It’s like this, except the opposite.
It’s been raining for about three days now. The kind of rain that comes with leaden dark white skies, streams of water everywhere, and cacophony on metal roofs. Yesterday, near hurricane winds led to all ferries to and from the mainland being cancelled. A wheelbarrow in our yard blew over and crashed through a basement window. I stayed in bed all day, groggily nursing the tail end of a cruddy cold, watching water squeeze through a screw hole at the edge of the bedroom window, slowly saturating an old, ripped towel that I had scrunched up on the window sill.
Last night, we emerged from hibernation and watched an Anthony Bourdain episode about Andalucia.
Conversation went something along these lines:
“Screw the UK visa. Let’s move to Granada”
“Okay.”
A few minutes pass.
“We could run a tapas bar there. I’ll cook!”
“Sounds good.”
“We could live in a converted hillside cave and learn to dance flamenco!”
A quick flurry of google action ensues while he looks up flamenco rhythms and measured attempts at various hand claps in Soleá, Alegría, and Bulería timing tentatively flutter forth.
Before Bourdain, there was a program about holiday disasters abroad. A nurse went to Mexico and had her arm and leg eaten by a shark.
‘Oooooh, let’s go to Mexico!”
And another tourist went to Jamaica and was nearly paralyzed after cliff jumping.
“Oooooh, let’s go to Jamaica!”
And so on.
I should note at this point that my passport is somewhere en route to Sheffield, where the UK Home Office will hopefully soon receive it and start the 4-12 week process of determining my worthiness to live there as the spouse of one of its subjects. The lady at the Vancouver biometric scanning office told me that I’d receive an email as soon as my application arrives in the UK, then at some point afterward, unspecified, I’d get another email saying approximately how long it would take, then eventually, an email declaring Yea or Nay.
So, basically, that means I’ll be sans passport until the end of October at the earliest and end of December at the latest.
*Insert sinking feeling/mild panic here*
Now, I know a lot of people live their entire lives without ever even owning a passport. Millions of Americans, for example. Hundreds of millions of Chinese. Many never leave their home towns, much less their native countries. I’ve only been back in Canada for 6 weeks and already I’m going ever so slightly stir crazy.
But then again, maybe I’m not. I’m not really sure any more.
I even miss the fake dyed tiger fur poacher dudes on Fang Bang lu.
You see, I’m really enjoying being home again. I’m delighting in all the cheese. And bread. And hey, look, a full sized oven! Breathable air and lots of trees! The ocean! Family! A vast, uninterrupted, totally excusable chunk of enforced unemployment partially subsidized by being able to live in my parents’ basement or up-island in the house in the forest that I grew up in. Days where I don’t have to get out of bed until lunch if I don’t want to.
Do you know how nice it is to be nearly 5 months pregnant and not have to commute an hour each way through Shanghai traffic to a job where you then have to stand and teach for a half dozen more hours before returning to battle that same grim, grey, sloggy traffic (or impossibly crowded metro during rush hour) home?
But shouldn’t I be, like, away? Somewhere I am barely literate, where my attempts at communication provoke embarrassed titters or blank stares? Somewhere I can easily get lost. Somewhere that scares me ever so slightly, though I’d never admit it. Somewhere that specializes in hallucinogenic spicy soups or which is mind-fuckingly hot and humid with slow turning ceiling fans.
Mmmm, spicy hotel breakfast soup!
I worry, ever so slightly, that I’ve conditioned myself to never be satisfied with my current situation, no matter what it is.
You see, if I’m travelling, I secretly crave stability, a home, a base, an oven, family, blah blah blah. I beg my travelling companions to slow down, to stay extra days wherever we are. I start looking at real estate listings. I get annoyed that I must depend on restaurants, cafes, street stalls for all my meals on the road. I grow tired of living out of my backpack (hello all of my 20s!). I just want to stand still and breathe deeply, finding my centre.
And so now I’m unpacked. Have been for ages. There’s a gorgeous home baked steak and ale pie in the oven, making the kitchen smell fabulous. I have all the time in the world to breathe, to stand still (or rather, to lie still, under the duvet, with tea and cookies), to find my centre. I can’t think of a single thing, objectively, that is wrong about my current situation.
Except for that annoying fact that I don’t have my passport and I don’t know when I will get it back.
Oh, and the fact that the trajectory of my next year or so rests solely in the hands of the UK Home Office and their big old Yea/Nay rubber stamps. I’m not used to having no control over the course of events. I can’t even say fuck it, I’m off to Mexico. No passport and all.
Damnit.
I want to go to Mexico.
Or Spain.
Somewhere.
He is so outta here.
9 Responses
I wouldn’t like being without my passport, either. Even though we are staying in the U.S. for the next 3/4 year, I have comfort in knowing I could board a plane at my earliest convenience. My U.S. driver’s license, on the other hand, was stored in an unused wallet and is now en route to Europe to await our eventual arrival. I won’t be driving a car anytime soon…
Heather recently posted..Snapshot: Pajamas as Shanghai Streetwear
I kept my drivers’ license… but I hate driving! I am, as noted, aching to travel though. Frustrating!
This is one of those posts that makes me say: “Yes, I am SO there too.” Well, without the baby and the BC bit. But everything else, you’ve summed up exactly.
Good to hear a fraction of how you’re doing!
Elizabeth recently posted..Everything’s Bigger in China
It’s been a bit of a struggle to write here because I can’t quite convince myself that anyone would find any of this interesting. Like, we’re hanging out in the forest, no internet, doing a lot of experimental baking and occasionally driving around to look at trees and lakes and whatnot. It’s such a transition phase, neither here nor there, that I’m not sure how to approach it…
Are you guys still sticking around BJ for a while longer?
Here till end of next June (if all goes well w/my work) then, most likely, closer to your eventual destination – after a short detour. Well, that’s the thinking. We’ll see if we make it!
Elizabeth recently posted..Everything’s Bigger in China
MaryAnne! I am finally on Facebook (can get it once a week at a coffee shop near my chiropractor’s office…woohoo – have been too cheap to sign up for a VPN this year) and catching up on all my traveling friends.
Your wedding photos are gorgeous. I love your dress (and your hair color), and I’m so happy for you two.
Congrats on the pregnancy! You are due in Feb as well? I am 22 weeks now. C-section will be around Feb 17th. Doctor and I would like to avoid the whole pelvis separation/not walking for 6 months scenario this time. He’s “99% sure” it’s a girl – have another ultrasound this week.
As for ‘expat withdrawal,’ I looked back at my notes and journals from my first 6 back after being in Pakistan for 3 years. It was pretty bleak. I felt I’d lost my identity at that point, and I would just feel I had to go out and drive and discover something, a country fair, a corn field, anything. I was going crazy.
But I made new goals for myself and after that first year, I really settled into the transition period. Of course, now I’m back abroad again (and feeling much more in my element), but yeah it was difficult to stay 3 years back in the US with limited budget to travel. I read a lot and did lots of travel research. : )
Heather recently posted..Field Trip to Hoi An & Lang Co Beach
Hello! So happy to see you here again! Sorry for the delay in replying to your comment- we were away in Vancouver (mostly internetless) for a week and I’m still playing catch up.
Thank you for the congrats- the same back to you. I’m due around Valentine’s Day, though have no idea when the little fellow (it’s a boy!) will make his formal appearance. Did you have your next ultrasound? Is it a girl? And hey, how is it getting everything done in Viet Nam? I’m still in limbo in Canada, still not a resident yet so can’t access health care here even though I’m Canadian (away too many years, it seems- need at least 3 months to be allowed back into system). Very weird, trying to scrape up odds and ends of required tests and whatnot when there’s no non-public medical option. It’s strangely refreshing to be doing it so minimalist though. So far so good.
Still having expat withdrawal like crazy. Waiting for the UK visa to go through. Our paperwork wasn’t 100% complete due to Chinese banking nonsense (no year’s worth of official bank statements to support his reported income for last year, which the UK seems to think is a universal given) so we are slightly terrified that we will have wasted months of time and $1500 on the application. If it doesn’t work, we will really need to rethink our options as I can’t sponsor him to stay here (because I’ve been away too long). I was really not wanting to give birth in yet another TEFL destination where I didn’t speak the lingo or have a support network (hence trying for the UK). However, at this point, I’ve been having daydreams about just saying screw it, let’s move to Oman… I’m enjoying being home but it’s been a bit underwhelming after years in the middle east and asia. Hard to feel like writing about it. We’re trying to do the excursion thing too but… not the same!
Welcome (back) to Canada, Mary Anne. At least here in Vancouver, we’ve not seen much rain in the month of October, although getting socked in with fog these past few days is a wae cold, damp, and grey. But I’d rather not have the rain, though I suppose we’ll “pay” for the lack of rain soon. It almost always happens that way here! Best wishes with your new baby!
Henry | @fotoeins recently posted..Happy 40 to the Sydney Opera House
We spent all of last week in Vancouver and the weather was surprisingly gorgeous! We did a lot of happy walking everywhere- Stanley Park is lovely when it isn’t grey and rainy. I don’t remember October ever being this nice… Victoria, on the other hand, is grey and heavy.