissing sprawl of fur, claws and teeth would initiate an interesting diversion and provide cover for my next move, which was to jump into the hallway, assume the official police firing position (learned from watching episodes of TJ Hooker) and get the drop on an empty stairwell. Empty, that is, save for a confused cat lying on the bottom riser, shaking her head and glaring up at me with a look that all but screamed, "And just what the hell was THAT all about?"
Despite the continued dearth of burglars, when I started the night shift, my wife insisted on transferring the pistol to her nightstand. Possessing a passing awareness of firearm safety, I was disturbingly conscious of the fact that the most likely person to become an unwilling target was myself, then my wife, children, neighbors, milkman, paper boy, visiting evangelists and way, way down the list, you might find a burglar. So when my wife left for work in the morning, I removed the bullets and loaded the revolver with blanks.
This kept the world a safer place, until she overhead me telling a friend about it at a party. As soon as we arrived home she frog marched me into the bedroom where—arms crossed, foot tapping—she scowled at me until I re-loaded the weapon. Seven hours later I reversed the process, restoring sanity, if not honesty, to a home rapidly filling up with curious toddlers.
To my wife's credit, she eventually relented and, recalling my own childhood pranks—such as removing the hinges from my father's locked gun cabinet to get at the hardware inside—I dismantled the guns and kept several key pieces secured in my desk at work, which was how things remained for many eventful, but thankfully firearm-free, years.
It wasn't until my move to the UK that I discovered pistols are like children; you continue to be responsible for them until you can convince someone else to take them off your hands. I was surprised at the paperwork involved in getting rid of these idle hunks of metal but, after accomplishing this task, I felt strangely unburdened, as if a 20-something son suddenly abandoned his dreams of becoming a mime, got a proper job and moved out of the basement.
Although the UK, like everywhere else, has its bad element, I feel undeniably less likely to be shot here than back in my old hometown where every other citizen is packing heat. Cultural differences continue to surface and I find it amazing to the point of disbelief that my friends here have never handled, and in many cases have never even seen, a gun. Likewise, when they hear tales of how enamored we Americans are of our weapons, they, too, are incredulous, and just a little bit afraid.
They should be.
As for myself, I'm enjoying living in a gun-free (well, gun-reduced, anyway) society. Crimes may happen—that's simply a sad fact of life—but, at least if I do hear something go "bump" in the night, I won't be scrambling around in the dark with a loaded six-shooter.
In the interest of home security, however, I'm thinking about getting a cat.
Push / Pull
I recently read that Britain has the highest failure rate for Americans attempting to relocate anyplace other than America. I'm not surprised. After all, if you decide to settle in Timbuktu, you expect life to be exotic and difficult; but Britain, that's really like the US, right?
Wrong. On the surface, it appears to be a quaint copy of its former colony, but you soon find everything about the place—not most things, everything—is just off-center enough to give you a sense of permanent imbalance, where even the most mundane of tasks becomes an opportunity for bewilderment or embarrassment or both.
Mailing a letter, for instance.
Back in the US, when I mailed letters to the UK, I walked into a Post Office, handed my letters to the clerk and said, "These need postage to the UK." It seemed reasonable, therefore, to assume a similar scenario should play out in Britain. So, with letters in hand, I set out to locate a Post Office.
I was informed there was one in a nearby parade, which, after some confusion, I discovered means a strip mall in Britain. Finding the parade was easy enough, but after wandering past a chippie, an Indian take-away, a DIY Center, a Kebab shop and an Off License, I still found no place to leave my letters.
A more rigorous search turned up the Post Office housed inside another store. In the far corner of the News Agent (a sort of magazine stand cum convenience market) I spotted something that looked like a ticket booth under a sign reading "Royal Mail", so I walked up to the woman inside the booth and slid my letters through the slot.
"These need postage to the US," I said.
She regarded me with a look that fell slightly short of annoyance and slid them back.
"You have to weigh them first," she told me, pointing at a scale sitting on the ledge outside her window. I obliged her.
"One at a time," she sighed.
Again, I obliged her.
"Sixty-eight pence, forty-five pence, sixty-eight pence. And you'll need some air mail stickers."
I slid my money, along with the letters, once again, through the slot.
She slid them back, with the stamps and blue airmail stickers on top.
"Next!" she said to the empty store.
I retreated to the sweets and crisps aisle with my DIY mail where I somewhat awkwardly assembled it, then returned to the street in search of a mailbox. The search went on for some time but became much easier once I was made to understand that mailboxes in Britain aren't big, blue and square but, instead, resemble overgrown fire hydrants.
Another source of confusion springs from the rather reluctant way Brits put numbers on their businesses. Thirty-Two Broadway is a seemingly foolproof address, but upon arrival at Broadway I discovered an alarming lack of numbered buildings and was left with no alternative except to start where One should be and count up to 32. (Thankfully, I have not yet had occasion to apply for a job with a company housed at 2165 Park Lane.)
Counting up to my destination seemed a brilliant solution until it occurred to me having a company receptionist watching a bewildered American counting doorways and then stopping in front of her building doesn't exactly improve that American's employment potential, especially when the American in question can't figure out how to open the door.
You see, doors open differently here. They do not uniformly swing outward, as they do in the States. Mostly they open inward, but not always. As a result, I'm forever trying to pull doors open when I should be pushing, and vice-versa. Signs offering helpful suggestions such as "PUSH" or "PULL" might reduce these incidents, but they are so rare it isn't worth stopping to look for one. Therefore, I repeatedly yanked on the door handle in a fruitless effort to pull it open until it belatedly occurred to me to push. As I entered the lobby I wondered that the receptionist hadn't already called her boss: "Your one o'clock is here, Mr. Jones. This shouldn't take long, he's a bit of a plonker."
The interview went about as well as you might expect, and lasted just long enough for me to forget that the door opened inward, affording me the opportunity of flashing my winning, "I'm not really an idiot, please hire me" smile at the receptionist before slamming face first into the unyielding door. Flustered, I reached for the handle—it was right there next to the big, red sign reading, "PULL"—and opened the door.
As I left, I swear I heard the receptionist mumble into her intercom something about my application form and the document shredder.
Married & Driving
This past week, I got married, which means, among other incidental legalities, that I can now lawfully drive my wife's car.
To me, driving is a deeply ingrained instinct. Owning a car isn't a privilege; it's a birthright, as much a part of what being an American is all about as firearms and fast-food franchises. Finding myself, for the first time in recent memory, without a vehicle or the legal right to drive one left me with a vague yet pervasive sense of incompleteness, like the feeling you get when you arrive at the office and realize you've forgotten to put on underwear. It also forced me to acquire skills unparalleled in most American's experiences, such as learning to read a bus timetable and appreciating the joys of walking.
Surprisingly, I find I enjoy being a pedestrian in England. Europe is infinitely more cordial to non-automobile traffic than America, primarily, because the proximity of everything makes walking a viable option. But just as important, public transportation, beyond the confines of the continental United States, isn't regarded as the sole reserve of recently released felons and people too poor or brain damaged to own a car. The ability to actually get somewhere and not have to worry about where you're going to put your car once you arrive is, I have discovered, an enjoyable and liberating experience.
On the other hand, I am an American, and that means I will—if I possibly can—drive. Which was why, immediately following our wedding, I convinced my wife we were in dire need of a liter of milk and found myself seated in what I consider to be the passenger's side of the car, facing traffic on a busy street traveling on the wrong side of the road.
The theory behind driving on the left isn't hard to grasp, but the actual execution leaves you feeling as if you arrived at the office and remembered your underwear, but it's on backward; the familiar is suddenly foreign and the simplest maneuvers can cause confusion or embarrassment and possess the potential of personal injury. It takes some time to become comfortable with the notion that all those cars coming at you are not, at the last moment, going to swerve into your lane and try to pass you on the left. But that's not nearly as frightening as realizing you are subconsciously planning the exact maneuver and are much more likely to attempt it in a moment of inappropriate patriotism.
The second most obvious difference is the positioning of the car itself, not on the road, but around you. In America, there is much more car on your right, but in the UK, the bulk of the automobile extends to your left, often up onto the pavement or into roadside bushes. This can be distressing to passengers, as I discovered from the occasional yelp emanating from my wife's direction.
Another interesting feature of UK driving is the roundabout. We call them rotaries in the US (or "traffic circles" if you live in Latham, New York) and they are found mostly in the New England states. After building a few there, they realized they didn't work and put traffic lights up in the rest of the country. Europe, slow to catch on, or addicted to the adrenaline rush, continues to use roundabouts.
I'm told that roundabouts aren't inherently dangerous and can genuinely aid traffic flow, if everybody using them understands and follows the rules. Needless to say I am a little light in the understanding department. Acquainted with the four-way stop, I simply assumed the first person at the roundabout had the right of way. I'm happy to report the brakes tested very well on our car, as did the horns on several others.
Then my wife told me to take a right. So I did. How was I to know that meant turning to the left and driving three quarters of the way around the circle to exit on the road to my right? It seemed much quicker and simpler to turn right but my wife insisted so I turned left and exited onto the wrong road.
Fortunately, you never have to drive very far in our town before you come to another roundabout, and one thing they excel at is facilitating U-turns.
Shortly after that, I was introduced to ZEB-ra crossings.
ZEB-ra is British for Zebra, because they pronounce "Z" as "ZED," something that, prior to this, had escaped my notice. (And, once it was brought to my attention, all I could think was, "Then how do they sing the 'Zorro' song?" Somehow, "Zorro, the fox so cunning and freeeee, Zorro, who makes the sign of the ZED" just doesn't pan.)
A Zebra Crossing, therefore, is a series of white stripes painted across the street; you can see the Beatles walking across one on the cover of the Abbey Road album. Apparently, the rule is, if you are a pedestrian and you step onto the street within the confines of these white stripes, automobile drivers are not supposed to run you over. Traffic stopping for pedestrians is an exotic concept to me so, in the absence of a red light or cranky policeman blowing a whistle and holding up his hand, I carried on.
When my wife shouted, "ZEB-ra crossing!" the words meant absolutely nothing to me, but the tone suggested I stop. So I did.
Several pedestrians ambled by, after which my wife—accompanied by the cars behind me who hadn't had the chance to test their horns in the roundabout—encouraged me to move along.
It was then, as I meandered the wrong way up the one-way lanes of the shopping center's car park, that I received my education regarding ZED's and ZEE's and pedestrian right-of-way.
When we eventually made it inside the store, I changed my mind about the milk and bought a half-case of Guinness instead.
And my wife drove home. At my request.
On Becoming Legal
It's dark when we leave the house, but already it promises to be a warm, clear day. On the train ride north, the sky tinges pink and dawn creeps over the horizon as we walk through the sleepy streets of Croydon toward the Home Office. It isn't hard to find, we just look for the queue.
At 6:50 AM, we are the fortieth in line. We weave our way through the cattle barriers under the covered queuing area and wait. By 7:30 the cattle barriers are packed and the queue snakes down the sidewalk. About that time, a beefy security guard appears and, in a broad, south London accent, orders us to tighten up the line. His accent is so thick and unfamiliar that I can't understand a word he says. If not for my wife, I couldn't know what he wants us to do. I can't imagine the others are having much more luck understanding him, but the group, as a whole, manages to grasp his meaning and we all scrunch up together, allowing the maximum number of people into the cattle barriers.
"Pklyd yrthg ejdhmk s jdkhme gfy," he says as he walks away.
I turn to my wife. "What did he say?"
"He said, 'Make friends, it's going to be a long day.'"
At eight o'clock we still have an hour to wait and my wife feels a sudden desire for the loo. We have plenty of time, so she slips out of line and goes in search of some facilities.
Almost immediately we begin to move. The security guards at the front of the barriers count off groups of petitioners and herd them through the massive revolving doors of the Home Office. I shuffle forward. Another group is counted and herded. I shuffle forward. Another group. No sign of my wife. The next group. No wife. Now it's my turn. Do I try to explain to them? They don't look like they are in the mood for a chat, so I allow them to herd me through the rotating door. I'm inside, my wife is outside.
I am processed, x-rayed and searched in much the same manner as I might be at Kennedy Airport if I showed up with a sawed-off twelve gauge in my carry on. After I'm cleared for entry, I find myself in another queue, and then I'm facing a large African man behind a thick panel of glass.
"Kjdufy jkfdu ndhegf," he says.
"Uh, I'm here to get a visa?" I try.
"Kjdufy jkfdu ndhegf!"
"Um, I just got married. I'm here for a marriage visa?"
"Kjdufy jkfdu ndhegf!!"
"The one year visa?"
"KJDUFY JKFDU NDHEGF!!!"
It's no use. He rips off a number, scrawls something on the back and hands it to me. I walk away with the prize. We are number 40 in the queue but, at the moment, we aren't even in the building. I hustle up the stairs to the second floor as instructed and ask the security unit there what I am supposed to do next.
"Go to the second floor," they tell me.
"But, this is the second floor!"
"This is the first floor. Down there is the ground floor. Up those stairs, that's the second floor."
I've been on my own for all of ten minutes and already I'm floundering. I've got to get my wife back.
Up on what is properly the third floor but which the Brits refer to as the second floor, I show my number to the security unit and explain that I have lost my wife.
"Can I go out and look for her?" I ask.
"Yes," they tell me, "but when you come back in you have to get in the back of the queue."
"But I already went through the line. I have my number."
"If you leave the building, you have to go to the back of the queue."
It's no use. I do the only thing I can, which is stand as close as possible to the rotating door while more cattle are herded in. I wait and watch and hope.
Soon I see her, frantically pleading with (thank God) a female security guard. She allows my wife to move up in the queue. She sees me waving. She slips through the revolving door with the rest of the cattle.
After processing, we're back together. Much relieved, we head for the stairs. The ground floor security unit inspects my ticket.
"This is for one person only," they tell us. "Only one of you can go up."
"But we were separated when I got the ticket. We were in line together."
"Only one of you can go up."
We rejoin the indoor queue and find a window without a large, African man sitting behind it. Instead, there is a petit, African woman there, and she cheerfully changes the numeral one on my ticket to a two.
The room on the second floor is massive and resembles the deck of an extremely crowded and low-budget cruise ship. The blue bench seats, in neat, nautical rows, are bolted to the concrete floor; at the far end of the room is an open, empty area where I wouldn't be surprised to find a shuffleboard court. Twenty-five clerk windows, all fitted with riot-proof glass, face the benches. Security guards are everywhere.
It looks like a meeting of the United Nations (or at least a meeting of the maintenance staff of the United Nations) with all manner of nationalities represented. We are ordered to sit. The room, though filling to the brim, is reverently hushed. They begin calling numbers at 8:30.
We don't have long to wait. It's not yet ten o'clock when our number is called. We approach confidently, our paperwork in a neat binder with plenty of supporting documentation.
The woman behind the counter, a large, Afro-Caribbean woman, looks at all our papers. She is particularly interested in my passport with its numerous stamps and markings. She studies our application.
"It says here you decided to get married last October."
"Yes, that's right."
"But you returned to the States after that," she says, eyeing me suspiciously. "Why didn't you get a Fiancée Visa?"
"Um…I…I was advised I didn't need one."
"You're supposed to have a Fiancée Visa."
"I, er, didn't think I needed one."
"You were back in the US; you were supposed to get one before you returned to the UK."
"I just…we didn't…the tourist visa, I came in on a Tourist Visa and we just…got married."
Her eyes accuse me.
"I thought that would be all right," I finish lamely.
She abruptly loses interest.
"Take a seat. I'll call you when I'm ready for you."
Our minds whirl with fantasies of security guards bursting in to the room, brandishing weapons, to handcuff me and ship me back to the States on a container vessel. The woman disappears with our documents into another room. We take our seats and wait, the fantasies growing more vivid and grotesque with each long minute. As my mind begins to involuntarily entertain thoughts of drawing and quartering, she returns. She is cheerful; a good sign, unless she truly enjoys deporting applicants. Perhaps she's a Tory. But she looks at us and, smiling, beckons us forward.
Our documents are returned. My passport has a nice, new stamp on it. She welcomes me to the UK and we are released to make our way across the sea of humanity toward the exits.
The line of applicants outside the building now stretches around the corner, yet people continue to arrive. We wonder how early the first person in line had to get up, and then decide not to think about it.
It is not yet eleven o'clock but already we feel drained and dazed. Ahead we spy a teashop and decide that my first act as a legal resident of the United Kingdom should be to have some tea and scones. It seems like a grand idea.
The Knights Who Say "NI"
I am, they assure me, in need of a National Insurance Number.
This came to light while filling out a job application form that made me long for the simplicity and clarity of 1040 tax booklet. If I'm going to work in the UK, I'm going to need their equivalent of a Social Security Number.
Unfortunately, they don't use NI numbers here quite the same as we use Social Security numbers. My wife could neither tell me what her number was nor figure out where her NI card might be, which left us little to go on. We checked the web without success and then decided to try contacting Inland Revenue on the assumption they might be able to tell us where to go.
I called the local office and, as I had hoped, they told me I was in the wrong place and gave me a number to call. So I called that number.
No one answered.
I tried again, with the same result.
And again.
And again.
So I called the Inland Revenue in a different city, where I was once again told I was connected to the wrong office and given the same phone number I had been fruitlessly calling throughout the bulk of the morning. The lady in this office, however, was kind enough to tell me the name of the office I was trying to contact.
"You need to talk to the 'DSS,'" she said, and hung up.
I looked up DSS in the phone book and found nothing. So I called the number again. Again, no one answered.
At length, I asked my father-in-law if he knew of a 'DSS.'
"Of course," he said. "That's the Department of Social Security. You'd better go down in person, they don't answer their phone."
And so I went into town and located the DSS in an unimaginative civic structure reminiscent of a DMV office complete with benches bolted to the floor. I was told to take a number and wait. And wait. And wait.
When, at last, I was called to a window, I explained my situation. "You can't have an NI number until you get a job," the man told me.
"But the application forms ask for it; I'm going to need one before I start work."
"You can't have an NI number until you get a job."
It was clear I was up against bureaucracy, as stolid and illogical as any the US could produce. I fell back on my usual strategy: begging.
"Please, is there any way I can get a number now?"
He considered my request.
"If you can prove to me that you are currently, actively seeking employment, and have a right to live in the UK, if you have your visa, and documents proving you've signed up with employment agencies and have been on interviews, then I might be able to set you up with an appointment to see if you can get an NI number."
I assured him I had such documents and could return with them. I took the bus back home, spent an hour or so pulling papers from my files and printing e-mails, then raced back to the DSS office and took another number.
And waited.
And waited.
After a while, it was my turn at the window, but my man was busy denying someone else's requests.
"I'm here to get an NI number," I began telling the woman at my window. "I was here earlier this afternoon and-"
"Oh, certainly!" she said. "Here, let me fill out this application form. Is next Wednesday good for you? Fine. Just show this to the woman at the reception desk and she'll make the appointment."
"Don't you want to see my documentation?"
"Oh no, we don't need to see any of that."
Since I couldn't reach through the glass to strangle the officious drone in the next cubicle, I had to settle for a vivid, mini-fantasy involving him, a coil of stout rope, a nest of anthills and a large vat of honey while I smiled and thanked the kind woman at my booth.
Now I understand why all the seats are bolted to the floor.
Transitions
One of the strangest side effects of my continental drifting was the fact that, when I checked out of my apartment in the US and bummed a ride to the airport (ironically, with my ex-wife) I was officially homeless. That's not a feeling I'm accustomed to, but there was no denying it; I had nowhere to live, no job and was heading to a place where neither of those comforts awaited me.
After 25 years of gainful employment and semi-responsible home ownership/apartment dwelling, I was suddenly, and quite jarringly, unfettered. I'm not sure how I was supposed to feel about that—perhaps I expected the siren call of the unencumbered life to lure me away to Aruba where I could live out my days as a beach bum—but what I did feel was scared. For those of you who have not had this experience (and for your sakes, I hope that is all of you) looking down and not seeing a net makes you want to wet your pants.
Thankfully, that feeling lasted only until I boarded the plane and my old friend Stark Terror took over. After that, when it became apparent my new in-laws weren't going to let me starve, I eased into my new role as layabout.
I have since, and in quick succession, become a 'we' and then we acquired an apartment, though my bride insists on calling it a flat. What we have not acquired is furniture.
My wife is the frugal one in this relationship (as well as the only one bringing in the money) but as attractive as the idea of freeloading off my in-laws was, she could foresee a time when having their new son-in-law living in their daughter's bedroom might, one day, wear a little thin and made the decision to move me out while everyone was still on speaking terms. But her splurging on an abode did not include putting anything, aside from us, in it; all we have is an old futon that used to belong to her brother and the 17 crates of household goods I shipped, at great expense, from the US.
The futon worked as a bed for about two nights, after which we decided sleeping on the floor was more comfortable. Now we use the futon as a makeshift settee, having placed it in the middle of the empty living room, facing the picture window, which serves as a sort of large, high-definition, flat-screen television that shows only one program. And since we're on the top floor, that program is mostly blue.
Still, we have a lot to keep us occupied, like sorting through the cartons I mailed over. I'm not sure what happened to them, but somewhere along the way (and Lord knows they had the time), someone took out all of the vitally important, indispensable items I had packed and replaced them with random junk.
Spatulas; did I really believe there was a dearth of flexible, rubber cooking implements in England? And even if there were, would it really have impacted on my lifestyle? And why the six economy-sized bags of Halls Menthol cough drops, the eight cans of shave cream with accompanying packs of Gillette razors (especially when I use an electric shaver), the ash tray or the clothes hangers; what was I thinking? Probably the same thing that prompted me to pack coffee mugs and mixing bowls and measuring cups and potholders and flatware and hand towels and assorted jars of spices. I'm not sure what I thought I was getting into, but it cost more to mail all those items over than it would to buy them at British Home Stores.
But, ill conceived or not, they are all here now, and at least we have a nicely kitted out kitchen. We could also, if we wished, have romantic candlelight dinners with authentic whale-oil candles and brass candlestick holders, even if we don't have a table. And we do get to sleep on Egyptian cotton sheets with matching pillowcases, sans bed.
It's strange, being surrounded by this sporadic opulence while living the life of a refugee; it's like seeing a street person drinking a bottle of Veuve Clicquot wrapped in a brown paper sack.
I'm sure I'll look back on these days with fondness (that's the best way to look at them—in the distant past) for they're about to come to an end. The final foundation stone in my new life has, at last, been fitted into place and we will no longer have to live on love alone. I got a job.
I received the call this morning; a software company in Brighton has decided to pass over a hard-working, native Briton in order to give this immigrant a job. It's half the pay I was making in America, but it's a start. I'm going to celebrate after lunch by walking to Curry's and buying an iron. Then, when my wife gets home, maybe I can convince her to go out shopping for furniture.
The job doesn't start until the end of the month, so we still have a few weeks left of living on love, but perhaps we'll also have a table.
A Typical Day
Mostly, the mornings are gray. Many times, however, the low slate shelf blows over and blue sky, fluffy white clouds and even sunshine are the order of the day. Other times, the drab skies do nothing but hang overhead and brood. Then, of course, it rains.
The next thing you notice is the temperature.
England, when compared to upstate New York, has an agreeable climate. You're unlikely to wake up to find your water pipes frozen or your windows blanketed by snowdrifts, but it does get cool, even in the summers, so a little heat is often appreciated. Unfortunately, the British obsession with conservation and frugality makes this a bit awkward.
Your flat—built sometime during the Eisenhower administration and a stranger to refurbishment—is equipped with storage heaters, which, once turned on, don't give off heat—at least, not immediately. Instead, they wait until electric rates are cheapest, then they begin storing heat. When enough heat has been soaked up, it is slowly released. During the cold season, when the heaters are on continually, this isn't so much of a problem, but if you wake up in the morning to a frigid flat and turn the heater on, you'll have heat the next afternoon, when it's bright and sunny. And you won't be able to stop it. Even if you unplug the heater, it will continue to release the stored heat unit it is empty. This can take several days.
Weather and temperature aside, it's time to start your day.
In the bathroom, if you're paying attention, you will notice there is no toilet. The toilet is in another room, all by itself. This can be jarring at first, but it doesn't take long to discover the advantages of such an arrangement.
You'll also notice that the English haven't yet caught on to the concept that hot and cold water, coming out of the same faucet, produces warm water. In the tub and the sink, there are two taps. One is cold, the other, ostensibly, hot, although this depends on the time of day, since the hot water heater is also programmed to turn itself on only when electric rates are low.
In the morning, you will note, it is hot—scalding even—which necessitates moving your hands rapidly back and forth between the hot and cold taps. You could use the small rubber bung chained to the sink to stop up the drain and fill the sink with warm water, but having been raised on the single-tap method, this doesn't occur to you.
After applying burn ointment to your hands, you search in vain for a place to plug in your electric razor. You needn't bother. First of all, if you have a US razor, you can't plug it in anywhere. The two or three pronged plugs common in the US look positively petit next to the honking big plugs on the British appliances. Their plugs have to be big—they draw 220 volts, not 110. If you did manage to plug a US razor into a UK socket, it would explode. This makes the Brits very cautious around electricity.
But 220 or 110, US or UK, you still can't run your razor in the bathroom. There are no plugs.
This is a safety feature, based on the premise that electricity and water don't mix. The net result is a national paucity of amusing anecdotes involving hair driers and showers, but the Brits seem willing to sacrifice a bit of humor for the sake of aggregate longevity.
With no plug or switches allowed in the bathroom, what you do have are "pullies," or pull strings, which turn on the light, the heater and the shower.
The light—okay, you've probably got that one figured out—but the heater and the shower may require some explanation. High up on the wall (you can locate it by looking at the other end of one of the pullies) is a longish, metal device that looks like a florescent light fixture with a metal rod where the bulb should be. Pull the string and the rod soon starts to glow red, bathing your scalp in harsh heat. This is your bathroom heater. It is the only heating appliance, aside from the stove, which you can turn on and receive instant gratification. Remember this in December.
Unlike the heater, the shower and its pull string are nowhere near each other, and the shower will not work until you turn it on. Look for a seemingly random string hanging from the ceiling. Over there, in the corner, that's the one. Pull it and you'll see a little red light come on. Okay, now the shower is activated.
The shower itself is a cunning device—a box, mounted on the wall above the tub, which takes in cold water and spews tepid water out of a showerhead. It's a grand idea, though it does not produce anything your average American would mistake for actual water pressure.
After your shower, you notice something that looks like a scale, but with strange numbers on it. These are stones and kilograms.
Stones are relatively easy to deal with; you can convert them by multiplying by 14. For example: If the scale reads 10 stone 3, then you weigh 14 times 10 plus 3, or 143 pounds. (Note that the scale does not actually read 10 stone 3, you only wish it did.) That may seem like a lot of mental math to ask of your brain this early in the morning, but it's easier than trying to convert kilograms—for that, I recommend a calculator.
Back in the bedroom, you look for a closet and a suitable outlet for your razor. You find neither. In Britain, there are no closets; clothing is kept in something that looks like an oversized gun cabinet, which they call a wardrobe. And the outlets in the rest of the apartment are for normal, three pronged plugs, while your razor has a two pronged safety plug for the type of outlet you would have found in your bathroom if electrical outlets had been allowed in bathrooms when your flat was built, which they weren't.
If you want to plug your razor in, you'll need an adapter, which you can pick up at any hardware store.
Time for breakfast. The kitchen is smaller than what you are used to, but not small enough to take much notice of. What you do find notable are the diminutive appliances.
Yes, those small, white boxes underneath the kitchen counter are the refrigerator, the freezer and the washing machine. Added to this line-up is a kitchen stove which looks like something a 10-year old might get for Christmas; you are certain, if you look closely, you will find the words "Easy-Bake" embossed on it somewhere.
Let's start with the fridge. Think back—what do you consider the best years of your life? Most people say their college years, when you lived in a dorm room and had a tiny refrigerator in the corner. Welcome back to the best years of your life!
But seriously, isn't your American fridge crammed with a lot of junk you're never going to use; RubberMaid™ containers housing furry or otherwise suspicious looking items that used to be food, a bottle of wine you got for your 32nd birthday even though you don't like wine, the brown, shriveled spheroid in the bottom drawer (next to the wilted broccoli and manky carrots) that used to be a head of lettuce back when you bought it on impulse, thinking it was time you started eating better? If you got rid of all that stuff, you'd find a small fridge like this one has ample room for real food and keeps you from accumulating a lot of junk. And the freezer, which is as big as the fridge, is actually larger than your American freezer, so quit your bitching.
You might wish the washing machine was a little bit bigger, but if you did wash a big American-sized load of laundry, how are you going to dry it all? You can't dry more than six items at a time on the clotheshorse in the hall without the law of diminishing returns kicking in.
Now open the fridge and get out some breakfast. The food is eatable enough but you won't find much you recognize. Even the eggs look a little, shall we say, different (here's a hint—wash them). Don't panic, just pick out some things you think you can deal with (suggestion: cheese, milk and the aforementioned eggs) and get on with it.
Before you start cooking, it's worth mentioning that the US is years ahead of the UK in terms of non-stick technology, so make liberal use of butter or cooking oil.
Breakfast over; it's time to learn about doing the dishes, or washing up, UK style. First, fill the sink with hot water and dish soap, then immerse your dishes and wash them as you normally would. Now take them out of the soapy water and put them in the drying rack. No, no, don't rinse them; just put them in the rack. Yes, like that, with soap bubbles all over them. Apparently, your mother was wrong—you can eat off of dishes that have not been thoroughly rinsed and not get sick. In time you'll get used to the idea. (Or you can sneak back into the kitchen and rinse them off when no one is looking.)
You're well into your day now and should be getting on with your chores. You need to go out to buy that adapter for your razor and you could use more eggs and milk. The sky is blue, the sun is shining and it looks like a grand day for a walk; better take your waterproof jacket.
Walking in England is hard work. In America, folks pass on the right because they drive on the right, so one might expect the Brits to walk the way they drive, even if it is the wrong way around. But instead, they march headlong down narrow sidewalks with no notice of people coming toward them. If you are walking arm-in-arm with someone, it is not unusual for people to walk between you. Every approach is a contest of wills, a guessing game and/or a collision.
Come to think of it, perhaps they do walk the way they drive. As if to prove this, you suddenly find yourself facing an oncoming car. You quickly double-check to assure yourself that you are, indeed, on the sidewalk. This is a tricky business, seeing as how, in Britain, the sidewalk is the pavement, not the street, so when someone shouts, "Walk on the pavement," you're not really certain where to go. But the Brits aren't confused about it, and that is definitely a car and it is definitely on the sidewalk.
No need to panic, just step out of the way and let it go by.
In a country as small and crowded as Britain, traffic, even in a small village, is bound to be an issue. The roads don't help. The one in front of you is about as wide as a narrow, one-way street in the States, but here a commuter bus and a delivery van are inching past each other in opposite directions while an impatient young man on a motorcycle roars between them. This type of traffic is certain to cause tie-ups. Fortunately, the cars are small and fit neatly on the sidewalks.
You wonder if some sort of parking regulation might help the traffic congestion but look in vain for any "No Parking" signs. In fact, there doesn't appear to be many signs at all. The reason is it doesn't snow here, so traffic signs can be painted on the roadway itself to keep the sign-clutter to a minimum. For example: a double yellow line along the side of the road means "No Parking at any Time." You can see it very clearly there, underneath all those parked cars.