Well, I’ve finished all my work for this degree, and next month I graduate. It’s amazing to me to think that two years ago at this time, I was still with the Australian boyfriend – was actually here visiting him then – and planning ways to move here. Six months after that, I found myself minus one boyfriend and plus one grad school acceptance, and decided to go to Australia anyway. Now, in a few weeks’ time, I’ll be graduating from my program, which means one thing: The Family Visit.
With all of us spread out over three cities on two continents, we have few occasions to get together, and since almost none of my family has ever been to Australia, they decided to come for my graduation ceremony as well as an extended holiday down under, the first and probably last time I’ll ever have a chance to show everyone Melbourne. My father came for a visit a year ago, but I was still wracked with grief from my sweetheart’s death only three weeks before, so it was a real struggle to try to make his trip enjoyable. My mother and her husband have made plans to visit Australia twice before, and both times had to cancel – the first trip was planned for October 2001, but then 9/11 happened; a couple of years later they tried again, but just before they were to leave my stepfather had a car accident and was in no shape to travel anywhere for several months. And my poor aunt, having to care full-time for my recently-deceased grandmother, hasn’t had a proper vacation in at least five years.
So of course I feel a great responsibility here, showing them around. Will they like Melbourne? There’s so much to do here – seriously, and I’m saying that as a New Yorker – that of course we can’t get to more than a fraction of it in the five days they’ll have free for tourism. I’ve got a minivan reserved for two day trips (the Great Ocean Road and Hanging Rock/Daylesford/Bendigo) and then some basic schedules for the remaining three days in town (St Kilda, the National Gallery, Botanical Gardens, walking tours, shopping, a show at the Arts Centre), etc. Thankfully everyone’s staying in hotels, so I don’t have to host anyone at my house (I wouldn’t have the room, anyway), but I’m still worried about fatigue and stress causing spats, as seems to happen at some point whenever we all get together.
I know I shouldn’t worry about what they think of Melbourne and/or Australia, but in some ways it seems that however they judge the city is also how they’ll judge me. As I’ve said before, in most situations being an expatriate is a choice you make, one that inherently reflects not only upon your home country, but in many ways upon the family and friends you leave behind. Even if you’re going forward towards something else, it’s still a statement that there’s something out there more important than being near them, and it’s often something that on some level – if they never wanted to emigrate themselves – they just don’t really understand.
But at least now they all have an excuse to visit Australia – that fabled land of sunshine and natural beauty and grueling, 24-hour trips to get there. (It’s amazing how I’ve gotten used to them after taking 9 long-haul flights in the past three years.) I’d always wanted to go too, but never thought I’d be able to until I had an Australian boy to visit. And of course, like any family visit, there’s always the upside – between my father and my stepfather, I’ll be getting free dinners out for a whole week.
I had a Romper Room moment while reading Rolf Potts' column on Yahoo the other day. (For non-Romper Room kids, Miss Mary Ann used to hold up the magic mirror and say "I see Jimmy and Kelly and Margaret and and and...I see you!") I saw my expat friends.
See, the column is entitled "Exploring the joys of expatriate life." Quit yer snickering, you know who you are.
I was once a sucker for the fantasy of expat living. It was all those damn movies. An American in Paris. That wacky 60s movie with Shirley MacLaine in it. The Year of Living Dangerously (though Mel is not invited for Passover) and Seven Years in Tibet and A Passage to India and and and. Some displaced Brit or Yank has awesome experiences and evolves, or some crap like that. Are there any movies that show what being an expat is REALLY like?
Lest you think I am totally off on expat living, well, that's not entirely true. It's just that expat living is nothing like I'd expected it would be.
I think the expat fantasy needs a pie chart. One slice for the hot 20 somethings off to teach English and/or study abroad[1]. Maybe one for the kibbutz volunteer[2]. One slice for the trailing spouses[3]. One slice for the financially well off bugging out for a year or two[4]. One slice for oh my god I fell in love with a foreigner and now I live in the stupidest place ever[5]. I think the advice for each sector of my pie chart would vary wildly. Because it's easy to tell the 20 something to chill and enjoy herself, but the trailing spouse?
The confession that I'd always wanted to live abroad as a younger, more ridiculous person met with some confusion at my house. If I'd always wanted to and now I had the chance, why wasn't I living abroad full time? "Not like THIS," I explained.
In my expat fantasy, I always lived in some crappy yet romantic apartment with a view of the city. Also, I could wear heels as though I was born to it, had the perfect part time job, and was on first name basis with the handsome barrista who made my coffee. I think I also had some breathtaking talent and was, of course, drop dead gorgeous. My expat fantasy was not the cow-filled somewhat solitary country existence I ended up with. My expat fantasy was also not the stunning beauty of snowcovered meadows or the spectacular calorie count of Austrian desserts.
I don't exactly feel ripped off, but I don't feel like I got what I ordered, either. I suppose that is an excellent piece of advice for potential intentional expats. No matter how much you prepare, it will be nothing like you imagined it would be.
The Cynic's Advice for Expats by Slice:
1. You are so getting laid. Be safe and carpe diem, baby.
2. See above. Also, all that attention seems flattering at first, but it really gets to be a nuisance.
3. No one will talk to you. I hope you have a hobby.
4. You are the luckiest people alive.
5. Ho ho ho. Boy are you in for it. We should talk.
Australia – land of sunshine, surfboards, kangaroos and … direct marketing. Not a single week goes by without some sort of telemarketing call at home, or, since spring arrived, door-to-door salespeople ringing the bell.
Some weeks I get at least one telemarketing call every day; they're easily identifiable as soon as you pick up the handset by the silent pause followed by a quiet click as the line goes through to the service rep. Half the time they ask for someone I've never heard of ("Yes, I am absolutely sure there's no Karen Harrison who lives here, honestly"), and every time I politely ask them to take my name off their list before saying goodbye and hanging up. Unfortunately, the "Do Not Call " registry they're setting up here won't debut until next year some time.
Maybe it's because I grew up in apartment buildings in Manhattan, where either a doorman or a buzzer stood guard – and this is the point where my housemate says I sound like a provincial New Yorker – but people soliciting or selling door-to-door has always seemed unbelievably quaint to me; I'd imagine an earnest young salesman, hat in hand, asking a suburban housewife, cookie-battered-spatula in hand, for just a minute of her time to show her this really fantastic set of encyclopedias or the world's best vacuum cleaner.
The reality is a lot less charming, I've learned. Just last week I had to answer the door to World Vision on Wednesday, an electric company on Thursday, and a pair of Jehovah's Witnesses on Friday. Feeling like my privacy at home has been violated certainly doesn't put me in the frame of mind to consider a sales pitch, and when they launch breathlessly into their spiel, designed with those faux-Socratic-method questions meant to make you realise that you'd just have to be crazy not to want to save over 15% per month on your gas bill, I feel my "hard-sell" detector needle hitting red. I've learned to politely and firmly cut them off with a "I'm really not interested, but thank you, take care, good bye" before I shut the door.
I should have really invited the Jehovah's Witnesses in for my daily Satanic baby-sacrifice ritual, though. Oh well, next time.
Here in Australia, my housemate and I were following the US elections like a sporting event, checking the websites every hour and texting updates to each other with the newest scores.
The Dems needed only six seats in the Senate. Then three seats. Then down to the last two. Then the projections for Virginia. And if you yell "The Dems win the Senate!" four times, it sounds just like "The Giants win the Pennant!"
It was an odd feeling, following these elections back in a country I don't live in. But it's the only country I can vote in. Naturally, I sent in my absentee ballot, although voting a straight Democratic ticket in New York City is hardly a radical act. And that's assuming it even got counted. My housemate had some irregularities with receiving her ballot, and then heard that in Michigan, there was some funny business going on with the overseas absentee ballots (non-military citizens abroad are perceived as being generally all left-voting, and so would be prime targets for any tricksters of a right-wing bent). She's contacted the local voting board to let them know.
But we both breathed a sigh of relief when we heard the good news. I still think the US is leagues behind most of its other first-world cousins in many ways, but there's no denying its preeminence in global politics. Here's hoping some of the ills of the last six years can finally start to be mitigated.
A week ago in K-Mart – yes, even before the end of October – they had Christmas decorations for sale.
Cue all the standard conversations about how much earlier they're putting them out every year, of course, but the real mind-trip is seeing northern hemispere, wintry white Christmas decorations put out in the middle of summer. I remember last year, shopping for furniture at the Salvation Army for my new house, and a store employee was decorating a big, green, fake pine tree for the front window. He called out to a co-worker: "Hey, where do we keep all the fake snow?" Meanwhile, it was about 27C (80F) degrees outside and I was standing there in shorts, a tank top and sandals.
That's Christmas in Australia for you: Santa Claus hats on men in swimming trunks standing under palm trees on a hot, sunny December day. Post-colonial surrealism, anyone?